The Church of England has just published it's latest attendance, finance, clergy numbers etc. stats on the web, the stats are here, and the press release is here and there is some comment on the Ugley Vicar blog. The data is mainly up to the end of 2005.
It's not very encouraging. The press release leads with the fact that giving is up, which is good news, but hides away at the bottom the fact that attendance is down, after a couple of years of holding steady. (to be fair, the attendance figures were originally issued earlier in the year, so the press release is leading on the new news, rather than the old news)
Even further hidden away are scarey things like the age profile of the clergy, which is already significantly older than 10 years ago, and the projections have hardly anyone under 40 in church leadership in 15-20 years time. Despite increased ordinations, an increasing number of those ordained are non-stipendiary, so the number of full-time leaders is still falling, as well as ageing, and possibly becoming more theologically liberal.
but hey, Jesus is still risen!
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