Too Many Churches - Part Deux

I posted this item yesterday regarding a town in Texas which is having budget problems, partly due to the large number of churches in a relatively small town - 51 churches in a town of less than 20,000. My buddy John seems to think I've gone soft on Kelo (the imminent domain case from last year) because I was suggesting that the town may have to take some action to restore their tax base.

John does make a good point about the fact that the Kelo decision was borne out of a similar budget hardship in a town back east, and in fact at one time I opined on the very subject of the dangers posed by Kelo to churches. However, the purpose of the post yesterday was more about the fact it took 51 churches to meet the worship needs of that town rather than what the city might have to do to save their budget. Budgets will work themselves out, but how many divisions must they have in Stafford that they can't consolidate some of those houses of worship into bigger, stronger churches? Granted, there are lots of denominations, independents and various subgroups, but you just have to know that a bunch of those churches are just hanging on until the last saint dies.

I see this in my business all the time, and I'll give you a couple of examples. I visited one church several years ago that is part of a major mainstream denomination. The church has a large, beautiful sanctuary that seats about 850 and a big two-story education wing. The guy I met with was not the pastor, and I found out that the church had not had a pastor for some time. I asked him how many people attended their weekly services and said 30. A asked him, "did you say 30 or 300?" Thirty, and the average age is well over 70. This guy was in his late 60's and he was the youth group.

At one time the church had been large and very active but over years people were transferred out (lots of military families) and others just drifted away as worship styles in other churches changed and their church didn't. Thanks to some rental income the church was able to continue functioning, but their usefullness to the community ended some time ago. It now survived only to meet the needs of the "saints". What a waste of a wonderful church property.

Another example that comes to mind involves a church I sang in back in 1997 or so. At that time the church nearly filled their 500+ seat auditorium on Sunday morning with a good mix of ages. Just a year or so ago I visited that church again and their Sunday morning crowd had shrunk to about 80, with most of them eligible for a senior discount. A board member told me that the church was beginning to have to use their savings to stay afloat, and he was very worried about the long term survivability of the church. As far as I can tell, "long term" is not a phrase they need to worry about.

As I read the story about Stafford, I couldn't help but wonder how many of those 51 churches are like the two above. And chances are, some of the new churches starting up in the past few years came into being specifically because the existing churches were no long relevant to the younger folks looking for a church home.

It's an all too common problem, and one that is shared in just about every community in the U.S.

Oh, and I'm still very much opposed to the kinds of takings authorized by Kelo (though I wouldn't feel too bad if they put some of these old dead churches out of their misery).