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For one thing, the social role of a Church seems overstated in my experience, though that might depend on denomination. After sitting through the sermon and tha

For one thing, the social role of a Church seems overstated in my experience, though that might depend on denomination. After sitting through the sermon and that business was done, what followed was merely lunch / dinner with extended family. We never mingled much with others. Religious families are big on family and I this day and age, they're smaller than ever. Gone are the days, in my case, of communing for a large family dinner almost every week. I barely even see my parents. All of which to say I think our social needs were met in large part by family, and Church was a convenient vehicle to bring it together. There's no substitute for family. However, between a plethora of possible social obligations given our leisure time, I think loneliness can be abated.

organsnyder 7y ago
I think it depends a lot on the individual congregation. Our previous church was terrible socially: everyone stuck to their own in-groups (which often overlapped with extended family), and there was little mingling outside of Sunday morning. Our current church, however, is incredibly vibrant: we've made many close friends there, and the church community goes out of its way for each other (such as doing extensive landscaping last week for two members fighting cancer). Both of these churches are effectively from the same denomination.
- slothtrop 7y ago
  Sure. I haven't hopped and skipped too many but that's been my experience with Catholic churches everywhere, a family affair. Mind you, French and Italian families can be fucking massive which kind of renders the mingling redundant.
humanrebar 7y ago
> All of which to say I think our social needs were met in large part by family, and Church was a convenient vehicle to bring it together. There's no substitute for family. In my experience churches and families are not independent things. Basically every healthy church spends a significant amount of time encouraging healthy families in both direct and indirect ways. And most healthy churches aren't all that convenient. There are too many people involved for church to be convenient.
- slothtrop 7y ago
  They're at once inconvenient, and convenient. Otherwise there would be no point. I'd say they're totally independent even if you perceive they may benefit families; lots of institutions can.

organsnyder 7y ago

I think it depends a lot on the individual congregation. Our previous church was terrible socially: everyone stuck to their own in-groups (which often overlapped with extended family), and there was little mingling outside of Sunday morning. Our current church, however, is incredibly vibrant: we've made many close friends there, and the church community goes out of its way for each other (such as doing extensive landscaping last week for two members fighting cancer). Both of these churches are effectively from the same denomination.

slothtrop 7y ago
Sure. I haven't hopped and skipped too many but that's been my experience with Catholic churches everywhere, a family affair. Mind you, French and Italian families can be fucking massive which kind of renders the mingling redundant.

humanrebar 7y ago

> All of which to say I think our social needs were met in large part by family, and Church was a convenient vehicle to bring it together. There's no substitute for family. In my experience churches and families are not independent things. Basically every healthy church spends a significant amount of time encouraging healthy families in both direct and indirect ways. And most healthy churches aren't all that convenient. There are too many people involved for church to be convenient.

slothtrop 7y ago
They're at once inconvenient, and convenient. Otherwise there would be no point. I'd say they're totally independent even if you perceive they may benefit families; lots of institutions can.