Have Sunday School Classes Increased the Number of Unchurched Christians?

Tim Wright at Patheos has written an article in which he suggests that Sunday school classes are a possible contributor to the number of unchurched people today.

Wright sees the separation of children from the worshiping community as the central reason why many of them have left the church after finishing their Sunday school programs. He writes:

We have raised the largest unchurched generation in the history of our country…perhaps one of the reasons has to do with the Sunday School shift…as we shifted kids out of the main worship experience, en-culturated them in their own program, and robbed them of any touch points with the rest of the body of Christ. Another way of saying it: by segregating our kids out of worship, we never assimilated them into the life of the congregation.

Wright ties the rise in the number of Sunday school classes to the desire to connect with Boomers.

Church leaders sensed that Boomer parents wanted the one hour break from their kids—that they wanted to focus on their own spiritual life for an hour away from the distraction of their children. And, again, we assumed, reasonably so, that worship targeted to adult boomers would not be all that engaging for kids. So dynamic Sunday school programs were created to engage the kids at their level in their language while their parents were in worship.

While the rise in Sunday school classes might have been beneficial to Boomers, Wright contends that without a connection to the liturgical life and communal life of the church, children in Sunday school programs did not have the tools to transition from Sunday school to liturgical worship.

The fact that young adults today were separated from the liturgical and communal life of the Church as children is not the only reason why they are leaving the Church; however, their separation from the worshiping community as children has not helped keep them in the Church today.

There is a need today to engage our children in liturgical and communal worship so that they can be formed in the Christian faith early on. Even early Christians understood this simple principle. I think that they practiced infant communion because they understood the importance of forming the faithful in the faith and liturgy of the Church from a very early age.

Wright’s argument might be a bit of a stretch, but I think he is on to something.

Nathan Chase

Nathan P. Chase is Assistant Professor of Liturgical and Sacramental Theology at Aquinas Institute of Theology in St. Louis, MO. He has contributed a number of articles to the field of liturgical studies, including pieces on liturgy in the early Church, initiation, the Eucharist, inculturation, and the Western Non-Roman Rites, in particular the Hispano-Mozarabic tradition. His first book The Homiliae Toletanae and the Theology of Lent and Easter was published in 2020. His second monograph, published in 2023, is titled The Anaphoral Tradition in the ‘Barcelona Papyrus.’

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Comments

11 responses to “Have Sunday School Classes Increased the Number of Unchurched Christians?”

  1. John Mann

    I don’t see much value in exposing 6-year olds to Mass at all. A year before First Communion seems like a good time to start.

    I don’t think I recall a single homily from my time as a young altar-server. What sticks is the ritual and the music. Keep those around and you’ll keep the nostalgia in these Catholics until old age. On the other hand, few of my altar-serving peers still attend Mass. They got nothing but the ritual and music. So the challenge is to present the Mass to youth as timeless yet relevant to them personally and the combination has to be seamless.

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  2. Todd Flowerday

    I think he’s got part of the puzzle. I would add cry rooms as part of the problem: the removal of very young children from the worshiping assembly. Add in the need to keep kids entertained with toys and small bits of food. Church is perceived as an adult activity and there is no clear entry into it.

    Then add youth groups: a whole parallel ministry that focuses on social life and service projects. Not integration into an adult community.

    Catholic schools probably don’t help. They conduct occasional mid-week workship and reconciliation services in gyms and auditoriums and promote school spirit and community above anything their parish provides.

    Mr Wright is on to something, for sure. But I suspect the indictment against church systems would be pretty broad if we looked at things even more closely.

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  3. Terri Miyamoto

    Are Sunday Schools a Catholic issue? I’ve never been to a Catholic parish that separates the kids out longer than the Children’s Liturgy of the Word, and then they come back for the Liturgy of the Eucharist. I have seen religious education classes on Sunday, but either before or after Mass, not during it. In fact, I think too much of our liturgy is “pick the kids to do it” – bringing up the gifts, special events, and so on – so that sometimes it seems like liturgy is something for the kids to do and adults to watch. I know this happens in our parish because the pastor is convinced that choosing the kids brings in the parents.

    Reply
    1. Charles Day

      @Terri Miyamoto – comment #2:
      +1

      Reply
  4. W. W. O'Bryan

    I often worship with the Hispanic population (separated out in the parish) at “their” Mass because I think they “get it” better than we do. For them, Mass is a family celebration. Small children running back and forth between parents and friends pews, people reaching across pews to comfort a crying child or shake hand, exchange a pleasantry. Just like we’d do at a large family gathering. (Thanksgiving, for instance). Everyone participates in the liturgy. Everyone seems to sing at the top of their voice. Maybe because they sing the same songs and Mass parts every Sunday – without hiding behind a book. When it’s over, I know I’ve been a part of The Sunday Celebration of the Eucharist. Most nearby parishes are almost all white, mostly rural or small town, usually older than the general population . . . so whatever it is, it’s not the Sunday Celebration of the Eucharist. The lady who passes the collection basket even smiles and thanks me when I drop my money in. Even though we don’t share the same language or culture, we may be sharing something more important – being human.

