Most teens who attend church come for worship. The latest Barna Research report shows that of the 48 percent of American teenagers who attend worship services, 45 percent are interested in connecting to God and 42 percent want to better understand their beliefs.

Churches that have an interest in reaching out to 13-to-18-year olds should understand the importance of worship as well as the way teens prefer to one know what believe. Most don’t want to sit in a class.

Traditional church activities such as Sunday school, youth group or small groupd appealed to only about a third of teens. About a third also reported reading the Bible. Even fewer teens (on average 18 to 26 percent) reported an interest in other church-related activities, such as learning about prayer, listening to religious teaching or discussing faith, discipleship or study.

Online faith search

So how are these teens finding out more about their faith? Research shows that one out of every four teenagers (26 percent) had learned something about faith or spirituality online in the last six months. For Christian teens this was even truer, as some 39 percent of born-again teens turned to the Web for a faith experience. Just what sort of faith practice are teens doing online? Some 16 percent of teenagers and some 25 percent of born-again teens said they had "a spiritual experience" online where they worshipped or connected with God.

Churches should understand the saturation of the Internet in younger generations. According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project, the younger the people the more likely they are to use the Internet. But that isn’t big news. And the appeal of the Internet as compared to other faith activities at church is not appreciably stronger. While a quarter to 39 percent of teens are looking for spiritual experience online, another third of teens expressed an interest in church volunteer opportunities, church friendships, and the encouragement and inspiration they may find at church.

According to Pew, more Gen X Internet users are looking for faith online (some 38 percent), compared to the Gen Y’s 30 percent, and online teens’ 26 percent. Pew’s research indicates that teens are most likely to be online for gaming (81 percent), instant messaging (75 percent), school information (57 percent), music downloads (51 percent), reading blogs (38 percent), downloading video (31 percent), or creating a blog (19 percent).

Pay attention to trends

Churches interested in teens should pay attention to these trends. Ramping up Web sites for the sake of reaching teens, unless they contain some of these components, may not be very effective. On the other hand, ignoring what comprises a majority of a teenager’s time, i.e., technology, music, Internet, messaging, videos and blogs, will endanger churches. Those stuck in the 20th century could become completely irrelevant to this plugged-in generation.

The bottom line for churches that want to reach teens seems to be to offer an array of opportunities for teens. The traditional groups and worship opportunities must expand to include online faith activities, service opportunities and other options. Adding these choices is no easy adjustment. However, fail to do so and the young faces will continue to fade away.