A Handful of Kids: Help!

Thanks to Convergence’s Rev. Dr. Anna Hall for sharing these insights – and Great Ideas for meeting the challenge.

If you are feeling the stress – or even fear – of lower participation among families and young people, this article is for you!

Rev. Dr. Hall’s article shares Pew Research numbers about congregational demographics: participatory ages, attendance, etc. – mostly to underscore that every church struggling with the realities of lower membership rates and fewer families and small children participating in the life of the church are not alone.

Hall answers this challenge with 4 tips for transformation:

• 1: Believe that God can call even the smallest group of believers to do amazing things.
• 2: Focus on quality child care first.
• 3: Make church life intergenerational.
• 4: Rethink spiritual formation.

The suggestions are only partially fleshed out, leaving a lot of room for inspiration, imagination, and contextualization. But they are robust enough to offer planning teams, committees, and councils with concrete steps to adapt congregational life to support greater involvement of younger generations.

Read the full article here.

Enjoy – you are not alone!!