Non christians and churches. What do you like about them please. ?

[lightand]

Our church[not Church of England] is a rather bland converted building.

We have opened it up[pre covid] on a weekday, and is open to all. We would like to encourage non Christians especially to wander in. Sit? Browse? Think? Pray.

What would you like, or like to think, was in the Church for you? What would you find helpful/useful.

Thanks.

Grew up in a village where the CofE ran the school and rented out the hall for all our events. My parents were not particularly bothered with religion. I am an ardent atheist. So I went to Brownies in the church hall, had my birthdays there (until I was a teenager) and went to all the jumble sales and fêtes there.

I love history and art. I like walking into cathedrals and seeing the engineering and architecture then went into building them. I've climbed to the top of Salisbury Cathedral and one of the towers of the Notre Dame. I love the paintings, the statues, and making up stories about the dead folk interred there. Kings and Queens have been crowned in them, artists and novelists are memorialised in them, and they have played strategic roles in wars and conflict.

There is a church cafe near me that does reasonably priced food, good coffee and home made cakes. It was brilliant when I had a little baby, then toddler, and just needed to get out of the house (this being the mid-2000s). They had toys my DD could play with.

So I admit they enrich my life but I just don't believe in the religion or the god. Or any god, in fact.

I’m a non-church goer and I’ve used churches for a number of things. The local united reformed has a great cafe and toddler group. After that I moved on to messy church, which is obviously more religious but no more than a school assembly. The local baptist church is very active in the community. They used to (and may still) run meals where people talked about their religious experience while you ate. My Christian mum and gran managed this once, as the lady spoke about how god had saved her child, whilst both of them had children who had died - it was absolutely excruciating. My mum was particularly furious my gran had to sit through it. I’m sure you wouldn’t do anything that tone deaf.
I have also used churches for reflection, but they tend to be the more historic ones. I spent quite a long time in St Paul’s in the jewellery quarter once pondering what had gone wrong in a particularly bad year.

To be honest our local church opened a separate building and branded it as a community centre: signposting, info on local children's groups, and a place to drop in for a chat and cup of tea. No mention of church at all. The people that work there are funded by the church. It was done because as PP said the building itself can be overwhelming.

Atheist, brought up in a loosely Christian household, and spent several years living in a deeply Islamic country.

The only thing that would get me through the doors of a religious building would be if I could guarentee there would be no pushing of a religious nature.
So I would go for many of the reasons mentioned above, but not return if there was a hint of trying to convert me.
Where religious centres can be opening and welcoming of all, they can make for a fantastic centre of the community. Where religion is the focus, many are put off.
I'd say you need to decide if you want religion or community to be the most important thing because the two arent necessarily compatible for those not directly linked to the religion.

I'm still following this thread with interest. OP I think you need to to establish your aims and goals in order to know what the next best step for your church is. There are several themes running through this thread.

People who have a positive association with churches because of their own experience or the buildings religious/historical/architecture significance. These people will come as long as the doors open and the space is welcoming.

People who view church as the equivilent of a community hall and will engage with the church for secular events, clubs, services and activities. If your aim is just to get people through the door and serve your community then you need to identify what your community needs and provide it, best of luck there.

People who have negative associations with the church or no reason to enter the building. No point trying to get them in, theyve made up their minds.

Regardless of where people fall the majority say they dont want to feel they are being pressured (however gently) to engage with Christianity, unless they have made an active decision to do so.This is why I think you really need to examine your aims, it will direct what you do or dont choose to use your church for.

There is nothing special about a church building, and just getting people inside or exposing them to church will not bring them closer to Jesus. People are also incredibly resistant to having any opinion/value/belief imposed upon particularly by people they are not close to, so using clubs and events as a mechanism to form superficial connections with people to have conversations is rarely going to result in people turning to Christanity and could negatively impact your relationship with the community.

In times of joy/saddeness/difficulty I turn to those closest to me, irrelevant of faith. My Christian, Muslim and atheist friends support me because I am their friend, not because of their faith or lack there of. We are not "other". My Christian friends talk to me often about their faith because it is part of their life, but I hear about their struggles, doubts aswell as their joys - we are just walking through life together as friends. My Christian friends were part of the the reason I came to faith in the first place, I witnessed their lives and I made a decision for myself. The church as a body of strangers and intent was the reason I left. Anyway that was a rather long winded way of saying, if your aim is to share Jesus, then I doubt chatting to strangers over a coffee in a church building is ever the way to effectively achieve this.

@GreenBeeSW A good sum up and points, thankyou.
It is very easy, I think, to think as Christians, we know what non-Christians are thinking, but we dont really. Plus, as you comment, they may fall into groups somewhat, but everyone is unique.

