“If everybody always lies to you, the consequence is not that you believe the lies, but rather that nobody believes anything any longer.”  —Hannah Arendt

With people spending hours on Instagram to tweak the lighting of a selfie or choosing only to post three vacation pictures from a camera roll of hundreds, it seems that everyone has become their own public relations officer seeking to publicize the very best version of themselves. Yet, despite all this effort to cast the most polished version of our lives into the newsfeeds of friends, family and coworkers, we can be painfully unaware of how the world actually perceives us.

That’s often the case not just for ourselves as individuals, but also the groups that we affiliate with in our community. Those associations can have a distorting effect on not just how we view our own lives, but also how we perceive groups with different beliefs than our own. That is no more acute than in the two most influential institutions in American life: politics and religion. The heated rhetoric that is bursting at the seams of cable news and social media seems to reinforce the goodness of one point of view, while assuming the worst about anyone who holds a different opinion.

Ground zero for this phenomenon is the modern perception of American evangelicals. The term has become a lightning rod in American society. While Republicans and conservative Christians see a group that does its best to live out the gospel message and love those around them, Democrats and people from other faith groups often characterize evangelicals as narrow-minded bigots attempting to stifle progress in the U.S. But what does the average American think of evangelicals?

Barna put a survey in the field days after the 2018 midterm elections to assess how evangelicals are viewed by the American public at large. As a political scientist, I am becoming increasingly convinced that Americans view evangelicals as a distinctly political phenomenon and, as such, understanding how political partisanship shapes views of this group seems especially helpful.

While analyzing the data, I separated the sample into self-identified political affiliation—Republicans, Democrats and Independents—then calculated to find what percentage of each group views evangelicals in a positive or negative light. My initial hunch was quickly confirmed after some very simple analysis.

Only one in 10 Republicans (of any religious affiliation) sees evangelicals in a negative light, while nearly half say that they have a positive impression. Compare that to the results from Democrats—just one in five has a positive outlook on evangelicals, while four in 10 view them negatively. It’s also noteworthy that while political independents don’t perceive evangelicals like political partisans do, it’s clear that their opinions are closer to Democrats than to Republicans. The impression here is that the Republican viewpoint is unique among the American population.

In addition, the survey included 20 different terms that could possibly describe evangelicals. Using the partisan identification previously described, I calculated the share of each partisan group that checked the box beside each of the descriptors. The results provide some context for why Democrats view evangelicals more negatively, while Republicans have a warmer perception.

The terms chosen most frequently by Democrats were: politically conservative and religiously conservative, narrow minded, homophobic and uptight. The ones that Republicans selected were: religiously conservative (but not politically conservative), caring, hopeful and friendly. It would almost appear that these partisan affiliations are talking about two completely different religious groups. Democrats seem to be pointing out some of the worst qualities they perceive about evangelicals, while Republicans are quick to emphasize positive characteristics.

The one that is the most puzzling to me is that while Democrats believe that evangelicals are both religiously and politically conservative, Republicans are much less likely to believe that evangelicals are politically conservative. I think this illustrates a central fact in American politics: Each side perceives their political viewpoints as pragmatic and moderate, while the other political party’s platform is viewed as extreme. In essence, we’ve lost a sense of what the “middle” really means.

It would be easy for evangelicals to look over these results and immediately become defensive. Retorts like, “that’s just what the media / their friends / the world tells them to believe,” are often quick to roll off the tongue when confronted with data like this. However, I would recommend that evangelicals lay down their defenses and try, as best as they can, to put themselves in the shoes of those who think about the world differently than they do. As Hannah Arendt alludes, it’s easy to believe that the other side is being lied to, but it’s much more difficult to believe that we are lying to ourselves.

Evangelicals do have a perception problem. It’s fair to say that some of that is media-driven, but it would also be appropriate to say that some of it is self-inflicted. Often, the focus remains on the heated rhetoric and divisive language used by some people of faith to articulate their beliefs, when it should be on the simple, even unnoticed acts of kindness that evangelicals engage in daily.

There’s no simple way to fix this problem of perception. Instead, I am reminded of Paul’s admonition to the church in Galatia: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” The only way to change the narrative around evangelicals is for them to not grow tired of doing what is good.

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Dr. Ryan Burge is an assistant professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University. He has published over a dozen articles in peer-reviewed academic journals as well co-founded the website Religion in Public (https://religioninpublic.blog), which is a platform for social scientists to make their work accessible to a wider audience. He is the pastor of First Baptist Church of Mt. Vernon, Illinois.

Feature image by Steve Houghton-Burnett on Unsplash

The post Guest Column: The Evangelical Identity Crisis appeared first on Barna Group.

