Quitting Church: Why the Faithful Are Fleeing and What to Do About It

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Book Reviewed
by Glen Norris,North Little Rock, AR

Quitting Church: Why the Faithful are Fleeing and What to Do About It
by Julia Duin
Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2008, $18.

Julia Duin is crying out, “The emperor has no clothes on.” She writes this book from her experience as Religion Editor at The Washington Times. She has interviewed people in the pew and people who have left the pew, backing up her conclusions with up to date surveys from George Barna, Lifeway Christian Resources, and other reputable organizations. We would do well to listen to her.

A woman, one of many, for whom the Church has become irrelevant says, “The churches I’ve been involved with were not very aware of singles and the elderly. They were constantly hitting up the middle-class, the married who were their bread and butter. I never felt connected. I tried hard: helped the food bank, volunteered for the missions committee, went to Sunday school. I didn’t want to go to a church feeling like I had wasted my time. The sermons were the same old, same old” (132).

Druin continues, “One of the top reasons people give for leaving churches is loneliness: the feeling—especially in large congregations—that no one knows or cares whether they are there. Midweek small groups are a help in creating connections, but fewer and fewer people are able to fight their way through traffic, wolf down dinner, then carve out several hours in a given evening to be a part of a small group” (50).

The Roman Catholic Church has ignored the impact of its sexual abuse scandals on the lives of its members. Protestant evangelical churches promote chastity vows when all the surveys say those vows are not working. While most Christian singles want a committed marriage relationship they feel the Church forcing them into a single role. She quotes Brian McLaren, “A lot of churches do not want to deal with the sexual chaos in a lot of singles’ lives. They are not dealing with the messiness of life” (36).

Druin writes of pastors who are burned out. Many things compete for their time alone with God to feed themselves and to prepare to feed their flocks. Many churches have become so seeker-friendly that their members feel spiritually malnourished. Some churches have blended so much with the culture they seem to have lost their identities.

Druin ends the title of her book with the phrase, “and what to do about it.” She doesn’t address it very well. Whether or not it is the answer, fully nine percent of American adults are finding nurture and true worship in house churches (58). She does say this about the local church, “I’ve not seen many churches like this, that concentrate on discipleship and leave the bottle-feeding to the mega churches, but I’m willing to bet such a church would do well in this era of dumb-downed, purpose-driven, seeker- friendly Christianity” (178).

LOST AUTHOR! Will the person who emailed book reviews on books by Daniel Vestal and Preston A. Taylor, please contact the editor.