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London.  What images does it conjure up in your mind?  Perhaps Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, with all they stand for in terms of democracy but also law-making and its impact on our lives.  Maybe you have taken a ride on the London Eye - when the vast expanse of the capital is set out below you.  Then it is not difficult to imagine the 7.5 million people who live in Greater London - 12% of the UK’s population.  Visit it at night and the huge numbers of young people out on the streets demonstrate the reality that only 14% of residents are pensioners compared with 19% on average.  And watch people streaming into theatres, concerts or the opera and it is not hard to believe that a third of them have an income of over £40,000, which makes average earnings higher than elsewhere (the average £30,000 pa for men is £5,000 more).  The metropolis has 15% of the UK’s businesses and 9% of the cars, as well as more crime (14% per capita compared with 11% nationally).

One of the better known nursery rhymes about London reminds us of it’s churches: Oranges and Lemons is all about City churches, while Dick Whittington is said to have turned back when he heard church bells.  Churches still play a major role, not only in London life but also in the overall picture of churchgoing in England.  Attendance increased between 1998 and 2005 (Herefordshire was the only other county to grow), and this growth was spread across more than half of its 33 Boroughs.

Black church growth

The Congestion Charge is said to have reduced traffic in Central London.  Drive down a road near some of the larger black churches on a Sunday morning at church time, and congestion is as bad as anything else you come across during the week!  Large numbers of black churchgoers and those of other ethnic minorities now outnumber white churchgoers in Inner London, as this pie chart shows.

The number of Pentecostal churches in London increased by 130 between 1998 and 2005, topping the 1,000 mark (1,005).  One result is that over half (53%) of the Pentecostals in the country attend church in London.  Most of these Pentecostals are black, but other ethnic groups have grown also.

Church attendance in Greater London

*Including Korean and Japanese

Big churches

Say, "Big churches" to a tourist and they’ll think of St Paul’s Cathedral or Westminster Abbey.  While there are churches with large buildings in London, what is more significant is that the size of congregations is on average larger.  There are over 4,000 churches in London which is 11% (1 in 9) of the churches in England.  However 20% of the churchgoers attend them, so the average size of 152 is double the 76 elsewhere.  Many of the biggest congregations are evangelical, which means that nearly a quarter (23%) of evangelicals in England worship in London.

Young people

Churches do even better than the population in having fewer pensioners and more young people.  This is especially noticeable for people in their 20s.  London churches enjoy the presence of three-fifths (57%) of 20-somethings who do go to church in England - which is great for them but very serious for the rest of the country.  There are only 99,000 of that age group attending the 33,000 churches outside London but they are not evenly spread.  The 4,000 churches with congregations greater than 200 attract 60,000 of them, leaving only 29,000 for all the smaller churches.  So where are the people to help with youth work, or consider ordination or mission work overseas? 

The pattern of attendance by age-group in Inner London is illustrated in the bar chart.  It shows that between 1998 and 2005 four out of six age groups grew, while the other two hardly changed.  The growth among under 15s and those between 20 and 44 almost certainly reflects an increase in the number of families attending church, probably many of them from the ethnic minorities.

So what does all this say?

Simply that church life in London is very different from the rest of England.  London churches overall are growing, are larger, and have a large proportion of black and other ethnic groups mixing with them.  They also have a higher proportion of those in their 20s especially, as well as an increasing number of families.

What can be learned from this?  The Anglican Diocese of London for example encourages its ministers to follow a five year plan; this targeting and forward thinking has enabled growth in their churches to occur for many years in the north and west of London.  Many of the largest churches in the country are in London, including the largest of all, the 10,000+ strong Kingsway International Christian Centre, which especially includes Nigerians.  These very large churches usually have a leader with a clear, sometimes audacious, vision.  Can the leadership principles seen in London be applied elsewhere, to help others share in the positive church life seen in the capital? 

Sources: National Statistics Online: London, Selected key statistics, accessed 10/07/06; Pulling out of the Nosedive, Christian Research, September 2006.

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