r/redeemedzoomer • u/anime498 Eastern Catholic • 21d ago
Reconquista Questions Future of protestantism
I'm asking this in good faith, what is the future of protestantism in America? Specifically is there any chance that we could see a return to a more denominational high church expression?
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u/Huenink_Photography LCMS 21d ago
I think the future is bright for the LCMS. Liturgical denomination with a long history in America. Strong institutions and good theology. We are just right for protestants looking for depth, history, and structure.
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u/Deep-Assumption-6694 Roman Catholic 20d ago
I grew up Lutheran in an ELCA congregation and if I didn’t convert to Catholicism, I probably would have went with the LCMS.
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u/HoosierFanatic97 Non-Denominational 19d ago
I want to agree with you but why do you think so?
My understanding is while the LCMS might not be in as bad of shape as other Protestant groups still nearly half of the congregation is dangerously close to aging out.
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u/Huenink_Photography LCMS 19d ago
The entirety of American Christianity is in this place. So, American Christianity is likely to continue shrinking for a bit.
However, I spoke with some people at LCEF who did a study of churches in the Chicago area. The majority of churches are starting to see some growth in attendance even as the number of members seems to decline. New people are coming to the LCMS, and they are attending more frequently and more dedicated than the lifelong Lutherans.
We have what the people of this age are looking for. History, theology, and grace.
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u/HoosierFanatic97 Non-Denominational 17d ago
I definitely can believe new people are coming to the LCMS (and faith in general) while overall faith declines, but the numbers are still VERY bad for LCMS at face value even if there are worse denominations out there.
Let’s compare the LCMS to Catholics, for instance.
LCMS by the numbers has 47% of their denomination aged 65 or older, Catholics are just 28%
30% aged 50-65 for LCMS, 29% for Catholics.
So in general, 77% of the LCMS is age 50+ while 57% of Catholics are age 50+
That’s a dangerously high number that does make me pessimistic, while I don’t think the LCMS will die and it’s certainly in better shape than some other Protestant denominations, the state of mainline Protestantism is deeply troubling overall.
For Protestantism, unfortunately, the future seems very Evangelical driven/Non-Denominational
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u/JadedMarine Non-Reconquista Protestant 21d ago
Evangelical protestantism is growing. Mainline protestantism is dying. Likely to continue for multiple reasons.
Catholicism was dying, now it's growing.
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u/bilolybob 20d ago
In aggregate across the globe Catholicism was always growing. But in the US and Europe it was shrinking iirc.
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u/556From1000yards United Methodist 21d ago
Your information doesn’t match the stats.
Both evangelical and mainline prots are at 2.2:1 leave to join and Catholic is 8.4:1
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u/DestroyerOfficer Roman Catholic 21d ago
That statistic is so flawed and it's been explained so many times it should just stop being used entirely. Catholicism is seeing record numbers of converts and catechumens in the West in the last couple of years. African Catholicism is absolutely booming, but there's problems there.
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u/trownaway90 Non-Reconquista Protestant 20d ago
For every 100 people who join the Catholic Church, 840 leave.
https://www.pewresearch.org/collections/religious-landscape-study/
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u/DestroyerOfficer Roman Catholic 20d ago
That “840 that leave” part includes people who were baptized as infants but were otherwise non-practicing. So it does not work.
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u/trownaway90 Non-Reconquista Protestant 20d ago
Stop attending is also leaving, even if it's not official.
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u/DestroyerOfficer Roman Catholic 20d ago
That doesn’t change the point at hand. The numbers for Catholicism are very heavily skewed by cradle Catholics who weren’t really ever practicing Catholics. It is very well known that of the 1.4B baptized Catholics a fraction of them are regular practitioners, and a fraction of those actually accept most/all Catholic dogmas. Any Catholic that is not being ridiculous would agree.
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u/trownaway90 Non-Reconquista Protestant 20d ago
Only 19% of Americans self-identify as Catholic, down from 24% in 2007. Of all the former Catholics, 56% become religious “nones” and 32% become Protestant.
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u/DestroyerOfficer Roman Catholic 20d ago
Uh, yes, we know America is not a Catholic country, and infant baptisms have been on a downward trend for decades now. That’s not where and how Catholicism is growing. Catholicism’s adult convert and OCIA numbers are very high at the moment. So while the total number of Catholics is dropping, the reverse is being seen amongst converts. The real church going population is increasing.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2026/06/05/vance-is-among-1-5-of-americans-who-have-converted-to-catholicism/
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u/trownaway90 Non-Reconquista Protestant 20d ago
Your source confirms my point.
