Hope in the Wilderness

In Central Maine, churches face a very difficult reality.  A Central Maine mainline church may have great programming, a wonderful minister, meaningful worship, an enthusiastic Christian Education program, a heavenly choir, and a friendly, welcoming and open congregation.  And, yet, a church may still not be able to sustain its membership numbers, let alone grow, and it may not be able to continue its existence into the future—for little, or no, fault of its own.

We can build it, but they still may not come—simply because they don’t live here anymore.

The once mighty industries that fueled the economy of Central Maine and the towns and cities therein—textiles and paper, in particular—are almost non-existent.  And the people that worked in those industries, well, they are mostly gone too.

In Augusta, Maine, for instance, the population shrunk significantly between 1980 and 2000.  In an especially significant category, one that signals the numbers of families with young children, the population of people under the age of 18 shrunk by 25% in that twenty year span.  In nearby Waterville, the population in the same category shrunk by almost as much.  Some of those people, and the families to whom they belonged, moved to some of the smaller communities in the area, but not all of them.  While the population between 2000 and 2010 has stabilized in the region, the decline in the years between 1980 and 2000 was considerable.

We see the toll of the population decline on schools, hospitals, the small, struggling downtowns, and in the real estate market.  Yet, so many churches continue to believe that they are somehow immune to the dynamics of the communities in which they exist.

And, while we fail to engage the numbers, we also don’t really consider the other dynamic altering our communities—they are getting older.  In the small city where my church, Old South Congregational United Church of Christ, exists (just south of Augusta), the median age increased from 32, in 1980, to 42, in 2000.  Overall, Maine is now the oldest state in the country.

In addition to all of this bad news, there is yet one more big piece of unwelcome news:  Maine is the least churched state in the United States.  Although there is some debate about this fact (some Oregonians believe that they are the least churched and some Vermonters believe that they “win” this prize), Maine is clearly among the least churched.  According to one study, only twenty-seven percent of Maine residents self-identify as Christian.

We can build it, but they may not come.  That’s the challenge, and reality, of our churches in Maine.

It’s not that numbers are critically important to who we are, and what our mission is.  After all, Jesus never said anything about the church with the most people being the church that he would love best.  But, numbers are significant to the bottom line.  It is unfortunate that our physical plants don’t magically shrink in tandem with the decline in our attendance numbers.  Our smaller congregations are stuck with buildings that are too large and expensive to maintain.

This is the challenge that churches in Central Maine face:  what if we build it and they don’t come?  And what does that mean for our future?  And perhaps the most important question of all:  Will we face this unwelcome reality openly and faithfully, or will we simply ignore it and pretend that a brighter day will just somehow happen?

My hope is that we can engage this unwelcome reality, in faith and in hope.  It won’t be easy, that’s for sure, but the alternative is to watch churches, one by one, cease to exist.  For me, that’s a possibility that is just too awful to contemplate.

Our future is certainly different than our present, but it’s important to remember that that’s always been true.  So, where is God calling us to go and how is God speaking to us about who we are and who we will be?

It will better for us to think through and discuss this question, prayerfully—together, as a church—and to ponder anew what it means for us to be the church in this place.  May God’s Spirit carry us through and lead us—push us—to new life in the midst of this challenging environment.

Review the placement openings for the United Church of Christ, and one finds many references to the word “grow” or “growth”—like, “Come Grow With Us!”  For many churches, growth is, and has been, a word of profound purpose.  Most churches want to share who they are and what they’ve found, the love of God, with others.  But, churches also recognize that membership growth—or at least membership/attendance maintenance—is important to the future health and well-being of the church.  A church can’t easily take care of its staff and physical plant without people coming to church and making financial contributions.

Churches in Maine, and I suspect in other parts of the country, are beginning to recognize how hard the growth business is.  And for some churches, even membership and attendance maintenance is not only difficult, it is impossible—and, mostly, for no fault of their own.

Yet, at least for my denomination, there is little focused talk on how to handle, explore and engage this unwelcome reality.  We still hear a lot about “growth,” as if all church’s need to do is find the right program or the right minister, and then the church will grow and everything will be fine.  And, even though we are witnessing the closing of churches, and the desperate struggle of others to stay afloat, those communities are simply thanked for the their service and we move on.

I believe that we should take every closed, along with every struggling church, and use them as case studies, object lessons if you will, like in a children’s sermon, and consider what story, and what message, they tell.

This week:  Object Lesson #1:  The small church in western Maine that tried.

I was at a Maine Conference event a few weeks ago and during lunch, I found myself speaking to a woman who attended a small church in a small town in western Maine.  Her church decided, a few years ago, to blanket the town with information about the church in the small center of their small town.  They produced leaflets, and other pieces of information, and then personally delivered the information to every household in the town—every single one.

