Christian Today report– The future of religion in Britain is in black majority churches and Islam, according to a leading expert in religious trends.

For white British people, it is particularly bleak. Leaders who can inspire and build congregations are few and far between.

“Most ordained ministers are good, well meaning people with the leadership ability of bank managers,” says Professor David Voas, who specialises in population studies at Essex University.

Statistics show that Islam and newer forms of Christianity are overhauling the Church of England as white Britons lose their taste for worship.

He says: “The future of religion in Britain is to be found in Islam and the black majority churches. Muslims already contribute ten per cent of British births; within several decades people of Muslim heritage will form ten percent of the population, even if immigration came to an abrupt halt tomorrow.

“If even half are observant, they will form a substantial proportion of the religiously active population. Ethnic minority Christians will have another large share.”

Professor Voas reveals the latest trends in a blog for the thinktank Theos which is published as the Church of England prepares to debate reforms to structure, training and mission at the General Synod which meets tomorrow in Church House, Westminster.

“While the secularisation of consciousness in the West is an ongoing process, the secularisation of behaviour has reached the point of no return,” he writes.

He says the leaders of the major Christian denominations are asking the wrong question. The issue is not why people are staying away from church but why anyone would go to church.

“The onus is on churches to offer something that people want and would have difficulty finding anywhere else.”

He says it is more about community than religion, and the problem is that local churches “are not especially attractive”.

“The elderly may need people, but for the young there are simply too many alternative ways of spending time.”

While about half of English people born early in the 20th century still declare their affiliation to the Church of England, just one in 20 of those born at the end of the century do so. All Protestant denominations are similarly affected.

In addition, belief in God has taken a battering, he writes.

In another blog for the same Theos series, David Goodhew, director of ministerial practice at Cranmer Hall, Durham, says the new “atheist church” in north London illustrates the secularisation of Britain. But the picture is more complex than that, he continues, with a proliferation of new and growing churches in parts of the country.

He argues that while it is often assumed that as Britain gets more ethnically diverse, it gets less Christian in fact the reverse is the case and that Roman Catholicism is being significantly boosted due to migration. In addition, at least 5,000 new congregations have started in Britain since the 1980s, mostly from new churches.

“Looking forward, evidence suggests that, alongside considerable potential for death, Christianity in Britain also has considerable potential for resurrection in the coming decades.”

Nick Spencer of Theos writes that a new edition of Professor Grace Davie’s influential book on Religion in Britain since 1945 is shortly to be published under a new title, Religion in Britain: A Persistent Paradox. Theos is hosting a debate on the subject next week with Prof Davie.

Source: Christian Today

Catholic Herald report– Prelates who do not comply with child protection norms adopted by their bishops’ conferences and approved by the Vatican must face real consequences, Cardinal Seán O’Malley has said.

The president of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors said the commission “is very, very concerned about this whole area of [bishops’] accountability” and has a working group drawing up recommendations for Pope Francis.

The proposed new norms, the cardinal told reporters at the Vatican on February 7, “would allow the Church to respond in an expeditious way when a bishop has not fulfilled his obligations”.

“We think we have come up with some very practical recommendations that would help to remedy the situation that is such a source of anxiety to everybody” on the pontifical commission, he said. The recommendations will be presented to Pope Francis.

The cardinal and members of the commission, which includes survivors of clerical sex abuse, spoke to reporters at the end of their February 6-7 meeting at the Vatican.

Peter Saunders, an abuse survivor and commission member, said: “Bishop accountability is most definitely something that is a concern and central to some of the work that is going to be carried out by the commission.”

Mr Saunders, who is from London, said he knows the Vatican and the Church at large “operate in a slightly different time dimension” where the definition of “quick” may be months or years. “I get that,” Saunders said, “but when it comes to time, children only get one stab at childhood.”

“It is not disputed that there have been far too many cover-ups, there have been far too many clergy protected, moved from place to place – this has got to be consigned to history very quickly,” he said.

Fr Hans Zollner, a Jesuit psychologist and member of the commission, said, “as far as we know”, the number of bishops who have not followed their conference’s child-protection norms is not large, “but it is certainly a huge problem in terms of publicity and in terms of the authenticity of the Church. If you have bishops who do not comply with the Church’s own norms, we have a problem.”

Currently, he said, even though bishops are part of a bishops’ conference, they are accountable only to the Pope and there is no procedure for investigating the way a bishop complies with the norms and nothing that spells out the consequences of non-compliance.

“Until now every bishop has been a little pope” in his diocese and “can do whatever he wants” with regard to national guidelines, Fr Zollner said. “Only the Pope has authority over him.”

Mr Saunders told reporters that if in the next year there is not “firm action” on accountability and the implementation of child protection policies around the world, he would leave the commission.

Marie Collins, an Irish survivor of clerical abuse, who was appointed to the commission about eight months before Saunders, told reporters she also would leave if no progress is seen soon.

“We’re not here for lip service,” Mr Saunders said, but to protect children.

Cardinal O’Malley said 96 per cent of the world’s bishops’ conferences have sent the Vatican their child-protection norms, as requested in 2011 by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

Some of the norms are “weak”, he said, and the commission will work with those countries and countries without norms to bring them to full compliance.

Fr Zollner said only five of the world’s 112 bishops’ conferences have not submitted norms. All five are in French-speaking West Africa and are facing the challenges of civil strife, the Ebola epidemic, poverty and a lack of people familiar with both canon and civil law, something necessary for drawing up effective guidelines.

Cardinal O’Malley publicly thanked Pope Francis for a letter, released on February 5, insisting that the protection of children – and not the avoidance of scandal or bad publicity – must be the priority for the way all bishops deal with accusations of sex abuse by Church personnel.

The Pope’s letter also encouraged bishops to meet with and listen to survivors, which is something Cardinal O’Malley said “many bishops have not yet done”.

Mr Saunders told reporters: “There are far too many bishops around the world who have refused to meet with survivors.”

If a victim of clerical sexual abuse feels able, he said, the first thing he or she should do is report the crime to police “because we know there is an abysmal record” of “ill-judged responses” from bishops and priests.

Cardinal O’Malley said the commission also has set up working groups to design child protection workshops for members of the Roman Curia and for the courses for newly appointed bishops that the Vatican runs each September.

“The commission is also preparing materials for a Day of Prayer for all those who have been harmed by sexual abuse,” he said, which “underscores our responsibility to work for spiritual healing and also helps raise consciousness among the Catholic community about the scourge of child abuse.”

In addition, he said, commission members are contacting Catholic funding organisations “to ask them to include some requirements concerning child protection in their guidelines for eligibility for funding” and to consider giving poorer countries grants to establish child protection.

Source: Catholic Herald