Least Christian church on the planet? Mine.

Gaaah, I am beyond frustrated right now. I have been working my proverbial ASS off at church all summer and have not stopped since the school year began. In fact, knowing that our staff is over-worked right now and that we've been petitioning the congregation for PT volunteer receptionists, I decided that I could offer some time in this manner. You know, some of that free time that I PAY MONEY FOR by sending Busy to MDO two days a week; I volunteered to give 1 morning/week to answer phones. But it seemed like the right thing to do, to send the signal that I support all the ways in which our church is trying to grow. And today I put in an extra couple of hours with Busy in tow, just because I found out there was a need. I could do something about it, so I did.

Under the leadership of our new senior pastor (NSP who's amazing, really!) we started up the Wednesday night dinners early ... usually we take a break through the whole summer. But we kicked them off with 4 weeks of dinners each followed by an open forum/discussion about our church's future. A lot of this was to help NSP learn more about us -- he's not from around here, and he's got a job to do quickly, since he's only here on interim basis. He was stunned last night to learn some statistics about our membership: over 60% is over age 60 (or something like that).

Week 1: Talk about our church's greatest strengths, what could we improve, what things will help us in evangelism.
Week 2: Talk about our community, how it's changing, what are the unspoken truths, what needs aren't being met that our church could address
Week 3: Focus on children and youth -- what are we doing for the young families that we have and how to attract new ones.
Week 4: Focus on adults -- how do we reach the unchurched in our town and bring them into our doors.

Weeks 1-2 went pretty well, Week 3 started to go south (big disconnect between what we say and what we do), but today was Week 4, and the taste in my mouth is so bitter. NSP means well, and he's got so much energy and drive that he puts most of us to shame, especially given that he's twice my age. But NSP started the discussion today by leading the group to give general characteristics of the different generations represented in our adult population. You know, the GI generation (Tom Brokaw called these the "greatest generation"), the Boomers, and Generation X (and Y, I think).

Of course we start at the top. Glowing reports of the 70+ crowd, from themselves and from much of the younger set. GI Generation are frugal, loyal, patriotic, independent, hard-working, etc. Got a little more critical of the Baby Boomers. Boomers are self-centered, time-stressed, over-worked, highly educated, started the dual-career family drive, and they want things NOW. And then, while we are still in the room, the group goes to town on Gen X. Gen X-ers are lazy, selfish, technologically dependent, entitled, open-minded (that one was mine), ready to question the status quo. And then NSP asked us to think about how are we going to talk about things together, given these different characteristics. Answer = focus on what we have in common, and be tolerant and accepting of other adults as they are.

Maybe I missed something later, because at that point I got up and quietly left the room. Seriously, I was actually hurt by what they said about Gen X and was about to cry. There were maybe 80 people in the room at this point, and maybe just 5 of us under 40. Our youth department is big for now, but the elementary age kids (and their parents) just aren't here. Our church recently lost (by transfer) a devoted family w/ 4 kids and another on the way. So many people in this town choose the other big church of the same denomination across town, which has a fabulous children's program. It is so hard to draw new families to our place. Everybody keeps joking with us that we need to have more kids, as if that will solve the problem.

I did come back to the discussion near the end, and then NSP asked a few of us to say a few words to wrap up the 4 weeks of discussion. I know he takes to heart our church's NEED to put our children (and youth) first so that we have a future. And he really is doing what he can to make this happen, not just talk about it. But when brought the mike to me, I took the opportunity to plead to everybody that these aren't just my kids, they are all of our kids, and we need everybody's support and participation. I quoted another pastor I used to know, who told us almost weekly: "The church is never more than one generation away from extinction." And then I took a little bit of satisfaction at hearing them all gasp at my saying it. Maybe I wasn't feeling very Christian then, either.