The Quiet Revival
Baptist Trainfan
Shipmate
in Purgatory
The UK Bible Society has revealed that their "Quiet Revival" report was based on faulty data from YouGov (not something which the Society could know). They have withdrawn the report and produced a new one with some interesting conclusions. What might your responses be to these?
https://tinyurl.com/ys6eed7z
https://tinyurl.com/ys6eed7z
Comments
https://www.churchmousepublishing.co.uk/2025/05/confessions-of-quiet-revival-sceptic.html?m=1
https://www.churchmousepublishing.co.uk/2025/08/the-quiet-revival-under-microscope.html?m=1
[As an aside, much has been made recently of a YouGov poll commissioned by ITV Cymru concerning possible results of the forthcoming Senedd elections. But can one trust this?]
For social attitude surveys (of which, "do you go to church?" is an example) rarely get run by multiple polling agencies, so without any "ground truthing", or even cross comparison between polls, it's difficult to know something is fishy. For the Quiet Revival poll, people like Churchmouse did that ground truthing, comparing the poll results with robust church attendance data, and smelt a rat. Given that those church attendance figures are readily available there's a big question for the Bible Society when they claimed they had independently assessed the YouGov poll data, why didn't they do the same ground truthing to see there was a problem with what the polling data apparently showed? Though, we're all very bad at that, we're much more likely to simply accept something that seems to reinforce what we expect or hope to see and more likely to question something that's disappointingly worse than we hoped.
Based on?
It appears to be based on raw testimony this time rather than stats.
Based on raw testimony and anecdote then, yes, I could say there's 'something' going on.
We've got a goodly bunch of catechumens with several baptisms and chrismations lined up over the Easter period.
I know of various Orthodox and RC parishes here and in other pa6s of the world which are experiencing the same.
I have friends in evangelical settings who have seen a recent influx of young men.
It's not all young men, of course but most enquirers seem to be coming from that demographic.
Not all of them are right-wing misogynists but there's an element of that most certainly.
Is it revival?
Well, no.
We aren't talking vast numbers and the young people I've spoken to see themselves as a minority within their age groups but they do cite friends who are turning to more Pentecostal or charismatic expressions of Christianity.
It's anecdotal I know, but when I speak to them they cite Roman Catholicism and evangelicalism as the other forms of Christianity they are most aware of.
That's true too of the CofE who are trumpeting increased congregations year-on-year. While that's true, figures haven't returned to pre-Covid levels, so it's hardly revival.
The CinW doesn't dare to publish its data these days ... or so it appears.
Nevertheless, something does seem to be going on.
In fairness they are using some stats, not just ones that are necessarily complete, for instance the stat on average church attendance from the EA. There's also an ellision of things from the Global Attitudes survey being ripped out of context and then being recast about the UK.
Back to my original post, to get at what I meant, consider things like:
The new thing is that something that was culturally associated is being brought into mainstream attention because inclusion has worked to an extent, and football less unwelcoming to players from those backgrounds (and to the point where they feel comfortable to bring some of their cultural practices with them). A similar thing is true of the musical artists they mention.
Given the patterns on page 40; a similar thing is probably true of churches, they are less unwelcoming to people from other backgrounds to the point where people can choose to attend them instead of or as well as cultural specific churches.
Regression to mean?
On the RC angle, I was struck by some of the numbers cited by a lay Catholic in East Anglia as to how many 'new people' and those seeking reception across their particular diocese.
From my own observations within the Orthodox orbit, we do seem to be seeing people rolling up who've developed an interest online - with all the positive and negative aspects that entails.
Some of these have no church background whatsoever.
We also have late 20 and early 30-Somethings who have been involved in non-denominational or charismatic fellowships but who now say they want something 'deeper'. This doesn't surprise me as that was the age I was when I began to engage more widely with older Christian traditions having repudiated them in my youth.
So there's a fair bit of 'recycling' going on. Perhaps that's always been happening. I remember instances of that back in the '90s and early 2000s.
And the rapid 'growth' of the so-called 'house churches' during the '80s was largely 'transfer-growth' from other churches - although we did get unchurched converts.
Back then initial inflated estimates of the numbers involved were published before they were revised downwards to more realistic figures.
I remember Peter Brierley having to retract over-optimistic estimates and issue more realistic ones.
Yes, and there was a mistake in my post, that line should read "just not ones that are necessarily complete, for instance the stat on average church attendance from the EA", that one alone seems to be fairly selective and easily capable of hiding a lot of transfer growth,
Looking back, over the years since my conversion/active involvement with the Christian faith (since 1981) - there's always been transfers and churn.
There was always some church of grouping that seemed to attract attention and new or transfer members for a while.
That seemed to be the case whether it was some kind of neo-Calvinist preaching centre, a lively charismatic church with lots of young people or an Anglo-Catholic one with all the trimmings that attracted those who liked 'that sort of thing.'
The main difference now, I think, is that things are more multicultural.
I like being in a multicultural parish but that may be under threat to a certain extent as a new ethnically-defined Orthodox parish has been established close by.
Hey ho ...
It always used to be the case that more liberal forms of Christianity benefited from fall-out/defections from more conservative establishments.
I wonder if we'll see that in future?
Meanwhile, whatever is happening is happening against a background of overall decline.
I keep warning some of my co-religionists not to become smug, triumphalist or snarky towards other churches.
'We are growing but the Anglicans are declining nah-na-na-nah-nah!'
'If anyone thinks they stand, take heed lest they fall,' I remind them.
And remind myself too of course.
Lord have mercy!