from Barna Group - 17 March 2017
The good news: Most people don’t dislike pastors.
The bad news: They just don’t really care about pastors either.
In Barna’s The State of Pastors report, produced in partnership with Pepperdine University, the reception of pastors was generally lukewarm. One-quarter of all U.S. adults (24%) holds a very positive opinion of pastors in general. Meanwhile, roughly the same proportion reports a negative opinion (28% “somewhat” + “very” negative). Similarly, one-quarter of the population has little regard for the pastoral influence in their city or neighborhood (23% “not very” + “not at all” influential), while one in five adults (19%) goes so far as to call pastors very influential.