Things Change

If you remember watching the Baltimore-centric movie "Diner," you'll recall a scene in which Kevin Bacon is drunk and rambunctious, lying amid the outdoor crèche scene at a church.  That church, in the middle of a very nice neighborhood in Towson, is known as First and St. Stephen’s Church, and according to Céilí Doyle in the Banner newspaper, the church building, its land and stone parsonage have all been sold to a man from the neighborhood for $1.1 million.

The congregation now numbers just 20 people. Church attendance is way down in this country.  Twenty years ago, 42% of American adults attended religious services on the regular. Ten years ago, that number was 38%. Today, it's 30%.

I'm not about to list all the reasons for the decline, but it's fair to state that if more adults felt services were relevant to their lives, they would be there. Not to drag Yogi Berra into this blog for a second time this week, but as he said about baseball attendance, "If people don't want to come, how are you gonna stop them?"

No. I'm not here to discuss church attendance. But what's happening here in an affluent community with First and St. Stephen’s must be happening in hundreds of churches, temples and mosques around the country.

Instead of it being a religious issue, it becomes a matter of commercial real estate. There are churches around that have become taverns, libraries, senior centers and what-have-you. Faced with a dwindling membership, First and St. Stephen's sold out to Steve McIntire, whose plan for the property involves selling off the parsonage as a private home, and turning the church into a community or recreation center. 

The church building, with the parsonage in the far left

There's a preschool downstairs, which will continue to operate. Stacking on a few more leases, as McIntire puts it, will leave the building reconfigured but still serving the community.

As Emily Perl, president of the church’s governing body, says, “As a church we have to morph and change, and that’s what we’re doing.”

People change, the nature of the building will change, but it will still continue to serve the public in a meaningful way.

And who knows? Someday, some people might want to turn it into a church again!