As a former Episcopalian, I read articles about the old church as they come across on the net. We left the church in 1990 for another denomination and have been saddened by the steady decline of the church in which both were raised and all our children baptized.
"Vibrant health" is not a term that has applied to the Episcopal Church for a long time but even so I was shocked to see that even by the church's own estimates it has now shrunk to only 800,000 "realistic" (e.g. - people who show up on more than just Christmas and Easter) members:
"The Church of England has 44 dioceses with 26 million official members, 1.2 million “realistic” ones. The Episcopal Church in the U.S. has 111 dioceses with 2.4 million official members, 800,000 “realistic” ones."
Holy Schnikey! Almost 50 years later and they still haven't figured out what's going on? Apparently not because it was just put on what is tantamount to probation by the worldwide Anglican Communion for its gay marriage stance.
Back in the day when we were members, "official" membership at its high water mark in 1966 was a little over 3.6 million. By 2002 this had shrunk to 2.3 million people. Now, only 14 years later, even that number has been chopped in half. My advice to other Christian denominations who want to grow - look at what the Episcopalians are doing and do exactly the opposite.
(Tip o' the hat to Lisa Wipf)
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