Immigration slows decline
IMMIGRATION IS helping slow the rate of decline in church attendance in Britain, according to new figures to be released soon by Peter Brierley in the second edition of ‘UK Church Statistics’.
Other factors helping churches to slow down decline are the growth of black majority churches (BMC), especially in London, and the success of Fresh Expressions.
According to Dr Brierley, the decline in church membership he anticipated would occur by 2020 will not now be evident until 2025. He based this claim on an analysis of data from nearly 300 denominations in the UK who were surveyed in mid-2013. The results were then compared with the 2011 census results for questions on religion, ethnicity and immigration.
The main Churches to benefit from immigration are the Roman Catholics, with large numbers coming from Poland, the Orthodox with new members coming from Romania, and the Pentecostals who have benefitted from African immigration.
Dr Brierley has already published material on the growth of churches in London showing that 700 new Pentecostal churches began there between 2005 and 2012, of which 400 were BMCs.
The Redeemed Church of God in Christ has started 296 churches in the UK in the last five years: this is the largest number for any denomination.
Total church attendance for 2015 across Britain (excluding Northern Ireland) is likely to 5,370,000 people, four per cent higher than forecast in 2010. On current trends total church membership will continue to decline by about one per cent every five years and will fall to eight per cent of the population by 2025.
Dr Brierley’s statistics are in line with those released for the Church of England, which suggest the rate of decline has slowed down and that some dioceses, notably London, have experienced considerable growth. But C of E statistics also suggest that immigration may not have been a major factor in boosting growth in Anglican churches.
While the Diocese of London has seen an increase in attendance, similar growth has not been evident in the Diocese of Southwark, which also contains large numbers of immigrants.
As far as Anglicans are concerned, the Fresh Expressions movement has probably been the major factor in at least slowing the rate of decline and in some dioceses causing growth. Dr Brierley told one newspaper that Fresh Expressions gatherings, with just half of them taking place in church buildings, tended to attract young families. “The genius is that you get informality in an institutional setting,” he said.
Dr John Wolff, who has carried out an analysis of growth in London, has also pointed to a church share scheme that does not penalise growing parishes, the creation of parish mission plans, and an emphasis on evangelism in making appointments as reasons why the diocese has grown.
In commenting on these statistics, Dr Brierley has been careful to point out that what he is talking about is a slowing down in the rate of decline, not dramatic growth.