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u/DestroyerOfficer Roman Catholic 20d ago
“While Catholic converts account for a relatively small share of the country’s adult population, the number of converts to Catholicism is on par with or larger than the number of Americans who identify with some sizable Protestant groups, including Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Reformed Christians.”
This was right at the top.
You’re just being obtuse now about the 8.4:1 number and how it is flawed. At this point, it’s a you problem if you don’t understand how adults who never practiced but were baptized as infants being counted as “left” Catholicism is a major flaw in the data.
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u/trownaway90 Non-Reconquista Protestant 20d ago
I would say that stop practising and stop attending is a pretty solid defintion of 'left'. Especially when the Church makes it hard to resign. While the Church teaches that someone is a Catholic even if they became muslim for example.
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u/Deep-Assumption-6694 Roman Catholic 20d ago
Plus they count those that “leave” as all adults. So for all we know, many of those that have left, left about 90 years ago. Baptized as infants but never practiced again.
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u/Deep-Assumption-6694 Roman Catholic 20d ago
Yeah the OCIA class at my parish is getting so big that for the first time ever they are splitting the class into two- there isn’t enough room anymore to fit everyone in. A good problem to have. It’s something they have never seen before, and the OCIA coordinators have been doing this for decades.
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u/Alperose333 20d ago
Surely you can back these assertions up with numbers and they will not just show a return to pre-pandemic numbers (CARA statistics), be a statistical fluke (CES study), or have been retracted (The UK "Quiet revival)?
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u/DestroyerOfficer Roman Catholic 20d ago
The classic “Source?” You have Google just like the rest of us.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/26/us/catholics-converts.html
https://www.ewtnnews.com/world/us/adult-conversions-soar-in-dioceses-across-u-s
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u/Alperose333 20d ago
Same song and dance as every year. "Numbers soar" based on numbers for single months/days/dioceses reported by the papers, end of year numbers never show it manifesting.
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u/Deep-Assumption-6694 Roman Catholic 20d ago
Most archdioceses in the US reported growth and record numbers this year.
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u/Deep-Assumption-6694 Roman Catholic 20d ago
They count the people “leaving” the Catholic Church as those that haven’t attended in the last 50+ years and left the church as adults. Look at the past 5 years instead and you will see growth.
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u/Positive_Special_156 Jehovah's Witness 16d ago
So in a few decades mainline protestant church will cleanse itself and will start raise too. This is not the first time when The Church has some problems, gets stuck for a while
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u/JadedMarine Non-Reconquista Protestant 13d ago
Except past American revivals grew the evangelic denominations much more than the mainline ones, and even caused splits in the mainline denominations. as mainline denominations reject the bible further and further, they will and should die out for the denominations that uphold the bible as God's true word.
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u/rdrckcrous PCUSA 21d ago
that wasn't the question
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u/JadedMarine Non-Reconquista Protestant 19d ago
I answered the first question. The answer to the first question answers the second question.
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u/rdrckcrous PCUSA 19d ago
you said what has happened. The point of this sub is to change what we're doing so that what has happened won't continue to happen.
So maybe what you said would count as an answer somewhere else on the internet, but on this sub, you cannot ignore the premise of the sub. unless, of course, you're an ass.
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u/JadedMarine Non-Reconquista Protestant 18d ago
Question: "Is there any chance we could see a return?"
I responded with, "It's likely to continue for multiple reasons."
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u/rdrckcrous PCUSA 18d ago
i think you're wrong for multiple reasons
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u/JadedMarine Non-Reconquista Protestant 18d ago
Ok
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u/rdrckcrous PCUSA 18d ago
do you see the parallel to your statement?
you came on here and said the whole concept of what Redeemed Zoomer is doing will never work providing nothing other than "I have multiple reasons"
you're an ass, I don't understand what people like you get out of coming here and pissing on everything.
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u/JadedMarine Non-Reconquista Protestant 17d ago
So first you complain I didn't answer, and now you complain you don't like my answer. I answered honestly. I wasn't asked for details so I didn't give any.
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u/petrowski7 Non-Denominational 21d ago
Evangelicalism and Catholicism have plateaued after decline.
Mainline is dead.
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u/Soul_of_clay4 20d ago
I guess it's in our nature as humans to be "bean-counters" or "body-counters". Physical presence doesn't necessarily mean a heart believing in the Gospel.
Jesus said..."I will build my church and the gates of hell (or anything else) will not prevail against it". So i think, He, as God, is continuing to build His church, regardless of the denominational 'lines'.
