The July/August issue of Touchstone features an editorial by Anthony Esolen that got me to thinking about broken church windows. I don’t mean literal broken windows; I’m referring as Esolen does to the now familiar broken-window theory, which suggests in a nutshell that when citizens and authorities let little things slip (e.g., a broken window), soon bigger and bigger things will slip. A broken window is not only more common in drug-addled neighborhoods, but may well be, through the long series of events and decisions that produce culture, a contributing factor as well.

Esolen applies this primarily to schools, but he offers this intriguing aside about churches:

“For several decades the hierarchs of our churches — men who have assumed the responsibility for governing their people — have failed to discipline those who in some way deny the faith of their church’s confessions, or ignore the disciplines, or modify the worship to please the secular, or encourage their people to discard those parts of the Christian moral teaching, usually having to do with zippers, they may find ‘unrealistic’ or ‘outdated.’”

By failing to fix our own broken windows, Esolen is suggesting, we are allowing the future disintegration of the Church. It’s an interesting idea. I think of Church dissolution as the consequence of errant decisions by misguided (or wicked) people in authority. This church ordains homosexuals, that church tolerates gossipy cliques, and virtually every church in Protestant circles tacitly encourages “church shopping.” The broken-window theory, however, suggests that by being slack in small things, we make it more likely that we’ll err in big things.

I don’t know if that’s true, but it sure does trigger some thought. Does it matter if our teenagers come flippy-flapping into the sanctuary Sunday morning wearing their sandals and shorts? Or if meaningful hymns are edged out in favor of whatever happens to be popular on the radio? In those examples I reveal some of my biases, and I’m hesitant to call them broken windows because maybe it’s just the case that I don’t like them due to the fact that I am a stuffy curmudgeon. It’s a routine sin of mine, and perhaps for some of you as well, to search for how my likes are Biblically justified, and my dislikes Biblically condemned.

Still, I’ve got the nagging feeling there’s something to this broken church-window idea. When the preacher tells everyone to call him “Pastor Joe,” when we care less and less about what we wear to church, when the hymns (and sermons)  get tailored to our tastes and other time commitments, I wonder if we ought to be hearing the sound of shattering glass in the background. On the other hand, sometimes a broken window lets in more air. If only we knew whether the changes we make (or allow) led to good or ill.

All of which leads me to the question I want to ask, because I’m sure it will spark some fun (yet respectful and thoughtful, because that’s how we do it here) discussion: What broken window do you see in the today’s churches? Not a great glaring sin, but a little thing. And explain why you think it will lead to big things.