Data show that while a majority of young adults have delayed having children, there is a small percentage who have chosen to begin a family. Who exactly are the 35 percent of young adults who, unlike the majority of their peers, have children? Barna wanted to know more about this segment—who represent a growing minority of their generation, a counter to many stereotypes about young adults’ delayed adolescence and a fresh area of research. Below is a Q&A excerpt from The Connected Generation report featuring Dorit Reichstein Hejslet, Communications for Open Doors Denmark and mother to three children, and Konstantin Kruse, a pastor living in Germany and father to two children.

Barna: Do you think the approach of parents in your age group will be different from that of previous generations?

Dorit: We are scrutinized every day in the media about what we should and should not do in order not to screw up our kids. We are told that we as parents are solely responsible for our children’s mental and physical well-being, and we have to be almost perfect. There is a lot of shaming toward parents today. I have a hard time relaxing. I am constantly focused on doing my very best and that sometimes makes me a worried, anxious parent.

Barna: Do you feel different from non-parents in your generation?

Konstantin: Many of my closest friends are also in my generation and have kids. I think differences between parents and non-parents in my generation are the differences in the amount of responsibility. When you have kids you spend your time, energy and money differently. Parents are also typically not as flexible with the schedule as perhaps those without kids.

Barna: How has the responsibility of being a parent affected your faith practice?

Konstantin: The hope is that they see what a natural and authentic relationship with Jesus looks like—whether it is serving the community, leading in church or how I love my family. I understand that it starts with me being an example for my family so that they can see what it looks like to serve the Lord—and through this example they will then hopefully also know and serve him.

Dorit: It is so much harder to focus on singing, praying or listening to the sermon with kids at church. To be touched by the Word and the Spirit is hard because I am constantly interrupted. I have to give a word of encouragement to a fellow church member with my baby on my hip. It might not feel very holy or like it used to, but it is my kind of discipline and spiritual devotion, and I think God knows how devoted it really is.

Barna: As you think about the next 10 years, what would you like to see happen in your life?

Dorit: We are renovating an old house. It’s our dream to see this turn into a home and a base for us and our children. I want to bless others through our home. I want to settle in the town where we moved and plant deep roots, show love to this city, serve my neighborhood by showing them Jesus and his love.

Konstantin: In the next 10 years, I would like to support my wife in her calling and would love to see my kids loving Jesus and see the Church thriving. Personally, I would love to become a better leader and do my best to help others find their own purpose and calling in ministry.

Photo by J Carter on Pexels

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There are plenty of conflicting stereotypes about Millennials: Are we the laziest generation or the hardest working? The most entitled or the most open-handed? The least religious or the most devout in new, misunderstood ways? The most connected or the least connected?

When we started The Connected Generation, we referred to it internally as “the global Millennials study.” It was presented to me as an opportunity to understand, test and, as needed, affirm or reject the messages we so often hear about the Millennial generation—my generation. This was one of my first projects since completing grad school and joining Barna Group, and I did not take this opportunity lightly. Working alongside our research partners at World Vision, under the guidance of David Kinnaman and with the greatest coworkers I could imagine, I was privileged to be the lead researcher and help create a first-of-its-kind study that would well represent this closely observed yet still misunderstood collection of young adults: The Connected Generation.

To be successful in this study, the first thing I had to do was push past preconceptions about the Millennial mindset and definition. As an Australian church leader reminded us during the early weeks of our work, the term “Millennial” has a lot of American connotations too often projected onto other nations. Similarly, given my background in sociology, I have always thought of my Millennial status as a bit of a dual personality. Which of my interests and qualities are innately mine, and which are products or projections of society? Is my daily, diagnosed battle with functional depression unique to me, or is it connected to the time and place in which I have been raised (or, perhaps, is it both)?

My job sometimes involves using data to separate stereotypes from truth, and being a Millennial sometimes feels like living in between the two. For me personally, it means fighting for what I love (OK, even if that includes vinyl records and avocado toast) just as much as it means rejecting the assumptions of laziness, self-righteousness and entitlement placed upon me by other generations. It means finding comfort in the fact that nearly a quarter of 18-to-35-year-olds around the world told us that they often feel “lonely and isolated from others,” reassuring me that I am not alone in my own struggles.

