Church attendance in the US has been in steady decline for decades. We all know about that. Researchers have noted that many people have given up on church altogether. We hear about their loss of faith, no longer having anything to do with religion.
But some researchers are digging deeper and finding out that many are leaving the "church," but these many are NOT leaving the Christian faith. They are simply exiting the doors of the visible church building. They still believe in God, the bible, and the one-anothers of the Christian life.
These people are not the group known as the "nones" (i.e. those who no longer profess allegiance to any denomination or even religion), but can be identified as the "dones." These are the people who are done with church. They have become fed up with the status quo. They have been ignored, neglected, used, abused, or have had any number of other things happen to them while attending their church. Now they are done.
Here is an interesting blog site called The Dones (hat tip to Eric Carpenter) that takes a look at Christians who have left the institutional church, but not Christianity.
Steve, It's been awhile. Nice to see you're still here. I'm a Done -- and quite sad about it. My doneness is kind of unusual. It occurred as a result of being elevated to being the pastor, completely out of the blue, of our tiny church. It lasted from October '13 to March '14. It didn't end well, and that was not of my doing. It still hurts.
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