There are two press releases today from the Church of England about church attendance.
New attendance figures show mixed picture for church-going
Figures just released by the Church of England for 2004 show a mixed picture for trends in church attendance.
Regular Sunday church attendance fell by one per cent – largely offsetting a similar increase the previous year. But weekly and monthly churchgoing held steady and the number of children and young people at services rose by two per cent.
The new statistics confirm that more than 1.7 million people attend Church of England church and cathedral worship each month while around 1.2 million attend each week – on Sunday or during the week – and just over one million each Sunday. …
The full statistics are here.
Churches packed for Christmas past
Reports from across the Church of England suggest Christmas 2005 was a cracker for church attendance.
An opinion poll suggesting increasing numbers are attending church services at Christmas has been backed up by anecdotal evidence gathered from across the Church of England. In the specially-commissioned survey released last month, pollster ORB found that 43 per cent of adults were expected to attend a church service over the Christmas period.
It wasn’t just the queue snaking from the doors of King’s College Chapel in Cambridge, where the annual Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols again saw hundreds attempting to get a seat; all over the country, churches experienced a growth in the number of people seeking an opportunity to worship. …
The survey results are here, and the original press release here.
“Churches packed for Christmas”
True.. I think this year was a record – heading for 700 in one Carol Service when normal Sunday attendance is only 150ish !