I am taking on board everyones' comments and I will take some time to consider them. Ultimately, our church is a team effort, and I will talk with them about the best ways to proceed.

One local church of ours has developed from having a community fridge (literally a fridge that you could either put food into or take it out with no questions asked) into an entire food bank/reduce waste hub. You can now join the community food centre for I think £13 a month, and then come every week and have pretty much whatever food you want including fresh food. Local supermarkets give them their about-to-go food, and they have other deals, and donations, and they also buy stuff to top up. I think quite a lot of low income families like the fact that it's more like a club with a membership than a food bank. However, it's a huge operation now with a big team. The community fridge, though, was a really good small starting point, and still runs.

@LondonTTC
You said you were told off for asking questions in Sunday School.
Personally, I think this is the opposite of what should have happened there, and I feel somewhat aggrieved that this happened to you.

@Didiusfalco Sorry what happened to your mum and gran too.

@olderthanyouthink Your post made me smile. I think a lot of churches have learnt their lesson from pouring weak tea and cheap coffee. The cake is normally good though!

@VanillaSheHer Ha!

@PermanentTemporary What a wonderful idea!
Sadly, wouldnt work where we are in a small village I dont think, but maybe I havent got that right. It is easy to think everyone locally is ok in a rural setting, but that is never 100% correct. It is only when something happens that is visible, are we jolted from our possible, quite incorrect, thoughts.
When we did the refurb, we put in a fridge and a small kitchen. so we do have a number of options. Thank you.

DH and I often talk about wanting to go to church but only if they don’t talk about God...

I think I’d go to your church OP. As somewhere to meet new people, make friends, know that if I needed someone to talk to there’d be someone there, toddler groups, a food bank, knitting club, singing group, soup kitchen etc. And somewhere I could give back to. People don’t want to be preached at, they don’t want to hear the Word - seeing in action is so much more effective. Didn’t Jesus say to minister to the people no matter who they are? So minister. Keep Sunday services for those with faith, and and by genuinely serving the community and living out your faith you will probably lead more people naturally to some kind of faith. But any hint of “we’re just doing this to “save” you” and people will run for the hills. I think too many churches are run for the people who go to churches. They should be run for the people who don’t.

I’m not Christian and never have been. I love visiting old churches for the history and the architecture but other than that I don’t any reason to go in.

Our local history society uses the Methodist Church or hall for talk which I will sometimes attend but I’m always wary of the attempts to invite me to services that seems to be the hidden agenda. It is very off putting to be honest

@lightand what are you doing now during covid? Are you reaching out to the community? Especially older people and young families that maybe struggling? Food banks, a weekly call to combat loneliness, a listening ear, signposting to other services?

I think what we find, by inviting everyone in the local community to use the building for activities (Beavers, Cubs, Scouts, lunch club, badminton, Afternoon Fellowship, Conversation classes for speakers of other languages, slimmers world, Home Ed group, Dementia Cafe, Exercise Group for retired people, job clubs, to vote in elections, etc etc etc then lots of people are familiar with the faces of the minister and some of the volunteers at the Church. That then make them easier to approach when they choose to speak to someone with a faith - and yes, that does happen often when people are bereaved. It isn't about the Church "preying on the vulnerable" or whatever weird wording was used upthread, it is about being accessible when people reach out for support - which many often do.

There is a supposedly retired minister at our Church who takes 300 funerals a year. None of them for members of our Church. These are people who reach out to him, or who ask the funeral directors to find them a minister.

@BackforGood it was me that mentioned religions preying on the vulnerable - you don't think this is one of the ways people become radicalised?

These are people who reach out to him, or who ask the funeral directors to find them a minister.

I think in these circumstances most people don't know what to do, a loved one has died and they need someone to conduct the funeral. The funeral directors will make suggestions.
When my DH died I didn't want a religious service, as he didn't believe, but his mum did and I wanted a nod to that. The funeral director suggested a chaplain for the racing industry, which was appropriate for DH and fitted my brief re MIL. I'd have had no idea where to look for a non-religious service taker, presumably the funeral directors would have ideas but I suspect church ministers are generally more known and available.

@treeeeemendous During covid, and especially since our congregation is small, and definitely mainly elderly, we are looking out for each other, but are definitely restricted in what we are able to do right now. From last March, half of them have not been coming, and have kept themselves largely at home. Since the current lockdown, the stay at home message has been heeded.
Our group of churches does most of the things you listed. There was talk of a foodbank in one of them, but not sure what has become of that idea.

It does feel though like they are preying on the vulnerable. My PIL were church goers so when they died they had a church service.

Fair enough- it was what they wanted. DP and I though had never set foot in the church for the entire time we’d lived there which was best part of 15 years (it’s an ugly Victorian monstrosity of no architectural or historical interest as a building).

