Why are Young Adults Leaving the Church?

Every pastor in the Northern Hemisphere knows that young adults are leaving the church in record numbers.  I’m not saying that to scare you.  I’m just pointing out the fact so that I can point to the reasons why, in my opinion, it’s happening.  I’ll only share two here.  

1.  The church tends to make faith in Jesus a mental exercise rather than a spiritual experience.

Most young adults I know have a deep respect for the scriptures, are orthodox in their beliefs and serious about doing theology.  But they know that faith is trusting in someone, not believing some things.  Most of the young adults I know are drawn to Jesus, sometimes almost irresistibly so.  But they insist that faith in him is about more, much more, than our attempts to explain him.

Intuitively, young adults know that faith in Jesus is deeper than being convinced that what the church teaches about Jesus is empirically true.  In fact, some young Christians I know have huge doubts about some of those teachings.  And yet, they love Jesus and are fully devoted to following him.

If we want to connect with young adults, the church must become a safe place for them to question and doubt and live out a messy faith.  We must give them permission to believe in their hearts that God raised Jesus from the dead (Romans 10:9), even while they struggle to reconcile that belief in their heads.  I think if we’re really honest, we’re all living out a messy faith.  Young adults are just not afraid to admit it.

2.  The church proclaims Jesus as the divine Son of God, yet often neglects his most basic teachings.  

Young adults are drawn to the church’s insistence that Jesus is the way, yet pushed away by what they perceive to be the church’s weak commitment to follow the way of Jesus.

Some of the core teachings of Jesus, such as caring for the poor and oppressed, love for our enemies, refusal to retaliate against those who harm us and extreme generosity seem to be watered down, casually dismissed or actively opposed by the church. 

Many young Christians I know point out that the modern evangelical church seems to chase after riches more than giving them away.  They are bewildered by the church’s endorsement of military campaigns.  And they don’t understand how we can say we love our neighbors but insist that they stay on their side of the border.    

This is not just empty rhetoric.  Many young Christians are embracing a different way, what they would describe as the way of Jesus.  And they wonder why they do it in the face of opposition from the Christian church.  Some choose to leave, not because they are giving up on the church, but to embrace it more fully in a friendlier context.

If the church is going to give these Christians a home, we will need to rethink our understanding of Jesus and repent of the ways we have failed to take his teachings seriously. 

In naming these two reasons I’m not taking pot shots at the church.  I’m a pastor who loves the church deeply.   I’m committed to being part of the church in my community.  I’m quite hopeful that the church is making great progress toward becoming a more beautiful bride of Christ in our world.  I’m convinced that young adults need the church.  That’s why I’m praying that the church becomes the kind of place where they feel safe and free to live out their faith.  I’m praying that prayer not only because they need us, but because we need them.  They have much to teach us. 

Laser Tag and Spirituality

Tomorrow I’ll take my three grandsons to play laser tag…

I’ve been told I enjoy doing things like playing laser tag and Marco polo.  And I’m not saying that I don’t enjoy doing these kinds of activities, it’s just that I know myself well enough to know that I won’t actually realize that I enjoyed doing them until sometime after I’ve done them.

Somehow in the afterglow of a rousing game of “wrestle Pa Pa to the floor and tickle him till he can’t breathe,” it dawns on me; hey, that was a lot of fun!  I feel better now!

It’s a little bit hard to explain (or for that matter understand) but an activity that doesn’t appeal to any of my senses and doesn’t feel like fun somehow becomes fun afterward…typically after I take a nap.

You may be able to relate to the phenomenon I’m trying to describe.  You engage in some activity that possesses virtually no energetic appeal during the course of the event but then, inexplicably, sometime later (depending on how soon you get to take the nap) you say to yourself, that was really fun, and mean it.

And it’s not just physically demanding activities you do with your children or grandchildren.  It works for things like lifting weights or going to a museum.

I’m thinking there might be a lesson about spirituality here…

What if healthy spirituality (specifically, Christian spirituality) works like playing laser tag with my grandsons or spending thirty minutes on an elliptical machine or reading poetry?  What if, sometime after engaging in a spiritual discipline (sometimes quite a while afterwards) you say to yourself, hey that was good for me.  I can feel it!

The ancient tradition of practicing spiritual disciplines is based on this idea.  The church fathers and mothers, including people like Augustine, St. Francis and Teresa of Avila understood and taught that practicing spiritual disciplines has this same kind of after effect.  (For a good list and explanation of spiritual disciplines read Richard Foster’s classic work, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth.)

As we begin a new year you may want to seriously give this some thought.  A tool that I have found helpful is The Daily Office (“office” comes from the Latin “officium,” meaning “duty, service or function.”)  The Daily Office is a prescribed set of scripture readings and written prayers that you simply incorporate into your daily routine, kind of like exercise.

The process of practicing The Daily Office may not be thrilling.  It may even be boring.   But over time you find yourself saying hey, this is good for me.  I can feel it!