I agree with your diagnosis about Evangelicalism, but I still have a niggling question about the relationship between worship and belief: Where do apostate liturgical churches fit into this? The Episcopalian Church (and the Church of England in England) has gone off the deep end in spite of its rich historical worship. I mention it perhaps only to caution that while historical liturgical worship is an excellent thing, it’s not sufficient by itself to maintain orthodoxy.
This is a great comment. The Episcopal Church is indeed a case study in the hollowing out of liturgy. They retain the forms, the motions, the prayers—but for many, the substance has been emptied out. The truths their rituals were meant to embody have been severed from the rituals themselves, leaving behind something aesthetically rich but spiritually anemic. In many cases, they do not even seem to recognize what their own liturgy is pointing toward.
So, yes, forms alone cannot do anything. Liturgy without conviction, without a rightly ordered love for God and His truth, becomes a museum piece—an artifact of a faith once lived but now only performed.
This is precisely why any recovery of liturgical worship cannot be about the forms alone. It must be a recovery of both the practices and the truths they symbolize, reinforce, and embody. The danger is not just in abandoning historic worship but in keeping it while forgetting why it matters. Liturgy must not be an aesthetic, a nostalgic reaching back to something beautiful—it must be a living tradition, shaping belief, deepening faith, and orienting the soul toward God.
In this way, Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi remains true, but only insofar as the worship itself remains faithful to the truth. Where there is no belief, right worship becomes an empty husk. But where worship is true, it not only preserves belief but deepens and strengthens it over time.
Because without truth, their liturgies are not truly beautiful. They may be intricate, they may be poetic, they may even be awe-inspiring in their pageantry—but true beauty is inseparable from truth. A form emptied of its meaning is not beauty but an echo of it, a hollow shell where glory once dwelled.
As one in an evangelical church, I see exactly what you are talking about. I desire to be connected to the mooring of Protestant/Orthodox faith but the church seems to drift too easily into the swift current of leftist culture. I do not believe it is evident to church leadership now but it will be soon. So much Christian thought has been recorded over centuries, yet we eschew it for the latest TikTok preacher or spiciest social justice “Christian” on X. The push to be the biggest and/or most influential and to play nice with culture has come at the expense of the historic truth.
As one who grew up in an evangelical setting and has struggled with some aspects of its current form, I have been more struck by its shift to the right than the left - especially when Trumpism has found a home in the far right of evangelicalism. Maybe the warning is that when we forget our roots in favor of what is “most current” we are at risk of not seeing how we are being carried by cultural shift. It is a human frailty. Just being historical does not safeguard us, but knowing what has been wrestled with and found beneficial in following Jesus helps safeguard against the “shiny” things.
I have been thinking along these lines too, but you put it better than I ever could. I am starting to hear the term "Magisterial Protestantism" more and more to make a distinction between more traditional Protestantism and our Evangelical neighbors.
Good Afternoon. “What we believe is shaped by how we pray. The structure of our worship molds the structure of our theology.” This is such a wonderful thought and so true. Thanks!
I picked out this too - but for a different reason. I thought in my case my prayer life is moulded by my theology, which I always need to test against Scripture. Praise God for the way He speaks to us in different ways, but I pray too that by His Spirit we will discern His voice and not our own or someone else’s. Every blessing to you in Christ!
Couldn’t agree more with you. Evangelicalism has morphed into something different from the other three branches of Christendom—although its birth from Protestantism is unmistakable and bears more thought.
Thank you. I appreciate many of the insights mentioned. But I am confused. How do you define—or delimit—“evangelicalism?” I ask because the post appears to describe the “modernist” churches Machen decried a hundred years ago in “Christianity and Liberalism.” I realize I’m wading into deep waters by raising this question because, as I think many of us know, there is debate about what it means to be “evangelical.” I’m not trying to start a debate. Rather, I’m simply looking for clarity.
That is an important aspect of the problem. Machen pointed out that the theological liberals may use conventional Christian terminology, but with meanings that are so different as to constitute a different religion altogether - and there has been too much vagueness in distinguishing between Evangelicalism and theological liberalism.
And let us not forget that the Roman Catholic Church itself diverged greatly from its original stance over the centuries, with many of its distinctive features emerging centuries after Christ, culminating in an imperial papacy having nothing whatever to do with Peter.
