From Touchstone Magazine:
Last week, while driving on an Interstate in the Southeast, I spotted a billboard that announced: “A church for people who don’t like church.” This description prompted me to imagine exactly what it was that the target market for this invitation might find objectionable about “church” as conventionally experienced.
It is unlikely that the congregation in question was ditching all references to God or to spiritual renewal (although who God is and what constitutes spiritual renewal might well be reconfigured in this setting). And while there are “churches” that eschew making any significant moral demands on their constituents, I don’t know that this was in the minds of the billboard’s presenters. However, since the leaders of this religious enterprise seem so eager not to offend potential clients, I also doubt that vigorous and sustained exhortation will be on the agenda come Sunday.
Driving further down the road, I wondered whether the NFL could dream up some sort of football for people who don’t like football. Might marketers at NASCAR re-tool stock-car racing for people who don’t like stock-car racing? Could the imagineers at Disney build a theme park for people who don’t like theme parks? In such scenarios (and countless others), what would need to be eliminated in order to attract the disaffected? And would the event still retain its identity when stripped of allegedly accidental characteristics?
History of the “Unchurch”
I’m guessing that what people typically dislike about “church” (not, interestingly, “the Church”) includes ritual, tradition, reverent silence, hierarchy, mystery, and doctrinal orthodoxy rooted in historic and learned debates. These are the things that Americans have typically and dramatically disliked about “church” for a long time.
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