Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Misunderstanding of a Crisis (Church of England)

"Furthermore, as Ross reports there is a perfect storm arriving fast on the horizon with aging congregations. The average age of an attender at a Church of England service right now is 61 and many congregations have averages far above that.  'Another ten years on,' said one of the leaders, 'some extrapolations put the Church of England as no longer functionally extant at all'.  That actually means they are looking at being extinct in less than a decade.  Andreas Whittam Smith, another Anglican leader there at the general synod said that the Anglican church now faces a demographic 'time bomb,' which should be seen as a 'crisis'.  Well, if a church leader is going to define their current problem as a demographic time bomb, then they are going to look for a demographic solution.  But the churches problem, when it comes to the Church of England, is not a demographic crisis.  The demographic crisis followed a theological crisis.  This is a church that has been in a theological crisis for the better part of a century.  We're talking about a church that began accepting unbelief into it's clerical ranks, among it priests and it's preachers and it's leaders almost a century ago.  And it's now reaping the bitter harvest of allowing itself to become secularized.  And the demographic crisis comes down to this: there is no reason for a secular society to attend any kind of worship in a secular church."

- Albert Mohler
The Briefing 9/30/2014 (18:08 - 19:25)
Quoting from: Ageing Church of England 'will be dead in 20 years' - The Telegraph

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