July 29, 2013
Pastorgraphs: “Why Millenials are Leaving the Church”
In 10 years
of writing these Pastorgraphs, I cannot remember posting a whole article
written by someone else. Today is different, because I believe every Christian
should hear what Rachel Held Evans has to say. You will not like some of what
she says. “ME TOO!” But if you care about the church, and its ability to reach
“the next generation”, at least hear her out. And I mean ALL the way to the end
of her article.
CNN.com
published her thoughts in their Belief Blog section for July 27.
By
Rachel Held Evans,
Special to CNN
(CNN) – At 32, I barely
qualify as a millennial.
I wrote my
first essay with a pen and paper, but by the time I graduated from college, I
owned a cell phone and used Google as a verb.
I still
remember the home phone numbers of my old high school friends, but don’t ask me
to recite my husband’s without checking my contacts first.
I own mix
tapes that include selections from Nirvana and Pearl Jam, but I’ve never planned
a trip without Travelocity.
Despite
having one foot in Generation X, I tend to identify most strongly with the
attitudes and the ethos of the millennial generation, and because of this, I’m
often asked to speak to my fellow evangelical leaders about why millennials are
leaving the church.
Armed with
the latest surveys, along with personal testimonies from friends and
readers, I explain how young adults perceive evangelical Christianity to be too
political, too exclusive, old-fashioned, unconcerned with social justice and
hostile to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
I point to
research that shows young evangelicals often feel they have to choose between
their intellectual integrity and their faith, between science and Christianity,
between compassion and holiness.
I talk
about how the evangelical obsession with sex can make Christian living seem
like little more than sticking to a list of rules, and how millennials long for
faith communities in which they are safe asking tough questions and wrestling
with doubt.
Invariably,
after I’ve finished my presentation and opened the floor to questions, a pastor
raises his hand and says, “So what you’re saying is we need hipper worship
bands. …”
And I
proceed to bang my head against the podium.
Time and
again, the assumption among Christian leaders, and evangelical leaders in
particular, is that the key to drawing twenty-somethings back to church is
simply to make a few style updates – edgier music, more casual
services, a coffee shop in the fellowship hall, a pastor who wears skinny
jeans, an updated Web site that includes online giving.
But here’s the
thing: Having been advertised to our whole lives, we millennials have highly
sensitive BS meters, and we’re not easily impressed with consumerism or
performances.
In fact, I
would argue that church-as-performance is just one more thing driving us
away from the church, and evangelicalism in particular.
Many of us,
myself included, are finding ourselves increasingly drawn to high church traditions – Catholicism,
Eastern Orthodoxy, the Episcopal Church, etc. – precisely because
the ancient forms of liturgy seem so unpretentious, so unconcerned with being
“cool,” and we find that refreshingly authentic.
What
millennials really want from the church is not a change in style but a change
in substance.
We want an
end to the culture wars. We want a truce between science and faith. We want to
be known for what we stand for, not what we are against.
We want to
ask questions that don’t have predetermined answers.
We want
churches that emphasize an allegiance to the kingdom of God over an allegiance
to a single political party or a single nation.
We want our
LGBT friends to feel truly welcome in our faith communities.
We want to
be challenged to live lives of holiness, not only when it comes to sex, but
also when it comes to living simply, caring for the poor and oppressed,
pursuing reconciliation, engaging in creation care and becoming peacemakers.
You can’t
hand us a latte and then go about business as usual and expect us to stick
around. We’re not leaving the church because we don’t find the cool factor
there; we’re leaving the church because we don’t find Jesus there.
Like every
generation before ours and every generation after, deep down, we long for Jesus.
Now these
trends are obviously true not only for millennials but also for many folks from
other generations. Whenever I write about this topic, I hear from
forty-somethings and grandmothers, Generation Xers and retirees, who send me
messages in all caps that read “ME TOO!” So I don’t want to portray the
divide as wider than it is.
But I would
encourage church leaders eager to win millennials back to sit down and really
talk with them about what they’re looking for and what they would like to
contribute to a faith community.
Their
answers might surprise you.
Rachel
Held Evans is the author of "Evolving in Monkey Town" and "A
Year of Biblical Womanhood." She blogs at rachelheldevans.com. The
views expressed in this column belong to Rachel Held Evans.
Thank you
Rachel, for these candid and challenging words. It is good news to know
millennials have a spiritual thirst for the authentic Jesus. Too many of us
have written off the younger generation as just not caring about church and
religion at all. You remind us it is not tweaking the order of worship, or
turning worship into a hoot-nanny, or replacing our old stale demeanor with the
pretense of being hip or cool that you are seeking. Thank you for the thumbs up
that young adults want substance more than style, and that finding the
authentic Jesus in worship is far more important than the battles between
organ/choir vs. guitar/drums or blue jeans vs. robe. Just this weekend, the
Pope (in formal garb and with tons of vestments and traditions) attracted
3,000,000 YOUNG PEOPLE to worship in Brazil! He didn’t come on stage in skinny
blue jeans backed up with a rock band. The teens and young adults came because
they see he genuinely loves the Lord and the people (especially the poor).
Putting the authentic Jesus first and foremost in worship will be the challenge
for attracting the next generation to the REAL church.
Bill
Jenkins
From the
Quote Garden:
“…we’re leaving the
church because we don’t find Jesus there.”
~ Rachel Held Evans ~
Link to Rachel’s CNN blog: http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/07/27/why-millennials-are-leaving-the-church/
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