Polling company YouGov has thrown into question claims of a recent upsurge in church attendance among young adults. This has not surprised some experts, who cite evidence for the more conventional story of steep religious decline. If Christianity was once central to British society, that claim remains difficult to sustain in the 21st century.
Church membership and attendance have both fallen sharply in recent decades. In England, 11.7% of the population attended church on a typical Sunday in 1979. By 2005, that figure had dropped to 6.3%. The number of people identifying as Christian remained much higher for longer, still above 70% in England and Wales in 2001.
