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The Collapse of the Anglican Church of Canada

New numbers for the Anglican Church of Canada (ACoC) are out, and they show that Canada is the first major province of the Anglican Communion to have collapsed.[1]

This is highly significant, both for Canada and for other Western provinces following its trajectory.

The Data

Here are the data for average Sunday attendance:

2001    162,000

2019    87,000

2022    65,000

These are truly remarkable numbers. A church already in steep decline saw that decline speed up during COVID. Attendance in 2022 was 40 percent of attendance in 2001. And between 2019 and 2022, the ACoC lost a quarter of its Sunday attendance.

There is online worship, but this remains extremely hard to measure, and other metrics tell a similar story.

The church is not only smaller, but is also much, much older. Here is the data for baptisms — and it is worth looking at a longer run of years to see the true extent of the fall:

1961    44,416

1981    23,334

2001    13,304

2019    4,784

2022    3,583

By 2022, the number of those ACoC baptized has fallen by 90 percent compared to the number it baptized in 1961. And the pace of decline has grown more rapid in recent years. Baptisms have fallen by nearly 75 percent since 2001. ACoC congregations now have very few children in them and very few people coming to faith in them. The collapse of baptism is an extinction-level event.

Some will reply, “But what about St. Whomever’s?” Of course, there are pockets of vitality in the ACoC. Not every church will shrink at once. But the overall trend is overwhelming.

Most of the ACoC church buildings in use in 2000 are still in use today. But the church is not primarily masonry, and baptisms are a fundamental metric of its vitality. There have been debates about when the ACoC will cease to exist. In baptismal terms, it no longer meaningfully exists now.

What Is the Truth ?

First, this is not a church “in decline” or “close to collapse.” This is what collapse looks like. Ecclesial collapse includes large falls in attendance and financial woes. But these are lagging indicators. The key metrics are the numbers of those being baptized and whether a denomination has a healthy age profile, rather than one in which the bulk of congregations are of a certain age. By these indicators, ACoC has already collapsed. It is far too convenient to say “numbers don’t matter” or “decline is inevitable” or that “the kingdom” can be advanced even when congregations are shrinking.

Second, all the trends show that this decline will continue.

Third, the New Testament places a hugely high value on the local church. The same is true of the vast majority of the Christian tradition. To assume that congregations are dispensable, or that their value lies primarily as a base for activism for other causes, chimes with secular individualism, but it is the antithesis of Scripture and the historic teaching of the church.

Fourth, the Christian church has consistently taught that congregations are the primary basis for mission. If you want to change a place, you form a community of believers in that place. Not external, parachuted in; but incarnated, enfleshed, there. Not the least of the tragedies related to the ACoC’s collapse is the effect this has on other aspects of kingdom ministry — such as serving the poor and seeking the welfare of the wider community. Empty pews disable such ministries.

Some Signs of Hope

There is much more to Canadian Christianity than the ACoC. There has been rapid population growth in Canada, largely fueled by migration. Coupled with a declining birthrate in the existing Canadian population, this means Canada is changing very rapidly. Canada has one of the highest rates of immigration in the Western world. And migrants to Canada are much more favorable to Christianity than its existing population. The bulk of black migrants (74%) describe themselves as Christians. This is helping fuel the growth of many Canadian churches.

Canada is home to many migrants from countries with strong Anglican churches, such as Nigeria, Ghana, and Congo — yet African Anglicans form a tiny part of the ACoC. Canada’s massive immigration is a potent fuel for congregational life across the nation, even if this has passed by the ACoC.

Linked to migration (though not wholly due to it), there have been large rises in the numbers of Canadians who are Orthodox or belong to non-historic denominations. Census data show that Roman Catholicism in Canada has declined, but noticeably less than the ACoC, as a percentage of Canadians. Roman Catholicism has shown a degree of resilience that the ACoC has lacked.

Canada’s Christians[2]

2001                            2021

ACoC                          2.3 million                  1.1 million

Catholics                     12.8 million                10.8 million

Orthodox                     495,000                       623,000

Other Christians          780,000                       3.3 million

Canada has seen much secularization. But many churches in Canada are doing much better than the ACoC.

