Churches of Christ in Decline?

3 Responses to Churches of Christ in Decline?

1. JMF says:

   July 24, 2010 at 8:26 am

   Here is an interesting one, Jay:

   In a bible study last night, I kind of had an "here O.J., try on this black glove" moment. I had been talking about the COC numbers and how our young people are leaving, etc. Someone said, "well, not according to this….". Here is what they went on to read from the recent volume 15, #3 issue of "House to House, Heart to Heart":

   -COC's rank first in the nation in weekly attendance among their memberships

   -COC's rank first in the nation in distribution of membership

   -COC's rank 4th in the nation in number of counties in which there is a congregation

   -COC's are the 6th fastest growing church in America

   -COC's are the 12th largest church

   -COC's are regarded as having "a remarkable degree of unity" by other religious groups because "they have experienced far less fragmentation."

   -Only 4.2% of young people in the COC who graduated HS in the past 10yrs have divorced, which is half the rate of their peers (8.1%)

   (Stats by Yeakley)

   Okay, Jay. Here is the most amazing part: here is what the beginning of the article stated: "We do not relate this information to boast, but simply to invite you to investigate for yourself what others are finding so compelling." It goes on from there.

   This appears to have been an excerpt from Wendell Winkler's "The Church Everybody Is Talking About".

   Okay, I don't mean to be cynical, but that felt like a few months ago whenever all of those Republican governors got elected, and Obama said it was not a referendum on his Presidency! I feel spun!

   It's one thing to spin stats; it's another to imply that they are actually great news that everyone should be excited about. I looked into these numbers:

   *First, having many church buildings is awful. There is nothing positive about having more buildings than other denoms, and that is what many of these stats seem to indicate.

   *As far as being the 6th fastest growing from 1980-2000…yeah, technically that is true. But, we grew by 2.8 PERCENT!!! It's just that everyone is leaving denoms for community non-denoms!

   **Finally, I have no idea what to think about the "remarkable unity, less fragmentation." The only thing I can conclude is that, unlike the Baptists, we don't change names. The Baptists go from Southern Baptist to Calvary Baptist. We all stay COC — we just damn the "wrong" COC. So, to an outsider, I suppose it would look like all COC's are united.

   Anyway, just thought I'd share. You might enjoy looking at this article. Personally, I felt like I was being sold a used Dodge Neon.
2. Jay Guin says:

   July 24, 2010 at 5:23 pm

   JMF,

   I suspect you refer to the article posted at http://www.housetohouse.com/HTHPubPage.aspx?cid=3…

   Amazing that this is "good news" given this included chart —

   1990 13,174 churches 1,284,056 members 248 million US population
   2000 13,032; 1,264,152; 274 million
   2003 13,198; 1,276,533; 291 million

   We are plainly not even keeping up with the growth of the US population. As I've shown, we aren't even keeping up with our own biological growth rate (births – deaths)! That is, we aren't converting enough people to replace those of our own children who leave. That's not good news.

   The truth is that the Churches have been plateaued since about 1980 and in absolute decline for the last 10 years or so. That may be better than most, but it's nothing to celebrate. Rather, we should be fasting, wearing sackcloth, and pleading with God to forgive us for our failures.
3. Jay Guin says:

   July 24, 2010 at 5:26 pm

   JMF,

   Sorry. Here's the correct link: http://www.housetohouse.com/HTHPubPage.aspx?pub=2… (not familiar with their website — learning the ropes). This is more extensive than the one referenced earlier and is in the current issue.

   I don't know how they have the audacity to argue that we are "growing" church when we are in fact losing members. Flavil Yeakley announced this in the Christian Chronicle about a year ago.