The latest statistics relating to Church attendance and service trends have been released by Church House.
Year on year (2007 - 2008) 'All Age' - ASA. Growth was reported in eight dioceses (out of forty-four reporting):
Ripon and Leeds (10.6%)
Derby (9.2%)
Ely (6.4%)
Bradford (2.9%)
Europe (2.5%)
Southwark (2.2%)
Guildford (1.2%), and
Rochester (0.4%)
Four more held their own for the period 2007-2008: Bristol, Manchester, St Edmundsbury & Ipswich and Truro'.
Looking at the trends for the period 2001 - 2008 (Thanks DMK) we have six showing growth, London topping the table with 9.1%. They were closely followed by Southwark 6.4% (so the capital city is showing the way) with Europe (5.8%), Manchester (3.9%). Ely (3.2%) and Hereford (1.9%) completing the gains category. Sadly for 2007-2008 thirty-six post decreasing numbers. Bottom of the pile is Sodor and Man, but as they have such a small sample any changes look worse there and the real losers are Carlise and Birmingham dioceses.
The national attendance (ASA) was -2% (well -1.9% if this makes it look a bit better) down on the previous year (2007).
Occasional Offices (National) 2007 - 2008:
Baptisms - No change (i.e. static)
Infant (02%), Child (+5%), Adult (+2%)
Thanksgivings - Five percent drop
Infant (-8%), Child (+4%)
Confirmations - Three percent drop
Marriages - Three percent drop
Blessings - Three percent drop
Church Funerals - One percent drop
CofE Cremations - Five percent drop
Easter (Communicants) - Five percent drop
Easter (Attendance) - Four percent drop
Christmans (Communicants) - Three percent drop
Christmas (Attendance) - Static
The statistics don't include fresh expressions and stuff that is happening outside of the Sunday slot but these are not large enough (at this time) to make any significant change or impact to the story. Salutary reading indeed!
For those of you brave enough to read the full report, it can be found at CofE Stats 2007-8
4 comments:
Vic - if you've borrowed these stats from me, then just to clarify: what I posted was the change in attendance by diocese from 2001-8, not the change from 2007-8. These are my own workings, based on the official CofE stats, but they've never actually been published with the Church House seal of approval!
I think the CofE reported that 14 dioceses had grown from 2007-8, the troubling thing is that few dioceses seem to be growing in any consistent fashion.
I have incorporated your stats and been playing with them myself to get the figures for 'All Age'ASA to see where the trends (year on tear) are.
Now comes the hard bit of making sense of the demographics and the challenges (met and failed) and seeing what this means for us on the ground.
It would be so much easier if they published them all in Excel.....!
I have already sent them an email asking for exactly the same thing - would make the manipulating and development of stats much easier wouldn't it :)
Interesting that we're losing out on the crem trips though - mind you we are seeing an increase in secular/humanist (we even have a local 'humanist minister' - now there's an oxymoron!) services where we are!
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