Church attendance isn’t everything. It’s authenticity that counts

When there’s a story about Christianity in decline, or in crisis, you always get a few loudmouth lifestyle columnists gloating – sorry, imparting their secular wisdom. Barbara Ellen was not very surprised that a new report says that Christians (at 44 per cent) are now outnumbered by ‘Nones’ (at 48.5 per cent). After all, the main thing religion claims to offer is ‘community’, and in practice that probably means ‘sitting in a draughty hall with a Bible group and a digestive biscuit’. This is a good snapshot of secularist arrogance. If Ms Ellen attended a local group in which a genuine social mix assembled (unlike at her book group) in order to practice literary analysis and share life-stories, imagine how excited she’d be. I attended a ‘Bible group’ earlier this year, largely composed of women of West Indian origin, and was impressed by the high level of textual discussion, and honest self-reflection that emerged.