Do people who attend church regularly have different perceptions of the church than those who do not attend regularly? We wanted to know how both the churched and the unchurched feel about the church.
The Church Answers Research team conducted a large, national study. After comparing the church with the unchurched, we found new, surprising insights.
The unchurched don’t attend mainly because of indifference and not because of busyness or antagonism.
We asked the unchurched why they do not attend church regularly. As expected, a variety of answers surfaced. However, clear themes emerged. They are not upset with the church or too busy for the church. They are mainly indifferent about the church.
On the survey, the unchurched could select up to three reasons why they do not attend church regularly. Their answers are sorted from most common to least common.
The top two answers point to a level of indifference. Non-attendees do not view church as necessary, or they simply got out of the habit of going. The third reason is expected. A portion of non-attendees have different beliefs than those of the Christian church. However, the fourth reason returns to the theme seen in the first two answers: They are indifferent to issues of faith.
Notice the lower percentages for previous bad church experiences (16%), being too busy (15%), or not feeling welcome (11%). What some may believe are hurdles are not that much of an issue. The unchurched don’t think they are too busy, and they are not antagonistic towards the church. Issues like divorce (5%) and poor health (4%) hardly register on the survey.
The catalyst for the unchurched to start attending church is both a spiritual and personal connection.
What is the prompt? What causes someone to start attending church? The answer to indifference is intentionality. The unchurched start attending to grow spiritually and because someone invited them. It’s the combination of spiritual and personal connections.
The survey asked the unchurched why they would start attending church regularly. They could select up to three answers.
The themes in the data are clear. The unchurched start attending regularly because of spiritual prompts: growing spiritually (32%) and God told me to go (20%). The spiritual prompt is coupled with the personal prompt. The unchurched also start attending regularly because someone invited them (22%) and a spouse wants them to go (17%).
As we have seen throughout several decades of research, it’s not good music or charismatic preaching that draws the unchurched. Those factors tend to enhance transfer growth (as seen in the subsequent finding). What the unchurched need is guidance by the Holy Spirit and a personal invitation. While the former is only a work of God, the latter is easily accomplished by any size church in any location in the United States.
Churched people tend to care more about worship style, programming, and denominational preferences than the unchurched, but the top reason churched people attend a particular church is because someone invited them.
The church and unchurched alike attend a particular congregation primarily because someone invited them.
While worship style, location, programming, denominational preferences, and preaching quality have great impact on a churched person’s decision to select a congregation, the top of the list is a personal invitation.
This new data supports our research findings from the last twenty-five years. A personal invitation is the most impactful way to motivate someone to start attending church.
