Book Review: Quitting Church
I have very mixed emotions after reading Quitting Church by Julia Duin. On one hand, she provides a very damning indictment about the state of most modern-day churches. Most churches are poorly led, overtly self-centered, and spiritually immature.
But on the other hand, she also laments many of the day to day struggles of the average churchgoer…and most of their “problems” are more “symptoms” of our society rather than deep spiritual deficiencies.
One of her arguments about why single mothers are leaving is that, like her, she has trouble balancing her work schedule and her role as a mother and she expects the church to meet her spiritual needs on Sunday morning. But in an earlier chapter decries the short amount of music (15 minutes) and spiritually shallow teachings (45) minutes. Duin longs of the days of her Charismatic communal living, but lacks the ability to inject that into her busy schedule. She wants God to meet her, but on HER terms and schedule.
I was conflicted when I read Quitting Church, I wanted to fully agree with her suppositions that the church held nothing for her and the people she interviewed.
Honestly, she backed up many of her arguments with extensive research and factual data reputable sources from George Barna and Pew Research Center to Christianity Today and Charisma magazines. With such overwhelming statistics, I began to wonder if I was not intellectually savvy enough to grasp the concepts being offered.
But in reality, I believe Duin, and many like her, has a desire for a deep spiritual transformation, custom fit for their exact season of life. The church MUST provide deep theological instruction, as well as provide for all the needs of singles, single-agains, the young, the old, the elderly, the immature, the mature, the learning, the single moms, the college aged, the drug addicted, the disenfranchised, males, females, and children all within the space of a “not too long” or “not too short” service. All this also allowing and encouraging a deep relationship with the entire congregation and a rich fellowship with the pastor.
The author recants many stories of her past, when she lived in a Charismatic community of believers. They shared their lives, their paychecks, their homes…it sounded truly Utopian. It seems that their quest is not for the perfect church experience, but to re-create the experiences of their memories. Times change, situations arise, and I know that this is petty, but I wanted to ask, “If it was so great, why did it change?” I would love to find out why those communities no longer exist.
It all seems very selfish to me.
Do I think that churches have failed in meeting many of the needs of their congregations? Yes. Do I think that they can do better? Of course. Do I think that people are leaving the church is massive numbers because they have just ‘outgrown’ the church? No.
Do I think that people (our society as a whole) are TOO busy? Yes. Do I believe that people need to stop depending on religion and institutions to meet all their needs? Yes. Do I believe that many churches simply fail because of poor leadership? Yes.
But do we need to forsake the church as a whole? No. The church is the Bride of Christ. Instead of leaving or ‘quitting’ church, we need to find ways to make the church better.
I believe that every church leader needs to read this book. It’s a wake up call: what we’re doing isn’t working as well as we had hoped. It’s a rallying cry to focus more on BEING the church, instead of just DOING church. Pastors, we have to wake up and realize that we no longer can phone it in, we have to roll up our sleeves and get busy doing the work of the Lord.
But I also believe that people in our society need to accept some of the responsibility for their life station. You cannot choose a career and work all through your 20′s and wonder why you have no prospects for marriage or children. My experience has revealed that many people, single and married, need to come to grips with some emotional and mental dysfunction instead of blaming the church for all their ills and misfortunes.
But unlike Ms. Duin, I don’t want to paint with a broad brush. I don’t think that she intended to, but it was the result.
Quitting Church will frustrate you and make you angry. It will also convict you and open your eyes to a growing problem in our congregations. We have to grow up and so do our churches.
