Women in Late Mid-Life: The Future of the Church

I was with a group of seminary students on Thursday night, along with 2 of our faculty members, and the subject of why young people aren't going to church and what should we do about it.  One of our students who is from the Democratic Republic of Congo posed the question, in the context of what surprised him about the U.S.  

I decided to listen, even though I have opinions.  I should have opinions, since I've been hearing people talk about this issue for much of my life.  The answer never really changes, but the specifics do.  Clearly, we're not offering what young people want, since they're making other choices.  On Thursday night, some people talked about what church represents (homophobia, racism, sexism) and why young people reject that.

If we had had more time, I might have asked if young people had ever been interested in the institution of church--or the practice of church.  Outsiders might ask why we care so much, and the standard answer would be something along the lines of young people being the future of the church.

Demographically perhaps they are--they have more years to be alive than I do, after all.  But lately, I've been wondering if we're asking the wrong question.  Maybe young people aren't the future of the church--maybe the people who will take church into the future, maybe those folks belong to a different demographic.

Before I go further, let me say that I realize I have some biases; I have some dogs in this fight.  I don't have children, so I don't spend time agonizing over why they don't want to go to church.  When I was younger, I didn't want to go to church either.  As an adult, I sometimes don't want to go to church.  Maybe the problem is church--but that's a different blog post.

When I think of The Future of the Church, I think of women in late middle age.  I know that I've probably written something similar here before; I decided not to bring it into Thursday night's conversation.  I'm fairly sure I was the oldest person in the room.  The one faculty member is having a 40th birthday party, which he invited us to, which is how I know how old he is.  The other faculty member talked about her experience being part of a focus group of people who were 18-35 years in age.

So many women in my circle are headed to seminary right now, at a time when we might be more likely to be settling in our last few working years before retirement or grandmotherhood (am I really that old?  Yes, it's quite possible for me to be a grandmother now, if I had had children right away who then didn't delay in having children).  When we talk about The Future of the Church, that's the change that comes to my mind.

What changes will we be able to make?  I have no idea just yet.  And a darker question:  will we be allowed to make changes?  I am sure that we will have to force some changes, and I don't know that it will be a bad thing.

The fact that younger people aren't interested in church makes me think that the changes that older women will make might be the ones that younger people have been waiting for.  They will certainly be the changes that I've been waiting for.