From Anglican Mainstream:
The Church of England yearbook for 2006 records the following figures for 2003
Church Electoral Rolls ( effectivelty membership rolls) 1,235,000
Average weekly attendance 1,187,000
Average Sunday attendance 1,017,000
Usual Sunday attendance 901,000
That now makes a C of E Sunday attendance of 1.5% of the overall population. But the very important [url=http://www.tearfund.org/webdocs/Website/News/Churchgoing in the UK Tearfund 3 April 2007.pdf]2006 Tearfund Survey[/url] showed that UK regular church attendance is heavily weighted in favour of Northern Ireland (three times the national average) and Catholics, and CofE accounts for less than a third of the total. The good news, such as it is? Tearfund found over 15% of the population still attend (or claim to attend) once a week or more, while over 25% go at least once a year. And: more than any other factor, receiving a personal invitation was cited as the reason most likely to persuade people to come (back) to church.
The population of England (leaving aside the considerable influx of revent legal and illegal immigrants) is approx 50.5m. That improves the figure for usual Sunday attendance to 1.8% (not much!) since the Church of England is responsible only for England, not Scotland, Wales and N Ireland, which seem to have been included in the calculation. I can assure you that the Archbishop of Canterbury hath no jurisdiction north of the Border, and none whatsoever as far as Catholics are concerned.
How many Catholics attend mass in England. on a weekly basis?
How many Muslims go to mosque in England, on a weekly basis?
Lausanne committee 2004 estimates (http://www.lausanneworldpulse.com/)
English population 50.5 million
Average weekly Mosque attendance 279 000
Average weekly RC Mass attendance 1 472 000
Average weekly Anglican attendance 1 380 000 –
but NB that a figure such as “those attending Anglican church or mosque at least once a month” might be as much as three times higher in each case; RC monthly-attendance figures, by contrast, are not as far above weekly figures.
I don’t know whether anyone keeps mosque attendance statistics, but those published by the CofE for usual Sunday attendance are thought by UK journalists to be broadly reliable.
Mass attendance was in free fall, but may have doubled in the past two years due to the huge influx of migrant workers from eastern Europe, especially Poland.
By contrast the CofE claims membership of 26m when calculating its place in the statistics of the Anglican Communion!
Now you can see why Ann Redding *had* to be dealt with; someone who attends BOTH church and mosque just makes hay of the record keeping…