I’ve noticed a connection between the nature of evangelicalism and the large number of church plants in recents years. I’m from southeast Louisiana and although there is a large Roman Catholic popular there are also tons of evangelical churches. Over the years I’ve noticed non-denominational churches popping up left and right. Some turn into well established, multi-site megachurches but most reflect the “hole in the wall” coffee shop church/house church model. There is little to no affiliation to a larger denomination from these churches. They are usually started by a single family. Josh, I’m curious as to your thoughts on why this is happening.
*Note: I know it’s sometimes necessary to start a solid church in a town with none but there are already so many theologically conservative churches around here.
This is a great question, Tyler, and it demands careful thought.
About a decade ago, a core group of families—including my own—planted a church in our very rural area of southern West Virginia. The need was clear. There were no confessional, liturgical, sacramental, and missionally oriented churches anywhere nearby. The few old PCUSA churches scattered throughout the region, along with an Episcopal church, had long since drifted into liberalism, severing themselves from their own confessional heritage. For those of us committed to a more historic, theologically rooted form of Christianity, the only option was to drive an hour or more north toward the state capital, where the population density made such churches viable. At the time, I was serving at a church in that region, and after much prayer and confirmation of my calling, they commissioned me as a church planter. By God’s grace, we planted, and He has blessed those efforts.
I recall hearing a statistic—though I can’t recall the exact source—that in the early 2000s and 2010s, church plants were reaching more people than established churches. That observation ignited a movement. If new churches were more effective at reaching people, the thinking went, then the solution was to plant as many churches as possible. This ushered in a church-planting boom, with massive investments of time, resources, and finances into establishing new congregations.
Having spent nearly a decade in church planting, I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the downright ugly.
Some church plants exist for the right reasons—because there is a genuine, theological need. That was our situation. When no confessional church is present, it is right and proper to plant one. Many faithful men have labored to bring the gospel and substantive doctrine to communities that lacked both.
But sinful humans remain sinful humans, and that means mixed motives. Some church planters do it for reasons that are, frankly, mercenary. I’ve seen countless churches receive funding for three to five years, and as soon as that financial pipeline dries up—at the very point when the church is expected to sustain itself—the planter packs up, moves to a new city, and repeats the cycle. I once had a church planter tell a group of men outright that his goal was to get rich planting churches. His plan was to plant a church, ride the wave of funding, and move on once it ran out.
This problem is exacerbated by the vast financial resources flowing into church-planting networks and missions organizations, especially in urban areas. When I was part of one particular church-planting network (which I won’t name), I saw firsthand how disproportionately resources were funneled into large cities—Boston, New York, Chicago, and the like. These planters were not just given stipends; they were often given full salaries, funding for their plant, and additional financial incentives. Whether that approach has changed, I don’t know—but what I do know is that at the time, they even gave out trophies for the highest baptism counts, as if evangelism were some kind of corporate contest.
And where money flows, so do opportunists. Some plant churches not out of a theological conviction or a call from God, but for personal gain—whether that be financial, social, or even egotistical.
Then there are the others—the ones who plant churches simply because they refuse to submit to any higher authority. They don’t want a session of elders, a presbytery, or an episcopate. They don’t want a confessional heritage, an accountable structure, or any constraints on their personal vision of church. So, they plant autonomously, without oversight or grounding.
These types of churches often attract large crowds, and for a very simple reason: they operate on a consumerist, buffet-style model of Christianity. There’s something for everyone. They build their brand around individualism, spiritual self-determination, and theological eclecticism. Instead of asking, What has the Church historically believed? or What is the faith handed down to us?, they ask, What do people want? And that is a very different question.
Ultimately, while some church plants are faithful and necessary, many reflect deeper problems within modern evangelicalism—problems of consumerism, individualism, and an addiction to novelty. And the result? An ever-fragmenting landscape of evangelical churches, each new one catering to its own niche, each promising to be more authentic, more innovative, or more accommodating than the last.
Which raises the larger question: Is this a symptom or a cause of modern evangelicalism’s instability? Some would argue that this rampant church-planting impulse is simply the inevitable outcome of Protestantism’s supposed sectarian nature. I don’t buy that. I think the deeper issue is the failure to distinguish between Protestantism as a theological tradition and modern evangelicalism as a cultural phenomenon. And unless we recover that distinction, much of what has been lost will remain lost.
Is the outrageous amount of church plants that “just want to do things there way” a symptom or a cause of modern Evangelicalism? Some would attribute it to the “Inherent” sectarian nature of Protestantism. I don’t buy it. I think drawing a distinction between Protestantism and evangelicalism will actually help us to recover some of what has been lost.
