OCTOBER 31, 2008

Besides the friends I’ve met at church, I can only think of a handful of people my age that regularly go to church.  This isn’t surprising: the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life recently found that 44% of Americans have left the religions of their childhoods.   The New York Times also reports that, “Among those born after 1984, about 33 percent attend church on a typical weekend” while 49% of Baby Boomers attend church regularly.  Churches are obviously having a tough time “[e]nticing young people to become regular members of a Christian congregation.”

So what are churches seeking younger members doing about it?  They are plugging into social media and other multi-media outlets to reach their flock.  In addition to having rock music instead of hymns and adding video clips to sermons, churches have begun joining Facebook, MySpace, and MyChurch.org among other sites.  Churches have begun blogging, texting pastors during services, podcasting, and set up message boards.

Most churches I know are all about growing community.  I think it’s interesting that now, community doesn’t have to stay local.  Some churches now show their sermons live online so you can check them out before ever darkening the doorway.  Out-of-towners and troops overseas can feel a part of the community while talking in a forum during service.

I can stay connected to my old church by watching clips posted to YouTube (yes, that’s my pastor and church staff doing the New Kids on the Block… I’d also recommend their Dirty Jobs clip!).  Churches have found a way for prospective members to preview what they can expect, figure out if it’s a community they want to be involved in, and decide if it’s worth their time to even show up.

In what ways has your place of worship updated its methods to keep up with the times and younger members?

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AUGUST 19, 2008

It’s obvious that times are changing– in many ways.  Too many to count, actually.  I know this makes me sound old, but I was born in the 80s, so I’m not that old…yet. 

One thing that I’ve always been fascinated with is people’s strong opinions about cohabitation by couples before marriage (this reminds me a bit of the stay-at-home mom vs. the working mom debate).  Most people I know find themselves leaning strongly towards one end of the spectrum or the other– for varying reasons.  Some think that it’s never appropriate for a couple to live together until marriage; others feel that if it makes sense financially and personally, they should go for it to “test out” the relationship before they leap into something a lot more serious. 

This doesn’t even take into account the barrage of images of celebrity couples (think Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt) who are choosing to live together before marriage and even start families with no feelings of obligation to wed.  The public may start thinking, if they can do it… why can’t I? 

A July USA Today article called “Living Together Isn’t Just ‘Playing House’ ” really delves into the issue and explains why living together no longer has the negative associations and stereotypes attached to it that it did in days of the past.  According to the article, the number of opposite-sex couples who live together has jumped from less than 1 million 30 years ago to 6.4 million in 2007. 

According to Jay Teachman, a sociology professor at Western Washington University in Bellingham, while old data showed an increased risk of divorce among cohabiting couples, that’s not necessarily true today:

Twenty or 25 years ago, if you were cohabiting and then married them, the marriage was more likely to dissolve and end in divorce…today that’s not the case.  You can cohabit with your spouse and not experience increased risk of divorce.  We’re making these finer distinctions that we didn’t make before.

I personally feel that cohabitation before marriage can be a good thing.  For me, it in part came down to a financial decision.  After I got engaged I realized it was pointless to keep my apartment because I was spending all of my free time at my fiance’s house.  Why continue to pay rent when I knew we’d be living together in a matter of months, anyway? 

My mom wasn’t exactly thrilled about this… but she got over it after she did the math and realized it would only be two months of living together before the date of our wedding.  She raised me with the mindset that cohabitation before marriage is a very bad thing.  Now that I am older and have formed opinions of my own, I stand somewhere in the middle of the cohabitation wars: I appreciate the idea in certain circumstances, but I also respect the perspective of my mother.

What do you think?  Is cohabitation less of a big deal today than it was in the past?  Does the new evidence make you think any differently about the concept?

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JULY 28, 2008

With over one million copies sold on a wimpy $300 marketing budget, this 256-page tale of human sorrow and divine redemption is undeniably a literary and religious phenomenon.  But how did this happen?

Just over a year after it was originally published in paperback, William P. Young’s The Shack debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times trade paperback fiction best-seller list, and hasn’t budged since June 8.  Currently it is No. 1 on the Borders Group’s trade paperback fiction list, and, until recently, it was No. 1 on the Barnes & Noble trade paperback list.  Motoko Rich at the The New York Times says it’s “the most compelling recent example of how a word-of-mouth phenomenon can explode into a blockbuster when the momentum hits chain bookstores, and the marketing and distribution power of a major commercial publisher is thrown behind it.”

