Religious leaders within the Church of England believe there is a real crisis when it comes to the future of the church, saying it will be dead in the next 20 years.
The Rev. Patrick Richmond, a Synod member from Norwich, warned the national assembly last week that the Church of England is entering into a "perfect storm" with an overabundance of elderly members. Richmond basically believes the Church of England as a whole is "dying off" because of the number of senior citizens attending church in comparison to younger members.
However, records from the Archbishops' Council's Research and Statistics Unit tell a different story.
Updated records show that more than 36 percent of those who worship within the Church of England are under the age of 45. New statistics show that weekly services in Church of England cathedrals in 2011 is at 1.7 million people each month, a level that has been maintained since the turn of the millennium.
The Archbishops' Council's Research and Statistics Unit recently changed the way the Church of England gathers statistics and measures attendance.
The new statistics teams also show that since the turn of the millennium, the Church of England has steadily grown by a total of 37 percent, which is about four percent on average each year.
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