Date
4-2019
Department
Rawlings School of Divinity
Degree
Doctor of Ministry (DMin)
Chair
Gregory S. Faulls
Keywords
Black Church, Church Growth, Church Decline, African American Church, Church Revitalization, Johnston County, North Carolina
Disciplines
Christianity | Practical Theology | Religion
Recommended Citation
O'Neal, Robert Allen Jr, "The Black Church and the Current Generation: A Program to Address the Decline of African-American Church Attendance in Johnston County of North Carolina" (2019). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 2024.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/2024
Abstract
This study concentrates on issues dealing with the decline of attendance in African American churches. Although long-standing statistics since the Civil Rights Era have always shown the African American Church keeping higher audience percentage than European American churches, the tide has changed, and now African American churches are uncharacteristically declining at a faster rate than usual. Unchurched young adults, particularly African American males, are disproportionately missing in the African American church. The fundamental purpose of this study is to focus specifically on evangelical denomination African American churches in Johnston County, North Carolina by employing quantitative and qualitative research. The survey collected recorded interviews with twenty pastors of African American or multicultural churches. The results of this study suggest several factors contribute to the decline of African American church attendance. Without a doubt, the African American Church has an epidemic attendance problem that has a backdrop of spiritual, social, and economic factors. This report makes recommendations for reversing the dwindling attendance problem.
