'Lost' Christians Greatest Crisis in American Church, says Author

http://www.christianpost.com/article/20080509/32312_%27Lost%27_Christians_Greatest_Crisis_in_American_Church%2C_says_Author.htm

[The Christian Post] 11 May 2008--The inability of the church to discuss a topic that has become taboo among many Christians is one of the root causes why millions of Americans are leaving the church and never to return, says one author.

There are "Christians who have experientially lost their faith" but have no one to turn to since church culture shuns the topic, Dave Samford said Thursday.

It's not that these Christians lost their salvation, but that they have lost their faith in the Bible, the church and Christian beliefs, said the author, who was addressing attendants at the annual convention of the Evangelical Press Association in Portland, Ore.

Over 31 million Americans are part of this exodus from the church, Samford said, citing a Barna Group study.

Any business that is losing 31 million customers is going out of business," he told a room of Christian journalists and editors. "[It] is the greatest crisis among Christians today in the U.S., Canada and some parts of Europe…We must break the silence in our publications.”

In his upcoming book, If God Disappears: 9 Faith Wreckers and What to Do About Them, Samford details nine reasons he uncovered through listening to stories of those who exited the church on why Christians abandon faith.