I think the best way to understand the proliferation of evangelical churches is they are entirely rooted in American business and democracy (rejection of hierarchy). They start small as a reaction to the problems of older, larger churches. They either feel a lack of zeal, unwelcomed, etc. so they splinter to make a new devoted core. This in their minds is true Christianity, living out what the perceive the early Church to be like.
However when they start to grow, they don't grow like a traditional church or denomination. They can't allow themselves to resemble what they came from. They can't grow to be like the Catholics or the Orthodox either. So they grow to resemble what they understand most: a business.
I believe this is why they all converge on the same megachurch model over time, if they are successful. They never join with other denominations. They only become a denomination of one, better understood as a Christian brand, or they fragment and start the cycle anew.
In my country, a small movement exists of similar fashion, but reaching Christians in largely lower-middle class areas in big cities often unserved or unreached by existing churches, in terms of membership. Some of those folks could not even afford transportation cost
I only have a vague idea of what all this means, but I have been trying for several years to be able to say what I think doesn’t seem right about evangelicalism. I want more than anything to know what is THE TRUTH……this helps
Evangelicalism has always seemed to me to be deeply American, even in, or maybe especially in its exported forms.
We Americans were too twitchy for Europe, with its rigid hierarchies and lords spiritual and secular. So we baptized ourselves in the mighty Atlantic and reemerged on this vacant shore as blameless as Adam in Paradise.
If our environs became too settled and restricting we decamped farther west. If our ecclesiastical structures failed to capture the latest ‘move of the Spirit’, to the flames with them. Even the boom and bust nature of our economic life mirrored the revival and declension of our Church life.
I wish I could gather my scattered thoughts about this into something more coherent, but I believe the Church’s sojourn in America will be as historically important as Byzantium or Reconquista Spain
I find your efforts to discuss anything about Christianity without mentioning Jesus Christ tells much. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one can come to the Father except through him. The only thing that matters is trusting Jesus as your savior and believing that He is truly the Son of God and you are saved only by his sacrificial
bloodshed on that cross. Everything else is fluff.
"It is a strange thing, the way truth provokes two entirely opposite reactions in those who encounter it."
Wow, it must be very exciting owning the truth as you claim. I usually stop reading when I see that level of hubris. Especially in a religious context, perhaps a bit of humility and admission of uncertainty would be in order. But maybe that hasn't occurred to the author.
Seminary grad here. RC, CofE, and EO experience/tendencies. There's nothing good about Evangelicalism. It is poisonous theologically, scripturally, philosophically, ethically, psychologically, politically, culturally, and sexually.
Great article and insights. In my experiences with fellow millennials and Gen Zs in Big Eva churches, Evangelicalism has become so distinct from the other three branches of Christendom by the fact that many evangelicals A) don't know they're evangelical, B) don't know that they would conventionally be labeled as under the protestant umbrella, and C) thinks that Catholicism is "outdated" Christianity at best and may quite possibly have never heard of Orthodoxy.
Many times I've heard young evangelicals say, "wait, what's a protestant?"
For all its liturgy, the Church of England has gone completely Woke and, in my view, apostate. The Church of Scotland is very similar. And these are just two examples of strongly liturgical churches that have gone completely off the rails. Meanwhile, it seems that while evangelical churches have suffered from the general increase in irreligiousness, they are doing a much better job at maintaining traditional Christian doctrines. Which in turn has helped to maintain their numbers and vitality. So, I don't really get the argument being proposed here. Liturgy, in my view, is inevitable and has a certain psychological appeal. But if it cannot move and adapt then it really has no value at all. It is not for nothing that the scriptures liken the Church to a body.
All I know is my Presbyterian USA church has devolved into a social activist organization, liturgy and all. Sermons that sound like MSNBC panel chats. They even changed a word from Jesus Loves Me - it’s now, “we are fragile, he is strong”. I don’t get it. What’s wrong with weak?
Anyway my family all left it and I won’t go anymore because of their (the Presbyterian church) frank antisemitism related to Israel.
When I go to the contemporary or more evangelical churches I miss the liturgy and hymns that date back centuries. My faith is as strong as ever but I am church homeless.