To summarize (but without revealing too much of the story): Early in the novel the young daughter of the protagonist, Mack, is abducted.  Four years later he visits the shack where evidence of the girl’s murder was discovered.  He spends a weekend there in a kind of spiritual therapy session with God, appearing as an African-American woman who calls herself “Papa;” Jesus, who shows up as a Jewish workman; and Sarayu, an indeterminately Asian woman who incarnates the Holy Spirit.

As intriguing is the storyline sounds, I’m not writing this post to encourage or even discourage you from reading The Shack – that’s entirely up to you.  But I’m curious as to why this book has become so popular so fast.  In other words, I want to know how we - the reading public - and even the author himself have turned this book into a best-seller.  I’ll offer five of my ideas:

1. It’s a quick read.  At 256 pages – a whopping 1055 pages fewer than the King James Bible – it’s no wonder that readers are drawn to a shorter rather than longer route to a cathartic encounter with the Christian God.

2. It’s cheap.  Foregoing the more expensive, hardcover version, Windblown Media originally published the book in paperback, making it approachable and affordable to everyone.

3. It’s bought in bulk.  In an effort to spread the word and share the love, many church leaders are asking bookstores for a dozen copies at a time – sometimes even a whole case – to distribute to colleagues, friends and family.  So, whether the book is digested in full or gathers dust on the bedside table, it counts as a sell.

4. It’s controversial.  Christian “feely-types” say it’s life-changing and will bring you closer to God.  Christian “thinking-types” warn that it’s subversive and will make you question the author’s intentions.  Sounds like it’s worth investigating for yourself, right?

5. It’s ambiguous universalism.  Beaner927 at the Closer to Free blog writes, “There were even parts of the book that almost seemed like they were meant JUST for me. . . . I got goosebumps!”  Inverse personalization?  Enough said.

Finally, I believe DHubka at the Thinking About Today blog has the most insightful rumination of all:

Why are so many people’s lives being changed by the book?  What can I take from the book and apply everyday?  I don’t know that there is anything. . .  I think it’s encouraging that this book isn’t life-changing for me, I think it means I’m already well on that path.

To be sure, with 40% of fickle - err, impressionable - American adults having changed their faith at least once since childhood, it’s no wonder The Shack is “changing lives.”  Today, it really doesn’t take much to become someone totally different than you were yesterday.

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MAY 6, 2008

At TMG, we track the impact that faith and values have on our society.  For example, consider that more than 40% of U.S. adults have changed their faith since childhood.  What does this mean to us as a society?  Or how about gay marriage?  Or the creation versus evolution discussion?  Faith and values play a very important role in shaping our positions on these very controversial issues. 

For a moment, let’s talk about paternity. 

Paternity is an interesting topic in our society.  Normally, it only makes the news when: (1) a male celebrity is involved in a jerky-guy-doesn’t-take-responsibility-for-his-child-way (e.g., actor Eddie Murphy denying paternity  of then-girlfriend (and Spice Girl) Melanie Brown’s claim that she was pregnant with his child) ; (2) a new stat about child support is particularly astonishing (for example, in 2005, $23 billion was collected by agencies working with the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services’ Office of Child Support Enforcement); or (3) or paternity fraud becomes public (New Hampshire reported that as many as 30 percent (!!) of those paying child support were not the biological fathers of the children being supported).  

But think about this: in Kentucky, a man who wants to establish paternity because he has fathered a child with a married woman has no legal rights to go forward with his claim, no matter what DNA evidence he presents, because the biological mother “was, and remains, a married woman.”  Last week, a 4-3 decision by the Kentucky Supreme Court divided the court as justices debated the intersection of law, science, and society.  Even the majority was split, with one side holding that no “stranger to the marriage” can ever attack the legitimacy of a child’s birth and the other side holding the biological dad may have stood a chance if it was proven that the “‘marital relationship had ceased at least 10 months’ prior to the child’s birth.”  Concurring opinions added strong statements like “[a]s long as marriage is on the books, it must mean something” and “bold declaration[s]” were needed to be made about “the marriage circle[.]”