After 15,000+ online interviews across 25 countries in 9 languages, our team dug deeper into the truths about Millennials and their friends in the leading edge of Gen Z (specifically, adults ages 18 to 35). We produced a printed study of our key findings, debuted the research through a live webcast and crafted country reports that offer an opportunity for us to share a story of hope with church leaders around the world. It’s because of the latter that, in October of 2019—almost a year after the study’s conception—I presented findings from The Connected Generation to a group of just over 100 church leaders in Singapore. While the gathering in Singapore seemed small, it was incredibly symbolic and a reminder of the variety of experiences we had fought to capture through our research. I started my presentation by reminding attendees that while I may be the expert of this international study, they are the experts on faith leadership and young adults in their country. The church leaders attended not because someone from Barna Group traveled across the world to speak with them, but rather because someone had robust, representative data about young adults in their nation. No projections or stereotypes.

All of these experiences—conducting the research, being on the publication team, speaking on a panel for our Faith for the Future webcast, producing regional reports and traveling to Asia—have greatly impacted my view of Millennials. The Connected Generation has been an incredible opportunity to learn about not just the effects of global hyper-connectivity, but also the beautiful, diverse expressions of Christians around the world, within a single generation. Just as I charge this research to re-invent the generational narrative, I also have a healthier understanding of where I stand within it. Just as I reject some of the assumptions about my age group, I also now confidently embrace the story of a passionate, hopeful and resilient generation.

The post Barna Takes: Using Research to Counter Millennial Stereotypes appeared first on Barna Group.

The Connected Generation project launched with Faith for the Future, a live, free event where leaders from Barna and World Vision revealed the main findings—some sobering, some hopeful—uncovered by this global study. The team was joined by panels of experts and ministers, as well as viewers from 88 countries and six continents.

A key finding highlighted in the study is that only one in three young people (32%) says that “someone believes in me.” Below, read responses from some of the leaders who joined Barna during the webcast—available as a free replay until Nov. 1—as they speak into this astonishing statistic, share stories from personal experience and offer valuable applications for the Church.

Faith Leaders Comment on the Findings
“For me, that’s been one of the key things about my life is that at different points, older, wiser people have invested in me, said they believed in me and actually taken a risk on me. And that’s the reason I’m here today really, is that people have invested in me and taken a risk on me …

“One of the things I fear about the Church is that, generally speaking, the Church will naturally go up in age and inward in focus. And it’s only intentionally that it will downward in age and outward in focus. So, we want to go down and out, not up and in. And one of the ways that we can do that is by spotting and raising up and releasing people into their leadership potential.

“[Millennials] and Gen Z, they want to be involved, they want to be part of it, they’re open to engaging with the Church. But they want to have responsibility, they want to have ownership and they want to feel like they belong. And that’s an opportunity, I think, for the Church to not just criticize this generation and go after them, but to actually call out the best in them and help them to thrive and succeed.” –Stephen Foster, UK National Director at Alpha International

“That statistic is staggering, but I also can understand why it’s true because the man that mentored me and stepped into my life, I had to chase him. He was the director of one of the largest youth theater companies in the world, … his name was Freddie Hendricks. He was the first man, besides my father, that really let me know that greatness was available for me, that I had worth and that God could use my life to do some incredible things.” –Sam Collier, Communicator & Author

“I’ve been gifted with a lot of people who saw me differently than dominant culture. So that began with the woman from the Salvation Army who saw me—I was a juvenile delinquent addicted to crack with a massive attitude and a criminal record—and she kind of went all the way through all of those barriers and saw, I guess, Jesus in me, saw sacredness in me and called it out. And that led to an encounter I had with Jesus where I suddenly saw that God was for me and not against me. It wasn’t a long laborsome connection—it was really just someone who saw sacredness in me…” –Danielle Strickland, Speaker, Author & Social Justice Advocate

“I had many people who believed in me and I think that was the problem because by the time I got to college, they started to die and the circle of people who believed in me got a lot smaller. I was blessed enough to have a number of people, but it was very scary to see that my circle was shrinking. What does it mean to go from having eight people who have your back and love you, believe in you and want to see the best in you, to having six, and then four? And the more it shrank, the more I was freaked out.

“I had to realize that you have to build some relationships that aren’t going to be so organic. Like, every now and then, you might have to hunt someone down … and you have to actually go out there and create [relationships] and I think that’s difficult for Millennials. We have a hard time thinking we have to risk or put ourselves out there, possibly even be embarrassed behind getting someone to believe in us. So, I think the fact that we actually have to put in some work might really contribute to that [statistic].” –Rev. Brianna Parker, Founder & Curator of the Black Millennial Café

If you missed the webcast, are interested in viewing it again or want to share it with a friend, visit theconnectedgeneration.com to watch the free replay, only available until November 1.

The post Who Believed in You? Leaders Tell Barna About Their Mentors appeared first on Barna Group.