I agree with your diagnosis about Evangelicalism, but I still have a niggling question about the relationship between worship and belief: Where do apostate liturgical churches fit into this? The Episcopalian Church (and the Church of England in England) has gone off the deep end in spite of its rich historical worship. I mention it perhaps only to caution that while historical liturgical worship is an excellent thing, it’s not sufficient by itself to maintain orthodoxy.
This is a great comment. The Episcopal Church is indeed a case study in the hollowing out of liturgy. They retain the forms, the motions, the prayers—but for many, the substance has been emptied out. The truths their rituals were meant to embody have been severed from the rituals themselves, leaving behind something aesthetically rich but spiritually anemic. In many cases, they do not even seem to recognize what their own liturgy is pointing toward.
So, yes, forms alone cannot do anything. Liturgy without conviction, without a rightly ordered love for God and His truth, becomes a museum piece—an artifact of a faith once lived but now only performed.
This is precisely why any recovery of liturgical worship cannot be about the forms alone. It must be a recovery of both the practices and the truths they symbolize, reinforce, and embody. The danger is not just in abandoning historic worship but in keeping it while forgetting why it matters. Liturgy must not be an aesthetic, a nostalgic reaching back to something beautiful—it must be a living tradition, shaping belief, deepening faith, and orienting the soul toward God.
In this way, Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi remains true, but only insofar as the worship itself remains faithful to the truth. Where there is no belief, right worship becomes an empty husk. But where worship is true, it not only preserves belief but deepens and strengthens it over time.
Because without truth, their liturgies are not truly beautiful. They may be intricate, they may be poetic, they may even be awe-inspiring in their pageantry—but true beauty is inseparable from truth. A form emptied of its meaning is not beauty but an echo of it, a hollow shell where glory once dwelled.
As one in an evangelical church, I see exactly what you are talking about. I desire to be connected to the mooring of Protestant/Orthodox faith but the church seems to drift too easily into the swift current of leftist culture. I do not believe it is evident to church leadership now but it will be soon. So much Christian thought has been recorded over centuries, yet we eschew it for the latest TikTok preacher or spiciest social justice “Christian” on X. The push to be the biggest and/or most influential and to play nice with culture has come at the expense of the historic truth.
As one who grew up in an evangelical setting and has struggled with some aspects of its current form, I have been more struck by its shift to the right than the left - especially when Trumpism has found a home in the far right of evangelicalism. Maybe the warning is that when we forget our roots in favor of what is “most current” we are at risk of not seeing how we are being carried by cultural shift. It is a human frailty. Just being historical does not safeguard us, but knowing what has been wrestled with and found beneficial in following Jesus helps safeguard against the “shiny” things.
I agree with this completely. Tom Holland's thesis also bears it out. This is my own take. https://oswald67.substack.com/p/love-thy-neighbour-and-immigration?r=2r3au
I have been thinking along these lines too, but you put it better than I ever could. I am starting to hear the term "Magisterial Protestantism" more and more to make a distinction between more traditional Protestantism and our Evangelical neighbors.
Good Afternoon. “What we believe is shaped by how we pray. The structure of our worship molds the structure of our theology.” This is such a wonderful thought and so true. Thanks!
I picked out this too - but for a different reason. I thought in my case my prayer life is moulded by my theology, which I always need to test against Scripture. Praise God for the way He speaks to us in different ways, but I pray too that by His Spirit we will discern His voice and not our own or someone else’s. Every blessing to you in Christ!
Amen. Grace and Peace,
Richard
Couldn’t agree more with you. Evangelicalism has morphed into something different from the other three branches of Christendom—although its birth from Protestantism is unmistakable and bears more thought.
Thank you. I appreciate many of the insights mentioned. But I am confused. How do you define—or delimit—“evangelicalism?” I ask because the post appears to describe the “modernist” churches Machen decried a hundred years ago in “Christianity and Liberalism.” I realize I’m wading into deep waters by raising this question because, as I think many of us know, there is debate about what it means to be “evangelical.” I’m not trying to start a debate. Rather, I’m simply looking for clarity.
That is an important aspect of the problem. Machen pointed out that the theological liberals may use conventional Christian terminology, but with meanings that are so different as to constitute a different religion altogether - and there has been too much vagueness in distinguishing between Evangelicalism and theological liberalism.
And let us not forget that the Roman Catholic Church itself diverged greatly from its original stance over the centuries, with many of its distinctive features emerging centuries after Christ, culminating in an imperial papacy having nothing whatever to do with Peter.