What of the Anglican Network in Canada (ANIC)? It is growing and is a significant presence in some areas (notably in greater Vancouver, where it may have overtaken official Anglicanism). But nationally, it remains relatively small and has no presence in many areas.

Conclusions

It is routinely said that churches must “move with the times,” that adapting faith is “the only way to connect with younger generations.” The ACoC shows this to be untrue.

Canada is the Titanic of the Anglican Communion. Some years ago it hit the iceberg. Since then, it has listed violently in a progressive direction. Now it is sinking beneath the waves. The figures are deeply sad, but they do not lie. And Western Anglicans would do well to learn from Canada’s baleful example. Much of Western Anglicanism is heading in the same direction, unless it changes course.

A church can have structural functionality — bishops, synods, cathedrals. But when its congregations disappear, it ceases to exist meaningfully. The Bishop of the Yukon attended and voted at the latest Lambeth Conference, yet the Sunday attendance of the entire diocese of the Yukon was 191 as of 2019. It is likely smaller now. There had been predictions that the ACoC would collapse by 2040. Those predictions were overly optimistic. The ACoC has effectively collapsed now. It contains the exterior façade of a denomination, but not the interior life that congregations constitute. There are sparks of life in the ACoC, but if you look at Canada as a whole, it has collapsed.

This is a cause for reflection, not just for Canadian Anglicans, but for all of Western Anglicanism. Canada is the first major Anglican province to collapse. But it is unlikely to be the last. Decline elsewhere — notably in Wales, Scotland, parts of England and the United States — has a similar trajectory. In these provinces, large chunks of the country have no meaningful Anglican presence, yet cathedral and diocesan posts proliferate.

Canada’s determination to be in the vanguard of progressive theology has been shown conclusively to lead to congregational collapse.

The late Tim Keller commented that the key cause of mainline decline was the tendency to relegate the gospel to second place behind other matters. Canadian Anglicanism is an example of exactly that. We can debate the merits of its stance on a wide range of issues, but what is clear is its adoption of progressive causes sidelined its attempt to call people to follow Jesus, and the formation and nurture of congregations.

Churches that intend to grow tend to grow. Canada shows that the opposite is also true. Churches whose primary intention is something other than the nurture of individual faith and congregational growth tend to decline. Making central the proclamation of faith to individuals and the growth of congregations does not guarantee congregational growth. But it is a fundamental first step to congregational growth. And, without local communities of Christians, the church ceases to exist.


[1] The most recent data come from the important work of Neil Elliot and in an article by Matthew Puddister in Anglican Journal, May 1. They are also discussed in the Anglican Samizdat blog run by David Jenkins. Neil Elliot’s blog, NumbersMatters, is also a mine of information.

[2] These numbers come from census data, which measure affiliation (those who self-identify as members of a particular faith/tradition). Affiliation is not a measure of formal membership, let alone regular attendance.

David Goodhew
David Goodhew
The Rev. Dr. David Goodhew is vicar of St. Barnabas Church, Middlesbrough, England, and visiting fellow of St John’s College, Durham University.

34 COMMENTS

  1. This: “their value lies primarily as a base for activism for other causes…”. I see this happening in the American church (not just Episcopal churches), where the leaders have decided that social activism is the raison d’être of the body and oh, yes, it would be nice if you came to church, too. This is a complete inversion of the Gospel. Social service should flow *from* the altar, not *to* it. The churches that are doing well are those that actually focus on preaching the Gospel rather than trumpeting how progressive they are.

  2. Consult Jordan Peterson, that’s all ya gotta do. Consult historian Tom Holland, author of Dominion. Remove everything with even a wiff of Woke, DEI, or WHO. Bring back the great music tradition, No campfire songs in the Sanctuary, more mysticism, more symbolism.

