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Comment by rebeccaskinner | Hacker News Reader

I think in a lot of places churches have served as a defactor "third place" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place) for communities. It seems like the decline in church attendance mirrors the decline in a lot of third place spaces. None of my grandparents ever attended church with any regularity, but I know that they were all involved in various social and community activities with the types of clubs that don't seem to exist anymore. Friends of mine with kids have parenting meetups, and I try to make technical meetups when I can, but the rotating group of people and the fact that they can be difficult to get to make them quasi-substitutes at best.

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As an Ex-Christian, I miss the "third place" but I do not miss the church. I don't know where to get that same idea for my kids but I also don't want them growing up with a belief in the doctrine I grew up with. I also have strong feelings about what religions my child is exposed to. I don't mind him being exposed to multiple religions, but there are certain religions I would consider secondary and don't want to be his primary exposure.

I'm fairly alone in this, and I say Ex-Christian to indicate I'm not Atheist but I don't know if that's true. Anyway, this is something I've been struggling with a lot. I just spent 3 hours last night talking to a Power salesman, because we had a good time chatting and I don't get that outside my friends and work. There is no forced place for me to talk to acquaintences.

Honestly, if I didn't disagree so strongly with the theology of the LDS (Mormon) church I'd go back to that. They are FANTASTIC for kids, parents, events, etc. They instill great morals (other than homophobia and some other things I disagree with). But they are in general very nice people.

So where do I go for a "third place" without God being involved, but I still get the, "hey man we missed you last week, where were you." and "Have you given your money to God lately?"

Sorry this struck a nerve, and I'm almost ready to go back to the LDS church just so Sam has people he knows but to try to counter the Theology by exposing him to other beliefs as well. IDK.

When I was young, my parents brought me to church for a little while just for something to do. They believed, but they didn't really care, so it wasn't anything that was discussed in my household. Looking back on it, I only cared what they said, not anyone else, so I ignored all the church BS and just played or whatever.

I think that if you bring your kids to church, they'll still look to you for what to believe (or not to believe!). Be straight with them, though. Tell them that you're just going there to have something to do. My parents pretty much said that and I didn't have any problem with it. Maybe ask them not to repeat that in front of others though.

This is also really good advice. Thanks, I might end up doing that. I have to work something out with my wife obviously. I grew up going to both the Mormon (dad) and Catholic (mom) churches. So my faith has always been an oddity. Especially after I became an adult and began questioning things.

You could see if there is a local Unitarian Church. The Unitarians are bound by a shared commitment to loving inclusiveness, not religious dogma, and many Unitarians are agnostic or even atheist.

I've heard this multiple times this weekend. I'm going to check it out. Thank you.

Do a search for social clubs in your area. They exist and have with a variety of activities to center around that may interest you. Finding a family-based social club may be more difficult, but not impossible. And of course there are the various computer/programming based meet-ups... which are really social clubs as well ;)

I've thought about picking up sports again. A lot of my friends and fond memories as a kid came from my dad's Softball team. That isn't a bad idea at all thanks!

I have some co-workers who attend a kind of spiritual-social group. It's designed as a kind of third place for those who choose to avoid the Christian tradition.

I haven't been, so maybe I'm wrong about there being any kind of spiritual focus to the group, but I might describe my coworkers as an ex-Christian (who's fairly bitter about it) and...well, the other guy, I'm not sure. Maybe "theist"? My impression was that they're an open-minded and diverse group of people. Maybe you can find something similar in your area.

Do they have a name or some sort of label to easily identify the group so I could do a search for something similar in my area?

And...they've both left the company. We've been having a lot of layoffs recently, along with significant turnover.

Hey thanks for the follow up though man! I appreciate it.

It's been a couple of years since I last talked to them about that. If I remember, I'll ask tomorrow.

In a lot of countries - Germany, Britain, France to be sure - the pub is such a third place, especially for men. Their special culture seems to be in decline as well, but not as dramatically as churches.

Well the pub has several problems - social stigma for one, and not being free (and in fact being quite expensive 20/30 euros per evening is not much)

And as you say pub attendance is down by a lot too.

I'm a member of CAMRA, the campaign for real ale. Every month they send out a magazine to members. On the front page is an article on the social benefits of having a regular local. On the back page are the member obituaries. Sadly, regularly drinking alcohol shortens your life pretty dramatically, unless you are incredibly disciplined with it.

Traditionally there was zero stigma attached to having a beer in the "Kneipe" in Germany, especially for the working class typically living in small flats.

There's no significant social stigma to going to the pub socially in the UK.

How about sports clubs? I find myself connected fairly well there, and there also is an interregional network with international workshops.

I feel the biggest hole in technical/small social groups vs. church groups is the lack of permanency. With most church organizations there is a built in way to bring fresh people in to associate with the church, and a dedicated place to meet that you can expect to be there with modest assumptions 10 years from now. A technical group is generally completely nomadic, they have to do a lot of work to bring people together. The glue that keeps them together is flimsy as well- a tech group is less likely to keep someone who makes a drastic change in occupation (IT to a brewer) compared to a church.

The major lack of easy association to the group is something that is hard to replicate in the nonsecular space. There is nothing strongly compelling about a group that's focus is too general, and the difficulty to bridge the gap from outsider to inclusion can be too high for a group that is interesting.

> I feel the biggest hole in technical/small social groups vs. church groups is the lack of permanency.

You mean other than the focus on God and morality?

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