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I spent fifteen years as a pastor in a mainline denomination. Here are some of the factors.1: Collapse of Christendom in the United StatesUnlike Europe, The United States never had a state church. However, Protestant denominations were given a fair amount of deference, especially on the local level. Retail stores, restaurants, movie theaters and other places of entertainment were closed on Sundays via municipal ordinance. Educational curriculum reflected the Protestant world view. Clergy were given a tremendous amount of deference. If the local clergy association objected to a proposal for a nightclub or bar it wouldn’t happen. Similarly, denominational leaders maintained decency standards in movies and television. The director of admissions of the seminary I graduated from had previously worked as a network censor in the 1960’s and was instrumental in getting The Smothers Brothers taken off the air.The peak of mainline Protestantism in the United States was the thirty year period after WWII. Business and civic leaders tended to worship in the mainline congregations in their towns. While many did not attend every Sunday it was rare that a college educated professional did not belong to and contribute to a congregation. In the town I grew up in — an affluent suburb about ten miles west of Newark, NJ — people used to joke about “the three P’s” that were the mark of the upper middle class distinction: Princeton, Prudential and Presbyterian. If a twenty-something was a Princeton graduate, a junior executive at Prudential insurance and a member of the Presbyterian Church he would be tapped for membership in the exclusive country club and leadership in civic organizations regardless of how humble his family origins might be.In the period between 1965 and 1985 Christendom began to collapse in the United States. It didn’t happen everywhere all at once. But town by town, region by region, things like Sunday blue laws and public prayer come to an end. You could see a movie and get a drink at a bar on a Sunday afternoon. By 1985 it was no longer a cultural expectation that respectable people attend worship on Sunday. Denominational affiliation was no longer a factor when it came to choosing a spouse.2: Protestant Churches failed to adapt to the post-Christendom contextThe period between 1980 and 2000 was characterized by denial on the part of clergy and lay leadership in mainline Protestant congregations and denominations. Worship attendance began to fall. However, endowments and the giving patterns of people born before 1940 kept the institutions afloat. Also, worship attendance among baby boomers in the southeastern and south central regions of the US helped bolster denominational coffers which furthered the denial on the part of denominational leadership.Most mainline congregations continued to worship in facilities built between 1880 and 1930 with inadequate parking and huge maintenance costs. They did little to no evangelism or outreach beyond the sign in front of the building stating the time of worship. Most of these congregations continued to worship using the “bulletin order of worship” that was developed in the 1920’s and 1930’s. Most of the hymns used in worship were composed between 1880 and 1930. Rather than engage directly in mission most mainline congregations were content to send money to denominational headquarters where mission agencies engaged in mission on the congregation’s behalf.3: Competition From Non-denominational ChurchesThe period between 1980 and 2000 saw the rise of innovative, non denominational churches. These congregations ditched the bulletin, the organ and the committees in favor of multi-media, praise bands and inclusive teams. They met in modern, attractive facilities with off street parking. They ditched the dress code. Most mainline clergy who wanted to bring such innovations to their congregations were met with stiff resistance from people born before 1940 and denominational polity that mandated a committee structure.4: Towns that once supported five mainline congregations can only support twoDespite these changes there are still people who prefer mainline Protestant congregations. College educated, non-fundamentalists, professional people still prefer mainline Protestant congregations over their independent counterparts IF they attend church and send their children to Sunday school. However, that number is far smaller than it was in 1965 and there is little denominational loyalty as most people in this group are open to attending any mainline congregation regardless of which denomination they were raised in. In most towns only the largest congregations offering the most programs thrive. Mainline Protestant congregations thrive in affluent towns but struggle in working class and rural communities. There is more competition today for a dwindling constituency.Edit: From some of the comments it is apparent that many do not know what mainline Protestantism is and is not. We are talking about denominations like the Episcopal Church, Presbyterian, Reformed, Lutheran, United Church of Christ, United Methodist and American Baptist churches that trace their lineage to sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth century Europe. These denominations are not fundamentalist, require their clergy to obtain both a bachelors degree and a Master of Divinity. They do not have a literal interpretation of The Bible and see no conflict between faith and science.

