The Church of England published its Statistics for Mission 2023 yesterday. There is an accompanying press release which is copied below.
Update Also available are the Detailed Diocesan tables from Statistics for Mission 2023.
Christmas and Easter congregations swell as Church of England sees third year of growth
04/12/2024
Attendance at Christmas services leapt by 20 per cent last year and the number of worshippers at Easter was up 8.6 per cent as Church of England congregations experienced a third year of growth, the latest full annual statistics show.
The number of regular worshippers in the Church of England edged above a million in 2023 for the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the Statistics for Mission 2023 report.
Overall attendance remains below 2019 levels but the report published today shows numbers recovering towards the pre-pandemic trend.
The report confirms the pattern highlighted in preliminary headline figures for 2023 published in May of this year, with some upward revisions.
Overall weekly attendance at Church of England churches rose to 693,000 in 2023, from 663,000 in 2022, an increase of 4.5 per cent. The total reflects an upward revision from the preliminary figure of 685,000 published in May.
Meanwhile the number of children attending weekly increased from 90,000 in 2022 to 95,000 (up 4.9 per cent in a year). Again, the figure was revised upwards slightly from a total of 92,000 quoted in May.
The Church of England’s overall “worshipping community” – the total number of regular worshippers – rose to 1,007,000 in 2023, from 982,000 the previous year.
Just under two million people (1,961,000) attended services on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day last year, up from 1,636,000 in 2022.
Separately, 2.1 million attended services for the congregation and community during advent 2023 in addition to 2.3 million who attended civic and school advent services.
Meanwhile the number of worshippers at Easter rose 8.6 per cent to 938,000.
It really feels like there is an opportunity here. Something about Christmas and Easter still draws people in. The initiative must be seized.
I strongly agree, Nevertheless, the Christmas figures are not quite what they might seem. Christmas Eve was a Sunday and so regular Sunday congregations were counted as Christmas ones.
The problem is that a large part of the Church doesn’t like Christmas and Easter surges and see them as beneficial only as a wedge to increase regular Sunday attendance. As you say there is an opportunity. The Church could focus on becoming a church where people attend in person for festivals and life events with house churches and online services providing for more regular worship for those who want it, supplemented by things like YouTube Bible study courses. I still think it unbelievable that the Church of England doesn’t have a set of audio books available online, free of… Read more »
I mean the Church’s social media is absolutely pants to be honest. If you compare it to what the Roman Church is offering, the Romans are so far ahead of us. The English Church spends too much time on stock images and doesn’t give anyone any meat.
I think being a church for festivals might not be a bad thing. It’s about sharing the gospel, after all, not just getting the numbers up. If we provide a service for high days and holy days, then so be it.
With respect to the idea of getting famous people to read the bible, I believe that David Suchet has done just that.
It’s instructive to look at Coventry because it covers the entire episcopacy of Bishop Christopher Cocksworth. Adult usual Sunday attendance 2009 11.500. 2019 9,700. 2023 8,000. Easter 2009 15,200. 2019 12,600. 2023 9.900 Confirmations (ie new communicants) 2009 340. 2019 204. 2023 161. In the past few weeks alone, three large contiguous benefices (17 parishes in total), all vacant, have been carved up and bolted on to neighbouring parishes without any increase in clergy. The opportunity for weekly communion is only possible with miles of travel. More likely to encounter lay led d-i-y or a church open once a month.… Read more »
I was a massive supporter of the parish system when it offered weekly communion and a vicar who was active in the local community. The present system often doesn’t offer that and, in many areas, has become a neither-fish-nor-fowl offering. If someone has a workable solution to revert to how things were 50 years ago, I would support it enthusiastically but, absent that, I think it would be better to choose an end point and implement it at speed, rather than being buffeted by the wind for the next twenty years. Better to choose one’s destiny and start afresh than… Read more »
Well it would be worth a try to use the significant resources at the disposal of the church commissioners to fund the ongoing ministry in parishes ahead of time bound project work that seems to have had no lasting impact.
I am no longer a regular attendee in the CofE so can’t comment at first hand, but several of my acquaintances who do (and several commentators on this site) have noted that they have never known congregational anger towards the national church such as what they have seen in the light of the publication of the Makin Report. As these statistics are collated each October, I dare say that we will have to wait until the 2025 statistics to know if that anger has impacted on the statistics? I would be very interested to hear if any folk here have… Read more »
I suspect ‘congregational’ response is entirely dependent on the ‘congregation’. Our parishioners barely blinked.
Indeed, not so much as a ripple here. But then I find the rural church in general hyper-local. Except for the purposes of gossip, events at the church in the next village barely resonate, never mind the ABC.
