The number of regular worshippers at British Quaker Meetings has risen for the first time in years – but the number in formal membership has dropped.

Figures released last week show 14,447 members, a drop of 1.2 per cent. In contrast, the number of recognised attenders rose to 8,330, an increase of 3.9 per cent.
There is no mechanism for asking how many people define themselves as Quakers. But if the number is taken to be the combined total of members and recognised attenders, then it now stands at 22,770. This is an increase of 0.6 per cent.
The number of children in association with Friends rose by 2.1 per cent to 2,237.

The figures are likely to encourage Friends working on outreach projects and media engagement. Last year saw significantly increased media coverage of Friends, following the decision on same-sex marriage. But the numbers may worry those who believe in an emphasis on formal membership.

Quakers are not the only group to struggle with the relationship between membership and attendance figures. In March, the Baptist Union of Great Britain reported an increase in attendance combined with a drop in the number of formal members, provoking a debate about the nature of membership that will be familiar to many Quakers.

Comments

• Posted by jgharston on June 04, 2010

  > There is no mechanism for asking how many people define themselves
  > as Quakers

  There is the UK Census next March. One of the questions is how the respondant identifies their religion. In the 2001 Census only 6,000 people identified themselves as Quakers. In light of Friends’ figures of about 22,000 that suggests a lot of people putting down Christian, Other, left blank or just None of your business. In the run-up to the 2011 census we should be persuading Friends to put Quaker down on the census form. After all, Jedi was listed as the fourth largest religious group in 2001!

• Posted by davidfishcf@msn.com on June 10, 2010

  We, quakers, are too proud of our membership.  Listen to the way we talk about members and non members in our business meetings area and local.  The way we, on occassions, belittle attenders (quote weighty friend from walsall ‘i think it is much better if they are members’).  Why are we too proud of our membership, I think it comes from the huge hill of our public process for gaining membership, with its public report of intensely private journey into membership.  Quakers should ‘humble’ downgrade the importance of membership, approach more attenders and ‘easify’ the membership process. Really, could the timing of membership be the time when an attender offers their contact details to a meeting?
  david fish (coventry meeting)