My parish is basically an experiment in this - small, aging population, in a trendy, growing neighborhood but distinctly non religious (you'll understand the area well if you know that the local Lutheran church shut down; and was bought by an org that turned it into the "Church of Cannabis").
My parish is basically an experiment in this - small, aging population, in a trendy, growing neighborhood but distinctly non religious (you'll understand the area well if you know that the local Lutheran church shut down; and was bought by an org that turned it into the "Church of Cannabis").
My understanding is the parish was slated for closure in 2021, but because of the neighborhood factors was handed over to a missionary group instead. They came in with a lot of resources (priests, trained lay missionaries, "interns" who go door to door for a couple months) and it's still an uphill climb I think - it takes time to build that kind of culture at a parish, time for people to grow into it (like I would have said I was comfortable with the idea of evangelization, but now I'm watching this happen and thinking no way would I want to go knock on doors). I would put no better than 50/50 odds on the parish still being open in 5 yrs
That's extremely interesting, thank you for posting that. I expect more success in the kind of parish areas where there's some degree of receptivity to the Christian message, not someplace where a "church of cannabis" might gain traction with locals. Still, the whole point is to contend - just maybe prioritize that work, right?
My parish is basically an experiment in this - small, aging population, in a trendy, growing neighborhood but distinctly non religious (you'll understand the area well if you know that the local Lutheran church shut down; and was bought by an org that turned it into the "Church of Cannabis").
My understanding is the parish was slated for closure in 2021, but because of the neighborhood factors was handed over to a missionary group instead. They came in with a lot of resources (priests, trained lay missionaries, "interns" who go door to door for a couple months) and it's still an uphill climb I think - it takes time to build that kind of culture at a parish, time for people to grow into it (like I would have said I was comfortable with the idea of evangelization, but now I'm watching this happen and thinking no way would I want to go knock on doors). I would put no better than 50/50 odds on the parish still being open in 5 yrs
That's extremely interesting, thank you for posting that. I expect more success in the kind of parish areas where there's some degree of receptivity to the Christian message, not someplace where a "church of cannabis" might gain traction with locals. Still, the whole point is to contend - just maybe prioritize that work, right?