{"id":2801,"date":"2025-05-14T07:02:53","date_gmt":"2025-05-14T07:02:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/?p=2801"},"modified":"2025-05-14T07:02:53","modified_gmt":"2025-05-14T07:02:53","slug":"complexities-behind-claim-of-christian-revival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/?p=2801","title":{"rendered":"Complexities behind claim of Christian ‘revival.’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Opinion piece published Barking & Dagenham Post, Docklands & East London Advertiser May 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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News of a \u2018Christian revival\u2019 has recently featured in the media. Some churches in East London have reported being inundated with worshippers.  Humanists are among those wondering what to make of all this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interest was sparked by a Bible Society report, The Quiet Revival, <\/em>released in April. It concludes that \u2018the Church is in a period of rapid growth, driven by young adults and in particular young men\u2019. It is based on robust YouGov polling which shows that monthly church attendance between 2018 and 2024 rose from 8% to 12%, and from 4% to 16% for 18\u201324-year-olds.  In a Guardian<\/em> piece (26 April) Father John Armitage described how his church, St Margaret\u2019s in Canning Town, has been bursting at the seams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, what people tell pollsters doesn\u2019t match all national attendance figures. While some congregations in East London are clearly thriving, head count figures, recorded respectively by the Church of England and the Catholic Church, show overall numbers declined up to 2023. Church attendance was, of course, impacted by Covid. It has increased since then, but not to pre-Covid levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One explanation for the discrepancy between polls and actual attendance is so-called \u201csocial desirability bias.\u201d  Church attendance is one of those areas, like drug use or number of sexual partners, where surveys are skewed through people trying to look \u2018good\u2019 or not \u2018bad\u2019 to others.  This might explain the high reported uptick in \u2018spirituality\u2019 by young men.  Younger people are likely to spend more time online and attend virtual services. Young men are also more likely to come under the sway of forceful Christian nationalist influencers like Jordan Peterson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reported upsurge in East London, and elsewhere, may simply reflect the higher proportion of residents hailing from more religious countries.  The Quiet Revival<\/em> acknowledges that 60 percent of the population as a whole does not identify as Christian, and nearly 90 percent do not go to church. Most young people are still atheists, although the number who think there is some sort of higher power has increased.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today\u2019s belief landscape is diverse, and not particularly Christian. Our laws and institutions need to catch up so all beliefs enjoy a level playing field. The case for reforming archaic institutions such as compulsory Christian school assemblies, and the automatic right for Bishops to sit in the House of Lords, is as strong as ever. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Paul Kaufman
Chairperson East London Humanists<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opinion piece published Barking & Dagenham Post, Docklands & East London Advertiser May 2025 News of a \u2018Christian revival\u2019 has recently featured in the media. Some churches in East London have reported being inundated with worshippers.  Humanists are among those … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9c4oP-Jb","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2801"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2801"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2801\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2803,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2801\/revisions\/2803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/eastlondon.humanist.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}