    • My late husband went to seminary with a gang of “boys” (pre-ordination of women) from western Canada. They were big on protests, guitar music rather than traditional organ and sitting on the floor in a circle to “rap”. He predicted that those trendy things would lead to the end of the Anglican Church of Canada within fifty years if they replaced preaching the Gospel and the Sacraments as the central focus of worship. He would be very sad to see the accuracy of his predictions. P. Maclean

    • In the article: “What of the Anglican Network in Canada (ANIC)? It is growing and is a significant presence in some areas (notably in greater Vancouver, where it may have overtaken official Anglicanism). But nationally, it remains relatively small and has no presence in many areas.”

      • I think Mr Wilson might have meant that the ANIC, by drawing people away from the ACoC, to some extent accelerated the shrinking of the latter. Not that that absolves the ACoC. They did this to themselves.

  3. The fastest growing congregations in Canada are those that believe Jesus was nothing more than a prophet. The number of Muslims in Canada has grown from 600k in 2001 to 1.8m in 2021. By the logic of this article, we apparently should all become Muslim?

    • You are comparing apples to oranges. We are sticking with Christianity for this comparison. Also, based on the numbers presented, there are roughly 15 million Christian Canadians, or about 36 per cent of the population. Meanwhile, Islamites represent four per cent.

      • What’s your definition for a Christian Canadian? Anyone who attends any sort of church? I know some here will disagree but I would only count people who say they are born again. And if you speak of born again Christians, the center of Anglicanism is in Africa. Some people above spoke disparagingly about first century ideas. Here’s my personal take on how to take fist century ideas.
        1. Biblical Sexual intimacy occurs between one man and one woman in the state of holy matrimony ie: church marriage/Christian marriage.
        2. Civil matrimony is legal for gay couples. Noone should be discriminated against because they are gay. They should have equal access to employment (except when the employer is a church or a church school) housing, partner visits to hospitals. In other words, it is our Christian duty to treat homosexuals kindly and fairly. And to examine ourselves for those sins common in the church: covetousness, greed, gossiping, gluttony and to strive to recognize and eradicate those sins.
        3. The husband is the head of the wife, but the husband must be willing to lay down his life for his wife.

        CS Lewis:
        “Between different ages, there is no impartial judge on earth, for noone stands outside the historical process and, of course noone is so enslaved to it as those who take our own age to be not one more period, but a final and permanent platform from which we can see all other ages objectively.”

    • I hardly see how that follows. What is clear is that our current trajectory is not working, and we need to take an honest and serious look at that. Our Lord himself said you will know a tree by its fruits, and we seem to not be interested in looking at the fruit, or lack thereof at all.

      • It is difficult to develop great commitment to a church that no longer repeats the creeds with conviction and whose message is focused on the social cause du jour.

    • I wonder if most new Muslims in Canada are immigrants? Immigration seems to be the main way that Islam has been growing in Europe, so Canada may have the same pattern. In this case, we’re not talking about people who choose a faith or convert to it but are born into it.

    • Any information on how much of that growth is due to immigration, how much family growth, and how much conversion? I suspect the vast majority is #1, a decent amount #2, and a tiny amount #3 (I have no idea whether conversion from Christian to Muslim or Muslim to Christian is greater). Whatever the impact of immigration of Muslims, immigration of African Anglicans is apparently not helping the ACoC.

  4. Very, very sad, but by no means a surprise. The decline has been marked and obvious for fifty years. This article is right on target, beautifully written with a compelling message. I went to seminary in Vancouver 1970-1973, and saw the beginnings there when the seminary merged with another one, and immediately “moved ahead” into “new things”, and within a year all but one of the Anglican professors had been dismissed; the one left was the only one who was willing to “move with the times”.

    When I became a Rector in 1978, within a few years we had moved to high Mass with incense every Sunday with evangelical style preaching focusing on conversion and sanctification leading to service. We sang as much of the liturgy as was possible. The parish grew, drew over 500 college students over twelve years, had 17 vocations to Holy Orders over thirty years (seven of whom were eventually ordained), and had lots of children and young families. Six retired or non-stipendiary priests joined the staff. It was a golden era.