I’m sure that many people have gone to church growth conferences or seminars that include lengthy discussions surrounding young people and how they fit into the future of American Christianity. A lot of those discussions likely center around making sure they come back to the church that they grew up in. That’s a key part of a church maintaining its membership, attendance and budget. Without the younger generation returning to faith, a church is left with a difficult growth strategy: winning over new converts. It’s incumbent upon churches to carry their legacy forward among the next generation.

It goes without saying that a healthy church is one that contains a good mix of age ranges. However, many vibrant churches look like a two-humped camel. They have a large and active youth group and a significant population of people who are either retired or close to retirement age. But what about those in the middle: people in their twenties, thirties or forties who often have children?

Understanding the Life Cycle Effect
Social scientists who study the relationship between age and church attendance have come up with a term to describe the way people move in and out of church as they grow older: the life cycle effect, visualized below.

If you’ll allow some generalizations, the life cycle effect is commonly explained like this: Typically, young people attend church at a fairly high rate as they move through their grade school and high school years. Often, this is because their parents require their attendance, though many also enjoy youth group trips and activities. However, as they graduate high school and move into college or career, large shares of them begin to drift away from home and many of the social institutions that were crucial in their early development. A young person’s twenties are usually filled with lots of volatility. We can assume this season often includes a lot of moves, job changes and romantic relationships.

Eventually, the lives of these young people begin to stabilize. They find a long-term partner, often marry, and usually have children. As their children move into school age, they want them to have the same type of moral foundation that they grew up with, so they head back to church. What happens to the parents as those children grow up and become adults? Either they realize that the Church fulfills a crucial role in their spiritual and / or social lives and become even more committed to their faith community—or they can’t wait until their kids move away so they can stop going to church on Sunday morning.

This life cycle effect is something that many pastors and church leaders bank on. They say to themselves: “Oh, don’t worry about those twentysomethings. Wait until they have kids. They will eventually come back.”

But is that really what’s going to happen? What does the data say?

I broke the General Social Survey into birth cohorts, which are five-year windows in which individuals were born. The theory here is that these groups of people experienced the same world events at basically the same age. (The Great Depression probably had a much different psychological and political impact on a 20-year-old than a 60-year-old, for instance. Cohort analysis takes that into account.) Then I calculated the average church attendance for each birth cohort in age groups ranging from 18–25 to those 65 and over. That’s displayed below with 95 percent confidence intervals indicated by the shaded ribbons. This graph is just the “Baby Boomer” generation.

Notice anything consistent? There’s that trademark hump when each birth cohort moves into the 36–45 age range. That’s exactly what the life cycle effect would predict: People settle down, they have kids, and they return to church. But what about the younger generations?

The graph below are the birth cohorts from 1965–1969 to 1980–1984. Notice anything different about these lines? The hump is there in the oldest birth cohort, just like it was in the prior graph. But things started changing around 1970. That trend line is completely flat—those people didn’t return to church when they moved into their thirties. You can see the beginnings of a hump among those born between 1975 and 1979, but in the next birth cohort the hump is actually inverted. That trademark “return to church”—which pastors and church leaders have relied on for decades—might be fading.

Intentionality Is Key When Reaching Young Adults
This should sound an alarm for people concerned with church growth. Many pastors are standing at the pulpit on Sunday morning and seeing fewer and fewer of their former youth group members returning to the pews when they move into their late twenties and early thirties. No church should assume that this crucial part of the population is going to return to active membership as their parents once did.

I think one path forward is for churches to become intentional about providing welcoming and engaging spaces for parents of infants and toddlers. Things like free childcare during the worship service should be just the beginning. Events that allow exhausted parents the chance to talk to other people their age without having to watch their children like hawks would be a welcome relief. Churches should be encouraging groups like “Mothers of Preschoolers” (MOPS) to meet in their spaces. If young people think that going to church is just going to consist of trying to keep their toddler from screaming the entire time, then staying home seems like a good option. And, if they find a church to be a welcoming space when their children are still toddlers, it stands to reason that they will be more likely to continue their attendance as their children grow older.

The data is speaking a clear message: the assumptions that undergirded church growth from two decades ago no longer apply. If churches are sitting back and just waiting for all their young people to flood back in as they move into their thirties, they are likely in for a rude awakening. Inaction now could be creating a church that does not have a strong future.

—

Dr. Ryan Burge is an assistant professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University. He has published over a dozen articles in peer-reviewed academic journals as well co-founded the website Religion in Public (https://religioninpublic.blog), which is a platform for social scientists to make their work accessible to a wider audience. He is the pastor of First Baptist Church of Mt. Vernon, Illinois.

Feature image by Helena Lopes on Pexels

The post Guest Column: Young People Will Come Back to Church, Right? appeared first on Barna Group.

