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Sunday Morning: No Longer For Worship?

The United Methodist Publishing House (UMPH) just announced a net operating revenue loss of $700,000 for the 2004 fiscal year. This is an especially troubling report since UMPH receives no income from general church funds (apportionments) and is required by The Book of Discipline to fund its operations through sales. One of a number of reasons given for the unusual loss is poor sales of the children's Sunday school curriculum. UMPH leaders attribute the sales decline, not so much to the curriculum itself, but to the "significant decline in Sunday school attendance." Fewer people means fewer sales.

How does this apply to church music? In many churches the decline in Sunday school attendance can also be seen in Sunday morning music programming. If they're missing from Sunday school, they're also missing from choir — children, youth, and adults — and from worship.

The question is, why the decline? Where are they? MaryJane Pierce Norton ([email protected]), leader of the Family and Life-Span Ministries Team at the Discipleship Ministries, has said the decline results from: " . . . the cultural change of how we view Sundays. For many families with children, Saturday is the day to do all of the catch-up tasks — laundry, appointments, and so on. It often ends up being an extension of workweek responsibilities. Sunday has become the day for (for lack of a better word) 'slacking off.' This doesn't mean that parents are bad (and we do have a tendency to label people as bad if they don't follow our expectations). It means that time has become a commodity; and families with children look for time to not be rushed, to do things together as a family unit and, yes — of course — to be involved in sports. Sunday morning Sunday school for children is not the given, not so much because of lack of quality or lack of teacher training, but because it comes in the morning of the one day families are seeing as their time."

My own experience agrees with this. In my last church music position, I finally gave up waging this battle in our community. The draw of soccer, city parades (even on Easter Sunday morning!), Rotary Club picnics, the local Air Force base's scheduling of the Thunderbirds' show and open house, Santa Claus's arrival at the mall, and Sunday-only community college continuing education classes for school teachers — all on Sunday morning — simply proved to be too much to overcome. I finally had to accept that Sunday morning worship, choir, and children's programming were choices among many that families had to make; and unfortunately, Sunday morning church was a choice being made less and less often. That was ten years ago; and people tell me that it has become even more difficult since then in that community.

If the church's hold on Sunday morning has been broken, if families are increasingly choosing non-church activities on Sunday morning, what should we do?

  • We can wring our hands, cry "How long, O Lord?" and do nothing as our children, youth, adults, and families gradually disappear from our choirs and congregations.
  • We can take each civil and secular challenge to the church's traditional hold on Sunday morning as as it comes along, resulting in an ongoing church versus culture or church versus community battle.
  • We can use guilt, judgment, and intimidation to try to persuade parents to not participate in these other Sunday morning activities.
  • Or we can look for alternative models for worship, Christian education, and choirs.

Some churches have had success with Sunday evening services, classes, and rehearsals — kind of an end-of-the-weekend coming together before Monday morning schedules resume. Others are offering a full schedule of worship, training, and rehearsals on Saturday afternoon or evening, or as an additional option to their Sunday morning schedule. Some churches are experimenting with various models of weekday after-school activities and training, sometimes including a family sit-down meal at the church and concluding with worship.

It is clear in today's western culture and society that the church (and matters of faith and religion in general) now has a diminished call on people's lives, significantly less than it once did. We must be willing to adapt to the cultural shift without sacrificing the integrity of our message or compromising our goals. As MaryJane Pierce Norton said, there is a "cultural change of how we view Sundays." The church must not ignore this change and continue to view Sunday mornings as it always has.

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