Leadership Latest - Dec 2005

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Clergy safety
A Home Office survey (2001) highlighted that being a priest is one of the most dangerous professions in the country, facing similar levels of violence as the police. The research, which surveyed 1,000 Church of England clergy found that:

• almost three-quarters had been assaulted or abused in the previous two years
• at least 7 priests have been murdered since 1996
• 1 priest in Bournemouth has been attacked 9 times

In urban areas such as Merseyside there is an average of an assault, robbery or arson attack carried out in one of its 1,400 places of worship every day.

Reported in the Daily Telegraph, 5 May 2005

‘Cool’ missionaries
A survey carried out by Interserve among church youth has shown that the popularity of missionaries and the work that they do is high. Young people used words such as ‘exciting’, ‘cool’, ‘adventurous’, ‘role models’, ‘friendly’, and ‘passionate’ to describe individuals involved in mission, and 74% of them said that they would like to know more about the lives of missionaries.

The average age of the young people from nine different church youth groups across the UK was 15.

Reported in the Christian Herald, 23 July 2005

Youth workers and others
A poll undertaken by Youthwork the Conference which questioned almost 400 youth workers online found that:

• 50% of youth workers report back to a minister or church leader
• 17% have a professional line manager
• 14% report to another youth worker
• 12% are line managed by a steering group
• 2% felt they were ‘not accountable at all for their youth work’.

When asked about their working relationship with church leaders almost half of youth workers said there was ‘no tension’ between them; a third said there were only ‘minor tensions’, and less than one in ten said they struggle with ‘major’ or ‘extreme’ tensions.

In response to the question ‘What is the single most important outcome of your work?’

• 39% answered ‘spiritual growth’ in young people
• 36% said ‘young people becoming Christians’
• 11% said a ‘change of behaviour’ in young people

When youth workers were asked what they believed their manager rated as the single most important outcome of their work

• 38% said ‘young people becoming Christians’
• 22% said young people’s ‘spiritual growth’
• 14% said it would be ‘attendance by young people at church’ (which only 0.4% of youth workers put top of their list).

Christian youth workers outnumber all other youth workers in the UK with an estimated 100,000 individuals involved in voluntary youth work and a further 7,000 salaried youth workers in local churches – which makes churches a bigger employer of youth workers than local or national government.

Reported in the Youthwork, November 2005

Evangelical church growth
Evangelical Church of England churches are on average larger than non-evangelical ones, and are leading to a rise in the proportion of evangelicals within the Anglican church in the UK according to projected figures for 2010 from Peter Brierley.

The Congregations of evangelical Church of England churches are on average larger than non-evangelical ones, a trend which is estimated to continue:

• In 1989 an evangelical congregation averaged 113 against 70 in non-evangelical churches.
• By 1998 the figures were 94 and 51 respectively – a proportional rise in evangelical numbers against non-evangelical ones.
• The projected figures for 2010 are set to become 92 against 38, a further proportional growth (it should be noted, however, that both evangelical and non-evangelical churches are seeing declining congregations).
• The proportion of total Church of England attenders who are evangelical will have gone from 26% in 1989, to 35% in 1998, to a projected 50% for 2010.
• In 1989, 18% of Church of England churches defined themselves as evangelical; by 1998, this percentage has increased to 22%, and is projected to become 29% by 2010.

Reported in Evangelicals Now, Dec 2005

Large Anglican churches
The larger get larger
The majority of Anglican churches with congregations of 350 people or more (larger churches) have grown in the past few years.

• 100 out of 172 larger Anglican churches in the UK have grown by at least 1% during the last 20 years – the majority of which are evangelical.
• The average congregation of larger churches has grown from 460 in 1989, to 490 in 1998, and is likely to become 590 by 2010.
• 56% of these larger churches are growing against the 20% nationally for all Church of England churches. The larger the church, the more likely it is to be growing, except for those churches in the 350-399 band. Larger churches collectively represent about a quarter of all evangelicals in the Church of England.

Leadership

• In June 2005 most larger Anglican churches were led by men, though most did include women in their senior teams.
• Larger church leaders were on average 1-2 years younger than the average Church of England minister, though a greater proportion of them tend to stay on over the age of 65.