Whenever Barna releases findings from a study, one of our aims is that it might be easy to glimpse the person behind the percentage. Our goal is that readers wouldn’t engage with the findings from a distance, but would be able to recognize their neighbors, their congregations, their families—and, yes, themselves—in the research. That can be an aha moment, when the numbers and tables become animated by one’s context, and that’s when, we hope, the research might be turned into action.

Our own team is not immune to this effect. I’d have to try hard to not see myself in the work. Some examples from recent projects and partnerships: For our Households of Faith study, I was challenged to find myself represented among the “couple households,” a comfortable group that, the data suggest, have to be quite intentional about incorporating spiritual rhythms and hospitality into their routines. In our Christians at Work report, I was heartened to align myself with ambitious Millennials who want to find their callings and infuse their careers with meaning. Most recently, The Connected Generation—Barna’s largest project yet—inevitably became an introspective effort for myself and some of my Millennial and Gen Z coworkers, as we partnered with World Vision to survey 15,000+ of our generational peers (18–35-year-olds) in 25 countries around the world.

One of the major findings from this international study struck but did not surprise me: Young adults today are, well, a little tense. Anxiety about important decisions, uncertainty about the future and fear of failure are among respondents’ most commonly reported emotions. These worries are often tied up in vocation, relationship status or financial means—all things that tend to be unsettled for this age group. Near-constant connection to and emotional investment in what’s going on around the world is a defining trait of my generation, but more personal, supportive connections aren’t quite so common; only one in three young adults feels someone deeply cares for or believes in them. People of faith may experience stronger community or well-being, the data show—but Barna has long documented this generations’ barriers to belief, including questions about human suffering or a feeling that communities of worship just aren’t appropriately speaking to big issues or daily life.

In short: I get it. Anxiety has been a pattern throughout my life, growing more pronounced in my adulthood. Beyond trying to crack the mystery of my mental health, when I look at my relationship to others, to the news, to productivity, to sleep and to devices, I can acknowledge the ways this digital age and my own age might aggravate the condition. Staring down, treating and learning to deal with my anxiety is a day-to-day effort, at times an urgent one. So I, too, have been disappointed on the occasions when I’ve witnessed people in the Church fumble discussions about anxiety, or shrug off a “generational angst” without delving into some of the issues (spiritual, psychological, societal, etc.) that might fuel it.

Thankfully, I can also attest to the power and relief of being in faith communities that have addressed these topics well—thoroughly, compassionately, holistically. One example comes from my own father, a pastor in Florida, who did a series of teachings on anxiety earlier this year. After validating the subject from the pulpit over multiple weeks, the church provided attendees with booklets including scriptures, readings and resources to take home and return to.

And I’ll never forget a Lenten service at my church in Nashville last year in which, in lieu of a sermon, we spent the morning meditating on and singing of peace—as well as its absence. We were asked to ponder: What is peace? Do we believe it is even possible today, as we consider the headlines, as we weather the storms in our own lives, in the nation and around the world? The service didn’t rush to feel-good messages or quick fixes. Instead, it allowed room for us to sit in silence, which was challenging at points. But I left feeling less alone. No small thing, the research tells us.

Working on this study, it was difficult to chronicle—and relate to—the doubts, isolation and anxiety plaguing many young adults around the world. I can understand that some might feel an urge to either despair over or dismiss these uncomfortable realities. But I hope faith leaders can go deeper, and young adults like myself need them to. More than disembodied data, these findings represent the experiences of the bulk of a generation—and act as reminders to receive and make the peace we are offered in Christ, the kind we’re told exceeds our understanding and guards our hearts and minds.

The post Barna Takes: Peace for an Anxiety-Ridden Generation appeared first on Barna Group.

Friends of Barna:

Many of you may remember when Barna president David Kinnaman’s wife, Jill, was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2017. Since completing her treatment, Jill has had regular MRIs to monitor any changes, and she’s been sailing along with nothing to report.

This week, however, Jill’s scan showed two small areas of tumor growth on the left side (her previous tumor was on the right hemisphere). We are so thankful for those regularly scheduled MRIs! Jill has had no symptoms to indicate any change, so the scan has made it possible for the oncologist to detect cellular changes at an early stage. In fact, the doctor has cleared her to go on a long-awaited trip to Australia and New Zealand this month with David and their son, Zack.

Would you pray with us for Jill, David and the whole Kinnaman family? Pray for their precious time together on this once-in-a-lifetime trip, that they would comfort and encourage each other—and have some epic fun! Pray for wisdom as they decide with Jill’s doctors what course of treatment to take. Pray that they draw close to Jesus and seek him at every step, especially when the way isn’t clear.

