No authentic fellowship, no doctrinal stringency, no masculine leadership, no spiritual relevancy, no life.
Readership: All; Men; Christians;
Theme: Cracking Nuts
Length: 1,300 words
Reading Time: 7 minutes
Why Are American Protestant Churches Declining?
We’ve all seen headlines like these.
- Pew Research Center: In U.S., Decline of Christianity Continues at Rapid Pace (2019/10/17)
- Denver Institute: What’s Really Happening to Christianity in America? (2019/10/20)
- So What Faith: Mainline Decline: 1990 to 2020 (2022/5/18)
- Religion Unplugged (Ryan Burge): Just How Bad Is Denominational Decline? (2023/6/12)
- Graphs About Religion (Ryan Burge): Just How Bad Is Denominational Decline? (2023/6/13)
- Baptist News Global: Making sense of denominational decline and church shifting (2024/6/3)
- Reformed Journal: Religious Churn in America: A New Study (2024/9/7)
- Pew Research Center: Decline of Christianity in the U.S. Has Slowed, May Have Leveled Off (2025/2/26)
- Milwaukee Independent: Shrinking congregations: Protestant denominations continue to struggle with aging and schisms (2026/3/1)
These articles go over a wide range of reasons why the church is in decline, but I sense there are some things left unsaid. So here, I’ll go over what I believe are the foundational reasons why Mainline and Evangelical Protestant churches are fading, in that order, followed by some general conclusions.
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