Church Growth Research Findings published today

The Faith in Research conference today will showcase the findings of the CofE's 'Church Growth Research Programme'. Looking again at the strands of the research, I wonder if some of this was behind Justin Welbys new year comments on growing churches. If quality of local leadership is found to be a key factor in church growth, then the dots are fairly easy to join.

There is the inevitable hashtag, so you can follow the conference via #FIRChurchGrowth, or the Church Growth R&D twitter account.

update: and here's the report of findings.

Researchers have concluded that, while there is no single recipe, there are common ingredients strongly associated* with growth in churches of any size, place or context. 

•  Good leadership
•  A clear mission and purpose
•  Willingness to self-reflect, to change and adapt according to context
•  Involvement of lay members
•  Being intentional in prioritising growth
•  Being intentional in chosen style of worship
•  Being intentional in nurturing disciples
• All of the above are linked to growing churches

I get the feeling Justin Welby knew all this when he was speaking on New Years Eve.....

nice little graphic on the Fresh Expressions research:

and a fairly lengthy press release from the CofE here.