    We upheld traditional morality and focused on families. We did all the “unpopular” stuff. We also drew, and made a place for, those who differed from such standards, and they grew in Christ. It was just a normal church, the way it was supposed to be, intentionally devoted to being as close to the New Testament as we could.

    Once we were asked to present a message to the clergy of the diocese on why we were growing so much. Six college students made a powerful presentation, filled with humor. Everyone loved it. As we were driving away, one priest ran up to the car, and said, “I loved it, David, I loved it. I didn’t believe a word of it, but it was great.” That was pretty much the general reaction. Sigh.

  5. I’m going to push back on David’s conclusion that the ACC has collapsed and is the first institutional casualty in the Anglican Communion. I cannot dismiss the general trend of decline – as this has been evident in Canadian Christianity and the ACC since 1966. I dispute the reliability of the aggregate data collected and the extent of the Covid induced collapse. Many diocese’ submit “approximate” or rounded attendance figures in 2022 and often those figures do not reflect a complete collection of parish reporting. In Toronto, where I’m a bit of a statistical authority – upwards of 15% of parishes do not submit results by the submission deadline. So there is a concern about both accuracy and completeness. Unlike the Church in Wales, Church of England, and ECUSA, data collection is spotty and inconsistent.

    The last year our General Synod publicly produced substantive data was 2017 – this first time in over a decade. Without yearly publication there is a lack of rigorous examination of y/y reporting or substantive questioning in inconsistencies or outliers. The ACC maintains a .5FTE staff person – the Rev. Neil Elliott – with the herculin task of analyzing and making sense of the trends. And while the indicators are not promising, it would be inaccurate to suggest they are accelerating.

    My own observations of the impact of Covid on ministry, growth and giving in the Diocese of Toronto can be found in the September, 2024 issue of The Toronto Anglican newspaper. As you can imagine I am rather reluctant to share my complete observations here before the article is made public, however, it is fair to note that 2023 might offer more complete and reliable post-Covid data. The use of 2022 data, I would suggest, is unreliable as many parishes were still building back from Covid losses.

  6. Goodness. I hardly know where to begin. The irony of an author from England, writing about the decline of the Anglican Church of Canada without having spent any meaningful amount of time in its congregations, going on to write: “If you want to change a place, you form a community of believers in that place. Not external, parachuted in; but incarnated, enfleshed, there.” I’m absolutely gobsmacked and disappointed to see this piece.

  7. I’d be reluctant to draw any conclusions from data collected in 2022. Much of the church was in recovery mode from Covid and attendance figures are bound to be adversely impacted. No one doubts that ASA and givings are trending downward. To say they are in freefall is unconvincing. My own analysis of data from Toronto in 2023 indicates strong participation in on-line worship corroborated by and increase in the number of givers. The year one uses matters as does the quality of the data.

    • Thanks for this, Peter.

      Whilst the 2022 data is still affected by COVID, it is the first year post-COVID when congregations could, realistically, meet in person. If you compare it with data from the Church of England, CofE data suggest a slight uptick in 2023’s figures compared to 2022, but nowhere near enough to compensate for the loss in previous years. I’d see ACoC’s 2022 figures as usable, in a way that the 2020 and 2021 figures were not. And, sadly, the 2022 shows that the big falls seen since 2001 sped up during COVID. It would require a massive bounce back in 2023 to negate the message the 2022 figures give and my understanding is that that has not happened.

      As to whether this is ‘collapse’ or something else, the drop of 75% in baptisms since 2001 makes terms like ‘decline’ seem, to me, too weak a term to describe the magnitude of what has happened.

      • David,

        What is missing in much of the Canadian data is any allowance for on-line worship. What we are seeing is only “in-pew” attendance as GS made no provision for its inclusion in it’s reporting. It offered no guidance in how to collect it at the diocesan and parish level. In 2023 the Diocese of Toronto commissioned a working group to identify consistent metrics to allow us to measure on-line attendance on Zoom, Facebook and YouTube. The 2023 reporting from parishes in our our diocese indicated a significantly high level of participating parishes and attendees. Now one might think the attendee number would be spurious but it is corroborated by an increase in the number of identifiable givers. As I indicated earlier, my article in the September issue of The Toronto Anglican will discuss this at greater length.

