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Evangelists targeting skeptic New England
Associated Press Writer
WATERTOWN, Mass. - It's hard to tell in the quiet of a color-splashed autumn morning, but Redeemer Fellowship Church is trying to set roots in a rough neighborhood. For churches, anyway.
Until this new church opened last month, its 19th-century Congregational church building in suburban Watertown was empty for nearly two years. Just across the street, a closed Baptist church is filled with condos. So is a former Catholic church a half mile away.
Dead churches are a familiar story in New England, which recent surveys indicate is now the least religious region in the country. But some see opportunity in a place where America's Christian faith laid its roots.
"You look at this area and it's a great area of potential, it's a great area of need," said Redeemer Fellowship pastor Chris Bass, a Houston native.
Several Christian denominations see New England as a "mission field" - a term often associated with unchurched, foreign lands. As they evangelize and work to plant new churches, they speak of possibility, but also frustration. The area's highly educated population is skeptical and often indifferent to their faith.
"About once every hour, I give up. It's tough, man," said a half-joking Joe Souza, a Southern Baptist missionary working north of Boston.
"It's like, you found a cure for cancer and you want to give it away and nobody wants it." Trinity College's American Religious Identification Survey released this year showed New England overtaking the Pacific Northwest as the least religious region in the country. Twenty-two percent of respondents here said they have no religious faith of any kind, highest in the country.
In a Gallup poll this year, all six New England states were in the Top 10 least religious in the country, with Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts claiming the top four spots.
New England's religious apathy has developed over decades, but it's striking where the Pilgrims landed seeking religious freedom and the great 18th-century preacher Jonathan Edwards helped spark the First Great Awakening.
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