Coach's Corner

Is Facebook Killing the Church?

Posted on 24. Mar, 2010 by markdoebler in Culture, Faith

I just read a truly fascinating article about the decline in church attendance.  We all know that fewer and fewer people are heading to church these days.  We have understood the causes to fall into the following categories:

• Church is boring and irrelevant
• Church is full of hypocrites
• Church is too judgmental

There are more, but those have been the main reasons that have been cited and accepted.  The above mentioned article however, makes the case that it is actually more about social media and facebook.  The point he makes is that the church has ALWAYS had these flaws, but previous generations put up with these shortcomings anyway.  And why was that?  Because previous generations lacked the instant connectivity of the internet and cellphones.  So, in spite of its flaws, people went to church for the SOCIAL CONNECTION they felt there.  Now that there are so many different avenues available to younger generartions, the primary reason for people going to church no longer exists.  His statement is that for earlier generations… “the church WAS facebook”.

Check out this graph of declining church attendance and the rise of cellphone use:

There’s no denying a visual correlation.  But is there a REAL correlation?  Is the church really only about social connections?  Is that how the general public views the church?  Is that how most Christians view the church?

If so, what does that say about the condition of the church?  If so, what lessons can we learn from this truth?

If this is not a genuine correlation, then what is the real purpose of the church and how do we change the perception of this writer that it is primarily social?

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Tags: church, facebook, Social media