The headlines from Statistics for Mission 2023 are that the post-COVID bounce-back continued with an increase in attendance of between 2.5% and 5%, depending on which measure you use. But the bad news is that those numbers still put us well below the pre-pandemic attendance level.

The key numbers are average all-age attendance during October, which increasing by 4.6% between 2022 and 2023, but that level is still 20% lower than 2019. That pattern is broadly consistent across most measures.

Easter and Christmas attendances increased by more in 2023 (8.6% and 20% respectively) but Mouse observes that these tend to fluctuate more depending on the weather and the day of the week that these festivals fall, and overall they are still well down on pre-pandemic levels by 20% and 16% respectively.

Mouse would like to offer a few observations.

It is commendable that the Church of England publishes such fulsome statistics and the methodology used is probably the most reliable of all the options. It has been consistent for many years to allow comparisons to be drawn and trends identified. The church asks each parish to physically count the number of people who come through the doors for each service during October and then adds them all up. This has the advantage that it is, in theory at least, not a subjective measure. It does not rely on estimations or surveys which could be subject to bias depending on who does or does not fill them out. To that extent, we treat the numbers as reliable.

However, that does not mean that we should not do further interpretative work on the outcomes.

It has been obvious for some time that one of the issues with this methodology is that counting the number of people in attendance does not give a clear indication of the size of the membership of a church. The count would be the same for a Church with 50 members who were all in attendance each week as a church with 100 members but where attendance is 50%. Electoral rolls are even less reliable as they are only fully refreshed every four years and even then depend on the extent to which church administrators are motivated to enrol parishioners.

This feature of the data means that it is difficult to interpret changes. Do falls represent the same number of church members attending less frequently or fewer members attending at the same rate as previously. Or both. Conversely, do we interpret the recent rise in attendance as the conversion of new members attending church for the very first time, or simply those who had stayed at home for a while coming back, or just those already attending coming to church more frequently.

For this reason, the Church of England stats wizards came up with a new measure - the ‘worshipping community’. This attempts to measure those who attend worship once per month or more, whether physically or online, so is intended to give a more rounded picture of membership. This number shows a 2.5% increase from 2022 to 2023, but only a 10% reduction from the 2019 level.

This is perhaps a little more encouraging, but given the more survey-based nature of this number, it is subject to more bias. Mouse likes the concept, but it lacks the rigour to be able to rely on it too heavily. And even if we take it at face value, it still points to a shrinking church, just one which is shrinking more slowly than the headline figures.

It is also important to note that these numbers are already pretty dated by the time they are published. The latest release relates to October 2023 attendance. To that extent they are what statisticians would call a lagging indicator, helpful mostly to understand the past rather than predict the future. However, within these numbers some of the statistics could be considered leading indicators - ones which point to a future direction. 

Marriages and baptisms are not true leading indicators, but have shown that they move more quickly than the headline attendance numbers, so may be a proxy for leading indicators.

Sadly the data here is not encouraging. As Mouse has previously noted, marriage rates within the Church of England have been plunging and, if you exclude some blips around the pandemic and avoid over-interpreting the post-Covid bounce-back, remain dreadfully low. Similarly, baptism rates are plunging, with the latest data showing the CofE undertaking 24% fewer baptisms than as recent as 2019.

The thing that determines whether a church will grow or shrink is the r number - the rate at which church members replicate themselves. Or more simply whether more people are joining the church through birth and conversion, or whether more a leaving it by death or by leaving the faith.

The Church of England has had a negative r rate for quite some time. This is in large part due to demographic change. According to the ONS, there were 598,000 deaths in England and Wales in 2023 and 598,400 births. However, there was population grown of 610,000 due to net immigration of 622,000. The balancing figure is migration from England and Wales to Scotland. Population growth was strongest in cities and urban areas, also reflected in the CofE data.

Recent immigrant communities are far less likely to join the Church of England than those born in England. At the time of the last census, the largest immigrant communities in the UK were from India, Poland, Pakistan, Romania, Ireland, Nigeria, Italy, Germany and Bangladesh. None have a significant Anglican church, from which migrants might expect to naturally move into the Church of England on arrival, with the exception of Ireland, which has around 125,000 members in the Republic - small enough not to invalidate the broad line of argument here.

Without any conversions or people losing the faith, the church will naturally shrink unless church members have babies at the same rate as the death rate and every single baby born to parents who attend the church will subsequently grow up in the faith. Neither of these propositions are realistic.

Evidence from recent studies in church growth within the Church of England show that this fundamental in the r rate has not been overcome, even by the most successful evangelical church planting initiatives. While the evidence base on church planting in the Anglican context is very limited, what does exist seems to show that the vast majority of attendees in new church initiatives are those who either come from another church or who have some degree of churchgoing in their past. In other words, these initiatives are reaching people from within a population which is itself shrinking. The best this can do, therefore, is slow the decline.

According to a 2021 report from the Strategic Development Unit, the data on Resource Churches who had been given funding to support church growth in the Church of England showed that 38% of attendees moved from other churches and 24% had recently moved to the area. A further 14% were ‘de-churched’ (i.e. used to go to church but gave it up) and just 9% had never been to church. The remaining 15% were either part of the plant team, the ‘inherited’ church community or attend in addition to another church.

