Large Anglican churches - Some facts and figures from Christian Research

The first National Larger Anglican Churches Conference was held at Swanwick in June.

‘Larger churches’ in this context are those Church of England churches whose average Sunday congregation is at least 350 people, adults and children together.

There are 172 such churches known to Christian Research, about 1% of the 16,000+ churches in the C of E.

Of these, in June 2005,
* 60 had between 350 and 399 people
* 80 had between 400 and 699 people
* 20 had between 700 and 999 people, and
* 12 had 1,000 people or more.

These churches are not distributed evenly across the dioceses: Hereford, Portsmouth, Sodor & Man, Truro and Wakefield have none. About 100 of these churches grew (cumulatively) at least 1% per year between 1998 and 2005, 45 were stable and 30 declined.

Churchmanship

The majority of these churches are evangelical in churchmanship. This churchmanship needs to be set within the changing churchmanship of the Church of England. In 1989, 18% of Church of England churches defined themselves as ‘evangelical’. In 1998, this had increased to 22%, and, if these trends continue, then by 2010 it will become 29%.

Evangelical congregations are larger than non-evangelical, on average. In 1989, for example, a Church of England evangelical congregation averaged 113 people against 70 in a non-evangelical church. By 1998 these figures were, respectively, 94 and 51, and are set to become 92 and 38 by 2010 if nothing changes. It should be noted that both evangelical and non-evangelical churches are seeing declining congregations. As a consequence, however, the proportion of total Church of England attenders who are evangelical is growing from 26% in 1989 to 35% in 1998 to 50% by 2010.

Against these trends, the average congregation of the larger churches has grown from 460 in 1989 to 490 in 1998 and is likely to become 590 by 2010. Unlike smaller churches, these larger churches are seeing increasing rather than decreasing Sunday congregations. They collectively represent about a quarter of all the evangelicals in the Church of England.

Sunday church attendance

Over half, 56%, of these larger churches are growing against the 20% nationally for all Church of England churches. Furthermore, the larger the church the more likely it is to be growing, except for those churches in the 350-399 band. In terms of Sunday church attendance, these larger churches form an increasingly significant group, as the diagram above illustrates.

These percentages assume that nothing will change in the next 15 years, an assumption almost certainly untrue, as changes in church life are already taking place. The value of such a forecast, however, is to show the likely increasing importance of this particular group of churches in terms of the teaching they give and the influence they are likely to have.

Leadership

In June 2005 all these larger churches were led by men, though most had women in their senior teams. The Vicar needs to be a good communicator, team leader, with vision and some administrative ability. By comparison with the Church of England generally, larger church leaders are, on average, a year or two younger, although a greater proportion tend to stay on over the age of 65.

In what ways are larger churches different? They have a number of attractions:
* Relevant preaching/teaching
* Quality worship (which usually means different styles)
* Friendly people (people are looking for friendship not just friendliness)
* A warm welcome is given
* All life-stages are present, so there is company whatever a person’s circumstances
* They engage in a wide range of activities: evangelism, discipleship, and reaching into their local community
* Where appropriate, there is an opportunity to be anonymous (although it would seem that many who desire such tend to go to cathedrals).

Present growth?

Have the present leaders of larger churches actually grown their church significantly (say from a congregation of 500 to one of 750) or have they inherited such churches, and thus were effectively appointed ‘to run the existing show’? Christian Research has incomplete information on this, particularly about churches whose current size is under 600, but what data is available suggests that the large majority of current larger church leaders inherited a large church.

What then is it that makes churches (not necessarily just larger churches) grow? The results of a large survey undertaken on behalf of the Salvation Army showed unambiguously that the key factors are strong leadership and clear vision. While other factors support these (relevant biblical teaching, warm welcome, strong sense of belonging, etc.), these two qualities were far and away the pre-eminent.

‘If you only look at what is, you might never attain what could be’ (Anon). The art of looking for the invisible, seeing what others do not see, is a key function of leadership, and not least those with the privilege and responsibility of leading the largest Church of England churches in the country.

Sources: Private research by Peter Brierley; Leadership, Vision and Growing Churches, commissioned research for the Salvation Army, Christian Research, 2003. Reprinted with permission from Quadrant (September 2005 issue), Christian Research, Vision Building, 4 Footscray Road, Eltham, London SE9 2TZ.