The Needs of the Unchurched
New England has passed the Pacific Northwest as the least religious area of the country. The ten least religious states in the US include all six in New England, the land of the early Puritans.
This has drawn conservative Baptist missionaries to the region, but they’ve found the fields hard to plough:
“About once every hour, I give up. It’s tough, man,” said a half-joking Joe Souza, a Southern Baptist missionary working north of Boston. “It’s like, you found a cure for cancer and you want to give it away and nobody wants it.”
Mainline churches attribute their decline in New England to the ‘insularity’ of their congregations, which have lost touch with needs in the wider society.
The Rev. Paul Nickerson, a church planting specialist at the UCC’s Massachusetts Conference, said local churches declined because of a creeping insularity, not because “we’re theologically inept.” Progressive churches that refocus on the needs of the unchurched are growing, he said.
What are the needs of the unchurched? I’m guessing Joe Souza would say they need Jesus, and Paul Nickerson would say they need universal health care. Maybe they need both.