Let’s go over Paternity Law 101: a child born during a marriage is presumed to be the husband’s child, establishing complete duties and obligations to the child.  Moreover, “[a]n unmarried father has the right to request genetic testing to prove that he is the father and he can establish the legal right to a relationship with his child.”  The U.S. government even promotes responsible fatherhood as a “national priority[.]”  So if, as in the Kentucky case, we have a father who wants to be responsible but the law disagrees, what is the national priority?

What do you do when, as Time’sMichael Lindenberger notes, “nature’s law isn’t the law of the land[?]”  Is this legal presumption of paternity still appropriate in today’s day and age?  How can law and science be reconciled in today’s society? 

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NOVEMBER 8, 2007

If communicators want to learn some lessons on reaching new audiences, they could study what modern day missionaries are up to.  Not to say I completely agree with their mission - to me, it seems disrespectful of local religions to come in and say that you’ve got the best one yet.  But I do admire their persistence and their wide use of communication tools, both old and new.

From the Washington Post article:

Using technological devices ranging from simple cassette tapes to solar-powered audio players and an iPod-like gadget called the Bible Stick, Christian groups are spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year to make one of the world’s oldest books accessible in remote corners of the planet…Complete versions of the Bible can now be downloaded onto cellphones in parts of Africa. To reach those who can’t read — nearly one-fifth of the world’s population, according to the United Nations — Christian groups are rapidly increasing production of audio and video versions.

Jill Fallon, over at Business of Life, writes about the movie that’s been seen by 5 billion people.  Star Wars?  E.T.?  Titanic?  Nope.  The Jesus Film - no, it’s not Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ - it’s the 1979 version, filmed on location in the Holy Land, starring a no-name cast.  It’s also, according to The Washington Post, been translated into more than 1,000 languages.  Where did this movie come from?  The BBC says:

"[It’s] the work of an American evangelical organisation, Campus Crusade. Funded by its supporters and well-wishers, it sends teams around the world, even where they are not particularly welcome. There they record new translations of the film, organise screenings to inquisitive crowds in improvised cinemas, and distribute copies to whoever they can."

Because of their zeal, missionaries leave no stone unturned in their effort to bring their message to everyone in the world - communicators should pay attention.

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NOVEMBER 21, 2006

Ilya Vedrashko over at the Marketing and Strategy Innovation Blog writes about product placement in megachurches.  He points to a Knowledge @ Wharton article:

"Advertising has begun to seep into churches, and the phenomenon shows no signs of slowing down, say academic, religious and marketing experts…Now some advertisers are taking the next step: marketing products — like an SUV — with no intrinsic religious value through church networks."

That advertisers and companies want into these communities doesn’t surprise me.  What surprises me is that these religious communities are letting them in.  Then I thought that in a way, megachurches in the U.S. remind me of the mega-social communities online - particularly MySpace.  Here’s what they have in common:

• Both have religions - in the case of megachurches, it’s Christianity, and on MySpace it’s music.
• Member demographics are more similar than you think: 
  • Megachurches -"… tend to attract "relatively modern, high-tech, middle-class, well-educated, upwardly mobile, suburban family types.."
  • MySpace - "Internet users between the ages of 35-54 now account for 40.6 percent of the MySpace visitor base, an 8.2 percentage point increase during the past year." (from Paul B. Walker at The Zone Read).
• Advertisers want access to members - (from Knowledge @ Wharton article):  "They offer a particularly tantalizing opportunity for those intent on network or ‘word-of-mouth’ marketing, a strategy that capitalizes on social relationships to spread product information and influence purchasing, according to Wharton marketing professor Patti Williams. ‘Megachurch members are drawn together by a strong common bond. Networks that exist naturally facilitate word-of-mouth marketing, because people tend to share information with those they are close to,’ she says."
• Members can join smaller communities centered around certain interests -MySpace has band fan clubs, Megachurches have weight loss centers and football games.
• Both have gotten too big for the individual member.  That’s my opinion anyway - MySpace has over 100 million members and Megachurches are defined as having a Sunday seating of over 2,000 members.  That’s just too many for me to be me.

I have no idea what I’m getting at here.  Isn’t this what blogging is for - to put out half-baked ideas?  Maybe it’s that these two social networking communities could learn from each other, but I’m not sure.  It just seems interesting to me.

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