We are completely the opposite of rural, but the sentiments are similar. People stick to their parish and remain largely uninvolved with (and uninformed about) the ‘national church’. I think this is a good thing.
There is little evidence for optimism here as the Church of England continues its gradual decline. But one remarkable statistic is the number of confirmations which are collapsing from 25000 in 2009 to 10700 in 2023. If Eucharist services require confirmation for participation there will soon be very few participants.
Increasingly children in the C of E children are admitted to communion at the age of seven or eight. It may be that not all go on to be confirmed but they do receive communion.
It would be good to have some more theological thinking in this area I think. As ever the picture seems congregational and varied in different parts of the country. I have been in churches where the invitation to communion is simply ” if you love Jesus”, no reference to baptism
Yes – this has been aired in TEC to make the requirement of baptism optional – it was seen off (for now) by a pack of liturgical scholars. It is creeping into the C of E. The lack of liturgy teaching in our TEIs does not help – I can name several where no liturgy is taught whatsoever. (Not of course the case in ERMC where I teach!) Sadly I had a conversation about this with a senior person in the national church institutions who seemed to be unable to grasp the concept of liturgical scholarship…
Yet the Sunday service is our shop window and front door. Icabod!
My last bishop chaired the Liturgical Commission and lamented not only this lacuna in priestly formation but also the lack of any corporate will to do something about it. I too have heard the “if you love Jesus” invitation to communion, and in two very different dioceses. To think, baptism used to be the gateway to the sacramental economy!
The Church of England allows communion on the basis of baptism – though the actual picture and practice is complicated. The drop in confirmations is worrying for other reasons!
Other than for children, the Church of England only permits it for those ready and desirous of being confirmed. If they are ready and desirous, it’s not as if we’re alarmingly short of Suffragan Bishops to undertake the necessary ministrations.
Some dioceses are currently expecting their suffragan bishop(s), or even a retired bishop, to do quite a long spell of covering the full responsibilities of a diocese, whether their own diocese or another. There are parts of the country where ‘not alarmingly short’ is hardly the right description.
Justin leaves us in a wonderful position: Growing churches, strong finances and high clergy morale.
Haven’t you forgotten the one about all victims and survivors fully compensated??
I have just watched a recording of ++Welby’s speech today in the House of Lords as part of a housing debate. The man was cracking jokes about his resignation and encouraging us to pity his diary secretary ‘if anybody’. Then there were 5 male Bishops, including one – the Bishop of Manchester, whose own failings in handling a disclosure made in his Diocese by a priest who had been abused have been recently exposed online – sitting behind him laughing away at it all – the good ole boys at it again, in their comfy little boys club. Only the… Read more »
I’m even more taken aback to find out the Bishop of Manchester is Vice Chair of the national Redress Scheme. See here: https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2024-02/gs-misc-1372-redress-final.pdf If I’m not mistaken, those involved have received training in trauma-informed responding to situations of abuse and their subsequent handling. So here we have a Bishop who has been so trained, and who may well have already sat with survivors in this role and seen first hand the horrific damage abuse does. Yet he laughs openly with a senior colleague making light of the aftermath of one of the most widespread situations of abuse the Church has… Read more »
I fear that, if you think that the bishops on the bench behind the Archbishop looked as if they were enjoying themselves, you were reading the room as well as His Grace did himself yesterday. They looked desperately uncomfortable despite the attempted smiles.
I disagree, but thank you for engaging. It came across to me that only +London looked uncomfortable. At best, a couple of the men (not including +Manchester) were more restrained than the others in their laughter.
Realist and others – if you have high blood pressure, please avoid the letters page of today’s Church Times. Four letters about Makin/Welby. All of them sickeningly pro Welby, including describing his resignation as ‘a miscarriage of justice’ and requiring a withdrawal of his resignation. Who knew that a new editor (from Christ Church Oxford) could so quickly change the culture of that newspaper. Where’s the editorial balance? Besides ‘Editor’ is gender neutral but each letter begins ‘Madam’ when it should be ‘Sir’.
