Well, maybe. The joy and the triumph might be somewhat muted and the ranks of the faithful are far from swelling. In Britain that is. A new academic study reveals that marginally over half the population of Britain now consider themselves Christian after a “sharp decline” in religious belief over the past quarter of a century.
The full results of the study from the National Centre for Social Research will be published next month. One of the organisers, Professor David Voas, revealed: “More and more people are ceasing to identify with a religion at all. Indeed, the key distinction in Britain now is between religious involvement and indifference.”
The number of respondents who call themselves Christian has dropped from 66% in 1983 to a little over 50% today. The proportion of people in Britain who say they have no religion has increased from 31 per cent to 43 per cent. Those who are religious but not Christians, including Muslims and Jews, are now seven per cent of the population, up from two per cent 25 years ago.
In Scotland, the Kirk’s membership has dropped from 1.5 million in the 1950s to less than half a million today. The Roman Catholic Church in Scotland is experiencing a worrying decline in the numbers attending Mass, and is facing a crisis in terms of its ability to staff parishes.
Is it time for the churches to panic? On one level, it’s long past the time to start panicking. There have been prophecies of doom for some years, suggesting that within two decades there will be no mainstream church life in Scotland. I’m not convinced by this.
Institutional Christianity has been taking something of a “hit” for some time. The days when people joined churches just as a matter of course, or in order to rise in society, are gone, thank God. Institutions generally are regarded more sceptically nowadays: look at political institutions, look at bankers. Just as politicians and financiers often don’t “get it” and regard it as an affront when they are subject to public scrutiny, so some church leaders have regarded it as an impertinence when they are challenged. But ecclesiastical stables need to be cleansed as well as political and financial messy environments.
What we are witnessing is a serious decline in the power of the old “Christendom”, and a grieving for the “good old days” when church and state cosied up to one another. The privileging of the Christian churches by the political powers came at a price. The gospel of Christ has at times been compromised.
Let me give an example. The shocking Ryan report into clerical abuse in Ireland has revealed not just secrecy and the scandalous shielding of abusers at a high level, but deference and collusion on the part of some senior police officers. It’s interesting that younger theologians in Ireland have been talking of “the humiliation of the Church” – regarding it as a necessary winnowing phase for the Christian community. Times in the wilderness and periods for reflection are both salutary and necessary.
As far as Christianity is concerned, only renewed and imaginative communities of faith, stripped of privilege, will be credible enough to offer spiritual bread to a hungry generation. Numbers and influence are not really the issue; after all, the Christian church started with only 12 members. Nowadays, people who join or attend churches do so because they mean it. The history of the Christian church shows time and again that renewal is often preceded by critical self reflection and a refocusing on the core message.
Which brings us back to Christmas. Christianity is not - or should not be - about power, image and control, but about vulnerability, transparency and love, as embodied in the birth of a special child to two asylum seekers. O come all ye faithful, penitent, yet hopeful.
