Philosopher Marshall McLuhan famously notes the medium is the message. As a result, many evangelical churchgoers are growing weary. The old church buildings and services of our grandparents’ childhood may have appeared boring and irrelevant—designed as they were for prayer and silent reflection, weddings, baptisms, and funerals—but since our present churches have been optimized for entertainment and advertisement, we’re beginning to feel the loss. The message, indeed, must be heard; but man cannot live on truth alone. Without beauty in particular, the soul starves.
Don’t get me wrong. Our megachurch parking lots are still mostly full on Sunday mornings. But the lots remain full of cars in much the same way that our Instagram feeds remain full of content: The people are still coming, but they aren’t exactly thrilled to be there. Exhaustion has set in.
A certain subtle odor, resembling the beginning of mainline decline, can now be sensed in the nondenominational evangelical corner of the world. The growing cracks in the empire appear to be coinciding with a new and widespread interest in more traditional forms of Christianity. I can’t even count the number of conversations I’ve had recently with young evangelicals pondering conversion to Catholicism or the Eastern Orthodox Church.
In my own community, we are in the early stages of developing a new (old) parish model of church, focusing on three key attributes—local, restful, and holy—that act as an antidote to the disembodied, frenetic, and addicted spirit of our helplessly online age.
To me, at least, this is where we must go.
A vision for the future church as local, restful, and holy—as an antidote to our helplessly online age.https://t.co/PgfBuYSaFf
— Christianity Today (@CTmagazine) July 15, 2026
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