Jamie Smith’s latest blog post unveils these things about the way in which our society and its physical arrangements have effected a decrease in the typical markers of community.  This is a study that is also born out by those of Ray Oldenburg’s A Great Good Place 

Over a twenty year period, the study considers the change in the circle of close friends (“confidants”) that Americans have. Over the 20-year span these social networks decreased by 1/3.

as more commuting traffics from suburb to suburb (rather than suburb to core city), the number of new solo drivers grew by almost 13 million from 1990 to 2000. The report also indicates that the number of workers with commutes over 60 minutes grew by 50 percent

Pretty hard to cultivate significant friendships when we’re spending so much time by ourselves in our cars.

Source: Fors Clavigera: The Lonely Commute

Oldenburg’s studies center on the decrease in the amenities of traditional neighborhoods; the lack of sidewalks,  the increase of “household-based” entertainment that keeps people indoors and off the “porches” and away from the side yards where neighbors used to catch up with one another;  and also the increasing rarity of “Third Places” where people go to “commune”  (third after or among Work and family;  “Cheers” type places where “everybody knows your name”.  Increasingly, churches themselves are becoming more like the society that makes such things all the more rare;  and churches follow in the footsteps of the culture at large instead of being a fortress against such individualism and consumer culture that makes consumers of us instead of communities.