While many so-called mainline churches remain healthy and engaged in vital ministries, the center of Christian gravity in the U.S. has definitely shifted toward the evangelical churches. They are where the growth and the enthusiasm have been for several decades. But, as we've noted before, there seems to be a fundamental shift taking place among American evangelicals. The optimism and enthusiasm appears to be dwindling. Early in July, we noted that a recent survey of international evangelical leaders showed a serious contrast between the almost heady optimism of third-world evangelicals and the much less rosy hope of those from the U.S. (here) We've also seen that the Southern Baptists are beginning to show the statistics of decline that have plagued ecumenical denominations for many decades now (here).Still further evidence of this shift among American evangelicals comes from research done by the Barna Research Group as reported in a posting on the Christian Post website entitled, "Study: Born-Again Christians Have Become Complacent." According to Barna, self-identified evangelicals are attending worship less often, and more of them have stopped attending worship entirely. They spend less time reading the Bible. They take less part in church activities. The article quotes George Barna as saying, "In the past decade, even the proportion of born-again adults who say their faith is vitally important to them has dipped substantially." Although the article suggests some causes, the reasons for this decline are not immediately clear.
Organized religion seems to be in general decline throughout the Western world including here in the U.S. The growing signs of evangelical decline only signals how difficult the current cultural climate is for all of us. At the same time, we should not overstate the decline. There is still an immense amount of life in American churches and denominations, which are not going away any time soon. It's just that the indicators are trending downward and the downhill slope seems to be getting steeper. It seems unlikely that America's churches will decline as severely as those in some parts of Europe. It may even be that eventually we will go through another round of American revivalism, one of the hallmarks of Christianity in our nation. Still, for the time being the downhill slope is getting steeper.
