A recent article in an online edition of The Atlantic calls attention to a problem for many urban churches: the care and feeding of their old building is sometimes more than the dwindling congregation can bear. The article raises an interesting question: what are - or should be - the obligations of a faith community to maintain a building that has become too much for them?
This question has many dimensions: property rights versus community obligations; free exercise of religion versus coercion by the state; and so on. It invites thoughtful discussion, even disagreement.
When the government tells you you must do something, even if that something is not to tear a building down, that is what lawyers call “a taking.” You have been deprived of a property right - the right to level your building and start over. Or to sell it to a developer who will do the same. Courts have ruled in the past that preservation of a city’s cultural heritage is a legitimate reason for “taking.” Less clear is how or whether owners should be compensated for this encumbrance on their property. One might reasonably assert that an asset claimed by the public should in some way be paid for by those making the claim.
There is little doubt that historic churches contribute enormously to the fabric of cities. Sometimes they seem to be the only human-scaled building in a super-sized downtown.
But sometimes the value of the land beneath an urban church can exceed the replacement cost of the building, tempting a faith community to leave their drafty, leaky stone money pit for a newer, if more modest, building farther from the city center.
There are several troubling things about this scenario, and the issue of property rights is the least of them. For one thing, I am of the strong opinion that churches should not abandon the city, regardless of the leaky roof or the value of the land. God’s love for the city is found throughout Scripture, and we should love what he loves.
Second, a congregation in a historic building that can’t afford the heating bill has a larger problem than operating costs. The inability to meet expenses is a symptom of a sick congregation; one suspects that the Gospel is proclaimed a little less than boldly when a beautiful urban building can’t generate enough attendance to keep the lights on. What might be needed more than a downsized building is some new blood in the pulpit, or on the board, or both.
Third, and most troubling to me, is the inability of a struggling church to see what they have. To trade a magnificent stone building with carved wood beams and stained glass for a utilitarian space in midtown or the suburbs is to be an Esau congregation - selling its birthright for a mess of pottage. The reason cities and preservation boards value these old churches enough to list them is that they are magnificent. What church walks away from magnificence on the excuse of poverty? A church with an impoverished imagination and, I dare say, an impoverished faith.
In the final analysis, it is not property rights (or wrongs) that should determine whether an urban church stays or sells. It is a Biblical understanding of beauty, of God’s own extravagance to us, and of his enduring love for the city and its people that should compel a troubled congregation to seek to stay in a beautiful home and to cherish it, the same way Christ cherishes his bride, the local church.
(Photo by David Greusel.)
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Comments (10)
To say that these people have an impoverished faith is unfair.
Yet, maintaining a beautiful building is a sort of ministry. There are people who would never go to a pole barn-style building with amped music, who would be drawn to a beautiful building with quality traditional, liturgical worship. My husband is one of them, so I am very glad churches like this still exist.
God can use us in any building if we have willing hearts.
After the service the woman told us about her church. Like her, most of the members of the congregation had moved to the suburbs. Attendance had been going down for years. She wanted my advice on what might be done to revive her church. I can't remember what I said. I remember struggling in my mind to say something true yet kind.
I wanted to dig down into her question about reviving her church. What would that mean to her? If the building was full of a thriving Hispanic congregation with services in Spanish, would she identify that as a renewal, or did she want back the old glory days of that congregation? I suspected the latter and she gave some indication to that effect.
My own home church has a beautiful facility and an older congregation that it dwarfs. They want the church to be different, but only different on their terms including worship style and even political stance.
It looks to me like older, beautiful urban churches find themselves in problems as much for the lack of real vision on the part of the believers who attend them as anything else.
But this issue is quite complicated. For some of these communities, a place where congregations can all meet together is important. I've seen cases where wealthier churches help out poorer churches with building maintenance and upkeep. In fact, the last three churches that my wife and I have attended did this sort of thing.
However, there comes a time when we have to realize that keeping the building simply because it has been a church for such a long time is simply a tradition and the tradition is enslaving a congregation. So while it may suck for congregations to move, we have to realize that this is an OK thing because in the end, the church isn't about the building - it is about God's people serving other people not real estate.
Since this is an imposition for the benefit of all, there should be a fund available so that, if a corporate body of a church cannot afford to maintain the building for its own purposes, with its own revenues, then funding for basic physical plant can be provided. Yes, there would be some church-and-state litigation, but that can be worked out. Its only the excess costs of physical maintenance that are being funded, and for a secular purpose.
Another option is to sell the building, with covenants that provide for keeping the building intact, but using it for another purpose. I am familiar with one former church building which ended up becoming an art studio, for instance.
Obviously if both parties come from the same denominational background, the transition is not too difficult. Real challenges arise when there are different polities and minor theological differences. And not to mention both church's traditions!
But these challenges aside, merging is a great way to breathe life (and money) into buildings that have good locations.