Anglican Church of Canada will be dead by 2040, according to its own report

Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. II Timothy 3:5

When Canadian journalist Ted Byfield was publishing the newsmagazine Alberta Report from the 1970s to the '90s, he often published articles about the apostasy of Canada's mainline churches, and wondered why, at their conferences, these churches spent a lot more time discussing social issues than their own aging and declining membership. Things haven't changed for the mainline churches since then, and the decline is now so much in evidence that the churches are now starting to acknowledge it. Submitted for your approval, the following example regarding the Anglican Church of Canada, as reported by Tali Folkins in the Anglican Journal, November 9, 2019:

The Anglican Church of Canada’s first reliably-collected set of statistics since 2001 show the church running out of members in little more than two decades if the church continues to decline at its current rate, the Council of General Synod (CoGS) heard Friday, Nov. 9.

“We’ve got simple projections from our data that suggest that there will be no members, attenders or givers in the Anglican Church of Canada by approximately 2040,” the Rev. Neil Elliot, a priest for the diocese of Kootenay seconded in 2016 by the national church to collect a new set of statistics, told CoGS. Elliot, who reported on 2017 data collected from all of the church’s dioceses, also told the group about ongoing efforts to expand and diversify data collection.

The current projection should be taken especially seriously by Canadian Anglicans, Elliot said, because it is suggested by five different sets of church data, all collected in different ways: older data from 1961 to 2001; Anglican Journal subscriber data from 1991 to 2015; and three sets of data from his own survey of the dioceses as of 2017: the number of people on parish rolls, average Sunday attendance and regular identifiable givers.

“For five different methodologies to give the same result is a very, very powerful statistical confirmation which we really, really have to take seriously and we can’t dismiss lightly,” said Elliot, who gave his presentation remotely with the use of videoconferencing technology.

Two other findings, he added, suggest different outcomes. Data collection on the pastoral offices of baptism, confirmation, marriage and funerals show an even faster rate of decline. However, a demographic study of a small number of parishes in the diocese of Kootenay, he said, suggested that—because of the age ranges that Anglicans fall into—the church could lose only 50% of its members by 2040.

In a response to a question on how other Canadian churches were faring, Elliot said data collected by the United Church of Canada also showed 2040 as a “zero-member date.” The Presbyterian Church in Canada, while declining, seems to be losing members somewhat more slowly, he said. For the U.S.-based Episcopal Church, he added, the projected zero-member date was around 2050.

Archdeacon Michael Thompson, general secretary of General Synod, told CoGS that senior staff of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada had given him a similar impression about membership decline in that church.

“Though I can’t quote the numbers, the lines look quite similar,” he said.

Introducing Elliot’s presentation, Thompson said he believed the substantial reduction in church membership since 2001 shown by Elliot’s data should not come entirely as a surprise to Canadian Anglicans involved in the church at a local level. The church they have been able to offer to God has been declining in size since the 1960s, he said, but they should not despair. Instead, Thompson said, they should look at this numerical decline in the context of other changes for the better.

The London, Ont., church in which he started worshipping in 1968, Thompson said, “while not filled to the point of discomfort, was full.” On the other hand, he added, “in all of the years that I attended that church…in all of the years I had attended church before then, and in all of the years that I attended church until I was in my 20s, I never once heard a sermon that made reference to God’s justice.”

He continued, “I never once heard anybody tell me about the residential schools. I never heard anything about the responsibility of the people of God to respect the dignity of every human being. It’s not that people didn’t care about those things, but those things were not tip-of-the-tongue discourse in the life of the church in which I was formed. Things are quite different now.”

In his report and in response to questions from CoGS, Elliot said he hoped the church would expand its data collection to be better able to monitor how specific aspects of its life, some of which may hold particular potential—home churches, Fresh Expressions, Messy Church and Book of Common Prayer services, for example—are doing.