Even this data is potentially subject to challenge as it was collected by survey from the churches themselves, who may have an inherent optimism bias about the success of their evangelism efforts. Mouse also notes that all the Resource churches identified were in cities, where population growth was strongest and were the result of huge efforts by the planting churches and massive financial investment.

We have yet to find a model which can reach significant numbers of people who have never been to church or come from non-Christian communities, which is essential to increase the r rate of the Church.

So what have we learned from the most recent statistical release? Mouse would encourage a combination of optimism and realism. It is positive that the church appears to have been growing. We must be realistic that the Church of England may not be the church of choice for everyone and we are not part of a growing community. We must continue with church growth efforts that are working, even if they are merely slowing the decline. We must re-double efforts to revitalise those church communities which have been neglected by the most recent Renewal and Reform plans.

The Save The Parish initiative has given voice to some of those who feel neglected by Renewal and Reform programme. The argument goes that the bulk of the Church of England’s parishes have been neglected and starved of resources while millions is ploughed into shiny new initiatives, which are yielding meagre results. 

Mouse has to admit that the maths is difficult to comprehend. With 16,000 churches at its disposal, growing the church by just one weekly attender at each church would be an increase of 2% - a remarkable and dramatic turn-around in the long term decline of the Church. That isn’t to say that shiny new things should be stopped - there are many great examples of revitalised churches growing strongly. But Mouse contends that these efforts have not overcome the demographics, so a new plan to support the whole of the church is needed.

The last dose of realism Mouse would add is that the trend of decline is a very long one. It has hardly budged regardless of who has been Archbishop, what national evangelism strategies we have employed, which issues are causing the most argument in the Church at the moment. This points to something more fundamental in our society and demographics which will take enormous efforts to overcome. It has happened in the past, but changes to trends this deep do not happen very often.

Mouse has a few questions, however.

The obvious question is whether these minor technical changes will be sufficient to placate militarised conservatives who have previously insisted that 'Godly discipline' be exercised over churches which have introduced policies on human sexuality with which they disagree. Mouse is sceptical on that front.

The description of the Anglican Communion to be amended originates only from the 1930 Lambeth Conference. the IASCUFO paper argues that it is de facto the primary definition as it is the one which is most commonly referred to, but it is not something which sits in a formal constitution or legally binding document, so this move is symbolic at best. It may be something which allows those in a form of impaired communion to stay within the Anglican Communion in good conscience, but it doesn't change much in practice.

Secondly, it reduces the concept of Anglicanism to little more than an acceptance of the name. If provinces are no longer willing to say they are actually in communion with each other, then in what way are they actually part of a communion? Mouse could understand a proposal which changed the perspective from being in communion with Canterbury to being in Communion with one another, but simply one which has a historical connection to Canterbury is watered down to homeopathic levels.

Rowan Williams' solution to this connundrum was to attempt to introduce a 'Covenant'. The 1988 Lambeth Conference called for a "common declaration" that would assist a coherent doctrinal identity for the Communion, but no such declaration was produced. In 2004 the Windsor report called for a declaration from provinces to 'bind themselves' to each other by a covenant and a paper was produced by the ACC in 2006 titled Towards an Anglican Covenant discussing a way forward. Rowan Williams ran with the idea as Archbishop, largely in response to the troubles the Communion was finding itself in. But his efforts failed to convince. The final nail in the coffin was a rejection by a majority of the dioceses in the Church of England in 2012, which meant the proposal could not be taken forward in the Church of England. It came shortly before the end of Williams’s retirement and the concept was not taken forward by his successor.

Mouse's final observation is that the process for appointing a new Archbishop of Canterbury is underway and under reforms brought about by the Church of England, this includes greater representation from the Anglican Communion in recognition of Canterbury's global role. In July 2022 the rules were changed to include five representatives from the Anglican Communion on the 17 member committee who decides on the new Archbishop and representation from the Diocese of Canterbury was cut from six to three. It is rather unfortunate timing that these are being put into action at the same time as the proposals to significantly downgrade the Archbishop's global role. Had these proposals come sooner it is unlikely the Church of England would have changed the rules on appointing the new Archbishop.

Caesar was popular with the people and fear of reprisals from the mob meant that the aftermath was tense and carefully managed. Mark Antony brokered a deal with the conspirators in the Senate to avoid punishment for them, but Julius Caesar would be honored and his appointments and structures maintained. Within two years of his murder, Caesar was recognised by the Senate as a god.

After a legendary power struggle, Caesar's great-nephew and adopted son Octavian emerged as the sole ruler of Rome in 27BC and adopted the name Augustus, ruling as Emperor. His keen propaganda skills made extensive use of his relationship with Caesar, promoting the cult of Caesar as a way of boosting his own status. Ever since Caesar's elevation to divine status in 42BC, Augustus had styled himself Divi Fillius - Son of the God. He would later claim that he was conceived by his mother Atian when she was asleep in the Temple of Apollo and was visited by the god in the form of a snake, so some considered Augustus the son of a god twice over.

