Worship should be joyous. But no matter how ebullient the service, if your congregation is literally receiving a less than warm welcome when they walk in, their appetite to rejoice may become diminished. With attendance declining year-on-year, cold comfort is a conundrum facing many churches, especially those in older buildings.
The Physics and Physiology of Cold
There are some very practical physical issues to do with being cold. Apart from the overall feeling of discomfort being cold impairs cognitive functions like attention, memory, and reaction time, making it harder to focus due to reduced blood flow to the brain. The result is less oxygen and glucose needed for optimal cognitive performance.
Basically, it’s harder to concentrate and, when it comes to worship, that’s worth thinking about. People come to church for a variety of reasons. Most come to listen to and be inspired by sermons. Others for quiet reflection. Others just to share in a communal act of jubilation. But generally, they all hope to leave with their spirit warmed and their soul feeling in some way nourished. And it’s much harder to feel nourished if you’re cold – you need to be able to concentrate.
Many churches are inherently cold
Through the middle-ages and even Victorian times churches were not designed to be comfortable. They were there to inspire awe. Then again, when church attendance was a social requirement for most people, they at least benefitted from the body warmth of a full congregation sitting cheek by jowl, even if the heat vanished into the rafters.
Within traditional places of worship – Anglican, Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian etc. very few new churches have opened, despite closures of over 1,500 churches since 2008. ‘New’ churches and smaller denominations have fared much better with a large net gain in places of worship, but many of these are established in existing building. New ‘new build’ churches, that can leverage the benefits of modern heating technology, and prepare for future proofing, are few and far between, if any.
Congregations of worshippers still face the fact that ‘churches offer cold comfort’.
The old feel the cold the most
Cold churches could be a factor contributing to dwindling congregations, especially amongst older parishioners, who have become the mainstay of many, if not most, religious communities. Quite simply ‘the old feel the cold’ more than younger people do. This is an unavoidable physiological phenomenon. As you age you lose muscle mass, your metabolism slows, blood circulation decreases, and the skin becomes thinner. Overall the body finds it harder to regulate temperature effectively.
Given that the average age of church-goers is over 60, with 36% aged above 70 and it’s clear that keeping warm would be a major ‘added-value’ to worship.
The young do not embrace the cold either
Unlike their predecessors, the majority of young people today have grown up in an environment of central heating and relative warmth. Whilst it may sound a bit harsh, they are not as used to the cold as their parents, and certainly their grandparents were. Many may attend Sunday School, but the numbers quickly decline in adolescence. There is no specific research on whether getting out of a warm bed on a cold Sunday morning in winter is a contributing factor to decline, but intuitively it seems likely.
Warm your people, not your rafters
Whilst praise and joy should float up to the rafters, it’s not the place to which your heat should vanish in a cold snap. The cure is straightforward – talk to us about replacing your (probably inadequate and expensive) legacy heating system with Infra-Red panels and bars.
Stay warm, save money, save on your energy bills.