Where are all the churches going?

A Review of Church Comings and Goings (July 24, 2023)

When a cathedral goes up for sale, or worse, demolition, local news will usually be all over the event.  However, coverage will usually focus more on the loss of municipal history and examples of bygone architectural design.  There will not be as much focus on the loss of a place to worship.  And, when smaller churches with simpler accommodations close, not so much coverage occurs at all.

When you take a drive around town, as well as in rural areas, you will often come across repurposed churches.  On the plus side, some may be taken up by another church.  However, most will now serve as community halls, arts centres, shelters of people in need and, sometimes, even businesses.  We have previously examined the significant drop in church attendance over the last several decades, but it would be interesting to see how that translates to actual church closings.

The closest we are likely to get to statistics on this subject is to review the number of charities registered with the government over time, and see how many of these represent churches.  A look at the list for 2020 indicates there were 14,184 charitable organizations with the word ‘church’ in their legal name.  We can see that, during the year, 382 of them indicated that they were inactive, while 103 were actually wound up.  These are not particularly large numbers when compared to the total (2.7% and  0.7% respectively).

A look at listed churches for the decade 2010 to 2020 shows a net decline (closed churches minus new churches) of 719.  This represents a 5% drop over ten years, being only a half of a percent each year, on average.  The number embodies a steady decline over the decade.  Each year saw a drop, except for two (2011 and 2020).

It seems from this data that the decline in church attendance, at least over the decade ending in 2020, has resulted more in churches being less full on Sundays, versus the actual shuttering of churches.