One of the most famous events in the aftermath of Julius Caesar's death took place a few weeks later. A bright star appeared in the sky, visible throughout the day and night. Scientists today speculate that this may have been one of the brightest comets in recorded history. The appearance of this 'star' was immediately interpreted as Caesar's spirit being taken to the divine realm in the process of his deification. It was the most famous comet in antiquity, known throughout the Roman world. The poet Ovid wrote in AD8

Matthew wrote his Gospel around a hundred years later. By then, the cult of Caesar was well established alongside the cult of Augustus, who ruled until AD14. The association of Caesar with the star as a sign of his divinity was also well known. Coins from the period regularly feature the star motif and Augustus reigned as the son of a god at the time of Christ's birth.

It is with this backdrop that Matthew tells us that magi from the East, saw a bright star in the sky, signifying the birth of a king and they followed it to find the baby Jesus in Bethlehem. Matthew's account is tailor made to invert the story of Augustus, Divi Filius, to tell the story of Jesus Christ, Son of God.

One of the keys is to avoid stars that point us to the self gratification, enrichment or status of those who spotted them. Following Jesus is a path of humility and self sacrifice, but Augustus urged others to follow the cult of Caesar for his own benefit, not for anyone else's. By contrast, the magi did not know where the star was leading them and sought no benefit in following it other than the privilege of paying homage to a new king.

As the Church of England struggles with a crisis caused by repeated and appalling failures to act on safe-guarding issues out of a sense of fear for its own position, we must more than ever follow the star that points to Jesus, wherever that leads us. And do so with the expectation of humble and sacrificial service to others.

Our story today can also invert the stories of those who look to take advantage of others for their own gain, just as Augustus did by encouraging worship of his Great Uncle, to boost his own prestige. In our case, if following the star to Jesus means accepting our personal and institutional failures, then it must be done whatever the seeming cost. Then we serve our communities with humility and grace, preaching the good news of a God who came as a baby to show us what a life of love can look like. 

Our church is shrinking and that is desperately worrying, but a church which lets the vulnerable suffer and covers it up through fear that a reputation could be hurt by the truth is no church of Christ and not one worth preserving. Perhaps if we follow the star to Jesus, we should be more confident that whatever hardship we face on the road it will eventually lead us to where we need to be.

A frequent debate in British politics is the discussion around the extent to which faith leaders should speak up on political matters. The typical pattern is for a Christian leader to criticise something the government of the day has done on the grounds of their Christian ethics, following which they are told to get their beak out of politics by the party who has been scolded, but are applauded as an important voice of morality by the party who agrees with them.

This pattern has become so familiar that it is greeted with eye rolling by those within the Church, who respond with the pat arguments that if you don't think Jesus had anything to say about the poor and needy you can't be very familiar with his work. And Mouse suspects that the view of the general public is that we would generally expect religious leaders to speak up on eithical issues.

But there are some issues which buck this trend. 

In the UK, the abortion debate lacks the intensity that it has in the US, but is still one in which the Christian voice, and particularly that of the Catholic Church, is prominent. However, their views are often labelled as 'religious objections'. The view that life begins at conception is considered a matter of faith, rather than an objective truth, so all that follows from that belief is a subjective morality, relevant only if you hold to that foundational article of faith. 

This has the effect of putting those 'religious views' into a box, relevant only to religious adherents. The response from secular society is then that if you believe abortion to be wrong 'on religious grounds', then we'll respect that, but you shouldn't expect us non-believers to abide by your religious rules. The strategy of Respect and Ignore.

The debate on assisted dying came unexpectedly quickly. Mouse commented before that Church leaders appeared unprepared. The new government had long indicated it would allow a free vote on the issue, but when Kim Leadbeater secured a coveted place at the top of the ballot for private members bills in the House of Commons she pushed that vote much earlier in the Parliamentary timetable than many had expected.

It was widely observed that the debate in the Commons and the wider public debate was conducted with respect and dignity all round. It was broadly accepted that both proponents and opponents of the measure were both attempting to work through a very difficult issue, minimise suffering, balance conflicting rights and protect the vulnerable.

But there was a rumble in the debate which was not happy.

The Humanists UK accused Christian lobbyists of 'hiding' their true motivations for opposing the Bill. Lewis Goodall wrote in the i Newspaper with a similar attack on Christian MPs for being 'dishonest' about their real reasons for opposing the Bill, suggesting that they should declare their Christian faith. He notes that 'religious MPs’ opposition is rarely articulated in overtly theological terms' and that opposing assisted dying 'largely or principally on the basis of one’s own faith alone, in a modern cosmopolitan democracy such as our own, seems far from satisfactory'. The respect and ignore strategy.

There was a fascinating exchange on Radio 4's Sunday programme between Chine McDonald, Director of the Theos think-tank, and broadcaster Mark Mardell. Mardell makes a similar argument again, saying that opposing assisted dying 'for religious reasons' would amount to 'stuffing your beliefs down my throat' and that those holding such beliefs should be honest that the real reason for the opposition is not concern for coercion or a desire for better palliative care but the belief that life comes from God and only He can take it away.

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