And guess what happened?  Not one new person came to church.  Not one.

In Maine, I fear that we are at the start of a wave, a strong and determined wave.  The recent Pew Research study that revealed the significant rise of the “nones” in the U.S. (and even more troubling, the finding that most of the “nones” are quite content with being “nones” and are not looking for a religious community at all) is one very troubling, and humbling, piece of news that we have actually been witnessing in all of its painful reality.

And, then along with that, are some other difficult pieces of information.  Maine is the oldest state in the country (in my late forties, I am one of the youngest members of my congregation) and many communities in Maine are shrinking.  The old dominant Maine industries—paper and textiles especially—are a fraction of the size that they once were.  People don’t move to, and people don’t stay, in communities where there are no jobs.

The difficulties for church growth, then, are not just about the right program or the right minister.  Some churches (many churches?) will not only not be able to grow, they will not be (and have not been able) to maintain even current levels of membership and attendance.

Instead of simply thanking closing and struggling churches for their service, we ought to hold each and every one of them up as an object lesson.  What should my church do differently?  Is closure the only inevitable option?

Personally, I think not.  But, we won’t figure out those other options if we ignore the whole problem altogether.  A couple of churches are dealing with this issue—by merging or sharing more of their resources—but, we need to do more, and to do it at a larger level.  I find that I have some among the leadership of Old South who simply cannot engage this issue and part of the reason is that they hear it only from me, and not from the Maine Conference.

My hope in the wilderness this week is that we begin to understand how important this issue is and that we find the courage to engage with it in new and meaningful ways.  Surely, we’ve been led through some very difficult times in the past.  I know that the Spirit is ready and willing to lead us now, as well, if only we ask and follow.

“As Maine goes, so goes the nation” was once a notion that held some weight in presidential election cycles, as Maine found itself to be a bellwether for the general sentiments of the nation as a whole.  While the phrase may no longer be true in presidential elections, the phrase has found a new home in the world of religion.  A recent Pew Research Center study shows the dramatic changing face of religion in America and, especially, the decline of mainline Protestant churches.  The study found that “nones” are on the rise, with one in five American adults having no religious affiliation.

In Maine, we’ve been experiencing this trend for quite some time.

Whether we want to admit or not, many religious communities in Maine know all too well this reality.  Churches wonder about their diminishing numbers and have experienced first-hand that Maine is the least religious state in the country (according to a census conducted by the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies released last spring).  Mainline Protestants have been especially hard hit, as their numbers have steeply declined since their glory days in the 1950s.

For those who find spiritual meaning in organized religious institutions, the latest Pew Research study offers an unsettling picture of what is happening nationally, but is already well in place right here in Maine.  In the last five years alone, the “unaffiliated” have increased from just over 15% to just under 20%.  This group includes non-believers, but also a large number of people who are “nothing in particular.”  And what is even more alarming is that in the “nothing in particular” category, a full 88% are not looking for a religion that would be right for them.

I witness this stark reality in Hallowell, where I serve the Congregational/United Church of Christ church.  For the few visitors that come to worship looking for a spiritual home, almost every single one has a previous church connection.  They have either recently moved here or they are looking for a change from the church they currently attend.  It is extremely rare to have someone visit who is “seeking” for the first time, or for the first time in a long time.

As we face this situation, I find myself often reminding my congregation that we must keep the numbers in perspective.  A full parking lot doesn’t necessarily signify that we are “doing it right.”  What is critical is our faithfulness to the Gospel.  But, numbers are significant to the bottom line, and our ability to do what we do in and through our staff and physical plant.  Many in my congregation are not happy when I begin talking about making changes.  And, to be honest, I don’t like it myself.  I was one of those weird kids growing up in the seventies who liked to go to church.

“As Maine goes, so goes the nation,” is all too true, though, when it comes to the Church.  Mainline churches must change in order to continue to witness to the life, hope and love of Jesus Christ.  If we simply decide to stick to how “we’ve always done things”—which usually means doing things as we’ve done them since the fifties—these churches will not survive.

For good or for bad, we in Maine are either trendsetters, or bellwethers.  Either way, many of us face an uncomfortable truth about our churches and the way of our faith—we either must conscientiously try to turn the tide or prepare for our inevitable demise.

We ought to take heart, though, in the knowledge that the Church, throughout its existence, has faced significant challenges and good people of faith have weathered those challenges.  If our faith truly means something important to us, we should embrace the challenges that we face, and set our churches on a course that truly witnesses to the love of God in these days.

Our call is to bear witness to the transformational love of Christ and the only way to offer that message is to live it, and to allow the Spirit to transform us.  In so doing, perhaps a few “nones” will join us and a whole new trend will find its way to expression.