Every year since 1983, an organisation called the National Centre for Social Research has conducted its British Social Attitudes Survey. In almost every year, it has included a question asking respondents about their religious affiliation. The most conspicuous trend over the years has been the growth in the proportion of people who say that they do not associate themselves with any religious denomination. They have grown from 31 percent in 1983 to 53 percent in 2016.
The proportion of the population who describe themselves as being Catholic has remained remarkably constant over the years, at around 9% - the minor fluctuations being within the margins of statistical error. Affiliation to the Church of England and other Anglican Churches (ie Scottish Episcopal Church and Church in Wales) has declined fairly consistently from 40% in 1983 to 15% in 2016. Here are some sample figures:
Year Anglican/C of E Catholic
1983 40 10
1987 37 10
1991 36 10
1995 32 9
1999 27 9
2003 27 9
2007 21 9
2011 21 9
2015 17 9
2016 15 9
I have projected these figures forward a few years. Although making such predictions is a risky business, the trends are so clear that I am fairly confident about making them. The figures look like this:
2017 14 8
2018 13 8
2019 12 8
2020 11 8
2021 10 8
2022 9 8
2023 8 8
This would indicate that the Catholic Church will overtake the Anglican Churches as the largest denomination around the year 2023.
Unfortunately, I cannot reproduce the graphical representation here, but I can assure you that it is very convincing.
The Catholic proportion has been boosted by large numbers of immigrants- Polish, Filipino, SyroMalabar, Nigerian etc. Had it not been for them, our native Anglo- or Anglo-Irish numbers would have shown a much sharper decline. No room at all for complacency or self-congratulation. Still, the Anglican collapse is scary!
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