“We’re really quite happy that our church doesn’t attract any young people.” It’s a good guess that no one says things like that at your church.

We all want young people because to exclude them represent an ecclesial suicide pact. Without young people congregations literally die out.

Having said that, however, you may have noticed that it is no small task to attract young people, particularly twenty-somethings. That is because, as sociology professor Christian Smith, director of the Center for the Study of Religion and Society at the University of Notre Dame has written,
“Most of the cultural and structural features of emerging adulthood [ages 18-29] tend to undermine or marginalize serious, committed religious faith and practice.”

To put it another way, most young people cannot imagine why they would want to attend at your church or any other. And those who come tend to have ideas about what a Christian life looks like that are out of synch with most PCA congregations.

Christian Smith’s research is vital to understanding this generation and to developing a wise and winsome approach to outreach.

The “Adrift” Generation
Five years ago, Smith published Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers. Now he has published Souls in Transition, a look at the same cohort now that they are between 18 and 24.

Read (Much) More Here: http://byfaithonline.com/page/in-the-church/when-scripture-becomes-an-a-la-carte-menu [Editor’s note: the original URL (link) referenced in this article is no longer valid, so the link has been removed.]
Jim Tonkowich is Minister in the Presbyterian Church in America. He currently serves as Senior Fellow at the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation and a Scholar at the Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD). Before that, Jim pastored Peninsula Hills Presbyterian Church, and served as the managing editor of BreakPoint with Chuck Colson.