Somebody recently asked me about Church Closures since 2020 and the aftermath of Covid Lockdowns, Hurricane Laura, and Hurricane Ida in Louisiana. I was curious and did a little digging and found there has been a tremendous impact.

433 SBC churches in Louisiana have been marked closed 2001–2025 (336 with closure dates; 97 with no date recorded)

Closure rates accelerated sharply since 2020: 

• 2002–2019: 156 closures, averaging 8.7 per year
• 2020–2025: 179 closures, averaging 30 per year
• Peak year was 2021 with 57 closures. 33 in 2020. 29 in 2022. 109 total 2020-2022. 

Mergers have been a factor. 

• 34 organizations closed via merger: 28 into another SBC congregation, 6 into a non-SBC body. 
• Mergers represent 8% of all closures. 

Geography:

• 74% of closures were in Metro areas, 23% non-metro, 3% city not listed.
• Top Cities: New Orleans 54 · Baton Rouge 26 · Shreveport 18 · Metairie 12 · Bossier City 11 · Hammond 9 · Lafayette, Pineville, Slidell, Lake Charles, Denham Springs, West Monroe, Bastrop, Monroe 8 each · Kenner, Minden, Gonzales, Alexandria 5 each. The remaining 240 closures are spread across 143 additional communities, most with one or two. 

Why Churches Close?

A lot could be said about this, but in brief, thinking about the significant increase in closures in Louisiana:

1. 2020 Disruptions. The disruption from 2020 in Louisiana with Covid lockdowns and Hurricanes Laura, Delta, and Zeta, led many churches and missions that were struggling to stay alive to call it quits. Hurricanes mean significant numbers of people are displaced, some for extended periods, and significant numbers choose permanent relocation in the aftermath. Laura was definitely one of those kinds of storms for Louisiana.
2. Urban Decline. New Orleans has never fully recovered its pre-Katrina population. Other Louisiana large cities struggle with crime, declining infrastructure, and population loss. When these happen, churches struggle as well.
3. Pastor Shortage. Louisiana Baptist maintain a list of 200+ churches that are without a pastor at any given time. If the church has had a long season of decline and has few young families, they are likely to choose closure given the realities of the situation. Inability to find a pastor or pay a pastor a living wage is a real struggle for 100’s of congregations in Louisiana.
4. Lack of Evangelism. The engine of growth in the New Testament Church is the proclamation of the message about Christ, backed by the power of the Holy Spirit. It always has been this and always will be, this side of eternity. Today, most churches lack an evangelism strategy. We’ve stopped engaging our community. We don’t have clear discipleship pathways for newcomers. We lack the systems to grow the church. And just like the human body, when systems begin to fail, death is close behind.

It doesn’t have to be this way. The Gospel can overcome the struggles caused by cultural change, leadership capacity, and lack of evangelism. We can be a solution to decline in our communities through the power of Christ. We can raise up the next generation of leaders from within, instead of looking for them in other places. We can put back on the shoes of gospel readiness and share the life changing, community shaking message that is the power of God unto salvation (Romans 1:16).