Reported in Evangelicals Now, December 2005

An Army of young people
Attendance at Salvation Army youth programmes in the UK and the Republic of Ireland has increased by 54% after years of decline, according to a Salvationist report.

This change has been attributed to the decision taken in 2003 to divide work with young people into two teams: the Children’s Ministries Unit (CMU) and ALOVE – The Salvation Army for a new generation.

Other statistics reveal:

• a 29% increase in youth fellowship attendance
• a 21% increase in youth outreach
• a 26% increase in youth work
• and a 39% increase in attendance at youth social events.

ALOVE director, Russell Rook highlighted the fact that:

• 70% of ALOVE’s youth work is aimed at reaching young people from outside the church family.
• Significant resources have been invested into the employment of 100 salaried youth workers and the training of hundreds of volunteers.
• The Salvation Army has handed over the agenda to young people themselves, with more than 200 youth congregations and cells being run by young people for young people.

Reported in the Salvationist, 22 October 2005

Churches and global warming
According to a survey conducted by the Christian lifestyle website Just2Fish.org.uk British churches are doing little to respond to the threat of global warming. The survey, which polled 1,000 churches found that:

• none of the respondents used renewable energy in their buildings
• only 47 of the 1,000 have made changes to reduce damaging emissions
• and just 37 plan to reduce damaging emissions.

Reported in the Baptist Times, 6 October 2005

A safe bet
One church in Sussex encouraged people in their area to attend church by supplying the following figures:

• 20% of all fatal accidents involve car crashes,
• 17% of all accidents take place in the home,
• a further 16% happen while travelling by air, water or rail,
• but only 0.001% of all deaths occur in church services, and a 100% of these so far have been related to previous physical disorders.

Therefore church is the safest place to find yourself in at any given time.

Reported in the English Churchman, 22-29 July 2005

No treasures in heaven
According to a survey entitled What Survives? carried out by Dr Michael Irwin and distributed by the National Secular Society, Britain’s elite are half as likely to believe in God than the general population, and far less likely to believe that there is life after death.

The survey which polled 761 individuals randomly selected from the Who’s Who listing found that:

• just 29% believed that a soul continued to exist after death
• 5% believed that no individual souls survived but thought a non-specific life force was a possibility
• 46% said that nothing at all survived death
• and only 20% were ‘uncertain’ about what happened.

These findings contrast with the higher rates of belief in life after death by the majority of the overall population according to a Reader’s Digest poll in March 2005 which found that 58% believed in an afterlife.

Reported in The Times, 23 November 2005

Scientists and faith
Political scientists were discovered to be the most likely to believe in God amongst scientists according to a survey carried out by Dr Elaine H. Ecklund of Rice University in Houston, USA. The least likely to believe were biologists.

The survey, which polled 75% of the 2,148 scientists to whom the questionnaire was sent, found that:

• 75% of political scientists said that they had a belief in God.
• Within the political sciences, 70% of those specialising in subjects such as sociology and psychology claimed a belief in God.
• 62% of natural scientists expressed a belief in God.
• Of the natural scientists, biologists showed the lowest level of belief with 59% of those polled saying they believed (still the majority).

Reported in the Church of England Newspaper, 26 August 2005

Parents and their children’s faith
A study by David Boas of the University of Manchester based on 14 years of data from 10,500 households in the UK has found that parents played a powerful role in the transmission of religious belief, but were not the definitive factor.

• Even in households where both parents held strong beliefs, there was only a 50/50 chance that their children would carry on believing.
• In houses where only one parent had strong feelings about faith, children were much less likely to believe.
• Two non-religious parents, however, had no trouble passing on their lack of faith.
• Whatever the parents’ beliefs, one child in 12 will join a denomination not supported by either parent.
• Also, women in their 20s were more likely than men to attend church, especially when only one parent did the same.

Other findings showed that:

• Older people described themselves as religious, though not necessarily orthodox.
• Middle-aged people saw themselves as spiritual rather than religious.
• Younger people most often held beliefs as part of a view of life that they did not recognise as spiritual.

Reported in The Guardian, 16 August 2005