The Mosaic of Christian Belief: Twenty Centuries of Unity & Diversity

by Roger E. Olson

Sociologists of religion tell us that two things have happened in the last decades of the twentieth century that complicate this matter of choosing a church. First, many people have such little familiarity with or concern for beliefs that they don’t even know what to look for other than clues to how churches worship. Many people base their decisions about churches more on worship styles or programs for children, youth or adults than on what the churches believe. And yet every church has beliefs. Finding out what they are is not as easy as it used to be, and many church hunters don’t have any idea what questions to ask or what clues to look for. Denominational titles don’t help as much as they used to, and the list of nondenominational churches (many of which actually do have a denominational affiliation but wish to hide it) is getting longer every year. Second, many and perhaps most churches have seriously downplayed theology and doctrine in the second half of the twentieth century. It is very difficult to find out exactly what a church believes and whether or not it actually takes the beliefs it says it holds seriously. Unless you are committed to a denomination already and find that there is a church of that denomination in your new city, you may be in for some very tough church searching.