Everything you’ve said agrees with my experiences. Though I’m not sure I would attribute this phenomenon to consumerism. After speaking with my older relatives

Everything you’ve said agrees with my experiences. Though I’m not sure I would attribute this phenomenon to consumerism. After speaking with my older relatives and being a part of more closely knit communities while moving around as a child, I would say the fall of churches is the single biggest cause here. It used to be that every week you’d see your neighbors for 3-4hrs supplied with discussion material, the culture/doctrine encouraged using your gifts to help your neighbors out, and other purely social events would be organized through the church. That combined with belonging to the same “tribe” as everyone is a recipe for a strong social community. In my current experiences, churchs are some huge corporatized production with some hype man spewing what the people want to hear then everyone goes home. These churches focus on growing numbers and building their campus without think of the community’s needs. It’s hard to build a strong social community with a sea of people. The smaller churches are filled with aging congregations sadly watching their culture die with them as younger generations fail to build any sense of community. I hope that we can find a way to replicate the good parts of our church going history. America could definitely use some stronger communities.