Meanwhile, a working group of bishops, to be headed by Mary Irwin-Gibson, bishop of the diocese of Montreal, has been formed, Thompson said, “to say what are the things we should be counting…that will help us understand that, while the church we offer to God is smaller than it has been in the past, that’s not the only thing that’s true of it.”

In table group discussions after Elliot’s presentation, members of CoGS were asked to ponder four questions: whether the data aligned with their own experience; what surprised or stood out for them in the report; what they believed God was telling the church through the data; and where the “Good News” was in it.

Some table spokespeople said the data matched the experience of those at their table; some reported that at least one member of their group came from a growing or stable parish. Some groups expressed doubt that the church would run out of members by 2040.

“We actually don’t think there’s ever going to be a ‘zero person,’” one table spokesperson said. “I think what we will be offering to God in 2040 will be a different church, and a much smaller church, but it will still be a church.”

Another reported of his group, “Between the range of us there were some who found it hard to understand how everybody that they knew would either be dying or becoming apostate at 55, for the church to run out of members.” But he himself, the spokesperson added, was amazed to learn the church hadn’t lost more than Elliot’s report stated.

Some groups spoke to hope that the report would spur the church to change.

“Our group talked about the great hope, and good news, in the idea of taking more risks,” one said. “We see good news in the fact that several of us were noticing that lots of newcomers to the congregation were new Canadians as well…. Now we’re in this time of change, we can start addressing these kinds of trends.” And the emptying of rural congregations might mean more opportunities for ecumenical shared ministries, the spokesperson said.

Some groups were curious about whether data could be collected in other areas—such as how church buildings are being used. At least one group spoke to hope that the collection of the data, and possibly more data in the future, would not only help the church identify areas of growth; it would also help parishes and dioceses in numerical decline know that they’re not alone.

Elliot said one tool he hoped would be very useful for gathering this sort of detailed information is ParishOS—a kind of “electronic vestry book” that he had already used to gather information from some parishes. The national church, his report stated, is providing ParishOS free of charge to dioceses that want to use it.

A version of Elliot’s report had been leaked earlier this fall. In October, a link to it appeared in the Anglican Samizdat independent blog, after which it began to spread through social media. On Monday, Broadview, the former United Church Observer, published a story on the report.

After Elliot’s presentation and the feedback from the table groups, Archbishop Linda Nicholls, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, noted the interest the report had generated outside the church after it was leaked.

“I have to tell you, there’s lots of interest outside this room in this conversation,” she said. “We had hoped to simply present [the information] here, have a conversation before it went public. Unfortunately, some of our colleagues were not so good at keeping things quiet, and it leaked into some media. And in fact I’ve had at least two or three requests for interviews prior to coming here, and even while I’ve been here in the last two days.”

Nicholls said she hoped that instead of trying to figure out why the church was in numerical decline, or get drawn into a “vortex of negativity” about it, Canadian Anglicans would instead focus on the church’s calling.

“We’re called to do and be God’s people in a particular place, for the purpose of sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, and the only question is, ‘How do we need to share it, so that it might be heard by those around us?’” she said.

“I think we’re being tested about perseverance, endurance, creativity in the coming years,” she said. “At the end of the day, when we stand before the great judgement seat and have to answer for how we lived our lives as Christians, I think the question that will be asked is, ‘Were you faithful with what you were given?’”

Nicholls also said she was hopeful to see “green shoots” of growth in various areas around the country—some in the church’s traditional ways of being and some in its new ways of expressing itself.

She said Elliot’s report was a “wake-up call” to the church, a mirror showing it unpleasant truths that could act as a spur to action. She noted the excitement she sensed in the church about the potential of detailed statistics-gathering to give it a deeper picture of itself, and said she looked forward to his work continuing together with the newly-formed bishops’ working group.

“It’s my hope that when we leave here, the message we take is not ‘Oh no, the church is dying,’ but ‘Oh, we’ve got a challenge’,” she said. “But we’ve also got a hopeful way of addressing that.”

