Churches awash in a growing tide of people attend, but don’t join

The Fields have attended Pacific Beach ever since, coming to worship, giving money, getting involved in ministry at a homeless shelter. But they are not members, and Gil and Pat have no intention of joining. “I’m not really into labels,” Pat said. “I just kind of already feel like we are a member of the body of Jesus Christ.”

The Fields are not alone in not wanting formally to join a congregation. Lonna Lee, co-pastor of Ocean Avenue church in San Francisco, calls them “friends” of the church — people who come regularly to worship and get involved and even give money, but don’t bother to join. Some will eventually, others never do. And some folks argue that congregations truly concerned about vitality and growth should listen to these friends — that their journeys of faith can teach congregations a lot about how people view the institutional church, and about what they come to church to find.

“We’ve moved out of Christendom and are looking at the world as it truly is,” where lots of people have had no positive experience with any congregation, said Brian Clark, pastor of Riverside church. The church was started six years ago in northern Virginia, just outside of Washington, D.C., and three out of every four people who show up have no consistent track record of church attendance as adults.

“You have a lot of folks who are hungry and who are really looking for meaning in their lives,” said Debbie Rundlett, pastor of Pacific Beach, the church the Fields attend in San Diego. “Sometimes we manage to open the door for them, but not consistently. We’re not really there yet. We don’t really understand how much of a post-modernist culture we live in,” how many people don’t feel compelled to be part of a congregation or how religiously diverse their communities are.

Pastors all across the country are noticing the trend.

In the Pacific Northwest, “there is much less of a commitment to membership and much less of a commitment to being involved in a church, even if you’re a Christian,” said Vic Varkonyi, pastor of First church in Tacoma, Wash. His congregation, for example, ministers to about 1,200 people, but the membership is 540. Of the 60 teen-agers involved in the high school youth program, only about a third are members of the church.

And “it is a huge issue in the city of Pittsburgh, because this is an unusually settled city,” said E. Stanley Ott, pastor of Pleasant Hills Community church. “People are far less transient than many places, so if somebody begins to come to this congregation and falls in love with it, their family have probably been members of XYZ Methodist for 50 years and they’re not about to transfer that membership …. We have lots of people like that. “

And this is not just a Presbyterian thing. Across denominations, church growth consultants are talking more and more about “What does membership mean?” and about the importance of tracking attendance as much or maybe more than membership.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that attendance is a vital figure to measure,” said Chuck Denison, associate for new church development for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). “Everything is driven in new church development by the attendance figure. I don’t even pay attention to membership.”

Ott, who’s written several books about congregational vitality, said that “tracking worship attendance today — just plain worship attendance — is much more significant than membership.” That’s partly because “membership for most mainline congregations really bears little relationship to activity level. Another way to say that is, you can be a member, but not be much of a disciple. You can be a disciple without being much of a member . . . People affiliate with a congregation because it speaks to their heart, not because they want to be a member of the church.”

At this year’s General Assembly in Denver, Lee, the redevelopment pastor from San Francisco, introduced a commissioners’ resolution to add “friends” as an official category in the PC(USA) statistical report. That didn’t fly, but she did persuade the Assembly to report the numbers in the annual congregational reports. And Lee knows from her congregation’s experience that some of these “friends” can be longtime, dedicated, deeply involved Christians.

Lee said since she and her husband, Chuck Goodman, came to Ocean Avenue more than five years ago to be co-pastors, their understanding of church membership has become “much more fluid.” Her congregation, in a working class area near the edge of the city, has 111 members, but 116 “pledging units” — and much of their growth in attendance is coming from those who have not yet joined.

One woman who died last year at 99 had attended worship and been involved in the seniors’ group since the 1960s — showing up faithfully for probably for 30 or 40 years, but never joining the church. Her daughter was coordinator of the seniors’ program for more than 15 years and attended for at least a decade before she joined, and now is a member of the session.

Another woman, in her 70s, told Lee “she had never joined a church and would never join a church,” but if she ever did, it would be Ocean Avenue.

At first Lee thought, “Of course you join. I’m a lifelong Presbyterian, my husband and I both are in that category. When we first came to the church, it was ‘What’s wrong with these people, why don’t you join?’ It’s been an opportunity for the Spirit to say, ‘It doesn’t mean the same thing for them that it does for you.’ You have to think about what it means for the people who are not here yet.”

Now she asks, “Why would somebody want to join? What difference would it make in their life? What do we have to offer that’s unique?” If, for example, people want to volunteer, “there are a billion nonprofit organizations …. You can go serve quietly in soup kitchen.”

But the church is a place of worship, where, in community, people hope to encounter God. So why do people come week after week but never join?

There are lots of reasons, including inertia, but for many it boils down to a different way of thinking about church. Some people need a good reason to join a church — they won’t do it just because it’s expected. And sometimes, they have a reason not to.