        I would also like to point out that I discussed my findings with Ken Eames of the Church of England stats office and he found our rationale for measuring on-line worship compelling and fascinating. If the result in Toronto is at partially consistent in the rest of Canada then the so-collapse is misleading as it fails to consider those who now make on-line worship their normative pattern of engagement.

        • Thanks for this, Peter – measuring online feels like the ‘holy grail’ of contemporary church statistics, so if you can find a way to capture it, that would be excellent. What its significance is – that is the question. The trajectory of financial giving is one metric – but baptisms and confirmations are another. If baptisms and confirmations do not rise, it would suggest significant limitations to purely online discipleship.

  8. Thank you, Brody, for identifying one of the Gospel prerogatives for determining what is Christian and what is not: “fruit.” In Matthean terms, this is neither numbers in the synagogue nor doctrinal purity. The fact that we have General Synod staff on the Canadian Anglicans Facebook group commenting on this article, saying the ACoC deserves to collapse for exactly the opposite reasons as Mr Goodhew, I think speaks to a more nuanced reality. Tired tropes like the church is “too liberal,” or “too conservative” strike me as distinctly unfruitful.

    • The Rev. Dr. Goodhew didn’t say the Anglican Church of Canada (ACC) deserves to collapse. He said the ACC is in a state of collapse because of progressivism and provided apparent authenic data from the church to make his point. Whether the ACC is in collapse or appears to be in collapse due to progressivism is arguable. The fact that the ACC, much like the Episcopal Church USA, is in terminal decline, however, is a fact. In other words, the end for both churches is near based on the attendance (ASA) data.

      It would be interesting to know how Dr. Goodhew and the General Synod staff of ACC define the specifics of “progressive” and whether the church’s severe decline is due to “too much” or “too little” of it. Perhaps you could shed some light on the matter.

  9. The 2022 ASA data for the Episcopal Church USA is in line with the decline of the Anglican Church in Canada. The UCUSA data for 2022 (the latest available) show a 40 percent decline from pre-COVID data of 2019 through year-end 2021. The 2022 data indicated a 19 percent increase post-COVID. The data for 2023 remains unknown, but the consensus is the decline in ASA will revert to trend of about 4 percent annual decline. We will know for sure when the 2023 data is released, probably sometime in September.

    The prediding bishop of ECUSA, Michael Curry, said two months ago, “What comes next in my mind is helping the church gracefully decline. Because I don’t think the numbers are going to reverse themselves.”

    One might argue with the Rev. Dr. David Goodhew’s characterization the ACC in collapse, but the the fact is both ACC and ECUSA are in terminal decline. And the progressive leaderships of both denominations have made it clear that they will not change or reverse course. In other words, the end is near for both ACC and ECUSA.

  10. I think the idea that sola scriptura parishes grow and others fail is a falsehood that needs to be named. There are variations across multiple denominations that indicate a variety of factors lead to church growth and/or decline. Faithfulness to scripture is highly suspect especially when many of the so called “growing” churches have different interpretations of the same holy book. No where in the bible does it claim to be the sole or even primus authority.

  11. Meh the whole church is about as relevant as the monarchy. Clearly those who left didn’t think the tradition was necessary to pass on. I live in the USA and the episcopal church has a nearly zero retention rate

    • Colin,

      Here’s irony for you. I began worshipping in the Anglican Church in 2008 with my wife and three children. I was raised RC but encountered too many doctrinal issues that I couldn’t live with so jumped ship. I exposed my kids to everything that was available in our church to engage them in a life of discipleship and charity. Last year my son left the ACC and joined the Byzantine Catholic Church. His reason? The Anglican Church doesn’t ask anything of you. He says the church lacks doctrinal rigor and biblical clarity. He wants objective truth and a backbone and says the ACC fails miserably in this department. What am I supposed to say to that?