Thank you for walking alongside the Kinnaman family and the Barna team as we follow Jesus through this season! As you might expect, David and Jill will be focused on her treatment and their kids, so please check the website www.prayforJill.com for updates from the family.

Thank you for praying.

Sincere thanks,

The Barna team

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In light of Pastor Appreciation Month, which takes place annually during the month of October, Barna thanks the clergy and ministry leaders serving the global and local Church. A focus in our recent research has been equipping elder leaders to think about their legacy and young leaders to step into more senior roles—particularly as pastors increasingly represent an aging demographic. Below is a Q&A excerpt from the Leadership Transitions report, which highlights new data surrounding pastoral change within the Church.

Originally from Australia, Mandy Smith is lead pastor of University Christian Church, a campus and neighborhood congregation in Cincinnati, OH. She is a regular contributor to Christianity Today and Missio Alliance and is the author of The Vulnerable Pastor: How Human Limitations Empower Our Ministry. She is also the director of Missio Alliance’s SheLeads summit and creator of The Collect, a citywide trash-to-art project. Mandy and her husband, Jamie, a New Testament professor at Cincinnati Christian University, live with their family in a little house where the teapot is always warm.

Barna: Tell us about your pastoral transition. What kind of church did you take, and what kind of leader did you succeed?

Mandy: By the time I transitioned into the senior pastor role in our congregation, I’d been associate pastor for four years, and had co-led for 18 months. It had become apparent that the lead pastor (who’d led the church for 16 years) was feeling called to justice work. He is an apostolic, courageous, justice-hearted, generous, visionary, creative, collaborative leader. He needed the space to pursue that calling.

Barna: What about the process was a challenge?

Mandy: In general the transition was quite gentle. But the change came after the pressure of “dueling callings” had been building a bit. Some of the ways the senior pastor had felt called to do justice work (such as writing and speaking at national events) had been making some people feel like he was less in touch with their local needs. That’s understandable—but it’s a conflict around a good issue: gospel calling. If I’m honest, at first I was resentful of how his other work was affecting the church and me. But at the same time I loved the work he was doing and was really proud of him. I felt torn.

Barna: How did you respond?

Mandy: I wrestled for months. What was the healthiest way to broach this conversation? I wanted to encourage him to pursue the things God was calling him to. He had been responsible for our congregation for so long, it hadn’t crossed his mind that it was okay for him to feel called to something else. As I encouraged him toward that, we decided the best path forward would be for him to transition to a part-time role, and for us to co-lead together. We had thought it would be a long-term situation, but after 18 months he stepped down, and I became lead pastor.

I had no idea as I encouraged him to pursue the things God was laying on his heart, that it would not only help him step into his calling but help me step into mine. While it was difficult at times, it was quite beautiful how God walked us both through that transition and we are still great friends. I still call him for insight on leadership here.

Barna: Looking back, what factors led to a successful transition?

Mandy: Our friendship helped us navigate the transition well. Sure, we had hard conversations, but we were able to hope for the best in each other’s motives and actions. Believing the best about the other person does wonders! I don’t think I’d change anything. It was a surprisingly smooth transition, considering he’d been lead pastor for 19 years by the time he stepped down.

Barna: What have you learned about taking over a church when your personality or demographic differs from the previous pastor?

Mandy: A gradual transition and overlap time is ideal! It was helpful that I’d already worked as associate pastor for 4 years, then co-led for 18 months before becoming the lead pastor. We went through a process (which we are just wrapping up, six years later) of gradual changes. We didn’t change the general vision (I’d been on staff before because I already valued the vision). Just changes to the specifics of how that vision is resourced and lived out.

But there could have been tremendous danger to the transition from our personal differences. I’m an introverted Australian woman who’s an artist. He is an extroverted American male who is a mathematics whiz. It helped that he is an active champion for women in ministry (not just theoretical but purposeful and proactive).

Before I came on staff, he had already walked the church through the process of welcoming women to the eldership and they’d had female pastors (campus minister, children’s pastor) preach on occasion. It was the first time they’d had a female lead pastor but he walked the congregation through those conversations. When it came to personality differences, it helped that people already knew and trusted me and so knew I wasn’t going to lead in the same way.

If I could go back in time and tell myself anything at the beginning of the process, it would be, “In every way you feel you’re different from the previous pastor, don’t be concerned that people will see it as negative.” Those differences can be strengths.

Barna: Any advice for leaders undergoing their own transition?

Mandy: The emotional and spiritual health of the pastors involved will be key as they have to lead the congregation through this transition even as they’re navigating their own transition. It was very helpful for me to have spiritual direction once I became lead pastor. I felt my differences and needed encouragement to be myself. A role like that has a way of shaping you, and not always in positive ways. I had to learn to be myself in order to bring my personal pastoral strengths and gifting into play.