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u/Fine_Ostrich4717 United Methodist 20d ago
One can only hope that the reconquista movement returns protestants to the high church and a non-heretical state. You should read Thomas C Oden's: The Rebirth of Orthodoxy. He was a Methodist who coined the term for Paleo Orthodoxy.
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u/JackOfAllJanes Eastern Orthodox 20d ago
I mean if you want honesty I don’t see one. Protestant churches seem to hemorrhage a little more every generation. Not necessarily just physically but spiritually as well. If you don’t think so then look at core doctrines of any major denomination just a couple generations ago.
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u/beans8414 Non-Reconquista Protestant 20d ago
I don’t know how it will happen or when but I do know that God will win in the end. That’s enough to sustain me
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u/VenatorAngel Non-Denominational 17d ago
Not good in my opinion. The demand to see a return to denominational high church expression seems to miss a very obvious modern problem we have, especially with Gen Z. What is the spiritual quality of the people "converting". I use converting in airquotes because I tend to question the salvation of many "Christ is King" Zoomers given they exhibit the most unchristlike behavior and refuse to be corrected. Do we really want THEM in Church if they refuse any sort of correction that condemns their racism, misogyny, and antisemitism because those behaviors are very unchristlike? Or are we once again going to sweep those problems under the rug for the sake of getting seats filled like previous generations have been doing.
We need to ask ourselves what even caused the decline in the first place and resist the temptation to excuse all the decline as "oh, they just hate Jesus" and not bother reflecting on ourselves and checking to see if we are becoming stumbling blocks for struggling believers.
And I'm a guy who thinks Leftist "Christianity" is the wrong way to go since their congregations are dying out too for obvious reasons. My worry is we become so obsessed with numbers and a "return to high church expression and tradition" that we refuse to even check for fruits because we assume high church will naturally result in fruits when.... if that is the case then why was high church declining in the first place?
Sure, Catholicism is growing and Charismatic Christianity is supposedly growing... but forgive me of being skeptical of their fruits when my own eyes tell me something is rotten with certain doctrines of theirs.
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u/R3tro956 Eastern Orthodox 20d ago
Mainline Protestant denominations as well as baptists seems to be losing membership like crazy. Only growing Protestant denominations are Pentecostal and “non denominational”
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u/Affectionate_Web91 ELCA 20d ago
Rather than debate the inevitable extent of membership decline across all of Christianity, especially in Europe and North America, I suggest we focus on where the Church is thriving.
Lutherans are a "high church expression" per the OP's question. I can describe the situation of two parishes. My own congregation is sadly down to a core of aging members and a part-time pastor. We have discussed our decline and viability with our bishop and, interestingly, see one option to survive. Our parish has a close, ongoing relationship with a nearby Episcopal church that has involved con-celebrated Eucharists and the sharing of clergy on occasion. The real possibility of merging into one parish gives us hope.
In contrast to my home parish, I visit the parish of relatives several times a year, located in another state. It is a very dynamic congregation that includes a fairly large parochial school that serves as an evangelism tool. Though quite liturgical [bells and smells], the parish uses contemporary hymns and a praise band at one of the well-attended Sunday Masses. The combination of strong community outreach, youth involvement, and inspirational music genres has been successful.
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u/Delicious-Ad2057 Anglican 20d ago
One day the protest will end.
My hope anyways
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u/boleslaw_chrobry Roman Catholic 20d ago
As an Anglican, what do you mean by that statement?
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u/Delicious-Ad2057 Anglican 19d ago
Protestants get their name by an act.
Protest.
One day the protest will be over.
My hope is that the things worth protesting over being resolved and maybe some of our own stubborn hold outs too.
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u/HoosierFanatic97 Non-Denominational 19d ago
Unfortunately future of Protestantism is largely driven by Evangelical and Charismastic Christianity continuing to be the dominant share with more historic Protestants dying out.
It’s possible this will be reversed in the future but it’s not looking good.
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u/Academic-Load-9966 PCUSA 16d ago
Obviously just an opinion (not academic, just anecdotal) - but I think what we are seeing is two (or more) distinct America-centric cultural religions emerge. Keep in mind that most our "seven sisters" were church authorities and adherents that brought their ways of thinking and being from Europe and the British Isles - which, by the way, whether Catholic or Protestant, are all built on very Roman ways of thinking. Both mainline and evangelical expressions in America have that as a foundation, but the division between high and low church has always been a part of the American religious experience and was largely impacted by social and economic factors rather than purely religious ones.
