“The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former.”

Haggai 2:9

Dear Kingdom Builders,

An Episcopal church in Austin needs a new church. So they’re going to print one.

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church is building what it says will be the world’s first 3D-printed church. The congregation had struggled for years with aging facilities and an estimated $8 million price tag.

Then an architect suggested using a giant robotic printer to lay the concrete walls.

My parish is building a new church right now, but I didn’t realize how widespread the construction trends were nationally.

U.S. religious construction spending reached an annualized $6.63 billion in July, up sharply from roughly $4 billion just two years ago. That still sits below the early-2000s peak, but the direction has clearly changed.

In spite of a recent resurgence, fewer Americans still identify as Christians today. Pew found 62% of U.S. adults identify as Christian, down from 78% in 2007.

Churches aren’t just building churches. They’re thinking about how their facilities can serve other purposes throughout the week.

Church consultants and architects are seeing more multipurpose projects, including childcare facilities, coworking spaces, and coffee shops.

Construction consultancy FMI also identified religious construction as one of its strongest segments, with adaptive reuse contributing significantly to that activity.

But this shift may be as much a financial strategy as an evangelization strategy.

Church buildings have to serve their mission, but they also have to make financial sense.

Land, construction, and maintenance are expensive. A survey found 30% of churches generated income through facility rentals, 14% through daycare or preschool, and 11% through cafés or coffee shops.

And churches continue to get creative.

Houston’s Fallbrook Church is an interesting example. It built multipurpose “worshipnasiums” for worship, sports, and education, then financed a $13 million Lone Star College building on church property. The college now leases the facility, which serves about 1,500 students.

The same space that strengthens a church financially can also expand its reach.

3D printing may or may not be the future of church construction. But churches are building again and increasingly asking their buildings to serve the community in new ways … hopefully to bring more souls to Christ.

Have a blessed week.

Matt

Congressman Barry Loudermilk is a six-term Representative for GA-11, Air Force veteran, small business owner, and longtime member of the House Financial Services Committee. He has also been very public about his Christian faith and interest in the role faith has played throughout American history.

Hormel Foods agreed to acquire Brakebush Brothers, a family-owned chicken company with nearly $1.2 billion in annual sales, for $1.055 billion after more than a century of Brakebush family ownership.

Kid Rock has launched a new Christian chapter in his music career with “James 1:17 (Jesus Is King),” the first single from his upcoming faith-focused album Halfway 2 Jesus, which he says follows a period of growing stronger in his faith.

Church Extension Fund is a faith-based financing model that pools money from members or affiliated investors and lends it back to churches and ministries.

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