Some who don’t join are couples from mixed religious backgrounds — one from one denomination, one from another — and someone may be reluctant to sever old ties. There’s the couple from Varkonyi’s church, for example, where the husband is Roman Catholic and the wife Lutheran. “She’d join here in a skinny minute,” he said. But the husband doesn’t want to, at least not yet.

“A non-denominational, the person who’s never been to church at all, is probably going to go ahead and join,” Denison said. “It’s the person who was raised Catholic or Brethren, a denomination that has a real identity, who is going to be much more reluctant to cash in that whole identity, which is part of their family history.”

There also may be generational factors. “The sort of standard wisdom is that baby boomers are much less inclined to join” any institution than were their parents, and those in their 20s and 30s are “far less likely to join just for the fun of it,” Denison said.

And for some, living out their faith is far more important than being a member of a particular church.

Pat Field said she moved around a lot growing up, attending a lot of different churches. “My commitment to the Lord in my life, Jesus Christ as my Savior, transcends any kind of church walls or geographic location,” she said. Her father, a Congregationalist, taught that “the Apostles Creed, that’s our faith in a nutshell. If you believe in that, that’s all that really matters. By your actions, you are known.”

For people such as these, “their faith is a journey,” Rundlett said. “They’re not looking necessarily for the destination, they’re looking for the opportunity to live the journey. So there are some sorts of shifting values. It isn’t so much about joining, it’s about belonging. They can feel a sense of belonging and connecting without joining…. They see joining coming with a lot of stuff they don’t want, like now you have to serve on session. We need to evaluate what role does session play, how can we set leaders free and not tie them into meetings but into mission and ministry. When we do that effectively, people respond.”

Rundlett works to get folks involved in ministry, and to discern God’s call in the church and the community. “I’m not looking to create leaders of little committees and church programs,” she said, but to get them thinking: “How is God calling them to live out their lives?”

But it’s not enough just to ask what people want from the churches they visit. There’s also the question of discipleship — what it means to grow in faith, what churches should expect from those whose faith is deepening.

Some congregations try hard to be welcoming to new folks, yet also try to communicate that at some point, they do want a commitment to more than just filling a space in a pew. For some pastors, talking to people about membership isn’t so much about rules and regulations, as a chance to talk to them about commitment, discipleship and faith.

To Varkonyi, membership involves mutual accountability. When someone prepares to join, part of that process is offering Christian testimony — “affirming your relationship with Christ and how you want to serve him,” Varkonyi said. Some people don’t want to do that — but still expect the church to be willing to marry them or baptize their children.

And Clark does not want to send the message that one can be a disciple, but not be part of a congregation. “That’s not Reformed theology,” he said. “Your true conversion happens when you are truly ready to commit to God and the community …. It’s bad Presbyterian theology to say it’s OK not to be part of a covenant community. We want you to love the body of Christ and to be committed to this community.”

In some churches, people join because it’s expected. “I really think in a healthy church, it’s join because you believe,” Clark said. “When you join, you are saying that you think Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior, and you will be a faithful member of this church and you intend to be a disciple. You’re ready to do those things.”

But he also uses an analogy that some people are “dating” the church — they’re interested, they’re attracted to the gospel message and are curious, but are not yet ready to make that commitment.

To them, he says: “We are giving you permission not to join if you’re not ready. We love you and we’re glad you’re with us. We understand you’re dating us, and it may be a long-term dating relationship. What you’re really not ready for is to get serious with your relationship with God. You’re not ready to say, ‘I surrender all.'”

And he also adds: “If you’re not ready, we’re not putting you in a leadership position.”

In the walk of faith, “I believe that our biggest struggles are surrender, and that includes us in the ministry,” Clark said. “I can’t control the results. I can’t make you give your life to Jesus Christ and live sacrificially and love others . . I can’t make you be a good member. I can’t make you a disciple. I can’t make you tithe. But I can lift up that this is what God wants from you.”

He adds: “If you are looking for comfortable Christianity, this is not the place for you. ‘Church Lite’ can exist in other places. We’re very up front that if you come Sunday mornings and that’s all you do, you really have never joined this church. We’re not ashamed to say this. You’re welcome. But you’re still dating who we really are. It’s not until you become connected and enter into service that you’re a member — and people respond.”

At Ocean Avenue in San Francisco, elders are given lists of “friends” and asked “to pray them into the church,” Lee said — hoping that, when the time is right, they’ll take the next step. She’s also found that once they do, “they’re at a much higher commitment level . . . they’ve formed real attachments in terms of their relationships and the ministries they’re involved with.”

And deepening involvement, in the end, is the real goal.

Even if they don’t join, “you’re reaching them for the Lord, you hope,” Varkonyi said. “In some cases, there will be people who will not join but will be extremely active and involved.” As he sees it, those who don’t become members but are active do more good than those who sign on the dotted line, and never do anything else.