Feature image by Chris Liverani on Unsplash

The post Mandy Smith on Leading Differently appeared first on Barna Group.

This fall marks the launch of The Connected Generation project, a Barna Group-World Vision partnership offering an unprecedented look at the faith and well-being of young adults today. In both scope and content, this first-of-its-kind study holds a unique place in Barna’s 30+ years of research. Let’s go behind the scenes to learn how we’ve been able to dramatically widen—and focus—the lens with which we view young adults around the world.

So, How Big Is This Study?
This project involved not only a large and international sample but also an extensive and highly collaborative survey design process. As partners in this research, World Vision staff in 20 countries aided with early input on the study formation, coordination of thought leaders and local contextualization. Here’s a peek at the numbers behind the data and how this portrait of the connected generation came to be.

The sample includes:
15,369 adults ages 18 to 35 in 25 countries
7,841 males and 7,479 females
(49 “Other / Prefer not to respond”)

The questionnaires included or covered:
9 language translations, including English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Romanian, Korean, Indonesian and Taiwanese
15 religious identity categories
630 country-specific regions
144 ethnic and racial groups
94 country-specific levels of education

Who Are We Listening To?
It’s important to acknowledge exactly who this study represents: respondents ages 18 to 35, from 25 different countries, who have an internet connection that allows them to participate in online surveys. The methodological obstacles make it difficult to conduct a study that is truly “global.” This international sample, rather, includes a more literate, educated and urban population than would be wholly representative of all of these countries. This is important context to keep in mind, as even a study as extensive as this one has its limitations.

So how to refer to these 18–35-year-olds across The Connected Generation report and resources? Adults in this age range are sometimes called Generation Y, Echo Boomers, iGen, Digital Natives and so on. Barna has chosen to use a variety of other terms for them in these pages. First, for clarity, they are often referred to as 18–35-year-olds from around the world. This age group also bridges the generations Barna would typically cover as Millennials and Gen Z, labels you’ll see occasionally in this report. The respondents may sometimes be referred to as emerging generations, this generation or young adults, the last of which we use to mean those on the lower end of the adult generations, not adolescents to whom this term is sometimes applied. Finally, for reasons made clear in the findings, we also proffer our own term: the connected generation.

What Did We Learn?
Looking at the general state of faith & well-being among 18–35-year-olds around the world, these are the stories that stand out.

• Connected but Alone

Despite being a hyper-connected and globally minded generation, many young adults say they feel lonely.

• Spiritual Openness

There is a general (and, at times, surprising) openness toward spirituality, religion and, in many cases, the Church—but less so among those who have left their faith.

• Age of Anxiety

Worry and insecurity, often tied to finances and vocation, are prominent traits among a generation that has come of age in a chaotic, complex time.

• Looking for Answers

Human suffering and global conflict are among the top issues that raise spiritual doubts for 18–35-year-olds.

• Resilient Discipleship

Across religious climates, the data point to keys for forming faithful Christ-followers, even among those Christians who lapse in religiosity.

• Longing to Make a Difference

When young adults engage with a community of worship, they’re looking for concrete teaching, opportunities to fight injustice and friends to join them along the way.

What’s Next?

 Leaders from Barna and World Vision introduced some of the major global findings through Faith for the Future, a live webcast in September 2019—we’ve already heard from pastors and leaders making use of this data in their context. The centerpiece of this project is The Connected Generation: How Christian Leaders Around the World Can Strengthen Faith & Well-Being Among 18–35-Year-Olds, a comprehensive summary of those findings launching in October 2019. You can also engage with country-specific reports and field guides, which will be rolled out over the next year on TheConnectedGeneration.com.

The post Behind the Numbers: How We Conducted a Global Study of Young Adults appeared first on Barna Group.

Over a decade and a half, we’ve been privileged to interview nearly 100,000 young people, speaking with them about everything from their social views to faith perceptions as we discover how they are beginning to shape the world around them and, of course, the future Church. In partnership with World Vision, Barna has produced a first-of-its-kind study that dramatically widens—and focuses—the lens with which we view young adults around the world. We’re calling it, and them, The Connected Generation.

Last week, we launched this study with a free, live webcast—Faith for the Future—and shared the key research findings that were uncovered from surveying 15,000+ young adults ages 18 to 35 in 25 countries and nine different languages. The broadcast also featured informative interviews and panel discussions with faith leaders and experts from around the world, many of whom are Millennials themselves.

