We thank Ralf Tate for sending us this article from the Dallas Morning News. This article reflects the position of prior articles published by Reclaim News on Texas, Kentucky, and Michigan Mega-Churches. 

Like shopping centers leap-frogging their way out into the suburbs the mega-churches leave of trail of market challenged real-estate. The mega-church with the better program, facilities, entertainment, and location takes the market share of the less fortunate.

The cost of a South East Christian outside of Louisville, KY is just under $10,000.00 for each of its 9,100 plush bucket seats. The cost of Prestonwood, outside of Arlington, TX is just about $7,500.00 for each of its 7,000 seats. Only the LCMS congregations who get to the LCEF first will be able to compete in this arena.

It appears the larger the mega-church the more it costs per seat and the more it costs to maintain. A small LCMS congregation can build a church with 200 seats for $4,000.00 a seat or less with less maintenance and fewer staff. In other words, small congregations, dollar for dollar, are more efficient, cost effective, and resilient.

The LCMS may be growing weaker as it encourages the growth of larger congregations while the number of clergy decline. In the long run, the pastor to member ratio may be a more accurate assessment of a church bodies ability to indoctrinate its members. In other words, 10 congregations, each with of 400 members, may be a more stable denominational structure than one congregation of 4000.

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Full Pews, Empty Plates
Churches' signs of growth belies a crisis in giving

By Michael E. Young / The Dallas Morning News
October 16, 1999

 

In the mile or so where Plano and Carrollton and Dallas converge, American Christianity's future seems boundless.

Prestonwood Baptist Church is so huge it dwarfs everything around it. Only a new mall going in up the street will approach its scale.

Across the Dallas North Tollway, Parkway Hills Baptist Church just wrapped up a major expansion.

At Bent Tree Bible Fellowship, the elders have decided to increase space by 60 percent to accommodate ever-increasing crowds. And Bent Tree is new enough that the paint is still unmarked, the carpets fresh, the shrubbery only beginning to take shape.

Judging from this corner of North Texas, the state of the church couldn't be much better.

But according to a small but growing chorus of financial experts, things have never been much worse.

Membership in the mainline Protestant churches has been slipping since the mid-'60s and the percentage of regular churchgoers continues to slide, from 45 percent in 1968 to 39 percent in 1996. Per capita giving is up, but so are expenses. And the percentage of household income donated to the church is in steady decline.

Forget tithing. The average church family in the United States gives roughly 2.5 percent of income to the church.

And meanwhile, houses of worship are constructing new buildings and expanding old ones at a nearly unprecedented rate.

"There are places where the church is doing fabulously well, and I suspect that's true in the Dallas area," said the Rev. Loren Mead, an Episcopal priest and founder of the Alban Institute in Bethesda, Md., a leading consultant in the problems facing churches today. "But across the board, more than one half of our congregations are under-funded.

"Right now, we're just breaking even," he told a recent gathering of Lutheran leaders at Prince of Peace church in Carrollton.

That means there might be enough money to run the church, to pay the salaries and utility bills. But it also means there is little for outreach and perhaps nothing at all for the denomination and its worldwide mission work.

How can a cash-strapped congregation change that?

"I don't know," Mr. Mead said. "If I did, I could make a lot of money."

He ticked off a few possibilities. First, cut staff.

"It's painful and it's difficult," he said, "but we have padded organizational structures."

And worry about long-term costs.

"I tell people, 'Don't build something if you don't endow it to pay for the maintenance,'" Mr. Mead said.

That's a start. But churches wish that he - or somebody - had more answers. The church consultant business is booming as leaders struggle to get members to ante up more money. They're suggesting stock contributions and automatic bank withdrawals along with the usual offering envelopes. And they're learning what triggers giving now - concrete needs that inspire compassion more than an endless string of mortgage payments.

But even when churches do raise more money, they're spending it on themselves.

"In 1997, 97 percent of [increased giving] has gone into congregational finances," said Sylvia Ronsvalle, executive vice president of Empty Tomb, a religious research institute in Champaign, Ill. "And that fits with the increasing consumer mentality in the church."

After studying giving patterns over the past 30 years, Empty Tomb came to this conclusion, Mrs. Ronsvalle said:

"By the middle of the next century, local congregations will have become clubs, with all of the income going to support the activities of the members."

Churches usually can raise money for building projects, or new ministries or expanded staff, because congregations see immediate benefits.

