Why have the Anabaptists FAILED at Reaching the Masses

[Josh]

Except that they aren't! (at least not most)
I am currently in communication with a family in Ft. Worth that doesn't want to drive to Grandview. They want a church started in Ft. Worth.

I would doubt the commitment of people to being able to start and sustain a new church who can't commit to driving a 34 minutes to church on Sunday.

It is not about commitment. It is about seeing the kingdom of God grow and flourish in various pockets around Dallas / Ft. Worth.

I find the idea interesting, though, of expecting multiple Anabaptist families to uproot themselves and start a church in some location, on behalf of 1 family that apparently isn't willing to move 30 minutes away. (People in big cities frequently will move 30 minutes around for better real estate, new house, closer to job, etc.)

[RZehr]

Speaking of numbers and masses.

Last September on National Back To Church Sunday, I visited almost every church in my county, and counted the people in attendance. This was a special Sunday, where many of the churches were having an aggressive drive to get people back to church that day. I guess for most churches, attendance dramatically drops off in the summertime. So Back To Church Sunday is a movement to try to get people back to church. Some of these churches cancelled services that morning in order to just to focus on getting people to come with breakfast buffets, brunches, lunches, bouncy houses, etc. So I would think it would represent a high point in attendance for the summer.

305 Catholic
180 Baptist
125 Assembly of God
120 Quaker/Friends
92 Morman
82 Jehovah's Witness
75 Community Church
65 Community Church
55 Community Church
43 Baptist Church
35 Baptist Church
32 Apostolic Temple
30 Community Church
24 United Methodist
26 Seventh Day Adventist
19 Lutheran + Episcopal Church (combined)
17 Christian Church
16 The Door Church
14 Church of Christ
6 Missionary Baptist

This is a county where my church is the first new church to be built in over 30 years. My church is one of the newest congregations on this list, and we typically have around 85 or so. Based on these numbers, I don't know that these other churches are doing much better than we are. The newest of the top 4, is 43 years old.

[Ken]

I would doubt the commitment of people to being able to start and sustain a new church who can't commit to driving a 34 minutes to church on Sunday.

It is not about commitment. It is about seeing the kingdom of God grow and flourish in various pockets around Dallas / Ft. Worth.

I find the idea interesting, though, of expecting multiple Anabaptist families to uproot themselves and start a church in some location, on behalf of 1 family that apparently isn't willing to move 30 minutes away. (People in big cities frequently will move 30 minutes around for better real estate, new house, closer to job, etc.)

I don’t think anything is expecting anything.

I would simply argue that a tiny rural church well outside the DFW metro area doesn’t represent any sort of outreach to what is the 4th largest metro area in the country. I would also argue that if Anabaptists want to be anything more than the tiniest of footnotes they have to do better than that. Or perhaps it is like you wrote upstream. It is simply about supply and demand and there just isn’t any demand for the current version of ethnic plain Anabaptism outside of a few rural enclaves where they settled a few centuries ago. And a few tiny rural enclaves to where they moved more recently.

Also to point out the obvious. The city of Dallas is only about 28% non-Hispanic White. And the combined DFW metro area is only about 42% non-Hispanic White. That is what America looks like today. So you are probably right. There isn’t going to be demand for a tiny quirky rural sect of White folk with rigid inexplicable dress and customs.

[Ken]

Speaking of numbers and masses.

Last September on National Back To Church Sunday, I visited almost every church in my county, and counted the people in attendance. This was a special Sunday, where many of the churches were having an aggressive drive to get people back to church that day. I guess for most churches, attendance dramatically drops off in the summertime. So Back To Church Sunday is a movement to try to get people back to church. Some of these churches cancelled services that morning in order to just to focus on getting people to come with breakfast buffets, brunches, lunches, bouncy houses, etc. So I would think it would represent a high point in attendance for the summer.

