Mark Tooley writes a clear account of the rapidly declining mainline religions. Made me think about offshoring and subscription software.
The older mainlines followed Rome’s locked-in subscription model. Individual churches sent part of their money to headquarters and in return got stability and assistance. The churches didn’t fully own their property even when they were rich enough to afford it. Headquarters took care of training and assigning pastors, and provided user manuals (bibles, hymnals, monthly prayer guides, etc.)
Around 1960 the HQ switched from stability to frequent Room 101 updates. Climate, LGBTQABCDEF, Firstses Nationses Indigenouses Peopleses, “virus” muzzles, etc, etc. Newly trained pastors enforced the weekly updates against members who just wanted to worship and trust God.
Tooley is writing about Methodists, who peaked in 1965 and now declined to a critical mass. For the last 20 years the plain Christians have been offshoring their faith, adhering to a headquarters in Africa. The US headquarters wouldn’t even allow them to exit with their property until 2019. At that point 8000 churches departed and offshored their supply chain.
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There are 20,000 churches left in USA United Methodism, most of them very small, and thousands of them will close in the coming few years. But stronger and larger congregations will increasingly distance themselves from the denomination, not from hostility but from indifference. Few church members under age 60 in America care any more about denominations. And very few are interested in subsidizing or yielding autonomy to a denomination. Congregations generally want to control the selection of their pastors, own their own property, choose their own resources, and set their own identities.
= = = = = END QUOTE.
Sounds pretty damn healthy to me, and also sounds a lot like Christianity’s original setup.
A similar process happened in software. Around 2010 the headquarters companies switched from selling tools and manuals to enforcing central ownership with frequent forced changes. I reached the schism point when Poser, my chief graphics tool, switched to subscription and enforced an update that made all of my previous work obsolete. I disconnected, demanded a refund, and rolled back to the last version where I could “own my own property, choose my own resources, and set my own identity.”
Big point: Renting isn’t necessarily better or worse than owning. It depends on the needs of the individual and the quality of the landlord.