I’ve noticed a connection between the nature of evangelicalism and the large number of church plants in recents years. I’m from southeast Louisiana and although there is a large Roman Catholic popular there are also tons of evangelical churches. Over the years I’ve noticed non-denominational churches popping up left and right. Some turn into well established, multi-site megachurches but most reflect the “hole in the wall” coffee shop church/house church model. There is little to no affiliation to a larger denomination from these churches. They are usually started by a single family. Josh, I’m curious as to your thoughts on why this is happening.
*Note: I know it’s sometimes necessary to start a solid church in a town with none but there are already so many theologically conservative churches around here.
This is a great question, Tyler, and it demands careful thought.
About a decade ago, a core group of families—including my own—planted a church in our very rural area of southern West Virginia. The need was clear. There were no confessional, liturgical, sacramental, and missionally oriented churches anywhere nearby. The few old PCUSA churches scattered throughout the region, along with an Episcopal church, had long since drifted into liberalism, severing themselves from their own confessional heritage. For those of us committed to a more historic, theologically rooted form of Christianity, the only option was to drive an hour or more north toward the state capital, where the population density made such churches viable. At the time, I was serving at a church in that region, and after much prayer and confirmation of my calling, they commissioned me as a church planter. By God’s grace, we planted, and He has blessed those efforts.
I recall hearing a statistic—though I can’t recall the exact source—that in the early 2000s and 2010s, church plants were reaching more people than established churches. That observation ignited a movement. If new churches were more effective at reaching people, the thinking went, then the solution was to plant as many churches as possible. This ushered in a church-planting boom, with massive investments of time, resources, and finances into establishing new congregations.
Having spent nearly a decade in church planting, I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the downright ugly.
Some church plants exist for the right reasons—because there is a genuine, theological need. That was our situation. When no confessional church is present, it is right and proper to plant one. Many faithful men have labored to bring the gospel and substantive doctrine to communities that lacked both.
But sinful humans remain sinful humans, and that means mixed motives. Some church planters do it for reasons that are, frankly, mercenary. I’ve seen countless churches receive funding for three to five years, and as soon as that financial pipeline dries up—at the very point when the church is expected to sustain itself—the planter packs up, moves to a new city, and repeats the cycle. I once had a church planter tell a group of men outright that his goal was to get rich planting churches. His plan was to plant a church, ride the wave of funding, and move on once it ran out.
This problem is exacerbated by the vast financial resources flowing into church-planting networks and missions organizations, especially in urban areas. When I was part of one particular church-planting network (which I won’t name), I saw firsthand how disproportionately resources were funneled into large cities—Boston, New York, Chicago, and the like. These planters were not just given stipends; they were often given full salaries, funding for their plant, and additional financial incentives. Whether that approach has changed, I don’t know—but what I do know is that at the time, they even gave out trophies for the highest baptism counts, as if evangelism were some kind of corporate contest.
And where money flows, so do opportunists. Some plant churches not out of a theological conviction or a call from God, but for personal gain—whether that be financial, social, or even egotistical.
Then there are the others—the ones who plant churches simply because they refuse to submit to any higher authority. They don’t want a session of elders, a presbytery, or an episcopate. They don’t want a confessional heritage, an accountable structure, or any constraints on their personal vision of church. So, they plant autonomously, without oversight or grounding.
These types of churches often attract large crowds, and for a very simple reason: they operate on a consumerist, buffet-style model of Christianity. There’s something for everyone. They build their brand around individualism, spiritual self-determination, and theological eclecticism. Instead of asking, What has the Church historically believed? or What is the faith handed down to us?, they ask, What do people want? And that is a very different question.
Ultimately, while some church plants are faithful and necessary, many reflect deeper problems within modern evangelicalism—problems of consumerism, individualism, and an addiction to novelty. And the result? An ever-fragmenting landscape of evangelical churches, each new one catering to its own niche, each promising to be more authentic, more innovative, or more accommodating than the last.
Which raises the larger question: Is this a symptom or a cause of modern evangelicalism’s instability? Some would argue that this rampant church-planting impulse is simply the inevitable outcome of Protestantism’s supposed sectarian nature. I don’t buy that. I think the deeper issue is the failure to distinguish between Protestantism as a theological tradition and modern evangelicalism as a cultural phenomenon. And unless we recover that distinction, much of what has been lost will remain lost.
Thank you for your thoughtful response!
