For the first half of 2018, I’ve spent my time embarking on a photo documentary project looking at the declining numbers within the Christian Church in England. This change is fairly extreme and is called secularisation, where a country’s religion transforms dramatically from its most associated religion. Enjoy my photos and then take some time if you’d like to read the article that I wrote to pair with the photographs.
With our Queen, the reigning monarch, being the head of the Church of England, we are officially a Christian Country. Christianity has been a staple religion within the United Kingdom since St Augustine’s mission in 597 AD, although there were brief mentions before that. However, Christianity has had a turbulent journey in the United Kingdom. For example, Henry VIII separating from the Catholic church to create the Church of England in order to grant his own divorce in 1534. Following on from that he then attempted to dissolve all monasteries within England.
The UK is losing its Christian numbers. The most recent proof of this secularisation comes from the 2017 Ipsos MORI Global Trends Survey where 41% of the population declared that they weren’t part of any religion. Christian believers still held the majority with 48% however. As well as this, people who were spiritual but not religious held 5% and other non-Christian religions held 5%.
This decline isn’t something that’s gone under the radar of the government and churches in the UK; the numbers have been falling since the 1970’s due to declining parish numbers and a decline in those devoting their life to become a priest. Between 1970 and 2014, the number of active priests in England and Wales dropped from 7,700 to 4,900. Alongside this, the number of Sunday worshippers has dropped from 1.9 million to 850,000. Before exploring why this has happened, let’s explore the facts further:
There is a lot of speculation as to why the Christian numbers are dropping. Some people see the church as being dated and unaccepting in regards to our changing society and values. The Bible teaches us the Ten Commandments such as ‘Thou shall not kill’ which we still hold as an important value; but we generally are much more accepting of things such as same sex marriage, divorce and abortions which the Church and Bible is not. So does this mean that the Church is out of date compared to the rest of society? I conducted a survey about people’s opinions on Christianity in the UK and when asked ‘what do you think can be done to boost numbers within the Christian community?’, one typical response was ‘[the] Church needs to be… accepting of everyone including divorces and the LGBT community’.
There are also issues facing the acceptance of women becoming priests within the Christian church. Pope Francis was asked about the issue of women becoming priests, to which his reply was “The church has spoken and says no … That door is closed.” Women can become priests if they are part of the Church of England but some have faced apparent difficulty in doing so. This relates to suggestions that the church needs to ‘speak in a modern tongue’ and to embrace our more liberal and open values. This can be related to the Church translating mass and the Bible from Latin to English to allow their followers to understand the religion. One part of the Church that is embracing these changes, though, is Evangelists who are reportedly becoming more liberal on subjects such as same sex marriage and this at least is partly helping to keep their congregation alive.
Research suggests that this lack of acceptance or willingness to conform to modern values could be a large part of the reason why the numbers of young people within the Church are dropping. As a young person myself, I can understand some of the reasons why young people go to church and, as someone who (although convent educated) rarely goes to church, the reasons why they do not. The millennial generation is diverse and forever changing and so maybe being seen to be a part of something that has ‘dated’ views creates a bad image of a person as they are seen not to be supporting things such as the LGBT community that isn’t currently fully supported by the Church.
As well as Christianity losing its followers, it is also losing its priests in the United Kingdom. One reason why is because of the rules on celibacy. Pope Francis is said to be discussing the matter at the next Synod this year according to the Catholic Herald. Plans for the Synod are said to “have proposed allowing married priests. While supporters of the move see it as a necessary practical response to a priest shortage” (The Catholic Herald).
Other reasons research shows to have caused a decline in the Christian faith is a lack of trust. A survey completed in May 2017 revealed “Of the 1,000 [of British people surveyed] aged 16 and over interviewed online in February 2017, 33% said they trusted the Church a great deal (9%) or quite a lot (24%) while 58% trusted it not much (28%) or very little (30%).” and according to the Catholic Herald, Britons are more likely to trust weather forecasters over Christian priests. This lack of trust could come from the negative press the Christian Church receives over their lack of acceptance of modern values and over things such as sex abuse scandals. Even though the scandals do not come from every priest, the perception is planted just from the few who act inappropriately. What makes these incidents worse is the Church’s reactions to them. An example of this comes from my research whilst embarking on this project. I read up on articles trying to get an opinion from priests on the declining Christian numbers. Whilst doing so I discovered an article from 2013 written by The Telegraph where the Ex-Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey had been interviewed. In the interview he made remarks such as “Christianity is just a generation away from extinction in Britain unless churches make a dramatic breakthrough in attracting young people back to the faith”. This shows a significant blame on the Church and highlights my earlier points about numbers from the younger generations not wanting to be a part of the Church. Ironically, I then came across another news article entitled: Lord Carey: “Police and prosecutors consider criminal investigation into ex-Archbishop of Canterbury over alleged abuse ‘cover up’”. This highlights some of the hypocrisy that occurs within the Church, damning its own name by protecting and covering up these historic abuse cases.
In 2016, the government released The Casey Review (an independent review into integration by Dame Louise Casey under the orders of the Prime Minister and The Home Secretary) which has a section looking at the religious make up of the UK. It stated that within the UK, numbers within other religions are rising such as the Islamic faith and Judaism and this increase brings a lot of cultures and faiths together, which, in turn, ‘creates an awareness of the tension between them’. Following on from that, some fear that Christianity will be diminished due to the fast pace at which the Islamic faith is growing. This growth in the Islamic faith in the UK can be said to come from higher immigration rates and followed on by higher birth rates within their communities according to the Casey Review. The research from the review stated that there is a group of Christians that fear that Christianity will be diminished and forgotten about if the Islamic faith continues to grow, which adds to the tension.
There is no denying the statistics surrounding the shift in the United Kingdom’s religious scene. The reasons mentioned within this article are just some of them and I am sure every person who has left or never joined the Church has their own private reasons for doing so. It is a deeply personal topic and in a time of such liberal free speech and thinking, our society is changing as more and more of us voice our personal opinions.
Have you noticed a decline in religion within your local area? Join the conversation to have your say about how noticeable the drop is and whether it has affected your parish.
Loxwood Joust 2018