As reported by Ms. Folkins in the Anglican Journal, July 16, 2009:

Vancouver--In 2018, the Anglican Church of Canada experienced a fall in revenues due to declining contributions from dioceses, poor market performance and a decrease in giving, General Synod heard Monday, July 15.

The national church’s audited financial statements for the year show that overall revenue was $11.1 million, down by $800,000—7%—from 2017, Fraser Lawton, bishop of the diocese of Athabasca and a member of the financial management committee, told General Synod.

The decline in revenue was due chiefly to a decrease in proportional gifts from the dioceses—the money they forward to the national church every year, which makes up 83% of the church’s revenue. In 2018, proportional gifts sank to $7,898,264 from $8,416,738 the previous year—a total decline of $519,000, the audited financial statement for 2018 shows.

It was the largest decrease in proportional gifts the national church had suffered in a single year since 1994, Lawton said.

“This was a cause for some discussion, and certainly catches our attention,” he said. “Seven dioceses decreased their contributions to General Synod, and the evidence is that dioceses are struggling to meet their proportional giving commitments.” Although there is a set rate at which dioceses are asked to give to the national church, their contributions are entirely voluntary; some give less than the rate stipulates because they’re not able to give the total amount every year.

“Contributions from dioceses are a key driver for revenues,” Hanna Goschy, treasurer and chief financial officer for the church, told the Journal in an interview after General Synod. “When diocesan revenue decreases, the contributions to General Synod decrease. Some dioceses are struggling to meet their commitments, [so] they decreased over the prior year. Resources for Mission also decreased by $180,000, and there was an investment loss of almost $300,000.”

Goschy said the investment loss was due to stock market losses in 2018 and that the market had recovered in 2019.

Expenses in 2018 were $11.8 million—$400,000 more than the prior year, Lawton said in his presentation, citing rounded figures from the statements. Goschy told the Journal that this increase was anticipated and budgeted for. “There was a planned deficit on core operations of $522,000. The actual deficit was $442,000, which meant we did better than budget on core operations.”

The deficiency of revenues over expenses for the year, Lawton said, was $735,322 before transfers from internally designated funds in reserve. “There are reserves set up for major initiatives that are large and don’t happen every year,” Goschy said. “Two examples are the meeting of General Synod and the meeting of Sacred Circle. They’re both triennial events.”

Efforts to develop a strategy related to revenue losses also emerged at General Synod.
Lawton noted that General Synod had passed, on July 14, a resolution directing the Council of General Synod (CoGS) to address questions about what kind of work the national church should focus on given the financial difficulties faced by the dioceses, which support it. Similarly, a second resolution passed on the same day asks CoGS to undertake a strategic planning process to consider its own mission and ministry...

...Editorial Note: This story was updated on August 2, 2019, to include an interview with Hanna Goschy, chief financial officer, who clarified that the deficit experienced by the church in 2018 was anticipated in the budgeting process.

As reported by Terry Mattingly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, November 30, 2019:

...Elliot noted that a 2006 report suggested the final Anglicans would exit Canadian pews in 2061. The church's membership had peaked -- as it did for many mainline Christian churches -- in the early 1960s, with 1,358,459 on parish rolls. That number fell to 641,845 in 2001, while Canada's population rose from 18 million to 31 million.

In the 2017 report, Anglican membership fell to 357,123 -- with an average Sunday attendance of 97,421.

Meanwhile, the number of Anglican clergy in Canada rose -- from 2,380 in 1961 to 3,491 in this new report. But other numbers were sobering. For example, the church confirmed 1,997 new members in 2017, while there were 9,074 burials or funeral rites.

"There is no sign of any stabilization in our numbers; if anything, the decline is increasing. Some had hoped that our decline had bottomed out, or that programs had been effective in reversing the trends. This is now demonstrably not the case," Elliot said. "International comparisons suggest that the decline in the Anglican Church of Canada is faster than in any other Anglican church," although 2018 numbers from the larger Episcopal Church in the United States showed "an even greater rate of decline in attendance than ours."...

