The UK Church is not in decline. There are signs of revival everywhere

Rev Dr Hannah Steele’s church in Peckham was transformed by the faithful prayers of a band of women who prayed for decades. It’s just one story of many green shoots of growth that are springing up across the Church, she says

It is often said that the Church in the West is at crisis point. Newspaper headlines tell us that Christianity is in decline in the UK and that, in our increasingly secular culture, religious faith should be a matter of personal preference, rarely seen and certainly not heard.

The church that I am part of was built in 1867. At that time, the existing church buildings in London could not cater for the expanding urban population. This, of course, was an era when most people went to church.

Now, as many of those Victorian buildings stand empty, are turned into fancy flats for city workers or performance venues, it can be hard to imagine a time when there wasn’t room for all the people who wanted to attend.