UK churchgoing “not in decline” says TearFund

At first glance, a January 2009 article published by Tearfund, a Christian relief and development agency in the UK, seems to paint a bright, rosy picture where the ancient churches and chapels in the United Kingdom seem to be enjoying an increase in attendance after decades of decline in church attendance. Upon closer examination, one quickly discovers that Tearfund’s ridiculously hollow claim only refers to those who attend institutional churches at least once per year. Give me a break! Once a year? That’s not “churchgoing” anymore than one day at the football stadium qualifies me as a sports fan.

Obviously the Tearfund Media Team is scraping the bottom of the news barrel, trying to put a positive spin on the unbelievably weak—almost non-existent—church attendance in the United Kingdom. We lived in the UK for quite a few years and it was our experience that the average attendance for an evangelical church is twenty-five people, eighty percent of whom are over the age of sixty years old. In a few more years, the institutional church in the UK may not exist at all.