305 Catholic
180 Baptist
125 Assembly of God
120 Quaker/Friends
92 Morman
82 Jehovah's Witness
75 Community Church
65 Community Church
55 Community Church
43 Baptist Church
35 Baptist Church
32 Apostolic Temple
30 Community Church
24 United Methodist
26 Seventh Day Adventist
19 Lutheran + Episcopal Church (combined)
17 Christian Church
16 The Door Church
14 Church of Christ
6 Missionary Baptist

This is a county where my church is the first new church to be built in over 30 years. My church is one of the newest congregations on this list, and we typically have around 85 or so. Based on these numbers, I don't know that these other churches are doing much better than we are. The three at the top are over 50 years old.

What percentage of your church are converts to Anabaptism and what percentage come from ethnic-Menno roots or were otherwise born into it?

[Josh]

Also to point out the obvious. The city of Dallas is only about 28% non-Hispanic White. And the combined DFW metro area is only about 42% non-Hispanic White. That is what America looks like today. So you are probably right. There isn’t going to be demand for a tiny quirky rural sect of White folk with rigid inexplicable dress and customs.

Yes, I'm aware of the efforts by some to replace Americans with Latin Americans.

19 Lutheran + Episcopal Church (combined)

[RZehr]

Speaking of numbers and masses.

Last September on National Back To Church Sunday, I visited almost every church in my county, and counted the people in attendance. This was a special Sunday, where many of the churches were having an aggressive drive to get people back to church that day. I guess for most churches, attendance dramatically drops off in the summertime. So Back To Church Sunday is a movement to try to get people back to church. Some of these churches cancelled services that morning in order to just to focus on getting people to come with breakfast buffets, brunches, lunches, bouncy houses, etc. So I would think it would represent a high point in attendance for the summer.

305 Catholic
180 Baptist
125 Assembly of God
120 Quaker/Friends
92 Morman
82 Jehovah's Witness
75 Community Church
65 Community Church
55 Community Church
43 Baptist Church
35 Baptist Church
32 Apostolic Temple
30 Community Church
24 United Methodist
26 Seventh Day Adventist
19 Lutheran + Episcopal Church (combined)
17 Christian Church
16 The Door Church
14 Church of Christ
6 Missionary Baptist

This is a county where my church is the first new church to be built in over 30 years. My church is one of the newest congregations on this list, and we typically have around 85 or so. Based on these numbers, I don't know that these other churches are doing much better than we are. The three at the top are over 50 years old.

What percentage of your church are converts to Anabaptism and what percentage come from ethnic-Menno roots or were otherwise born into it?

Probably quite similar to the rest of these on the list. But remember, numbers is apparently the metric that matters.

[Ken]

Also to point out the obvious. The city of Dallas is only about 28% non-Hispanic White. And the combined DFW metro area is only about 42% non-Hispanic White. That is what America looks like today. So you are probably right. There isn’t going to be demand for a tiny quirky rural sect of White folk with rigid inexplicable dress and customs.

Yes, I'm aware of the efforts by some to replace Americans with Latin Americans.

Texas is part of Latin America. The original name of the state was Provincia de Tejas. The most significant rivers flowing through the state are the Brazos River (Rio de Los Brazos de Dios) and Rio Grande. The oldest major city is San Antonio. Spanish was spoken in Texas long before the first Anabaptists settled in North America.

[ohio jones]

26 Seventh Day Adventist

On National Back To Church Sunday? Backsliders!

[Josh]

Also to point out the obvious. The city of Dallas is only about 28% non-Hispanic White. And the combined DFW metro area is only about 42% non-Hispanic White. That is what America looks like today. So you are probably right. There isn’t going to be demand for a tiny quirky rural sect of White folk with rigid inexplicable dress and customs.

Yes, I'm aware of the efforts by some to replace Americans with Latin Americans.

Texas is part of Latin America. The original name of the state was Provincia de Tejas. The most significant rivers flowing through the state are the Brazos River (Rio de Los Brazos de Dios) and Rio Grande. The oldest major city is San Antonio. Spanish was spoken in Texas long before the first Anabaptists settled in North America.

You seem to be saying that it's somehow bad for America to have "white" people in it or to be majority white, and then are celebrating white people becoming a minority within Dallas city limits (although this isn't the case for the entire DFW metro area). Did I read you correctly, or am I misreading you?

[RZehr]

26 Seventh Day Adventist

On National Back To Church Sunday? Backsliders!

I actually got that number from the day earlier, on the Sabbath.