A report on the future on the Anglican Church in Canada says declining membership could make it extinct by 2061.
The new report was prepared for the Anglican Diocese of British Columbia and says at the current rate of losing 13,000 members a year, the church is “one generation away from extinction,” the Globe and Mail reported Wednesday.
The analysis said the church had 1.36 million members across the country in 1961. By 2001, the number had fallen 53 percent to 642,000, the study said.
On Vancouver Island alone, the report suggested 19 of 54 churches should be closed.
“The unchurched are not coming to us. Lapsed Anglicans are not coming back in sufficient numbers,” the report said.
Membership and attendance are down in Canada across all religions, except the Roman Catholic church, which the Globe said was attributable to immigration patterns.
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