Pilgrims of a certain age

A flurry of recent media coverage has focused on a sub-trend: the migration of evangelicals to more rooted, liturgical traditions such as Anglicanism, Catholicism, and Eastern Orthodoxy. Most reporting has centered on Gen Z spiritual émigrés and even more narrowly on young men, seeking a more rigorous—and in some cases “masculine”—Christianity. But a quieter migration may also be underway.

The evangelical émigrés I know aren’t young marrieds or young men. They are older, single women. I am one of them.

After 35 years in Bible churches, I am exploring biblically faithful liturgical traditions. Meanwhile, close friends of mine are also striking out in their 60s toward ancient spiritual destinations.

In 1968, my friend Anita was a bona fide Southern California Jesus Freak. The spiritual wave that began at Pastor Chuck Smith’s Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa had swept south to laidback San Diego. There, evangelists roamed the sands, witnessing to surfers and other young seekers, baptizing them by the hundreds in the blue Pacific.

After high school, Anita’s spiritual journey took her deeper into the world of evangelicalism through Gordon College and the Massachusetts branch of L’Abri Fellowship. Despite a taste of an Episcopal congregation and exposure to iconic Reformed churches, she stayed connected to her nondenominational roots for decades.

Then in 2023, after prayer and formal catechism, Anita was confirmed at International Anglican Church (IAC) in Colorado Springs. “What appealed to my spirit was that it was not an American version of Christianity,” Anita told me. “It is ancient Christianity, unbounded by conventions of modern culture.”

Anita is now 72 years old. Her long spiritual arc wasn’t mere denominational restlessness, but a late-life search for rootedness, belonging, and fellowship with the worldwide communion of saints.

We “women of a certain age” aren’t leaving evangelical churches because we’ve abandoned faith in Christ or the doctrine of grace. Some of us have simply lost confidence in the late-modern evangelical delivery system. After decades inside personality-driven, sermon-centered churches, we are looking for reverence. For sacrament, creed, and calendar. For theological continuity that stretches beyond Mr. Gutenberg’s movable type to wax tablets, parchment, and papyrus.

My friend Jill, who is 65, also spent 35 years in nondenominational evangelicalism. But during the pandemic and Black Lives Matter movement, her church began losing its biblical footing on moral issues. “It was blowing with every wind and tossing with every wave,” Jill says. “Its positions were only vaguely aligned with the Bible, and I became more and more uncomfortable with that.”

Over the years, she’d noticed her Catholic friends had deep, coherent theologies of life and ready answers to issues of the day. Not “culturally relevant” answers, but answers grounded in centuries of Catholic scholarly tradition. Jill was attracted to that: “There’s something about getting older that you want things you can count on. You’re looking for solidity. Consistency.”

In 2024, Jill left nondenominationalism and was confirmed in the Roman Catholic Church.

The idea of evangelical-to-liturgical migration is hardly new. In 1985, Wheaton College professor Robert Webber published a book, Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail. Back then, the trail hosted only a trickle of pilgrims. Today, though, the pilgrim ranks have swelled enough to draw fresh reporting. Still, Pew Research Center’s 2025 figures on religious switching suggest it remains a small and hard-to-measure current within American Christianity.

I admit it’s very un-Pew-like for me to cite just myself and two friends and hint at even a sub-sub-sub-trend. Any statistician would label our stories anecdotes, not data. Still, Jill and Anita don’t know each other, and each of us, in our 60s, embarked on our journeys independently. So with the broader trend well-documented, perhaps it’s reasonable to wonder whether this pattern extends beyond my own circle.

At some point, perhaps older, single Christian women don’t need Sunday worship as a weekly presentation or churches as inspirational event platforms. Speaking for myself only, I am finding that the Anglican practices of Word and table, creed and calendar, along with rhythmic prayer, support endurance, hope, love, forgiveness, and moment-by-moment fellowship with God. It is a different walk on the Canterbury Trail, one I hope will help me complete my life in peace and repentance.