The Barna Research Group has found that Sunday School is still one of the great mainstays of ministry, holding steady in a culture of theological transformation. And while the general concept of Sunday School remains in place in most churches, certain details surrounding its practice are evolving with the times.
Barna found that 19 out of every 20 Protestant churches offer “a Sunday School in which people receive some form of planned or systematic Bible instruction in a class setting,” and across denominations, Sunday School remains one of the most widely embraced ministry programs.
‘Customized’ classes
One change Barna noticed was that churches are increasingly less likely to offer classes for children under the age of 5 and for junior high and high school students, which researchers calculated as 20,000 fewer churches providing Sunday School for each age group. The most common Sunday School programming is offered for elementary age children and adults, Barna found.
Another emerging change in Sunday School is that congregations are moving toward “customized” curriculum, meaning they create their own. Southern Baptist churches are among those least likely to customize their material, with just 4 percent reporting such a practice.
Barna also found that since 1997, there has been a 15 percent decline in the percentage of churches offering Vacation Bible School (VBS). Southern Baptists were among those most likely to continue the tradition, but other denominations are moving away from the program, citing a lack of teachers as the most common reason.
While further examining educational programs beyond Sunday School in churches, Barna discovered a 10 percent drop in the proportion of churches that have midweek programming for children, representing 20,000 fewer churches providing such opportunities. Again midweek programming for children was most common among Southern Baptists.
David Kinnaman, director of the Barna study, was optimistic about the results of the research on Sunday School.
“Rumors of Sunday School’s imminent demise are greatly exaggerated,” Kinnaman said. “Every weekend more than 300,000 churches offer some type of systematic religious instruction in a classroom setting — and those programs are attended by nearly 45 million adults and more than 22 million youth and children. In fact, nearly nine out of every 10 pastors said they consider Sunday School to be an important part of their church’s ministry.
“The changes facing Sunday School seem to be more about the form — not the function — of Sunday School,” he said. “It appears as though churches are moving toward a ‘label-less’ future: They will offer summertime programs, but not necessarily VBS, and they will continue to prioritize Christian education, but not necessarily Sunday School.”
For more information on the study released July 11, visit www.barna.org.
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