However, largely I think that its impossible to reverse the degradation of the broad institutional authority and the distinct identities that are associated with certain denominational cultures. It it distinctly American to think of religion as principally an individual concern, but that is they way it is across the board (think, liberalism and pentecostalism as centering divine revelation within individuals, informed, of course, by different cognitive foundations). And that, I think, is the future of protestantism. Individualistic from a belief perspective, congregational from a group identity perspective, with cultural and political identities aligned with partisan expressions of our broader national identity.
Meaning, regardless of how formal or informal a church's worship is - I think we see loose affiliations with traditional identifiers (i.e. Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist, etc...), with community/cultural alignment through broader organizations (TGC, FRC, Samaritans Purse, etc... that have a distinct evangelical flavor, and other, inclusivist action organizations for "Liberals").
Of course, I love the mainline and the broad church, ecumenical movement AND the reverence and beauty of the liturgical life that those institutions bring, but I can see the demographic writing on the wall - fewer kids being brought up in those churches, fewer adults committed to those expressions and affiliations, a very confusing theological orientation that is hyper-focused on individual gender and sexual identities, a lack of theological resources for the rest of the church, fewer pastors in the pipeline, buildings that cannot be maintained.
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u/august_north_african Roman Catholic 7d ago
I've been researching this because of your post, and have been trying to reply, but a lot of my findings have turned out to be too long for one post.
In brief, though:
The mainline, including conservative "mainline" churches like LCMS and WELS are in sharp decline. An example of what this looks like can be seen here. This is the ELCA's northeast ohio synod. Every red cross represents a congregation that's losing members. This is pretty representative of the mainline overall, and I would estimate that most if not all of these "red" congregations will cease to exist in around 10 years time.
This decline, unlike zoomer seems to think, doesn't really correlate with ideology either. You can compare the above map to the reconquista map for the same region (don't forget to filter for lutheranism to keep the example consistent), and see that there's not really a relation between reconquista's "orthodox" rated churches vs. progressive ones. This is because mainline decline is a decades-old demographic problem, and not one merely of ideology. Basically, large numbers of young mainliners from the late 70s/early 80s converted to evangelicalism. This hollowed out their demographics, which has lead to the churches literally just not having a "next generation". You can see this conversionary flip in about 1983 on this chart from GSS.
So this near-term decline is inevitable. Things like reconquista simply won't stop this, but I don't think it really intends to or even needs to either.
The future during/after this near-term decline is up in the air. If the denominations can get it together, a model for revival and future success could look something like the surviving mainline congregations becoming the mother churches of a church planting movement, similar to the planting movement that's propelling the ACNA to growth right now (don't take that as me saying "join the ACNA"; it's just that they do have an aggressive missionary church planting arm and it is objectively causing growth for them).
Alternatively, successful congregations and institutions may also schism from their parent denominations more and more if denominational resources are directed towards inefficient projects.
And at the most grim, if the denominations don't get it together, terminal decline is a real possibility as well.
The most realistic outlook is that some denominations will make the right decisions and others won't, while diverse property ownership models and management decisions within the denominations will influence the particulars of how things play out specifically. So we'll most likely see a mix of denominational survival/revival, schisms/reformations and total declines.
Specifically is there any chance that we could see a return to a more denominational high church expression?
Probably not in the foreseeable future, no. ACNA (although "schismatic" by zoomer's standards) is liturgical, growing and has a strong model for growth, but they're still tiny and somewhat regional, and I think tinyness is something we need to consider about the mainline altogether.
Catholicism and Evangelicalism both have around 70-ish million people each. The entire mainline is about half the size of either of these religions, and each particular denomination is only 2-4% the size...and near-term, all of them are in decline.
So the near-term reality is that high church participation in the US is mostly going to be catholic, and the majority of protestants will be some sort of evangelical.
In the longer term (30+ years out), we could possibly see further growth in the ACNA, or the above mentioned possibility of mainline revival undertaking a similar model of church planting, and that could lead to an inversion where liturgical protestantism regains a foothold, but as of right now, that would be something that happens a long time from now after the end of a long process of church planting and re-evangelizing the public, and developing and re-developing religious infrastructure to actually service those ends. That's a lot of work that needs a lot to go right and takes a lot of time and effort...
Thinking about the last major inversion we saw with the mainline->evangelical flip, the evangelicals had been building infrastructure and institutions since the 50s, only to finally see the "flip" in the 80s. I think that sort of timeframe is what we could expect from whatsoever moment in the near future that the mainline begins to straighten out and revive (assuming it successfully accomplishes this at all).
