Earlier this week Episcopal priest Tom Ferguson wrote a piece titled “The Collapse is Here,” exploring The Episcopal Church’s recently published statistics on Sunday worship attendance from 2008 to 2018.
Ferguson offers several high level observations about what has happened and what the Episcopal Church looks like today:
- Average attendance dropped 25% (24.7%) between 2008 and 2018. Average attendance in 2018 was 562,529.
- There are now more parishes with an average attendance of less than 10 than there are parishes with attendance greater than 300.
- With an average age of 57, the Episcopal church is much older than the American population in general that has a an average age of 37.
- With a membership that is 87% Anglo, the Episcopal church is far whiter than the American population, which is 62% Anglo.
So What?
Numeric decline isn’t new for Mainline Christianity in general nor for The Episcopal Church specifically. Ferguson, however, suggests that the latest numbers point toward a coming collapse.
After many decades of declining membership and reduced funding at the denominational level, many Mainline Protestant denominations have engaged in serious discussion about what the future of their denomination should look like. While many denominations have experienced multiple reductions in denominational staff and some have implemented changes that extend beyond staffing levels and configurations, none have taken radical steps toward merger or dissolution.
I invite you to think about Mainline Protestant decline more generally by reading a few of my many posts. I’ve provided links to some of general interest followed by some that are more focused on change within specific Mainline Protestant denominations.
- How has your denomination’s membership changed in the last decade? Over the last 50 years?
- Based solely upon your answers above, what one word best describes the trajectory of your denomination (ex: “collapse”)?
- What do the answers you provided to the first two questions mean for your local congregation? for you?
General Posts
- Mainline: The 5 Percent? (2019)
- Will Mainline Protestantism Disapear by 2039? (2017)
- Mainline Protestantism = Old (2016)
- Fewer and Fewer Christians (& Even Fewer Mainline Protestants) (2015)
- From Mainline to Sideline to Oldline (2015)
- Shifts in Religious Affiliation (1972-2012) (2014)
- The Great American Religious Decline (2014)
- The Great Decline (2014)
- The Decade of Christian Decline (2013)
- Role Reversal (2012)
- Liberal Protestant Decline – Fact Check (2011)
- What if No One Comes? More Decline in the Mainline (2010)
Denominationally Focused Posts
- Majority of UCC Congregations Now Worship 50 or Fewer (2019)
- 6 Decades of Decline in the United Church of Christ (2018)
- Dwindling Membership: The United Church of Christ from 1965-2015 (2016)
- Declining Worship Attendance (UCC – 2014)
- So Many Dwindling Congregations (ELCA – 2013)
- From 5 Million to 4 Million (ELCA – 2013)
- More Decline in the Mainline: UCC in Florida (2012)
- The Presbyterian (PCUSA) Church is Deathly Ill (2011)