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  5. Fritz Bauerschmidt

    I agree that the Sunday-School-during-church issue is not one I’ve encountered in Catholicism. But there is, in my experience, a growing phenomenon of families bringing children for religious education (whether on a Sunday or a weeknight) but never coming to church. I would say that, on a give Sunday, we’re lucky if half of the families with kids in religious education are present in church, and our religious education classes are right before Mass, so it’s not like it involves a second trip each week.

    I realize there are lots of possible factors at play here, including the growth of athletic activities on Sunday mornings. But I also think that American Catholics have imbibed the rather unCatholic notion that religion is mainly about having certain ideas rather than participating in a sacred mystery, so they think they are doing their religious duty as parents by exposing their children to the ideas of Catholicism and see worship as optional. It makes me sad for them, because I have found that ideas will not sustain faith.

    Reply
    1. Todd Flowerday

      @Fritz Bauerschmidt – comment #4:
      I would have to observe that maybe one-third of Catholic school parents bring their kids to Church. They see the faith, at worst, as a child-sitting service, and at best, as a way to infuse the faith by intellect. Either approach relies on grace, but ignores the obligation believers have to meet God part-way.

      The way the Church handles catechesis is certainly an issue. But most commentators think we’re doomed unless we focus on adult formation–at least get the parents into the fold so they can pass the faith to the next generation, rather than delegate this task to catechists and staff.

      Reply
      1. Paul Fell

        @Todd Flowerday – comment #7:

        “Either approach relies on grace, but ignores the obligation believers have to meet God part-way.”

        This comment makes me think about the depiction of God straining from heaven to reach the hand of Adam and Adam casually lifting a finger from a reclining position to touch the hand of God. We have become such a nation of “entertain me, then I’ll listen” that even our church services have to be some type of showcase now. I recently overheard a teacher at the school say to the musicians, “What we need is lots of peppy music and hand motions!” Is this what Catholic liturgy has devolved into? Can we not find some way outside of this straightjacket into a way that feeds not only the children but the adults as well, a way that maintains the dignity of the occasion but also engages those present?

        @Terri Miyamoto – comment #2 / @Fritz Bauerschmidt – comment #6:

        I think the two of you have some culprits here. Between parents skipping CCD / PSR to go to breakfast while the kids are in class, then leaving rather than attending Mass, and Sunday sports schedules (even those from some Catholic schools) overlapping with church attendance, parishes feel compelled to compete with everything else. The real question is should we? When followers left Christ at various points or chose not to follow him in the first place due to other concerns, Christ did not change his message or soft-pedal the content. He let them make the choice. We never hear if anyone came back later and changed his or her mind, but it seems logical and likely. By the same token, if we choose as parishes to constantly compete with the current marketplace of activities on the secular marketplace’s terms, then how willing are we to deform the liturgy and our worship of God to make a dent in people’s attention? Are we tacitly saying that the market’s way is better than God’s and, therefore, are we making the market into an idol that we worship in God’s place?

  6. Scott Pluff

    Now that most people don’t see their participation in Sunday Mass and other sacraments as a deciding factor whether they end up in heaven or hell, church has become a recreational activity. Some people enjoy golf, reading, or going to the theater, and some people enjoy going to church. No one feels compelled to go to church any more than they feel compelled to play tennis.

    Perhaps it’s not that our grandparents were all so fervent in the faith, but rather that the majority of Catholics who were never that into it finally feel free to stay home.

    Sure, they still enjoy a few Catholic rites of passage: Baptism (babies are cute), First Communion (little kids are cute all dressed up), Confirmation (look, they’re all grown up now), Matrimony (actually, scratch that one!), and Funerals (church meant so much to grandma). Religious ed programs are seen as hoops to jump through to earn the sacraments. My daughter’s PSR class was around 30 until after First Communion, then dropped to 5 or 6 the following year.

    Evangelization!

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  7. Harry Tucci

    Nonsense!!!!!!!! Having taught Sunday School I can’t count the # of students that this was there only experience witb Church. The parents would drive up, barely stop to let the kids out before heading to McDonald’s or Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. The students often told me their parents did no Religious Education at home and didn’t take them to Mass. The unchurched starts at home with the unchurched Parents … an hour spiritual break from the kids? That’s the dumbest thing i’ve ever seen written about Sunday School!!!!

    Reply
  8. Donna Eschenauer

    In my new book, First Communion Liturgies (Liturgical Press, 2014), I make the point that there is something extremely formative about families worshiping together. I make the following point: In one particular parish there was once a four- and five-year old catechetical program on Sunday mornings. Parents were dropping their children off and attending to other things and not going to Mass in many cases. Gradually the program was phased out and parents were encouraged to understand that their four- and five-year old children needed to be at Mass WITH their parents – together children and adults make up the worshiping assembly.

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