...Trends in Canada are part of a larger global drama, with Christian churches booming in Africa, Asia and elsewhere in what researchers call the "Global South." At the same time, membership numbers have stalled, declined or collapsed in many mainline and Catholic flocks in Europe and North America.

It's certainly true that Canada has become more secular, creating a climate of "intolerant progressivism" that has troubled many physicians, nurses, lawyers and others, said the Rt. Rev. Ronald Ferris, a veteran Anglican Church of Canada bishop who now helps plant missions for the conservative Anglican Network in Canada.

"You can still grow churches in Canada, but it's an uphill challenge," he said. "We grieve to see so many people leaving the church, but we also know that many are still seeking a spiritual home. ... We know the changes in Canada are real. The question is whether the church has to change its teachings to fit into that. We see no signs that making those kinds of compromises leads to growth, or even survival."

The articles above provide abundant evidence of the truth of Vox Day's second law of social justice warriors: They always double down. The Anglican Church of Canada was informed in 2006 that it would be dead in 2061. One might think that such a dire prediction would prompt the church to examine itself and take appropriate steps to reverse the decline. Did they do that? Nooo! They doubled down on their "progressive" ecclesiastical practices and social agenda to the extent that the speed of decline has accelerated. If the Anglican Church of Canada had merely continued at a steady pace in keeping with the 2006 prediction, it would now be 42 years away from extinction; instead, in the last 13 years, the predicted expiry date has been moved up by 21 years. The SJWs who run the church would rather destroy it than abandon or dial back their agenda. Liberal Anglicans such as Archdeacon Thompson seem to be economic illiterates as well as apostates, and it doesn't seem to bother them--if it even occurs to them--that they won't be able to enact their politically correct social agenda if there isn't anyone around to pay for it.

In the case of the Anglican Network in Canada, they should obey the command of scripture: Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you. II Corinthians 6:17

For further information, go to Mr. Mattingly's podcasts:

Canada's Anglicans are vanishing and RNS can't find any conservatives to debate the reasons why (November 21, 2019)

Why it matters that Canadian Anglicans are having a near-death experience (November 23, 2019)

See also my posts:

Baptists, Anglicans and Pentecostals team up to host Emergent speaker and writer Peter Rollins (February 26, 2009)

Calgary parish votes to leave the Anglican Church of Canada and join the Roman Catholic Church (December 6, 2010)

Anglican Church of Canada mulls open communion (March 9, 2011)

Dissident Anglican congregations lose their properties when the Supreme Court of Canada declines to hear their case (June 18, 2011)

Another dissident congregation leaves the Anglican Church of Canada (July 5, 2011)

More Canadian Anglicans break away to join the Roman Catholic Church (May 16, 2012)

50 years ago: Anglican Church of Canada adopts new Book of Common Prayer (August 22, 2012)

Aboriginal bishops in Anglican Church of Canada invoke "colonial occupation" in opposition to same-sex marriage (March 10, 2016)

Anglican Church of Canada votes in favour of sodomite and lesbian marriage--after changing the vote count (July 13, 2016)

40 years ago: Anglican Church of Canada ordains its first female priests (November 30, 2016)

50 years ago: Anglican Church of Canada abandons its opposition to abortion (December 18, 2017)

An Anglican Church of Canada priest who's an example of a pagan disguised as a Christian (February 28, 2018)

50 years ago: Canadian Anglican traditionalists oppose union with United Church of Canada (June 21, 2019)

Statement from Anglican Church of Canada Primate-elect shows the church to be beyond the possibility of satire (July 27, 2019)

Anglican Church of Canada General Synod votes overwhelmingly to remove prayer for the conversion of the Jews from the Book of Common Prayer (August 7, 2019)

Anglican Church of Canada will review its governance structure in order to remove those who stand in the way of the alphabet pervert agenda (August 22, 2019)

Anglican Church of Canada General Synod votes to endorse Chrislamic A Common Word Between Us and You (December 22, 2019)