BEAVER FALLS — Dozens of people gathered on a balmy Monday afternoon in May outside Christ’s Evangelical Lutheran Church on an urban side street here. When the doors opened at 4 p.m., they descended the timeworn stairs to the basement fellowship hall where a team of volunteers had spread out a meal that included barbecued chicken, mixed vegetables and cake.

The arrivals found seats at the rectangular folding tables. The Rev. Kim Rapczak, wearing an embroidered denim shirt over her black clerical garb, said: “Let’s pray.”

“Lord God, we thank you for this beautiful day,” she began. “Thank you for the opportunity to gather for this meal. We’re grateful for the people who provided the food and cooked it and serve it.”

After she finished the blessing, she began organizing the food line.

“Table two! That’s you guys! That’s you, Jack!”

The workers chatted with the clients as they filed up to the serving tables.

“Hey, Jay, you doing all right? I haven’t seen you in a while,” said Bob Porter, a church member and longtime director of the soup kitchen.

It was a Monday night much like any other since a group of church women launched the soup kitchen at Christ’s Lutheran about 25 years ago in the wake of the steel-industry collapse. More than 50 people typically come for the hot meal. Nobody’s asked to prove a need when they come to dinner, but many are poor and dealing with addictions or disabilities, or single parents with children.

“My son loves to come to the soup kitchen,” said Wendy Unsworth as she ate with her 13-year-old son, who has cerebral palsy. “We don’t miss a Monday unless he’s sick.”

After the meal was done, volunteers scraped off trays and cleaned tables. Later, workers for an overnight shelter — which is hosted by the church and operated by a separate board — would set up cots. It’s the only emergency shelter for men in Beaver County.

The Rev. Kim Rapczak greets people as they arrive at the weekly soup kitchen at Christ's Evangelical Lutheran Church in Beaver Falls. (Andrew Rush/Post-Gazette)

For all the energy and community spirit of Christ Lutheran’s members, some demographic and economic realities are catching up with the 131-year-old congregation. Average attendance on Sunday morning is about 25 to 35, most of the participants are elderly and funerals for senior members are all too common. The savings that the church uses to supplement its budget are running out.

Christ’s Lutheran expects to close the doors of its Gothic brick sanctuary in the next year or so.

Which raises some questions: Who’s going to pick up the Monday night soup kitchen when it does? Who’s going to host the shelter?

The Presbyterians nearby serve a meal on Wednesdays, the Methodists on Fridays and the Salvation Army on Saturdays. Catholics and Orthodox run food pantries in the area. Smaller churches donate to the soup kitchens.

But each time a congregation is lost, it leaves a hole in the fabric of social services here.

And the shelter board is looking for a new location willing to host homeless men every night, so far without success.

“It’s going to be a shame they’re going to lose this,” Mr. Porter said of the soup kitchen. “I will seek somebody who will take over, but they’re going to have to have their own location because this building will not be available.”

Added Rev. Rapczak, pastor of Christ’s Lutheran: “I would imagine this is a story that is repeated all over the Rust Belt.”

It appears so.

To be sure, many small congregations in struggling communities find a sense of purpose in reaching out to the needy.

But they can only do so if they remain open. Many of the factors that contribute to a town’s struggles, such as the closure of steel mills, the long-term population decline and the departure of many younger residents in search of jobs elsewhere, also take their toll on churches when a community needs their services the most. 

Researchers in the St. Louis region found that by several measures, church closures went hand-in-hand with declines in their neighborhoods along various criteria, from poverty to home-ownership to rates of income, education and racial integration.

The study “did not assume these congregations cause the resulting conditions in the communities where they are situated; clearly, many factors are at work,” said the report, published in the Journal of Urban Affairs in 2015 by researchers Nancy T. Kinney of the University of Missouri-St. Louis and Todd Bryan Combs of Washington University in St. Louis.

But the report backed “the premise that religious congregations contribute in some way to the quality of life experienced by residents” — and that their closures subtract from it.

Religious congregations have an economic “halo effect” on their neighborhoods by hosting organizations and programs, providing volunteer labor and attracting worshipers and others who spend in the nearby neighborhood, according to a separate study by University of Pennsylvania researcher Ram Cnaan  for the group, Partners for Sacred Spaces.

Depopulation, secularization and other factors are taking their toll on the religion landscape, particularly in economically struggling communities. Beaver Falls’ estimated population of 8,500 is half its mid-20th century peak.

Though recent figures are hard to come by, Beaver County lost a net total of 17 congregations between 2000 and 2010 among denominations tracked over the decade, according to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies. While new congregations were created at that time, the types of churches most likely to close — Catholic and mainline Protestant, such as Lutheran, Presbyterian and Methodist — are those often hosting food pantries, clothes closets and other charitable services.

Dina Ciabattoni, the continiuum of care coordinator at The Cornerstone of Beaver County, a clearing house for social services, said that in the constellation of providers of services to the needy, congregations have a unique role.

“The churches oftentimes are filling the gaps that we don’t have formal services for,” said Ms. Ciabattoni. They have crews of volunteers and space to host programs and store supplies, for example.

To lose a church “would definitely be a challenge, but in nonprofit social services, we’re always preparing for an unexpected shift.” She expected other entities would pick up the slack.

Mr. Porter said he’s trying to find a church or other place that can host the soup kitchen.

He and his wife, Barbara, began volunteering more than a decade ago.

He grew up in Beaver Falls and was baptized and confirmed at Christ’s Lutheran.

He left  town in 1971, not wanting to work in the steel mills, and spent a law-enforcement career elsewhere returning upon retirement to a post-industrial Beaver Falls. Of the 15 people in his confirmation class, he’s the only one still at Christ’s Lutheran. 

Still, he said he and the volunteers would serve as long as they can.

“This is something that Christ wants all of us to do,” he said. “I honestly believe there are more people out there that could probably be doing this. I also strongly believe the community should be taking care of the people not the government.”

Regular diners at the soup kitchen are concerned about its future.

Without it, “there would be a lot of people hungry,” said Ms. Unsworth. “Yeah. A lot of people hungry.”

First Published: June 4, 2017, 4:00 a.m.