But raising money for the missions is a much harder sale, she said.

"Many times churches are busy building new buildings or increasing staff, and as a consequence, they say, 'We have to cut back on what we send in for the missions,' or they start wondering why they even send money in," Mrs. Ronsvalle said.

The irony is that while so-called "benevolence money" is drying up, America's overall affluence has pushed total donations to religious institutions to their highest dollar level ever.

Dean Hoge finds hope in that.

Dr. Hoge, a professor of sociology at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., and co-author of Money Matters: Personal Giving in American Churches, acknowledged that many churches and some denominations face tough financial problems.

"On the other hand, we have a lot of new churches going up. The number of dollars given is up, too, and at about the rate of inflation," he said. "So in the long view of history, I'd say this is a pretty favorable time for churches."

Rather than a decline in religion, Dr. Hoge sees the current problems as a result of shifting demographics.

The people who have been leading America's churches are aging, and the people replacing them, born and raised after World War II, don't bring the same implicit trust of institutions, Dr. Hoge said.

"That makes the younger people much less inclined to write a check," he said.

Dr. Patrick H. McNamara, professor emeritus of sociology at the University of New Mexico, said the World War II generation gave unconditionally to the church, certain their money would be well-used.

Not so their children.

That puts the burden on pastors and other leaders to define their vision for their congregations, to present it and at the same time tell the people in the pews that it's their responsibility to support it.

For the average pastor, nothing could be harder.

"We're scared to talk about money," Mr. Mead said. "You say anything about money from the pulpit and the lay people line up and say, 'It's all he ever talks about.' "

But not in every church, Dr. McNamara said.

In his new book, More Than Money, Dr. McNamara details the stories of 11 "stewardship" churches, Protestant and Catholic, that have managed to counter the trends.

They do it in large part by "articulating a theology of stewardship" that involves giving time and talents as well as money, Dr. McNamara said.

"This helps the parishioners grasp a theology that helps motivate them to give, to return something to God for all of his gifts.

"And it makes it easier for the pastor to talk about money. It gives him a theological handle to talk about a topic most pastors don't want to talk about."

The pastors of these 11 churches, including First Presbyterian Church of Fort Worth, have been able to talk convincingly about current ministries and about others they believe their church should begin.

"The people out there in the fifth pew need to know where the church is going," Dr. McNamara said. "They need to be reminded of their responsibilities."

With fewer institutional ties to particular denominations, Boomer-led families select their churches in much the same way they pick their cars and their clothes: They shop around, Dr. McNamara said.

"The churches that grow are the ones that appeal to young families," he said. "And once a family is ensconced in a church like this, it becomes much easier for them to support it because they see how it supports them."

Some churches, in fact, insist on their members' support, both in ministry and money.

"In evangelical churches, if you belong, they're going to ask you to give generously, tithing or quasi-tithing - 5 percent to the church and 5 percent to charity," Dr. McNamara said.

"The firm expectation is, 'This is a pledging church,' or 'a tithing church.' And the pastors might say, 'If that doesn't work for you, this might not be the church you want to join.'"

These pastors challenge their congregations by leading in giving.

"At one church," Dr. McNamara said, "the priest simply revealed what he made - people were amazed he made so little - and he said, 'I'm starting with 5 percent, and I'm going to work my way up.'"

When Pete Briscoe became pastor of Bent Tree Bible Fellowship seven years ago, the money from the collection basket didn't begin to pay the bills. So after debating what they could do, he and the church's elders decided to pray.

"After a month, we were receiving more money each week, so needless to say, we continue to pray diligently," Mr. Briscoe said.

But he teaches biblical stewardship as well.

"Jesus talked more about money than prayer or any other subject when it came to practical living. But you have to remember that old adage, too, that the last thing to get converted is the pocketbook."

The dollar dilemma is particularly interesting at a time when presidential candidates are asking to increase the social services role of faith-based institutions.

But if current giving patterns continue, there could be little left for a soup kitchen or a homeless shelter, let alone financing missionaries working around the world, Mrs. Ronsvalle said.

Even more worrisome is the attitude that such work isn't as important as meeting the congregation's needs, Mrs. Ronsvalle said.

"Remember that most of the positive human services activities in our culture have religious roots," she said.

"If interest in human services is weakening in the church, then we're going to see real problems in society as a whole."

Reprinted with permission of The Dallas Morning News.

October 16, 1999