Why Young People Are Leaving Church

You can't leave what you never belonged to

Last week I wrote about the surprising and encouraging trend that seems to suggest growing numbers of young people are coming to church. Today I want to write about the opposite: Why do young people seem to leave the church? It’s not hard to find statistics showing that once young people enter adulthood, one of the habits they often shed is church attendance.

I’ve never been particularly alarmed by the fact that people in college and in their 20’s don’t prioritize attending church. First because I’m a bit allergic to other people telling me to panic, and second because it seems to me like the sort of thing that we probably can’t do much about. People get very excited about the idea of impacting an entire generation, or turning the tide when all seems lost. I don’t mean suggest that things can’t or won’t change — they do, and they will. But I think that sort of change happens as part of a cycle rather than because of our valiant efforts or clever strategies. At some point there will be a natural correction, and the pendulum will swing back the other way. My piece last week examined what might be that very thing starting to happen.

While I’m skeptical that we have the ability to affect large cultural movements in any direction, I certainly don’t advocate sitting around doing nothing. Instead of trying to correct an entire generational movement, though, I think it makes much more sense to consider how we can respond, both as individuals and as churches. This does not mean compromising our convictions, nor should we do this just to try and get young people to come back. Indeed, one of the best ways to make sure young people want nothing to do with church is to signal that we are desperate to attract them.

Rather, we should start by trying to understand what is happening. While there are many reasons young people might not return to church (and let's remember that “leaving” and “not returning” are not the same thing) there is one I want to consider in particular: They were never actually a part of the church.

What I mean is they attended church, but without ever belonging to it. Now, I think we can all understand why a student who unenthusiastically attended church because they had to would have no interest in finding a church as a young adult. But why do so many students who spend every week at youth group, attend summer camp, etc. still fall off the edge of the spiritual map once they go out on their own?

Here is what I think often happens: A student grows up in church. They actually like going, they like the music and the services. Once they get to middle and high school, youth group becomes the center of gravity for their spiritual life. It’s where their friends are, it’s where they spend time in worship and listening to teaching. Then, they graduate and aren’t a part of the youth group anymore. What do they do at college, or beyond? They can’t go and just join another youth group. They are expected to join a church — “Big Church” if you will.

But why would they do that? They were never a part of that church. Their church ended at graduation; there isn’t another one they recognize waiting for them. We encourage our children and students to belong to a sort of parallel church for the first twenty years of their life and are confused when they grow up and have no interest in ours. But of course they don’t — why would we expect them to suddenly form an attachment that wasn’t there before?

Photo by Stefan Kunze on Unsplash

When I was in high school I very clearly remember attending church with my friends. There was an entire section of seats that filled up with high schoolers. It was probably not the most enjoyable experience for nearby adults, I admit. But I remember feeling like I belonged in that room. Yes, I had youth group, and I was very much involved in it. But many of us in the youth group itself saw it as part of the larger church, not something alongside it. I stayed in church all through college and beyond because “big church” was something I knew and understood; it was as much a part of my life as the youth group.

I’m not saying that churches should get rid of youth groups, but I am saying that youth group cannot take the place of attending weekend services with the rest of the church. Students should see weekend worship as the central to their spiritual growth and they should be made to feel that they belong in the room. If we want them to worship as grownups they first have to worship with grown ups. Too many churches promote youth group as the better experience for students, which is the same as admitting that grown-up church is boring.

There are many things about entering adulthood that are new, strange, and difficult. Being part of a church does not have to be one of them. If we make students feel that regular weekend worship is as much theirs as it is ours, then they are more likely to feel ownership of it, and to want to keep it a part of their life once they go out on their own. We can’t arrest an entire movement, but we can prepare for those who are ready to come back.