Opinion: Millions of Americans have stopped going to church, but what they've lost is more than religion

Paul Wesslund
(Photo via USA Today)

As Americans leave church behind, many fail to see it's more than religion they're giving up. "Record numbers of Americans have quit going to church. Studies and personal stories describe people either leaving churches or just drifting away for reasons like being too busy or disagreeing on social issues," writes Paul Wesslund in his opinion for the Courier Journal in Louisville, Kentucky. "The odd thing is that these former churchgoers seem to be searching for some kind of community. . . . And those pulling away from religion don't take into account what a church can offer that addresses what people say they're searching for: Friends, and being part of something larger than themselves.

"I attended the Kentucky United Methodist Annual Conference this year, where disaffiliations were approved for the last wave of the more than 300 churches that left our conference. At the meeting, I sensed the hundreds of remaining delegates going through the classic stages of grief, including depression and acceptance. It's a denomination figuring out how to navigate a new world, working hard at keeping hope alive.

"Much of the current commentary on church attendance refers to the new book, The Great Dechurching, by Jim Davis and Michael Graham. It takes a deep dive into surveys about why so many have stopped going to church. The studies found plenty of reasons, from wanting to sleep in after being kept awake by a new baby to attending brunch with friends. . . . Other widely reported reasons cut even deeper – the widespread child abuse in the Catholic church, the use of the Bible to score political points and the too-frequent requests for money.

"The U.S. Surgeon General issued a report this year on loneliness and isolation, comparing its health effects to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. He created the report, he says, after Americans repeatedly told him they felt invisible and insignificant. That's a condition every church seeks to address, however imperfectly. . . . We overlook defects in other parts of our lives. Who hasn't had a less-than-perfect experience at what is still their favorite restaurant? Or stayed loyal to their team despite a series of boneheaded plays?

"My disagreement with one of the church's policies didn't drive me away – I helped organize a group of church members to hold forums on the [LGBTQ+] issues, to let people know that at next year's United Methodist General Conference, there could be a vote to change those policies. . . . I choose to stay because no person – or institution – is perfect. Because leaving a more diverse group of thinkers and believers for people who are closer to being exactly like me seems sad – and even wrong – because it would just contribute to today's tendency to listen only to ourselves.

"A church's hold on people doesn't come with the drama of watching a sport or offer a dinner menu. It's bigger than that. I can't help but feel that both the church and its former members are wandering around looking for each other. . . . Maybe they'll meet again."

Summit on rural journalism explores ways philanthropy can support local news media, individually and collectively

Fifh in a series of reports on the National Summit on Journalism in Rural America, held June 3-4 by the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues and the College of Communication and Information at the University of Kentucky. Previous articles were on the state of rural journalism, the Summit-driven effort for sustainability in rural journalism, nonprofit models and help from higher-education journalism programs. 

By Al Cross

Director and professor, Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, University of Kentucky

Philanthropy is becoming part of the business model at many American newspapers, but not so much among rural weeklies and dailies. Rural philanthropy has always been something of an oxymoron, with most of the big money staying in big places. The National Summit on Journalism in Rural America explored how philanthropy can help rural news outlets.

Editors and publishers at chain-owned rural papers may think that their ownership model precludes asking for philanthropic help from individuals and institutions, but one of the better examples of philanthropy helping a non-metropolitan paper is at the Traverse City Record-Eagle in Michigan, a daily owned by Community Newspaper Holdings Inc. 

Nathan Payne

Nathan Payne, who recently moved from the editorship of the Record-Eagle to be the rural team editor for Kaiser Health News, discussed at the Summit how he raised support through the local community foundation, a type of philanthropy that is becoming more common in rural areas. 

When Payne needed matching money to get a reporter from Report for America two years ago, he got more and different help than he expected from the Grand Traverse Regional Community Foundation. He said people in Traverse City see the value of "20 professional skeptics all over the community, turning over rocks" but they didn't really know the state of local journalism. He said involving the community foundation added a trust factor to a chain paper asking for money.

The philanthropy has put $10,000 into a community news fund that helps the Record-Eagle, but that hasn’t meant as much as the help it has given the paper with fund-raising. Payne and Publisher Paul Heidbreder got guidance and support from a retired journalist in the community who was interested in the paper’s future, and their meetings with the foundation's executive director helped Payne frame his case for financial support from others. Last year, he ran a crowdfunding campaign that raised about $8,500 and an end-of-year email campaign that produced $5,550. This year, the paper has $15,000 from foundations, and it has expanded its coverage area to include more rural counties, a rarity today.

An RFA report said some foundation board members were reluctant to fund journalism or a for-profit business, but Executive Director Dave Mengebier said he persuaded the board and the local funding community that “If you want to have healthy, resilient, thriving communities, which is part of our vision statement, then there are certain institutions that are really important to exist in your community. This includes having a newspaper, you know, along with things like having a community library, and, and a vibrant arts-and-culture community.”