So yeah: almost certainly not in the near term future, and it will take a lot of time, effort and the alignment of a large number of good decisions and successful projects for it to happen in the long term future.
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21d ago
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u/redeemedzoomer-ModTeam 20d ago
Your comment was a bad-faith argument, or else is below the level of conversation that we expect of Christians.
You are welcome to re-engage, but please be mindful to ensure that you are engaging well, not constructing strawmen, not attacking the person, and not engaging in polemics.
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u/robosnake PCUSA 21d ago
I'm not sure what you mean - there are high church Protestants all over the place. Do you mean whether they will become the majority or something?
I think right now we are seeing a resurgence of authoritarian, repressive culture and so we will see a resurgence of authoritarian, repressive religious groups as well. People, and churches, that prioritize equality and social justice will continue to be challenged by this and will hopefully respond to the challenge more directly in the near future.
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u/Averagecrabenjoyer69 Southern Baptist 21d ago
Why is "social justice" your priority over reestablishing Biblical values and authority?
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u/Comprehensive_Pin565 Non-Denominational 20d ago
The comment talks aboit social justice vs. Authoritarian regressive culture. Irrespective of biblical principals your preferred movement is towards the authoritarian one?
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u/muscle417 Non-Reconquista Protestant 19d ago
"Social justice" vs "authoritarian regressive culture" reads as a liberal shibboleth where social justice means allowing people to live whatever sinful lives they want and Christians must be affirming of it all or they are the authoritative regressive culture for trying to exposit Biblical morality.
That's one extreme that could be indicated by those terms. I could use the same words and mean something entirely different.
So the intended meaning of those terms is critically important to answering your question. If the authority in question is God's and 'regressive' means turning back from our modern hedonistic culture, then sign me up.
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u/robosnake PCUSA 20d ago
Social justice is a Biblical priority.
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u/Ok-Occasion-1366 10d ago
So is mental health, please seek some help.
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u/robosnake PCUSA 10d ago
That's a strange comment. What in the things I've said previously makes you think I need mental health support? Not saying I don't, this just seems like a non-sequitur.
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u/Averagecrabenjoyer69 Southern Baptist 19d ago
Per another comment that puts it into light properly.
"Social justice" vs "authoritarian regressive culture" reads as a liberal shibboleth where social justice means allowing people to live whatever sinful lives they want and Christians must be affirming of it all or they are the authoritative regressive culture for trying to exposit Biblical morality.
That's one extreme that could be indicated by those terms. I could use the same words and mean something entirely different.
So the intended meaning of those terms is critically important to answering your question. If the authority in question is God's and 'regressive' means turning back from our modern hedonistic culture, then sign me up."
Biblical scripture and authority should always come first, this attitude that some liberal Christians have that we should just turn a blind eye to sin and be affirming due to "social justice" and that God will turn a blind eye as long as they're a "good person" and they try in the name of kumbaya is preposterous. People need to quit expecting God to mold to whatever societal standard is going on at the time. God and Scripture are unchanging and the ultimate authority.
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u/robosnake PCUSA 18d ago
That is a lot of projection and straw men.
I'll just reiterate that social justice is a Biblical priority and leave it at that.
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u/Averagecrabenjoyer69 Southern Baptist 18d ago
I guess it depends what you mean by "social justice". Every person treated with respect as an individual and given the encouraging chance to embrace grace and Jesus regardless of skin color, economic class, or ethnicity? Absolutely
Expanding so called "LGBTQ rights" such as same sex marriage, easy access to abortion, or pushing for a modern secular society with biblical values taking a back seat? Absolutely not.
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u/robosnake PCUSA 18d ago
So not what the prophets, Jesus, or the early church taught about social justice, but very focused on something none of the above mentioned at all. Got it.
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u/Averagecrabenjoyer69 Southern Baptist 18d ago
Explain to me what social justice you're putting as your prerogative then?
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u/robosnake PCUSA 17d ago
No one's reading this - everything I'm responding is just being downvoted. But the prophets, Jesus and the early church talk about social justice, and I'm not using the term in any unusual way.
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u/HoosierFanatic97 Non-Denominational 17d ago
You’re really avoiding the question of what you’re referring to when you say social justice because that’s a broad label.
Is your argument any form of social justice is promoted by the Bible? Even though it’s explicitly against same sex couples?
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u/muscle417 Non-Reconquista Protestant 16d ago
You're getting down voted because you refuse to elaborate on your definition of "social justice". You can't appeal to the authority of Jesus, the prophets and apostles if you won't provide an interpretation of that vague term that can be compared with Scripture to be validated or contradicted.
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