  12. I am amazed that The Living Church would publish such a superficial analysis by somone whose only knowledge of the Candian church seems to be some numbers he ran across. The motivation for this article seems to be wanting a stick to beat theological liberalism with. I can easily get on that bandwagon too. But to claim that the ACC has “collapsed” is just false. Of course the attendance numbers in the ACC are in serious decline. Anyone can see that. But to understand what that actually means for the church needs some expertise the writer seems to lack. Just one case in point: while the ECUSA is historically an urban church, the ACC has been a predominantly rural one. One of the factors in the attendance decline in Canada is the ongoing closure of rural churches where the popuation can no longer support them. I live in a mid-size Canadian city with five ACC churches. All are flourishing, and most are growing. The author writes, “Some will reply, “But what about St. Whomever’s?” Of course, there are pockets of vitality in the ACoC. Not every church will shrink at once. But the overall trend is overwhelming.” What does this even mean? ‘Trends’ are somehow imperatives to be followed? Should the churches in my city close so that we don’t disturb the doomsday scenario the author is so invested in?
    Really, a rather silly and unhelpful article.

    • I was in seminary in the ACC circa 2001 and the analysis seems pretty accurate to me. It was just as predictable at the time. What all the debates about this don’t seem to take into account, though, is that the leadership is committed to this decline. They are not trying to turn it around, and will actively (if quietly) sabotage the people who do. To them, selling church real estate to fund diocesan pension schemes is guaranteed money, and they would rather take that then engage in the risky uncertainty of trying to build a thriving congregation.

  13. As a priest of nearly 50 years in the ACC, I have been through every debate and controversy we have had, beginning in the 1960s. I think that the Church has had talented leaders and has conducted its decision making wisely. There is always imperfection, but Canadian Anglicans are not a radical lot. However, whether it was the Ordination of Women, Liturgical change, or Same Sex matters, there have always been dissenters and attacks, It is shocking that the author of this article cites Anglican Samizdat as a source, since its writer has made slanderous personal attacks and is extremely homophobic and misogynistic. No doubt some persons enjoy a sense of schadenfreude, since church decline is music to their ears because they have all the answers. It has always happened that any problems in the ACC, despite important and irresistible external forces, both demographic and cultural, have almost. always been blamed on “change” in the crudest manner. No thought is given to what the Church would look like now if we were strictly where we were prior to the 1960s. Canada is a different place entirely. Any serious critic should realize that these are not all just Anglican problems, and that our culture and history has contributed to them.

  14. I am not surprised with the conclusion. I drew a graph from 1966 to 2017 of the total number of members and got a straight line, R^2 ofover 0.95. The 2022 data was on the line, so there may be some questions but statistically it fit the curve. This curve went through zero in 2042. Based on numbers, I would say there should be at the most eight dioceses today. In 56 years the church is only now talking about this. The warning should have been raised in the 1980s. I have seen many active and growing churches but these seem to be the exception. My experience over the years is the majority of clergy just don’t know what to do. When proposing programs in my current church, I have faced resistance and stalling tactics by the priest. Judging by the other churches in the diocese and the national church this appears to be the norm. One can pray that the church can recover, which I believe is possible if the focus is on the Great Commission

  15. The ACC destroyed itself when it compromised, not only on the 39 Articles of Faith, but the basic tenets of Christianity.I recall speaking with Dean Nissa Basbaum, of St Michael and All Angels in Kootenay, B.C., after a few minutes, I asked her if she believed in God. Her answer was no, she was a follower of the likes of Bishop Spong. Fortunately, I had long abandoned Anglicanism, for the Orthodox Church, but with leaders such as these, the extinction of the ACC would indeed be a good thing for Christianity.

  16. The Anglican Church has ceased to be Christian and proceeded to adopt Woke and ideological correctness and is not worth saving. Let it die and out of the ashes hopefully a Christian focused church will arise without all the idiot bishops and priests who have destroyed changed the church to make it unrecognisable as a Christian church.

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