Dear Wary Welcomers:

Because religion is my industry, Christianity is my product and Presbyterianism is my brand, I spend more time than most reading various trade publications written to assist me in marketing our church product. Various research groups, chief among them the Barna Group and the Pew Research Center, conduct regular polls to discern peoples’ preferences in church participation. Most of them conclude that regular church attendance arises out of a need to feel closer to God or to aid in the moral development of children. Explanations for non-attendance, however, are significantly more complicated. (For a deeper dive into the data, see this 2018 survey by Pew; we are still waiting for good post-pandemic research).

The complication in surveying nones, the group that identifies no religious affiliation, lies in how to question non-participation. It’s difficult to discern behavior patterns when the survey raises a topic not previously considered by the subject. If you ask someone, “Why don’t you like beets?” or “Tell me why you’re not a Democrat,” their answer arises out of some experience with the vile root vegetable or the not-Republican brand. But asking about the absence of church attendance invites answers based on no lived experience. It generates un-reflective responses more tailored to the survey’s expectations than the participant’s discrimination.

Market surveys seldom raise questions rooted in one’s lack of experience. “Why don’t you like Funyuns?” or “Why do you distrust Latvians?” would be considered absurd. But “Why don’t you go to church?” regularly appears in surveys of the non-affiliated. When faced with a forced-sort set of answers, “It never occurred to me” is almost never one of choices. As a result, we end up with data that conveys the bias of the study rather than the experience of the surveyed. These studies portray a nation of cynical skeptics and resistant unbelievers rather than a growing pool of the inexperienced.

As a result, inviting someone to church has taken on a significantly onerous reputation. Faced with the reputation of whack-job cults and corrupt televangelists, suggesting the church option to friends or family feels like telling someone to take sour medicine or taste-test beetles. We cautiously inquire, anticipating reasoned objections based in faith-eroding brutal experience. Yet in informal conversation I’ve found non-church attendees far less hostile. Seldom am I told of scandals, hypocrisy, loss of faith or God-hating resistance; usually church has become something folks used to do, like playing on a softball league, or something not even on their radar, like curling.

Which brings me to a week from Sunday, December 18 at 10:00 a.m., our annual Family Christmas Service. Take a deep breath and ask folks if they would like to see a bunch of cute kids and great teens present a program about the meaning of Christmas? Perhaps you’ll need to sweeten the offer with the promise of a ride or post-service brunch. Offer it as a break from holiday bustle or solemn Sunday sermons (yep, no preaching that day!), but ask assuming they’ll like it, because I can assure you, they will. They may even enjoy an old-fashioned, candle-lighting service of Lessons and Carols on Christmas Eve at 8:00 p.m. Who knows? They may even thank you.

Here's my untested suspicion: most people who do not attend church are absent because no one has invited them. Like the shepherds long ago, they’ve no idea what they’re missing. They’re waiting for you to be their angel, singing the praises of what has come to pass.

Planning something invitation-worthy for this week too, I remain,

With Love,
Jonathan Krogh
Your Pastor