Viewers in 88 countries and six continents tuned in to watch the webcast, which is still available for free replay until November 1st. Below, you will find feedback from leaders who plan to incorporate what they learned from the webcast and this research in their specific context. (Responses are lightly edited for length and clarity.)

“‘Resilient disciple’ is now a part of our vocabulary, and we are moving toward identifying that within our church … both current / active resilient disciples and how we can move toward developing resilient disciples within our context.” –Seven Oaks Church

“My application from the webcast is this weird mix of deep sorrow and abundant joy. My soul weeps for a whole group of young, amazing people who do not feel nurtured, supported and encouraged for who they are as God’s awesome creations. This is crushing! Equally, my joy rises because as a byproduct of this webcast, Barna, by pointing out statistics, enables us to focus on what to do with Jesus’ endless love, which is reach the broken generation not with a fast fix, but with ears to listen, hearts to connect and compassion to extend.” –William Hagenbuch, author of Jesus Cloned

“Thinking of the statistics given gave me more passion to make sure ‘my kids’ end up in the resilient disciple category, not the prodigals.” –Becky, Youth Minister at ELCA Youth Group

“As the missions director, I want to use the information learned to make sure our church is getting involved in a meaningful way and find ways to connect to this generation through the outreach and missions that we are participating in. As the women’s director, I want to find ways to train our older generation to see past the ‘labels’ and find the Jesus in every person. I want them to embrace that this generation needs people to believe in them. It also confirmed for me that the mentorship program we are trying to build IS necessary!” –Toni Mihal, Director of Adult Ministries

“This gives us more specific insights on our messaging and future content development with younger audiences (specifically dealing with debilitating anxiety).” –Joe Padilla, Cofounder & CEO of Mental Health Grace Alliance (The Grace Alliance)

“I think this will inform the ways in which we talk about developing college students. Our staff work in partnership with local churches, and I think this has a great deal of relevance for integrating college students into the life of the local church. I also think it helps to know more about some of the motivations (broadly) of students. … We’ve had some well-informed conversations about developing students into student leaders, and I think that Barna’s research supports what we have long known to be true. It’s affirming to be sure, but it means that whatever doesn’t help us to develop student leaders needs to take a back seat to that task.” –Michael Swanson, Assistant Director of Training at Coalition for Christian Outreach (CCO)

“In my upcoming board meeting, we will be discussing ways to implement some of the research findings in our local, state and national meetings.” –Elizabeth Hodges, Director at Women Nationally Active for Christ (WNAC)

“[The research] will infuse my communications both personally and professionally. The information helped create an enlightened mindset so that I view this generation with more understanding and a greater hopefulness. … One specific insight that stuck with me was that this generation ‘doesn’t just want to know that Christianity is true, they want to know it is good.’ That is powerful in how ministry approaches this generation as a whole—it’s a very different perspective from previous generations who were not that cynical.” –Peg Jones, Director of Marketing, AAEO at North American Mission Board

“We have been heading down this same road and were confirmed in many of our ministry concepts. Hopefully, this will help us as we try to serve and interact with the broader community we are part of.” –Josh Cramer, Cole Community Church

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I’ve been on a search for the last 12 years to understand what makes faith formation possible in and among the next generation of Christians. We’ve referred to it internally as the Faith that Lasts project, and it’s been my driving motivation even as we worked on unChristian and You Lost Me.

I know as a dad to teens and a twentysomething—and as a friend to many Christian leaders—that we’re all searching for insight about what can be done to raise resilient disciples in this pressure-packed, faith-depleting age.

Today I’m thrilled to tell you about my new book: Faith for Exiles: 5 Ways for a New Generation to Follow Jesus in Digital Babylon, releasing on September 3.

The questions at the heart of Faith for Exiles are:

• What practices distinguish resilient young disciples among young Christians?
• Why do young people stay faithful?
• What can we do to make a difference?

My coauthor, Mark Matlock, and I are convinced that the biblical concept of exile is the right way to think about Christians’ relationship to the current culture, which we at Barna have been calling “digital Babylon.” Furthermore, when we talk with young adults they resonate deeply with the concept of exile—they feel like exiles, being torn between the expectations of the Church and challenges of the world.

We discovered that resilient disciples are the 10 percent of young Jesus followers whose faith is thriving in exile conditions. They are not only sustaining childhood faith into adulthood, against all odds. They are somehow expanding and deepening their commitment to Christ even as digital Babylon does its worst to dazzle, distract and dominate them.

Faith for Exiles is their story. It’s good news about what churches are doing right to form resilient young disciples.

Mark and I bring to this project everything we’ve learned over five combined decades of working with, thinking about and praying for young adults and teens—and we can’t wait to share what we’ve discovered.

David Kinnaman
President, Barna Group

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