People of no religion outnumber Christians in England

[Scot Dutchy]

People of no religion outnumber Christians in England and Wales – study

Proportion of population who identify as having no religion rose from 25% in 2011 to 48.5% in 2014, surveys show

The number of people who say they have no religion is rapidly escalating and significantly outweighs the Christian population in England and Wales, according to new analysis.

The proportion of the population who identify as having no religion – referred to as “nones” – reached 48.5% in 2014, almost double the figure of 25% in the 2011 census. Those who define themselves as Christian – Anglicans, Catholics and other denominations – made up 43.8% of the population.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/m ... ales-study

The men is skirts can now fuck off.

[JimC]

Dover Beach
BY MATTHEW ARNOLD
The sea is calm tonight.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Ægean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery; we
Find also in the sound a thought,
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

[Svartalf]

doesn't change a thing to the fact that the CoE is the state religion thre... conform and make no waves or die.

[JimC]

It has lost all teeth...

[Scot Dutchy]

Once Liz departs this mortal soil it will die a death. Jug Ears is not religious by any means as she is. Willie and Harry are certainly not. The same as our mob. It was Trixie that kept the religious side going although men in frocks never appeared at any commemoration service here. They are always secular.

[Rum]

The Church will still be 'established' however and it would take a huge constitutional change to remedy that. I can't see any potential government in the next 20 years tackling that - or wanting to.

Sadly.

The English way tends to be to muddle through and let things take the path of least resistance, meaning the church will have less and less credence and authority and will wither on the vine.

[cronus]

Things will change. There will be a calamity, either a plague or a war or some economic decline. And the flock will return - as they have done so often in the past. It's the comforts of a easy life keeping them away. Satanism will flourish. Give it time....

[Scot Dutchy]

The Church will still be 'established' however and it would take a huge constitutional change to remedy that. I can't see any potential government in the next 20 years tackling that - or wanting to.

Sadly.

The English way tends to be to muddle through and let things take the path of least resistance, meaning the church will have less and less credence and authority and will wither on the vine.

Ok it will be the established religion but if it has almost nil followers it will have almost zero influence. You are heading our direction now. Only 5% of the population go to church at least once a month. We have plenty of churches for sale.

[rachelbean]

[Meekychuppet]

I quite like the CofE in a way. It's oddly comforting to have a completely useless and pointless religious organisation that is teeming with closet homosexuals around.

[rasetsu]

A spokesperson for the Church of England said: “The increase in those identifying as ‘no faith’ reflects a growing plurality in society rather than any increase in secularism or humanism. We do not have an increasingly secular society as much as a more agnostic one...."

You just keep telling yourself that.

[Svartalf]

Rasetsu, always nice seeing you here

[JimC]

A spokesperson for the Church of England said: “The increase in those identifying as ‘no faith’ reflects a growing plurality in society rather than any increase in secularism or humanism. We do not have an increasingly secular society as much as a more agnostic one...."

You just keep telling yourself that.

They are in that Egyptian river for sure...

[Hermit]

A spokesperson for the Church of England said: “The increase in those identifying as ‘no faith’ reflects a growing plurality in society rather than any increase in secularism or humanism. We do not have an increasingly secular society as much as a more agnostic one...."

You just keep telling yourself that.

They are in that Egyptian river for sure...

The spokesman also sounds as though the church wants a return to theocracy and desires secularism and (shudder) humanism to go to hell.

[JimC]

A spokesperson for the Church of England said: “The increase in those identifying as ‘no faith’ reflects a growing plurality in society rather than any increase in secularism or humanism. We do not have an increasingly secular society as much as a more agnostic one...."

You just keep telling yourself that.

They are in that Egyptian river for sure...

The spokesman also sounds as though the church wants a return to theocracy and desires secularism and (shudder) humanism to go to hell.

And he doesn't get what the essence of secularism is - not necessarily atheism at all, but simply that religion(s) should be a private affair for individuals or groups, and not have any form of control over politics or society...