Summary
Churches across the U.S. are grappling with dwindling attendance and financial instability, forcing many to close or sell properties.
The Diocese of Buffalo has shut down 100 parishes since the 2000s and plans to close 70 more. Nationwide, church membership has dropped from 80% in the 1940s to 45% today.
Some churches repurpose their land to survive, like Atlanta’s First United Methodist Church, which is building affordable housing.
Others, like Calcium Church in New York, make cutbacks to stay open. Leaders warn of the long-term risks of declining community and support for churches.
Not conventions. A convention requires paying for a convention space, and that requires making attendees pay for admittance or getting sponsors to pay in their stead so they can sell products. That’s not community.
The power of churches is they are entirely free and not commodified. That’s what makes them communal. We’d need something like a communal boardgame hall, supported by donations that anyone can come to without needing to pay anything.
Where I live, the library serves this purpose. They even have advertised game nights for various age groups on weekly to monthly basis. Maybe reach out to your public library and see if they would host.
Do you mean that you have no library, or the library doesn’t have a game night? If the latter, you could try to start it; it’d just be a matter of getting their permission to use the space, setting a schedule, and putting up a sign. It might not take off immediately; it’d probably help if you brought a friend or two the first few times, but if there’s interest in your community, I bet folks would start coming once it became clear something was happening.
The power of churches is they are entirely free and not commodified. That’s what makes them communal. We’d need something like a communal boardgame hall, supported by donations that anyone can come to without needing to pay anything.
I think you don’t understand “Free”. They weren’t free.
Use required, at the very least, selling your soul. But more pragmatically, a flat 10% tax- which frequently funded ostentatious lifestyles of the priests and pastors; and sacrificing your children to pedos.
But sure. It created “community”…
Use required, at the very least, selling your soul.
But since souls aren’t real it was free.
But more pragmatically, a flat 10% tax-
Tithes are voluntary. Taxes are enforced at the tip of a sword or the barrel of a gun. Quiet different.
I think they meant soul as in personhood or however you want to put it, its metaphorical speech ya pedant.
Secondly tithes are socially enforced to what degree depends on what group we are talking about but at minimum there is an expectation that you pay it, you also get fuck all out of it making it a completely empty transaction unlike taxes which gives roads, fire departments, libraries, et cetera.
Around here the churches require you to submit your personal finances so that they can tell you how much you need to tithe in order to attend services.
I remember my roommate telling me his fiance was running around the house looking for the checkbook just before church. She was beside herself. He was like, WTH, I have cash if you cannot find it, we’ll just throw that in the plate. She was like, “NO, they track the amount, it has to be a CHECK.”
He was nominally Protestant, and she was Catholic. He was quite taken aback by this rather grotesque practice…these days, do they have a QR code to scan and take cash apps? I think I can guess the answer…
Honestly a community hall that fills similar roles to the library as others mention would be awesome. You could get people running community brunches on weekends, you could get holiday parties and rooms for groups to meet. You could use it to host food not bombs or other food giveaways. You could let it be what churches are supposed to be, but replace the pastor and pews with a meal space and some administrators
The power of churches is they are entirely free and not commodified.
If they belong to a denomination, that’s absolutely not true. If they don’t, they’re nearly all fundie evangelicals whose independence is solely financial, since they all believe essentially the same bullshit, and any “community” they have consists of enforcing toxic social norms and conformity to antidemocratic ideals. Good riddance. You want community, reopen bowling allies, small music venues and community dive bars.
reopen bowling allies, small music venues and community dive bars.
i.e. places you need to spend money
Indeed, it’s a real quandary. The current choices for “public” spaces have mostly been a choice between religion or commerce.
If only there were more truly public spaces for people to congregate that were neither. Where just congregating and just doing something together (or alone, but among others in the same building) was not considered a criminal act (“loitering”).
I think about this a lot. And yes, for things like board games and other meetups. A well lit, warm, safe space for people to meet in public, and without having to engage in commerce. Without having to profess a belief in some creed.
