Mainline Churches

Having worked most of my life in mainline churches, I may have a natural bias towards them. In a recent issue of Christian Century (a magazine that caters to mainline progressive thought) there was a great article based upon Elesha J Coffman’s book Christian Century and the Rise of the Protestant Mainline, in a review by David a. Holinger.

Mainline churches (Congregationalists, Northern Baptists, Disciples of Christ, Episcopalians, Methodists, Presbyterians and some Lutherans (I’m not sure why the Roman Catholic church was not included by the author) dominated the religious scene in the 40’s, 50’s, and 60’s. Solid established institutions that all worshipped at 11 a.m. on Sunday led by well-educated clergy and were the centers of their communities. Christian Century magazine spoke well for and to these institutions and still does.

Then there was Billy Graham, a fundamentalist, who drew thousands to his modern tent meetings and converted thousands to Christianity (often the same ones being converted on a regular basis). His appeal was more emotional than intellectual but in 1957 his television audience was over 10 million per week. That magazine that reflected this portion of Christendom was Christianity Today. I always thought Billy Graham was much smarter than he portrayed himself and in his message and he occasionally admitted that. But he was a pragmatic evangelical doing what worked to save souls. (I have a theological problem with that as Billy Graham nor any other individual ever saved a soul, which is solely the work of Jesus the Christ from a Christian perspective.)

If you look around today the dominant church seems to be the evangelical churches popularized by Graham’s message and the mainline churches have been shrinking in numbers for years and continue to do so. Modern observers noted that the evangelical churches will also experience membership loss as mainline churches have, which is already beginning.

For a time observers thought the mainline churches were losing members to the more enthusiastic and emotionally based evangelical churches. That was really not the case. Those who were leaving the mainline churches didn’t go anywhere, they just became secularists, often expressing the same humanistic and social values of mainline churches, but were not foud of institutional and politicized religion. These secularists were just as educated and thoughtful as the mainline leaders. Many of them were enthusiastic about existential writers such as Jean Paul Sartre and Albert Camus who were atheists. On the other hand they were mainline existentialists such as Soren Kierkegaard and Karl Jaspers but they seemed less popular. I’ve often thought that existentialism is wonderfully described in Matthew 6. Verse 24 onward; my favorite biblical passage.

There is also a word problem; the writers say that you could switch the word mainline for ecumenical and have a more accurate portrayal of that segment of Christendom and I agree. I am proud that Eugene Carson Blake of my Presbyterian tradition was the major mover and shaker of the modern ecumenical movement. We mainline/ecumenical churches have created the World Council of Churches and the National Council of Churches, organizations where we cooperate together and learn to work for common causes emphasizing our commonality versus our differences.

There are also evangelical organizations such as the National Organization of Evangelicals but they are not very ecumenically minded.

The question left in my mind is the existence and role of mainline churches today. We are a well-kept secret that has much to offer, but the headlines are often given to the more radical evangelical movements and religious reporting in the media is a bit of a lost art.

Both groups I think have lost effectiveness when they cater to the general thought of society where religion mixes inappropriately with politics and certain single issues groups. But I am a believer in faithful remnants that God maintains throughout history despite our desires to shoot ourselves in our collective feet.

Religious institutions are institutions, which are run by short sighted and vested human beings who are as exclusive as they are inclusive, or, they are just like all other human institutions. But they also are the visible representation of the invisible body of Christ and God’s spirit moves among them and good results.

Now we just have to guess well where God wishes to lead the church in the future and to following that divine guidance with steadfast faithfulness (hesed is the Hebrew word for that state. Mainline, well educated elite thinking folk like to use those types of words which often do not translate adequately to today’s world.)