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REX/Moritz Wolf / imageBROKER
UK News

CofE: Urgent action needed on falling church attendance

by Desmond Busteed

In a joint statement, the Church's most senior leaders have also highlighted their concerns over the prospect of priest shortages because of the aging profile of current clergy, with around 40% due to retire over the next decade.

Most Revd Justin Welby and Dr John Sentamu say the age profile of congregations have also become significantly older than the general population, posing further issues for the Church's finances, which remain stable but cannot be expected to remain so unless the decline in membership is reversed, according to the Archbishops.

However, Revd Dr David Goodhew, a researcher at Church of England's centre for church growth research based at Cranmer Hall, Durham believes the Church is well placed to grow further in some areas, speaking to Premier's Marcus Jones on the News Hour, he said: "We're seeing growth in a number of key aspects in the UK. Firstly we're seeing a lot in London. That's across a wide range of churches."

Four task groups whose reports are now being published each identifies changes which are designed to enable the Church of England to be better equipped for meeting the challenges that it faces. The reports will be discussed at the next General Synod gathering in February.

On average, just over a million people attend Church of England churches each week showing no significant change over the past decade.

Figures for all age average weekly attendance show around 1 in 5 churches growing, and just over this number declining with 57% remaining stable.

Christmas and Easter services continue to attract higher numbers with services on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day attracting around 2.5m people and services at Easter attracting 1.4m people.

Currently, regular church attendance in the United Kingdom stands at 6% of the population with the average age of the attendee being 51.

This shows a decline in church attendance since 1980, when regular attendance stood at 11% with an average age of 37.

Revd Dr David Goodhew, Centre for Church Growth Research:

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