IT IS a common assumption that churches will continue their inexorable decline with each generation being less religious than the previous. This may not be as true as many would like to believe.

Since 1858, a high point in the mid-Victorian era, Christian adherence in Britain has been in near-constant decline. The short period of growth following the Second World War petered out with the arrival of the Swinging Sixties. At the last national census in 2021, only 46.2 per cent described themselves as Christian. For the first time less than half the British population identified as Christian. Church attendance in Great Britain in 1980 was 11.8 per cent of the population; by 2015, it had dropped to 5 per cent. It is safe to assume that most of the 46.2 per cent self-identifying as Christians are nominal, cultural Christians lacking any real understanding of the faith, and aren’t involved in the life and worship of any church. Unfortunately, cultural Christianity just doesn’t cut it.

It is clear that mainline denominations, despite dreading the demographic collapse of ageing congregations, are failing to reach people with the gospel. The general expectation, although rarely admitted, is that the British church is in terminal decline.

Yet a recent study by the Bible Society indicates this may be in reverse. YouGov surveyed more than 13,000 people, repeating similar research in 2018. The comparison of these surveys on church attendance other than at baptisms, weddings and funerals seems to show that Britain is experiencing what the Bible Society describe as a ‘Quiet Revival’. We don’t find masses of people queuing up to get into popular churches, rather it is many local churches having a few more in the congregation.

The most dramatic increase in churchgoing is among young people, particularly young men. In 2018, just 4 per cent of 18-24-year-olds said they attended church at least monthly. Today, this has quadrupled to 16 per cent, with young men increasing from 4 per cent to 21 per cent, and young women from 3 per cent to 12 per cent. 18-24-year-olds are now the second most likely age group to attend church regularly.

Churchgoing Christians now make up 12 per cent of the population, up from 8 per cent in 2018. Overall, 13 per cent of men and 10 per cent of women are likely to attend church. The quiet revival shows that the accepted picture of Christians at worship as being feeble, grey and female may not be accurate.

There are other indicators of growing interest in Christianity. In the 11 years between 2008 and 2019, Bible sales increased by just over £277,000. In the five years between 2019 and 2024, UK Bible sales went from £2.69m to £5.02m – an increase of £2.33m.

What is driving this turning to Christ and His church? There have been no large revival meetings with demonstrations of spiritual power, the faltering evangelistic endeavours of the mainline denominations continually sink in the quicksand of secularism.

The primary impetus for the quiet revival is the increasingly chaotic secular world itself. Having abandoned the concept of truth and certainty, the secular world cannot offer hope. With a prime minister and establishment who didn’t know what a woman was until they were told by the Supreme Court, is it any wonder that thinking young people would search for definite truth, and find it in the source of truth Himself (John 14:6)?

In the midst of cultural chaos, what Jonathan Haidt describes as ‘the anxious generation’ have found a path to peace and security. Disillusioned with woke culture, young people are seeing the shallowness of secularism and are searching for and finding truth.

The primary beneficiaries of this revival are the Roman Catholic and Pentecostal churches, both groups which speak with certainty and assurance about their faith. Catholics have increased from 23 per cent of total churchgoers in 2018 to 31 per cent today, and Pentecostals from 4 per cent in 2018 to 10 per cent today. In contrast, Anglicans have dropped from 41 per cent to 34 per cent.

Where growth happens in Protestant churches, it is often amongst the more conservative evangelical congregations. Membership of the Church of Scotland is vanishing like snow off a dyke, and it is in the process of selling more than 500 ‘surplus’ buildings. Meanwhile, the much smaller, more conservative and Calvinistic Free Church of Scotland looks like succeeding in its ‘30 by 30 Project’ which aims to plant 30 viable new congregations by 2030, many in areas without their presence for a century.

Read it all in The Conservative Woman