I heard the story, back in 1997, from an AT&T executive who was giving a technical presentation to Prudential Insurance executives. He said that back in the 70’s, Denis Ritchie and Ken Thompson were working to re-write Unix, the operating system that is still being used today, albeit in different incarnations such as Linux.UNIX was difficult to enhance, basically because the languages that were needed to implement the enhancements were pretty limited. Assembler, which is very efficient and fast, is also very tedious to work with. Other than that, there were not too many choices. Languages, such as Fortran, where too high level and cannot communicate very well with the hardware. They also used an interpreter called B, which in turn came from an existing language called BCPL. Interpreters, by the way, are notoriously slow, not a good choice for an operating system.However, B language had an advantage: with only a few lines of code the programmer could write the equivalent of many pages of arduous Assembler. The disadvantage, it lacked many features that were necessary to re-write the operating system.That is when Denis Ritchie set himself to re-write B and, naturally, he called C. He added all the features needed to enhance UNIX and the project was a success.One by-product of UNIX efficiency is that it can run in relatively cheap and small machines with modest amount of memory while providing truly multitasking capability.To highlight the importance of this achievement, in 1984 AT&T marketed a desktop computer, the 3B1, which, according to PC Magazine, it was the first computer which documentation was heavier than the machine itself. At that time, the PC was just a little more than a toy. 3b1 was a powerful multitasking marvel, albeit immensely unpopular, but it was a glimpse of the modern desktop computer that we know today.Both products, C and UNIX, revolutionized the way we use computers. C, in particular, became the mother of most modern languages. In fact, Java, C++, C#, Python and on, and on, are just expansions of the C language.I came to embrace C in 1984. At the time, I was writing programs in Microsoft GWBASIC. Around these days, I read an editorial in PC Magazine which affirmed that this curious language was so powerful, small, and efficient that (paraphrasing it) in the future, even if other more power languages came along, C would be adopted to teach logic and reasoning. I jumped to studied it immediately. That day is not here yet, but C is still a powerful and popular language that inspires millions of programmers around the world.According to Wikipedia, Denis Ritchie died in 2011. His star was obscured by the celebrity status of Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and others, but not his genius: A pensive, solitary and revolutionary thinker and tinker who showed us the way to modern computing and beyond.

The difference between an Insurance Carrier and an Insurance Agency is analogous to a Manufacturer and a Retail Shop.Insurance Carrier:The Insurance Carrier (also called an Insurance Company) is the manufacturer of the insurance product. Insurance policies are created, administered and claims paid by the insurance carrier.InvestorWords .com defines Insurance Carrier as: The company (that) issues, and assumes the risk of, an insurance policy.Insurance Agency:The insurance agency is like the retail shop that sells and services the product created by the manufacturer, the Insurance Carrier. Insurance Agencies can consist of a shop with a single owner operator to an agency of many owners and employees.InvestorWords .com defines Insurance Agent as: Individual who is licensed by a state to sell insurance for one or more specific insurance companies.In this context, the "agency" is the place where people associated with the agent(s) conduct their business.In practice there are many different types of agencies (and companies for that matter). Some agencies are actually wholesalers (Usually called Managing General Agencies), but the above provides the gist of their difference.Top 100 Property/Casualty AgenciesSome examples of Insurance Carriers include:State Farm InsuranceErie InsuranceAllstate InsurancePrudential InsuranceThe HartfordSome examples of Insurance Agencies include:State Farm Agency Near YouIndependent Agency Near YouAllstate Agency Near YouAn Insurance Carrier is synonymous with an Insurance Company. They are the manufacturers of insurance products. An Insurance Carrier is responsible for issuing and assuming the risk for insurance policies.Top 100 Insurance Companies.An Insurance Agency is the Retail or Wholesale shop that sells and services the product created by the manufacturer. An insurance agency employs people who are licensed by a state to sell insurance for one or more specific insurance companies.Top 100 Insurance CompaniesThat is the difference between an Insurance Agency and an Insurance Carrier.