Is the outrageous amount of church plants that “just want to do things there way” a symptom or a cause of modern Evangelicalism? Some would attribute it to the “Inherent” sectarian nature of Protestantism. I don’t buy it. I think drawing a distinction between Protestantism and evangelicalism will actually help us to recover some of what has been lost.
I think the best way to understand the proliferation of evangelical churches is they are entirely rooted in American business and democracy (rejection of hierarchy). They start small as a reaction to the problems of older, larger churches. They either feel a lack of zeal, unwelcomed, etc. so they splinter to make a new devoted core. This in their minds is true Christianity, living out what the perceive the early Church to be like.
However when they start to grow, they don't grow like a traditional church or denomination. They can't allow themselves to resemble what they came from. They can't grow to be like the Catholics or the Orthodox either. So they grow to resemble what they understand most: a business.
I believe this is why they all converge on the same megachurch model over time, if they are successful. They never join with other denominations. They only become a denomination of one, better understood as a Christian brand, or they fragment and start the cycle anew.
Jack, this is very insightful and I think a correct interpretation of what we are seeing.
In my country, a small movement exists of similar fashion, but reaching Christians in largely lower-middle class areas in big cities often unserved or unreached by existing churches, in terms of membership. Some of those folks could not even afford transportation cost
I only have a vague idea of what all this means, but I have been trying for several years to be able to say what I think doesn’t seem right about evangelicalism. I want more than anything to know what is THE TRUTH……this helps
Evangelicalism has always seemed to me to be deeply American, even in, or maybe especially in its exported forms.
We Americans were too twitchy for Europe, with its rigid hierarchies and lords spiritual and secular. So we baptized ourselves in the mighty Atlantic and reemerged on this vacant shore as blameless as Adam in Paradise.
If our environs became too settled and restricting we decamped farther west. If our ecclesiastical structures failed to capture the latest ‘move of the Spirit’, to the flames with them. Even the boom and bust nature of our economic life mirrored the revival and declension of our Church life.
I wish I could gather my scattered thoughts about this into something more coherent, but I believe the Church’s sojourn in America will be as historically important as Byzantium or Reconquista Spain
I find your efforts to discuss anything about Christianity without mentioning Jesus Christ tells much. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one can come to the Father except through him. The only thing that matters is trusting Jesus as your savior and believing that He is truly the Son of God and you are saved only by his sacrificial
bloodshed on that cross. Everything else is fluff.
"It is a strange thing, the way truth provokes two entirely opposite reactions in those who encounter it."
Wow, it must be very exciting owning the truth as you claim. I usually stop reading when I see that level of hubris. Especially in a religious context, perhaps a bit of humility and admission of uncertainty would be in order. But maybe that hasn't occurred to the author.
Seminary grad here. RC, CofE, and EO experience/tendencies. There's nothing good about Evangelicalism. It is poisonous theologically, scripturally, philosophically, ethically, psychologically, politically, culturally, and sexually.
Great article and insights. In my experiences with fellow millennials and Gen Zs in Big Eva churches, Evangelicalism has become so distinct from the other three branches of Christendom by the fact that many evangelicals A) don't know they're evangelical, B) don't know that they would conventionally be labeled as under the protestant umbrella, and C) thinks that Catholicism is "outdated" Christianity at best and may quite possibly have never heard of Orthodoxy.
Many times I've heard young evangelicals say, "wait, what's a protestant?"
For all its liturgy, the Church of England has gone completely Woke and, in my view, apostate. The Church of Scotland is very similar. And these are just two examples of strongly liturgical churches that have gone completely off the rails. Meanwhile, it seems that while evangelical churches have suffered from the general increase in irreligiousness, they are doing a much better job at maintaining traditional Christian doctrines. Which in turn has helped to maintain their numbers and vitality. So, I don't really get the argument being proposed here. Liturgy, in my view, is inevitable and has a certain psychological appeal. But if it cannot move and adapt then it really has no value at all. It is not for nothing that the scriptures liken the Church to a body.
All I know is my Presbyterian USA church has devolved into a social activist organization, liturgy and all. Sermons that sound like MSNBC panel chats. They even changed a word from Jesus Loves Me - it’s now, “we are fragile, he is strong”. I don’t get it. What’s wrong with weak?
Anyway my family all left it and I won’t go anymore because of their (the Presbyterian church) frank antisemitism related to Israel.
When I go to the contemporary or more evangelical churches I miss the liturgy and hymns that date back centuries. My faith is as strong as ever but I am church homeless.
Open to ideas!