Baptisms fell to their lowest number in 60 years among Southern Baptists, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination.
The new numbers are a sign that the denomination is in trouble, Baptist leaders say.
“This is not a blip,” said Ed Stetzer, president of LifeWay Research. “This is a trend. And, the trend is one of decline.”
When we see a sprinkling of posts about this or that Episcopal parish’s (or Diocese’s) declining numbers, it takes very little time before the predictable comments come flowing in that the declines are attributable to errancy of the Church hierarchy etc. (we’ve all seen the responses). I am inclined, however, to think that something else is going on that reaches across a wide spectrum of denominations that once were the mainstream non-Roman Catholic foundation of Christianity in America. On a parish level, my guess is that a lot of parishes that made sense in the 18th and 19th and early 20th centuries simply are not sited rationally in the 21st century. Their dwindling to extinction may reflect a demographic sorting out that probably should have been accelerated by flinty bishops some time ago. I’m sure there are even grander forces at work that contribute to the phenomenon described in the post, and many have written knowledgeably about them. I doubt, however, that decline is primarily or even substantially attributable to doctrinal rejection by realigning parishioners.
Call out the emergency forces, Southern Baptists. You’ve had tiny declines for two years running now!!! It’s a trend. You’re in grave grave horrible trouble. You’re [heh] just like TECusa now!!!!!
This will make a *perfect* sample case to observe the differences between the the response of the leadership of TECusa and the leadership of the Southern Baptists in response to decline — for the former, a massive gutting and spiraling into the ground and for the latter, a teensy “decline” over which they are sounding the alarm.
Not that TECusa leadership will learn anything from it — for them, decline isn’t so bad anyway as long as they can push through their agenda.
Thank you, Sarah. I knew that was out there in the ether someplace. I should have held my breath and waited eight minutes for it to come in and reinforce my point.
The problem with you Southern Baptisits is that you have failed to embrace the progressive and inclusive social agenda that society wants and needs from their Churches today. Why, over here in TEC we got that message many years ago, and our numbers are….er…..uh….
um, well you know, numbers aren’t everything…
RE: “and waited eight minutes for it to come in and reinforce my point. . . . ”
Oh you would have had to wait a whole lot longer than 8 minutes, since of course no comment afterwards has “reinforced” anything at all about “your point,” which appears to be the usual forced clueless delusions about how the decline of TEC over the past 8 years is not “even substantially attributable to doctrinal rejection by realigning parishioners.”
Amused utter rejection of one’s “point” does not equal “reinforcement,” although certainly imagining so illustrates nicely the nature of the person indulging in such hopes.