It's been quite a week! On Tuesday morning we released a major study titled, Not Who You Think They Are: The Real Story of People Who Attend America's Megachurches. We publicized it in Leadership Network Advance, which goes to over 25,000 church leaders, in a press release, and through emails to various innovation partners. We co-sponsored it with the Hartford Institute for Religion Research, and they too spread the news about it. The research project was funded by Leadership Network, and the report was co-authored by Scott Thumma (Hartford) and me (Leadership Network).
At the 24-hour mark several hundred people had downloaded it from our website plus several hundred others had accessed it from the Hartford website. Also many media wrote stories about it. My favorites were the Christian Post article by Lillian Kwon and the Religion News Service write-up by Adelle Banks.
Error in AP Report, error then spread by NY Times and others
Which of these statistics sound better to you?
- 55% of megachurch attenders volunteer at their church
- 45% of megachurch attenders do not volunteer at their church
Obviously, that's two ways to say the same thing. The first option does sound more positive and favorable, but the second is just as accurate.
Unfortunately when the Associated Press did a story on our project, it said -- wrongly -- that volunteering at megachurches occurs less than at other churches. There is no research basis for that last line. The fact is we don't know.
I think a 55% volunteer rate is pretty good for a church of any size. Would you say that 55% of the people at your church volunteer?
The Associated Press then ran a correction the next day as follows, which others such as Forbes also picked up. It read:
In a June 9 story about a survey of megachurch attendance, The Associated Press reported erroneously that a study showed that worshippers at such churches volunteer less than other churchgoers. The study found that nearly 45 percent of megachurch attenders never volunteer at their church, but it did not include comparable data on volunteer rates at churches of all sizes.
People who want evidence to support healthy things in megachurches will see the many statistics in our report one way, and those who want evidence that megachurches are shallow will probably view our statistics another way. My concern is that they reflect our report accurately. The AP version did not (an honest error by a good reporter), and I'm hoping that the inaccurate version of his story doesn't spread too far.
If you haven't read the report, it's free to download -- and we welcome your comments about it below.
Warren Bird, Ph.D., is Research Director at Leadership Network, and co-author of 21 books on various aspects of church health and innovation.
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