Where are new Christians coming from?

It is a strange question, but one that I believe is a critical one for the church and the wider Christian community to address.

Now there was a report that church attendance figures had increased by 2% - I have searched for confirmation of this, but have not found it. There is some suggestion that there have been increases during the recession, which may well be the case. I am glad that some people, i a time or hardship, find some degree of solace in returning to the church - because that is what is happening, people who have attended churches in the past are returning for a while in a difficult time. These are not new people, and this does not change the overall trend, consistent over nearly a century, of decreasing church attendance.

What is more, church attendance figures are not the same as numbers of Christians.Not everyone who attends church would count themselves as Christian, and not everyone who would consider themselves a Christian goes to church. It is dangerous to equate these, or, for that matter, to equate either of these with a "more Christian country" and similar phrases, because to change the "Christian-ness" of the country requires influential and powerful people to be Christians, something that may happen and may be a result of less influential ad powerful people attending church, or may not. In all honestly, I do not see the power structures of the UK showing any signs of a more Christian approach.

But this is not the core question here, which is, where do we expect new people to encounter, engage with, and accept Christianity from? The days of big rallies with well known speakers like Billy Graham are past - and quite rightly, not because they were wrong, but because they are no longer appropriate or relevant. Churches, which used to do some work in the public gathering places, have tended to reduce this work for a range of reasons, not least because these public gathering places are not the same as they were. There are no places where everyone goes any more, that make sense to focus attention in that way. The world is a different place, the places of meeting, the means of making decisions and choices are different.

This presents an interesting challenge, which some Christian groups are trying to address, but many others are not looking at all - there is, I think, an unfortunate tendency for many groups to simply try the same things they have always done, just louder. The worry I have is that the Christian community is failing to bring new people in. Any new people are family members of existing people, or, as mentioned above, people returning to their faith in times of trouble. People will always leave, and often take their families - and definitely their family connections - with them.

So the question here is, how does the Christian community - church and non-church - bring new people into an engagement with God? People who are not part of any faith community at all - some of the hardest people to reach. How do we actually enable people to engage with God in the 21st century? The problem is that if we don't address this urgently, the community that can make this happen is shrinking, and the opportunities will slip away. The longer we leave it, the more family groups have no contact with the Christian faith at all, and the harder the job becomes.

And sorry that there have been a lot of church-specific posts of late. It is just that I have been made to think about church issues again of late. I tend to post whatever I want to explore, so it goes in cycles. This happens to be one of my current cycles, but I will return to other matters next post.

Rochdale and Eastborne

This last week has seen two interesting stories relating to children. They are quite different but both have some interesting insights.

Firstly, the story of Megan Stammers, who ran away with her Maths teacher, Jeremy Forrest. There is still some doubt over exactly what went on, but they are back, which is good. The problems I have are the betrayal of trust that Forrest showed, because his job is to look after the children in his care, not to abduct them.

If that is what happened. Of course, Megan might have been far more willing than "abduction" sounds. And, as others have said, she will be seen as the victim, and get all of the support, he will be seen as the perpetrator and be demonised. But, at this point, we do not know exactly what went on.

Now I do accept that Megan is 15, and so is the victim, but Jeremy may also be a victim. And all of those who are so insistent that at 15, Megan is still a minor, remember that she is just a few months away from the age when she can expose her breasts legally in the Sun. That does not justify it, but it shows that the age of consent is not some clear fixed point, but a randomly determined age at which every child is determined to be an adult, at least partly.

What of Jeremy? Recently married, and yet runs away with one of his students? The oddity of this makes me certain that there is more to this than we have yet heard. It is, I am sure, more complex than seems to be assumed. We - myself included - are often too quick to just to assumptions, but I think there is something more in this story than we yet know.

Rochdale is a completely different story. Here, young girls were abused, raped and pimped out systematically, and - to me the most shocking part of the story - when they told the authorities, they were dismissed. the official position was that they were willingly engaging in sexual activity, and were working as prostitutes.

The fact that this activity could continue - they were being picked up outside school - without anyone picking up that this was an issue shows a lack of oversight. The fact that they were not listened to is a disgrace - the accusations should have been investigated, even if they proved false. This dismissal of the complaints, without ascertaining their veracity, makes this the more sickening of these two stories.

Just his weekend, accusations have come out about Jimmy Savill, also about child abuse. It is interesting that, given these accusations, the BBC says that it has investigated in depth and found no complaints raised, and no basis of these accusations. It is interesting to see that when a celebrity is involved, the investigations are done properly.

"Suffer the little children" said Jesus. Not in this way though. When we fail to nurture and enable our young people, we are failing our society and our faith. This is not an easy or simple thing to do, but I understand it as meaning trusting and respecting our young people. It means listening to them when they talk, it means ensuring they are safe when with others. This does not mean simply CRB checking their group leaders.

It does mean treating them as thinking people, especially as they hit their mid teens, and allowing them to think for themselves. It means listening to them, trying to help them work out their problems, not just spoon feeding them our answers. If we can enable them to act responsibly, think through their faith, grow up to be mature members of society, who know what they believe and can discuss it, then we are doing them well. My experience is that too many churches do not do this.

Children and demon possesion

"There is a belief ... that children can be possessed, and those beliefs have no place in the 21st Century." This quote (from memory) was in respect of deaths of children because they were believed to be demon possessed.

The problem is, I don't agree with the quote. Now, just for clarification, I DO NOT agree with killing children, under any circumstances. However I do believe in demon possession, although I need to explain that, and I will later. The deaths of these children through the misguided actions and beliefs of their parents or carers is a tragedy, and one that should be avoided. The beliefs and mindsets that lead to these actions are, in my view, very misguided and clearly dangerous. Any belief system that teaches that killing children is better than them being "possessed" need to take a good look at itself. And change.

Now I did say that I do believe in demon possession, and I need to clarify what I mean. I think that there are enough examples and enough evidence that something that is covered by what we might call "possession" has and does occur. There is, I believe, something that goes on with certain people, in some cases, which changes the way that they behave and think. I also believe that the "demonic" is real, in that there is a spiritual force for evil, and that this force has a personal nature.

But the truth is that I - and no-one else - do not know or understand the true nature of the spiritual. In fact, in the West, we have a very Greek perception which separates the "body" and the "soul" and the "spirit". The Hebrew perspective does not separate these, but sees a person as a holistic one, not distinct. The problem is that in this perspective, the traditional concept of "demon possession" does not work.

The reason I have a problem with the quote at the start is that I think those beliefs are perfectly reasonable in the 21st Century. I believe that the concepts of demon possession, that people, including children, can be possessed, are valid. I don't know what it means, and I do know that killing a person is not the answer. Rejecting a belief and an idea that does appear to have some lasting validity, just because some misguided people misuse this belief is wrong and also dangerous.

So, in conclusion, killing children because they are believed to be demon possessed is unacceptable today. Killing, hurting, abusing children is unacceptable today, that is the the core problem. The fact that people use a belief to justify it is no reason to totally reject the belief, just to accept that certain people will misuse any belief to hurt others.