Viewpoint: Want millennials back in the pews? Stop trying to make church ‘cool.’

Bass reverberates through the auditorium floor as a heavily bearded worship leader pauses to invite the congregation, bathed in the light of two giant screens, to tweet using #JesusLives. The scent of freshly brewed coffee wafts in from the lobby, where you can order macchiatos and purchase mugs boasting a sleek church logo. The chairs are comfortable, and the music sounds like something from the top of the charts. At the end of the service, someone will win an iPad.

This, in the view of many churches, is what millennials like me want. And no wonder pastors think so. Church attendance has plummeted among young adults. In the United States, 59 percent of people ages 18 to 29 with a Christian background have, at some point, dropped out. According to the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, among those of us who came of age around the year 2000, a solid quarter claim no religious affiliation at all, making my generation significantly more disconnected from faith than members of Generation X were at a comparable point in their lives and twice as detached as baby boomers were as young adults.

In response, many churches have sought to lure millennials back by focusing on style points: cooler bands, hipper worship, edgier programming, impressive technology. Yet while these aren’t inherently bad ideas and might in some cases be effective, they are not the key to drawing millennials back to God in a lasting and meaningful way. Young people don’t simply want a better show. And trying to be cool might be making things worse. Keep reading

I have seen the research findings of the Barna Group and the Cornerstone Knowledge Network and they do not point quite to the conclusions that Rachel Held Evans draws from them.

The church in which I am involved does not fit the description of a "classical church" nor does it worship in a "sanctuary." We are not liturgical or sacramental. On Sundays we have a large number of Millennials in attendance and a substantial number of Millennials active in its various ministry teams.

The church is located in a university town, which is also the county seat. The larger setting is rural. We have a number of liberal, liturgical, sacramental churches in the region. Whatever may happening in the area where Ms Evans is. Millennials are not flocking to these churches in my area.

Ed Stetzer has pointed out in a number of articles that the research does not show that Millennials are flocking to liturgical churches throughout the United States.

Millenials do not appear to be acting on the preferences that were identified in the survey that the Barna Group and the Cornerstone Knowledge Network conducted.

Photo credit: Pixabay, public domain