I was giving a tour of the sanctuary to a lighting consultant, who was asking me about what we wanted for the sanctuary. I told him my concerns were fairly practical: I wanted to have things more adjustable, and brighter up the front and on the sides, new sconces etc. He suggested all sorts of new lighting ideas, that the churches he worked with wanted fancy lights to “bring the young people back.”
That stuck with me, that churches had told him that they thought fancy light production at worship would make young people more interested in church. This shouldn’t surprise me. But it still seems like such 1990’s thinking. Back then, a lot of people (Baby Boomers – largely) grew up in traditional churches, but thought they were boring. So adding bands and light shows and production elements would tilt the scales when picking between churches. If you’re going anyways, why not the one with lasers, fog machines, jumbotron etc.?
But times have changed. I honestly have never met a person under 40 (heck, under 50 now) who says they don’t go to church because it’s too boring or traditional. Their issues are deeper. They don’t believe in God at all. Or they don’t like “organized religion,” and they will give a list of grievances with “church”. And none of them have anything to do with lights. Instead, the view is that Christians are hateful, transphobic, intolerant.
Ouch.
This bites much deeper than production value.
But where do they get these ideas?
The internet, of course.
And the newspaper.
And stories from friends.
And the stories they hear are disturbing.
I’m sure you all heard about the pastor at Faith Christian Church, based out of the University, using church funds to buy mansions on Mount Lemmon without paying taxes. He claims it’s for “spiritual retreats”. But, interestingly, only he and his close friends ever go on them.
So the internet lights up with “tax the churches. They’re all a scam….”
Then there’s the episode at Bookman’s where they had one of those drag queen story hours. A local church sent a crowd of angry people to shout and scream them down, scare them into stopping. They said they were “protecting the children from grooming”. What utter nonsense. There is no data to support drag queens leading to child molestation. Most offenders are straight and married. None of them started with drag queens.
Of course, to the young people watching from the sides, this is glaring hypocrisy, and intolerance. They see priests molesting kids and bishops covering it up, then Christians are worried about drag queens?
Of course, you and I will point out a distinction between some non-denominational personality cult and the Roman Catholic Church. They don’t. It’s all just “Christians are hypocrites”.
You want to know why kids don’t want to come to church? They think we’re hateful, homophobic, reactionary, sexist etc. They can’t figure out why they’d want that guy with his shiny red corvette and frosted tips to tell them every Sunday why LGBTQ people were going to hell. No thanks. I’ll be a good person, live love, and do it without “organized religion”.
I’ve had people ask my kids, when they say I’m a pastor, “so, your dad hates gays?” Gentle ribbing? Or do they really believe it?
The two biggest questions I get asked by confirmation students are “what is hell all about?” and “why do Christians hate gays?”
That’s the world we live in. Like it or not. The kids who go to church have to answer to their friends for the sins of those Christians who are screaming loudly to block what most young people see as self-evident human rights. They don’t see atheists shouting down drag queens and screaming at school board meetings. Ergo: atheists are more tolerant and loving.
I know that we as a church, as the ELCA, have struggled over the years with what course we will plot over LGBTQ issues. We know all too well at Lord of Grace that many of our former members left to go to conservative churches that would affirm their belief that all same-sex activity was sinful and against the Bible. We also know that our social statement on human sexuality both affirms same-sex marriage and ordination, but does not condemn those who choose not to support that. You don’t have to agree with the change, but we do expect you to live in a loving and supportive way in community with those who do.
Which brings me back to thinking about our place as a church, our future, our strategy for proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ in these times. Most of our society seems to be splitting apart along hard, partisan lines. Some churches stake out a traditionalist view, and they keep planting churches that affirm those beliefs, and do so with really good light shows. On the other hand, more and more of the population is just dropping out of church entirely. They don’t see a place for them. They may not deny God’s existence, but don’t want to participate in what they see as hateful politics.
In order to do evangelism these days it’s not enough to talk about Jesus. You have to overcome all these negative views, all these preconceptions first. You have to BE loving and supportive of people ostracized by other churches. And you have to keep clarifying, “but we’re not like that church, we don’t believe that, we don’t practice that……”
It's gets exhausting. I used to be more circumspect about doing the whole “We’re not them” bit. It felt arrogant. But after watching the screaming at Bookman’s and credible threats against the Catalina Foothills school board, I don’t feel we have a choice. Honestly, I would rather go to no church at all than that one.
And I used to be more circumspect about talking about ELCA social statements. I was worried it would offend people and cause controversy, and I didn’t have the energy for a fight. But, the more I see in the news, the more I feel the opposite. We’ve already lost people because of our positions. Maybe it’s time to use them to gain new ones.
It's why I feel we need to be more bold in identifying ourselves as different, and highlighting our social positions, and letting people know we’re an alternative. We also have the burden of living that out in practice, and demonstrating that we can be loving, open-minded, tolerant, inclusive, accepting, non-judgmental, listening to diverse views, and not automatically against all social change. We have a lot of obstacles to overcome to reach new generations for Christ. And none of them have to do with flashy lighting.
That said, we will be upgrading our lighting. We’ll go with the simpler plan: nothing flashy, but more bright and adjustable. We’ll be able to set a mood for a meditative service, and raise it for Sunday morning. And I hope that under those lights, whether dark and contemplative or bright and celebrating, that we act and live love and acceptance of Jesus, so we can melt hardened hearts with deeds and actions that give a different voice to Jesus and the church.
Peace,
Pastor Lars
