Who checks on absent members?

[Lamb]

Sometimes the absence of members goes unnoticed in a congregation, but in some congregations they have a group of people who check up on those people. In your congregation, who checks in on the absent members?

 

[Forgiven1]

In our church it really depends. Sometimes the Pastor, sometimes the elders and sometimes a member who is friend of the absent member.

 

[tango]

We have someone tasked with overseeing congregational care but obviously they can only do so much unless they happen to notice someone has stopped attending. Usually I think it's a matter of people noticing someone hasn't been there for a while and checking up on them.

It's a tricky one to balance because this time of year it's quite common for someone to disappear for a week or two. Sometimes it can feel intrusive if you get something formal from the church when all you did was miss a week. At the same time if it goes too long it just makes the church look uncaring.

I remember many years ago I knew someone who left a church and nobody made contact. After about six months someone called her to ask if she could do the reading that coming Sunday. That made for an awkward discussion.

 

[Josiah]

The pastor

 

[NewCreation435]

as far as I can tell nobody is.

 

[Albion]

I remember many years ago I knew someone who left a church and nobody made contact. After about six months someone called her to ask if she could do the reading that coming Sunday. That made for an awkward discussion.

I learned somewhere that it's more common than we'd like to think for people to leave a church in favor of a different one. There's even a slogan or saying (now forgotten by me) that's used among ministers in reference to the "kiss off' letter that arrives on Monday from the former congregant along with the rest of the church's mail.

Given that scenario, I suppose there's a tendency in many churches not to pursue people in general who used to attend and then cease to show up after awhile.

In my own case, I changed churches several times when I was younger and my absence resulted in two things, depending upon which church it was. Several of these never made any contact at all, while one of the others did take notice and so had the governing board send me a letter warning me that I was going to be excommunicated!

 

[Castle Church]

I have been an active member at several churches, and nobody has ever reached out from any of them when I left. Several of them I was very active in, one a member of the Knights of Columbus (third degree) and a member for nearly 10 years. I never left in a contentious manner or anything like that, and honestly it still hurts a little that nobody bothered to even send an email or text. After over a decade at a church, giving thousands of dollars in tithes, one would think that someone would notice.

 

[tango]

I learned somewhere that it's more common than we'd like to think for people to leave a church in favor of a different one. There's even a slogan or saying (now forgotten by me) that's used among ministers in reference to the "kiss off' letter that arrives on Monday from the former congregant along with the rest of the church's mail.

Given that scenario, I suppose there's a tendency in many churches not to pursue people in general who used to attend and then cease to show up after awhile.

In my own case, I changed churches several times when I was younger and my absence resulted in two things, depending upon which church it was. Several of these never made any contact at all, while one of the others did take notice and so had the governing board send me a letter warning me that I was going to be excommunicated!

I suppose a lot would depend on the turnover of a particular church and whether they want to know why people are leaving.

One church I attended briefly had a fairly small core of people and turned over new people terrifyingly quickly. It seemed people would arrive, rapidly volunteer to get involved in stuff, and then within a few weeks they disappeared without trace.

If people are leaving because another church better meets their needs that's one thing. If people are leaving because there's something within the church that they can't live with you'd hope that leadership would want to know what's happening. They might not change things for one person but if they are losing a steady stream of people over it they might want to reconsider, or at least know so that they have the option to reconsider.