Churches can provide a sense of place

Churches can aid their community by offering a needed sense of “place,” according to researchers reporting during the fall meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion in Houston.
   
“Time and memory are increasingly dislocated. Neither has a position in the world,” said researcher Nancy Eisland of Atlanta. “Many people today don’t have a historical sense of the long-term. They desire a sense of collectiveness and yet don’t have the time to contribute to it.”
   
Various studies of communities have found that churches help create historical memories for residents, Eisland and the other researchers said. These memories may be based on aspects of the church buildings or in the ceremonies and experiences that were shared in those buildings.
   
But there is “both a gift and a danger” in promoting a church’s historical memory, Eisland said.
   
Dangers arise when the sense of historical place impedes progress or when communities undergo change that the church doesn’t embrace, she noted.
   
“What people project is that God was in the perfection of the past when in fact God may be in the possibilities of the future,” she said.
   
“Congregations can hold a sense of place, but only so long as they do not succumb to a romantic notion.” When communities change, existing churches often stay in those communities even though the congregation is made up of people who have left the community, the researchers noted.
   
And churches often remain in buildings that are not ideally located for their current members or require intensive maintenance, said Gaynor Yancey, a social work professor at Baylor University.
   
Yancey and Ram Cnaan of the University of Pennsylvania recently collaborated on a national study for the Partnership for Sacred Places of historical churches meeting in buildings constructed before 1940.
   
A primary question of the research, Yancey said, was “What are congregations doing in these communities that requires them to stay in this building?” And the answer, she reported, is that churches are providing vital community services. Ninety-three percent of the 111 congregations studied were providing at least one community service program in their buildings, and the remaining 7 percent were providing space for others to offer community service programs.
   
On average, these historic congregations each operated four ministries from their buildings.
   
“Congregations with older buildings host 76 percent of their communities’ programs,” Yancey reported. “The groups benefiting most are youth and children.” This sense of place — and the accompanying commitment to serve a community — is stronger than the economic forces that otherwise might drive a church away, she said. Twenty-one percent of these historic church buildings need major repairs, with costs estimated at $225,000 per congregation on average.
   
It is in the best interest of community leaders to ensure that these congregations continue to feel their sense of place, Yancey said. “If these congregations aren’t there, who will provide these services?” (ABP)