The changing face of UK evangelicalism

"Who do you actually represent?" It’s a question I am often asked in my role at the Evangelical Alliance. Usually it is followed by another: "How many evangelicals are there in the UK?" Then, "What actually makes someone an evangelical?"

For years, those questions did not have straightforward answers. We pointed to our 30,000 personal members, and to our more than 3,000 church members. We might mention charity Tearfund's research from 2007, which estimated there were around two million evangelicals in the UK. It was the best answer that we had, but it was almost 20 years old.

As the Evangelical Alliance reached its 180th anniversary, we decided it was time to revisit those questions properly. Working with research consultancy Whitestone Insight, we commissioned one of the largest studies of evangelical identity, belief and practice ever carried out in the UK. Nearly 8,500 adults were surveyed, giving us a much clearer, and encouraging, picture of evangelical Christianity today.

Identity, belief and practice

Before you can count how many evangelicals there are, you have to define who they are. Our research looked at three different ways of understanding evangelicalism.

1. The first is identity: people who describe themselves as an evangelical, even if they do not always use the label in everyday conversation.
2. The second is belief: people who affirm the historic convictions that have long defined evangelical Christianity.
3. The third is practice: Christians whose faith is active through regular church attendance, Bible reading and prayer.

Those three measures overlap, but they are not identical. Some Christians hold evangelical beliefs, while others identify as evangelical but do not hold those beliefs consistently. Looking at all three gives us a much richer understanding of the evangelical movement in Britain.

To measure belief, we used British historian David Bebbington's well-known description of evangelicalism through four defining characteristics: the authority of Scripture, the centrality of Christ's atoning work, the necessity of personal conversion and the call to active gospel witness.

2.6 million classic evangelicals

The headline finding is that there are approximately 2.6 million classic evangelicals in the UK.

These classic evangelicals are Protestants who both identify as evangelical and affirm the historic beliefs captured in Bebbington's definition.

Beyond that, we identified around 5.5 million broad evangelicals who both identify as evangelical and hold evangelical beliefs across a wider range of Christian traditions.

Perhaps the most striking finding is what this actually means for the church. Around 12% of UK adults attend church at least monthly, and 64% of practising Christians are also evangelicals. Nearly two out of every three people in church on a Sunday belong to the evangelical tradition.

David Bebbington reflects on the significance of these findings:

"The movement originating in the Evangelical Revival of the eighteenth century did much to shape the United Kingdom in the following two centuries. Now in the twenty-first century it is clear from the statistics in this report that evangelicals of various types continue to form a significant proportion of the British population, and are growing."

I see this reflection as a remarkable observation from the historian whose work has shaped the way so many evangelicals understand themselves.

A growing movement

Much of the public conversation about Christianity focuses on decline. Census figures show fewer people identifying as Christian, and many assume that faith is steadily disappearing from British life.

However, our research tells a more hopeful story. Compared with Tearfund's estimate of two million evangelicals in 2007, using a different methodology and population base, we now find there are around 2.6 million classic evangelicals. While nominal Christianity has declined, the number of people who both identify with evangelicalism and hold evangelical convictions has grown. This suggests that the evangelical movement remains one of the strongest and most resilient parts of the church in the UK.

Younger than the church as a whole

The age profile is especially encouraging. More than 40% of classic evangelicals are under the age of 35. Evangelical churches are considerably younger than the wider church population and younger than the UK population as a whole.

Many churches will recognise this as reality. Children, students, young adults and young families are a significant part of evangelical congregations. The next generation is not absent from the church; it is helping shape its future.

More diverse than many imagine

The research also challenges long-held assumptions about evangelicalism. Nearly a third of classic evangelicals come from ethnic minority backgrounds. Evangelical Christianity is one of the most ethnically diverse expressions of the faith in the UK, reflecting the global church far more than many stereotypes suggest.

The largest single denominational group within classic evangelicalism is Pentecostal, accounting for 29% of classic evangelicals, alongside substantial Anglican, Baptist, independent, Presbyterian and other evangelical traditions.

The evangelical movement in Britain is increasingly multicultural, multidenominational and united around shared gospel convictions.

Encouragement for the church

There are, of course, limits to any survey, and no piece of research can capture every aspect of evangelical life. This report is only the beginning. Over the coming months, we will publish further research exploring what evangelicals believe and how they engage with the issues facing Britain today.

For now, these findings give us a good reason to thank God. They show that evangelical Christianity is not a shrinking fringe within British church life. Evangelicals make up the majority of practising Christians in the UK. They are younger than the church as a whole, increasingly diverse, and rooted in the historic convictions that have defined evangelical faith for generations.

After 180 years of the Evangelical Alliance serving evangelicals across the United Kingdom, it is encouraging to discover that this movement continues to grow, continues to witness to Christ, and continues to offer hope for the future of the church in the UK.