Well yes, those letters are pretty dreadful. And also display rank hypocrisy. “I write to congratulate the Church Times for publishing the authoritative and impeccably researched article by Francis Martin: “Makin erred, say retired detectives”” Let us quote from Wikipedia on the moral authority of the writer of that. My emphasis. The Guardian and Granada produced, via their counsel George Carman, evidence countering his claim that his wife, Lolicia Aitken, paid for the hotel stay at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. The evidence consisted of airline vouchers and other documents showing that his wife had, in fact, been in Switzerland at the time when she had allegedly… Read more »
Let’s not forget that this is the same old Etonian who according to his Crockford’s entry was ordained deacon in 2018 at the ripe old age of 76 and priested in 2019, aged 77. The standard cut-off age for revolting peasants like you and me is 60, except in exceptional circumstances which are interpreted differently in the dioceses. A very humble man 15 years younger than Aitken in my Dio had to put himself through the full discernment process twice after he was rejected first time round for being “too old” when only a couple of years away from this… Read more »
One of the best, and worst, aspects of our politics is that most politicians are friends across the house: they praise people whose politics they publicly condemn as “servants of the house” or “great politicians” or “passionate debaters”. On the one hand, that is good: it spares us the tribalism and aggression of US politics. On the other hand, it gives the impression that the participants treat it as a game, and that ultimately their loyalty is to other politicians rather than the electorate. The same goes, more so, to the Lords both spiritual and temporal. They have absolutely no… Read more »
I can say this now he is going. I visited Lambeth the first week of his tenure to discuss matters, with him and Josiah Idowu-Fearon. He struck me as someone out of a stereotyped film, “The Man from Eton Becomes a Prelate.” I lived in the UK on a “leave to remain indefinitely status” as Prof at St Andrews and had close friends in the Charterhouse/Godalming milieu, so it was hardly “the yank comes to meet an Englishman.” I taught at Yale when Rowan Williams did a replacement stint for the late Hans Frei. And worked closely with him for… Read more »
The stats are grim, and have just been given a very thick coat of gloss. A deeper dig into the reality of the CofE would show: 1. Fewer ordinations; more clergy leaving early; huge crisis of trust and confidence in leadership; colossal issues of morale and mental health in clergy; dire financial straits in clergy households; fear, fear, fear. 2. Laity overstretched and not prepared to volunteer because of burdensome admin and fear of inconsistency in incompetent safeguarding. Despair and depression are everywhere. 3. Younger people either drifting away, or more likely going nowhere near an elitist out of touch… Read more »
Just when you think things could not get worse for the CofE, Justin Welby delivers a masterclass in how not to give a graceful resignation speech. Truly dreadful.
Welby’s speech could have been made by Boris Johnson, and reveals their similar educations, upbringing and and ethics: it’s all a game, take nothing seriously, laugh at everything and everyone, because you have enough money and social capital that nothing really matters. He, like Johnson, is a trivial man: he does not believe in, or care about, much other than self-interest. He was desperate to be in the top job, managed to parlay his way into it and, yet again like Johnson, had no idea what to do once he got it. He wanted to be head boy, that’s all.… Read more »
He has now apologised.
One might naively think that a man employed as a preacher and a leader of preachers would have the ability to read the room and speak appropriately: that is, one would have thought, one of the key competences of the role. Apparently not.
The man has blundered his way throughout his tenure – naive to think this tin eared man would get it right in his farewell address to the Lords.The man is a nincompoop and we’re all paying a heavy price not least the survivors of the safeguarding scandals.
Welby’s inheritance will be the promotion of a superficial religion in which church ‘planting’ has been led by grinning nincompoops . He failed to read the mood of a tolerant nation which found Welby ‘s public school evangelicalism laughable, toxic and irrelevant. Smyth’s terrible crimes were the worst example of this alien unAnglican religion.
Nincompoop – such a good word!
I am reminded of an American film I once saw. Addressing his morning newspaper he ranted: I know you’re a nincompoop and I strongly suspect you of being a scoundrel.
A remark which could now be addressed to pretty much any bishop.
The electronic appendix reveals a lot, and drills the statistics down to dioceses, and in some all is certainly not well.
I can’t find the table of Confirmations by diocese which is in the contents list of the appendix but not actually there – or have I made a mistake?
Hi Dave, thank you for your comment (I wrote the report), and for the reminder that the electronic appendix contains a lot more detail, for those interested.
Having just double-checked, I’m sure the diocesan confirmation figures are there: table A13, to be found where you’d expect it to be.
Always possible I’m being dim, but in any case if you still can’t locate it please contact me (contact info in the report) and we’ll work it out.
I’ve added a link to the Detailed Diocesan tables from Statistics for Mission 2023. This is where you will find the confirmation figures.
Thanks Ken. It is there, my fault, I am not good on excel. Thank you.
If I am reading the table on church size distribution (table 5, page 10) correctly 75% of C of E churches have 1 or no children attending on a Sunday. If true, where is the ministry amongst families?
Correction, should be “5 or fewer children” on a Sunday. My mistake.
The most important stats will be 2024’s. As with the economy ‘bounce back’ has played a significant role in these figures. 2024 will be the first new normal year, and I’d expect it to show at best stagnation but most likely a decline on 2023. Significant in these figures are the continued fall in baptisms and confirmations, and the increasing proportion of over 70’s in the overall congregational figures. Given these the trajectory is consistent decline rather than growth, despite decades of focus on ‘you fer wider, deeper’ to quote an unfortunate diocesan strap line.