The end of decline

Quakers in Britain are used to telling each other a story about how our meetings are ageing and shrinking, and the Quaker movement as a whole is in steady decline. This story is no longer true.

Over the last couple of years something new has happened. New people have started coming to Quaker meetings in unusual numbers, and many of them are in their 20s and 30s. As a result, some of our meetings are not just growing but also getting younger.

This is not happening everywhere. Many Quaker meetings are still struggling with static or declining numbers, especially in rural areas with small populations. But it is not limited to large cities either. Some meetings in smaller towns are also growing. For a small meeting, even a handful of new attenders makes a very significant difference.

There are also meetings where more new people are attending once, but never coming back. If this is happening regularly, it should prompt us to reflect on the quality of our worship and welcome. Increasingly, a divide may be opening up between the meetings that newcomers return to, which are growing, and those which send potential new Quakers away disappointed.

Most of these newcomers are young adults of working age, who are looking for a non-hierarchical, inclusive and politically engaged faith community. Many of them have young children, and a regular children’s meeting and genuine welcome for families is essential to include them in a Quaker community.

Wakefield Quakers have recently started the first new weekly children’s meeting in Yorkshire for many years. When they were deciding to do this, one established Friend said ‘We’re not a small meeting any more, we’re a growing meeting, and we need the infrastructure of a growing meeting.’ And if you want to see what a welcoming Quaker message for families looks like, their information is here.

In Sheffield Central, which began welcoming large numbers of newcomers about three years ago, we are now starting to see some of them getting involved in running the meeting and applying for membership.

This is a new situation. It is over forty years since Quakers last attracted significant numbers of newcomers, during the cold war. It’s possible that we haven’t seen such a large proportion of new young adults since the 17th Century (when most Quakers were young).

It is important that we start to tell ourselves a true story about what is happening now. The right story matters, not just because it is the truth, but because it shapes what we do. If we keep telling ourselves that Quakers are dying out, we will carry on just managing decline, instead of planning for the needs of the thriving Quaker communities of the future.

If we acknowledge the new reality of change and growth, we will stop demoralising each other with tales of inevitable decline. Instead, we can respond to what the Spirit is doing in our times. In response to political disintegration and ecological crisis, people are seeking meaning in spiritual community, and looking to Quakers to find it. We are being called to welcome these newcomers into our communities, and to share the Quaker way generously with them.