We were besieged afterwards with offers of “fellowship” to help us through our grief and for years afterwards on the anniversary of their deaths we would get an invite to attend a service. We ignored them all, asking them to stop didn’t work.

[quote lightand]@GreenBeeSW A good sum up and points, thankyou.
It is very easy, I think, to think as Christians, we know what non-Christians are thinking, but we dont really. Plus, as you comment, they may fall into groups somewhat, but everyone is unique.

I am taking on board everyones' comments and I will take some time to consider them. Ultimately, our church is a team effort, and I will talk with them about the best ways to proceed.[/quote]
There also a lot of lapsed Christians and cultural but non-believing Christians around, but a lot of those people would accept and follow broadly Christian values.

I’ve often thought that the answer to the church attendance crisis would be to embrace community work with no attempt to
proselytise. Soup runs, community groups, leisure functions, refugee services, toddler groups, food banks etc, but all very much “faith in action” with strictly no preaching.

Also, someone should really come up with a much less evangelical counterpart to the Alpha course. There is an appetite out there for basic religious knowledge without the Shine Jesus Shine and so on.

@treeeeemendous well, it wasn't highlighted in any of the Prevent courses I've attended

@Elphame and yet, many families do appreciate the fact that someone is still thinking of them after the service, and come back and say that to the Churches that offer invitations to future services and events. Invitations remember - thereby offering a choice to people, or letting people know an event is happening. Quite different from a demand.

In some ways, would it hurt if it did become just a community centre? Churches used to be community centres - places to exchange gossip, find partners, support etc. As attendance has fallen, the church and its community becomes further and further removed from the actual community, and ends up looking rather remote and frankly, totally up itself. I'm lapsed and am deeply suspicious of proselytising, having witnessed some of the more evangelical churches actively preying on the vulnerable. But even if I wasn't, if you're so remote from the real community, what is the temptation to even think about joining you?

I've been to a few services at Quaker meeting houses. They genuinely feel like a community building. Lived in, loved, modern witness to day to day life, where you feel you can say what you think because it's not trying to preserve 1890. A relationship with god feels much more possible there, because you end up feeling there's a chance he might understand about smartphones! The toys and biscuit crumbs make the building feel alive and relevant, rather than abused and debased.

I've been thinking about this thread today and wanted to suggest something our local church has done to have an open door. They've created a glass porch inside the church, so the big old wooden door is open, and people can see inside, but it keeps the bugs / cats / dogs / heat/cold out.

It's also occurred to me that I would be far more likely to go into a mosque or synagogue that was open for people to just look around than I would a church, because I've never been in a mosque or synagogue and I'd be curious. I've no idea if that's even slightly useful, but it was a surprising realisation! I was raised broadly Christian - Christmas, Easter eggs, pancake day, things like that, and I know the stories around those days because of school. But never actually went to a church for a religious reason. I can see other faiths from a more academic viewpoint, I think, but Christianity feels more of a pressure and an expectation somehow.

I know you've said you want to help your community, and you're limited because your older members are staying home. But I think that's just the point, if you want to help your community there's far more people who aren't part of your church, and don't want to be, than are. If you just want to help people then I think it's important that any thought of preaching or converting is put aside. Our local methodist Church have been putting posts on Facebook for anyone who needs or wants anything to get in touch, from people needing shopping collected or medicines, to just needing to chat to someone on the phone because they're shielding alone. There's no religious subtext, they're just people who want to help other people by doing what those people need, not what they think they should need.

Pre covid the methodist Church rented an industrial unit and had a soft play and cafe there. Non profit, so very cheap. And it was just a soft play and cafe, no religion at all. In fact if you didn't know it was church run you'd have no clue.

But one Christmas I felt comfortable going into the church itself for the first time, because the people outside welcoming people were the people from the soft play, and I didn't feel like they would press religion on me. And they didn't, I bought some Xmas cards, and tea and cake, and DD played with the craft stuff they gave her. It was lovely. But if I had wanted to explore a spiritual relationship with them then I would have felt very comfortable doing so.

I think the upshot is that you can't encourage people into religion, they will come to you if they want to. The important bit is being there if they come, and being the place they think to come to. For that you need to already be in their lives in some way, without pushing them away by actively trying to push faith onto them.

[quote BackforGood]@treeeeemendous well, it wasn't highlighted in any of the Prevent courses I've attended

@Elphame and yet, many families do appreciate the fact that someone is still thinking of them after the service, and come back and say that to the Churches that offer invitations to future services and events. Invitations remember - thereby offering a choice to people, or letting people know an event is happening. Quite different from a demand.[/quote]
Once maybe - but they wouldn't take no for an answer!

I’ve always felt a sense of peace in churches - God is there. Sometimes I like to go in and sit for a quiet moment :)