Dennis Brack

A similarly enlightened community is Rappahannock County, Virginia, pop. 7,400, where the weekly Rappahannock News has added muscle to its newsroom with the help of Foothills Forum, a local philanthropy that was created specifically to help the independently owned paper. The county "has tradition of deep civic engagement," Publisher Dennis Brack said at the Summit. He acknowledged later that its proximity to Washington, D.C., 90 miles to the east, and the presence of many retirees from D.C., also help.

The first funded project was a poll of the county, to which 42 percent of residents responded. "The findings themselves made news," Brack said; residents said what mattered most to them was privacy, beauty, family farms, and internet and cell service. So the next funded project, using freelance journalists, was on the "digital dilemma;" the second was on land use, always a major issue in exurban counties, then housing. In the pandemic, the News produced a daily newsletter.

Brack said the paper and Foothills Forum are independently operated, with an operating agreement that is public, along with the names of donors, but are "highly collaborative." The only direct subsidies have been sharing the match for RFA reporter and picking up the pay for a part-timer during the pandemic.

Jody Lawrence-Turner

At least one philanthropy has been created specifically for rural news: the Fund for Oregon Rural Journalism, headed by Jody Lawrence-Turner, who is also project editor at The Bulletin in Bend, whose owners founded the philanthropy. She said it was created to help rural news organizations adapt and adjust their business models, with strategic advice on digital revenue and other topics, partnerships on stories, micro-grants, talent recruitment and development.

FORJ's first big pilot project addresses a growing complaint of rural editors and publishers: They can't find qualified people who want to work in local news. One solution often suggested is developing interest and talent among students in high school or even middle school. FORJ's Future Journalists of America pilot at four high schools in Bend newsrooms hosts a lab with sessions taught by professionals in a semester-long curriculum: media literacy, professional craft, doing assignments with news staffers, a digital, district-wide publication, and exploration of sustainable business models. The overall goal is to sell "a career with a purpose, ensuring the continuation of a free democracy," Lawrence-Turner said.

The Summit session on "Putting Philanthropy in Your Business Model" is on YouTube, here.

Philanthropy was mentioned in other sessions. Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro of the National Trust for Local News discussed how the Trust and philanthropic partners bought a chain of 24 community papers in Colorado and put them into a nonprofit, creating an umbrella model for other places.

The Trust, the Institute for Nonprofit News, the Kentucky Press Association and the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues (sponsor of the Summit) have conducted a survey of newspaper owners in Appalachian Kentucky with the Mountain Association, an Appalachian Kentucky development organization that wants to keep the papers in local hands, perhaps using a nonprofit umbrella for those in distressed counties where for-profit buyers either wouldn't be interested or could damage the papers.

Philanthropy would be needed to fund such a model, but that challenge could also be an opportunity. If an umbrella nonprofit was also committed to improving coverage of regional issues, across the county lines that typically define rural newspaper markets, that could attract funders. "Successful papers don't think geographically" but are "breaking out of geographic jail," Penny Abernathy of Northwestern University said at the Summit's opening session, which is here on YouTube, along with other sessions.

Reporter and wife leave $3 million to community foundation

Carol and John Willard

A longtime newspaper reporter in the Quad Cities of Iowa and Illinois and his wife have left a $3 million estate with their local community foundation to benefit nine local organizations.

John Willard of Davenport, Iowa, retired in 2007 after 34 years at the Quad-City Times, and died unexpectedly in November 2017. His wife Carol died in July. "Those who knew the quiet and soft-spoken Willards are surprised by the amount of the bequest, but not by the entities they chose to befriend, as they had a wide range of interests and causes," Alma Gaul reports for the newspaper.

One of the beneficiaries was a hospice program where Willard volunteered, interviewing veterans and writing stories their military service, which were presented to each veteran in a ceremony. "With his professional skills, as well as his military skills — he was a Vietnam veteran — it was a natural fit for him," said Lori Bruning, volunteer coordinator at Genesis Hospice. "What made him especially good at what he did is that he was a listener, not a talker. He really listened to what people said." 

Other beneficiaries are the Davenport library; the Iowa PBS Foundation; a park the couple loved; their alma maters, George Williams College of Aurora, Ill., and the University of Illinois; Grace Lutheran Church of Davenport; the Humane Society of Scott County, and the community foundation itself, to use at its discretion. Community foundations are increasingly used by donors to help their hometowns by leaving their money to a local organization they trust.

"People who knew the Willards were unaware of their substantial wealth because the couple did not live a showy lifestyle," Gaul writes. "Carol Willard worked as an administrative assistant and they shared one car, with Carol often taking the bus or John dropping her off and picking her up. . . . The couple did not have children; survivors were a brother for John and a sister for Carol. That is a big reason the Willards came to the foundation," according to President and CEO Sherry Ristau.