RE: Decline of religion
August 20, 2026 at 12:25 am
(This post was last modified: August 20, 2026 at 12:35 am by Fake Messiah.)
DOORS SHUT Dark journey of devastated pastor forced to ditch sacred relics from 150 year old church as statewide crisis mounts
SACRED relics have been removed from a historic church that officially shut down in one US city.
Several other churches have been forced to close down due to a decline in church members.
The Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church in Lu Verne, Iowa, roughly 119 miles outside of Des Moines, closed down in June.
Prior to the closure, Pastor Steve Struecker and members held a final service, where many of the church’s relics were removed, the Des Moines Register reported.
Sister church Immanuel Evangelical Lutheran Church in Livermore, Iowa, also closed down in June.
Data from the US Religion Census shows that over 200 churches across Iowa have closed from 2010 to 2020.
Iowa has also seen a 13% decline in residents who consider themselves members of a church, leading to the recent closures.
“What’s happened to us happened to the whole town,” Zion President Dave Hanselman said.
“We’re not able to support ourself any longer.”
In July, the Archdiocese of Dubuque, Iowa closed down 76 churches amid an ongoing decline in mass attendance.
The archdiocese consolidated 160 parishes into just 24 across the city.
https://www.the-sun.com/news/16861604/ch...lics-iowa/
SACRED relics have been removed from a historic church that officially shut down in one US city.
Several other churches have been forced to close down due to a decline in church members.
The Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church in Lu Verne, Iowa, roughly 119 miles outside of Des Moines, closed down in June.
Prior to the closure, Pastor Steve Struecker and members held a final service, where many of the church’s relics were removed, the Des Moines Register reported.
Sister church Immanuel Evangelical Lutheran Church in Livermore, Iowa, also closed down in June.
Data from the US Religion Census shows that over 200 churches across Iowa have closed from 2010 to 2020.
Iowa has also seen a 13% decline in residents who consider themselves members of a church, leading to the recent closures.
“What’s happened to us happened to the whole town,” Zion President Dave Hanselman said.
“We’re not able to support ourself any longer.”
In July, the Archdiocese of Dubuque, Iowa closed down 76 churches amid an ongoing decline in mass attendance.
The archdiocese consolidated 160 parishes into just 24 across the city.
https://www.the-sun.com/news/16861604/ch...lics-iowa/
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
