Page 4 | Church attendance

Troubledwords · 2024-10-31T10:16:19+00:00

How busy is it when you go to Church? Are you someone that goes to a Church that's struggling to get parishioners or is it a busy, struggling to find a seat type?

Original poster

Troubledwords · 14/11/2024 08:30

mathanxiety · 14/11/2024 02:07

I go to a Mass that usually has about 1500 people attending. It's one of five weekend Masses. Big parish, big church. The parish also does various ecumenical prayer services, lots of social justice outreach, many lay ministries, and a lot of continuing education/ theology series. (In US).

I'd love a Church that does more theology, sadly I find you don't see it nearly enough in Catholic Churches.

OP posts:

Fink · 14/11/2024 08:52

Troubledwords · 14/11/2024 08:30

I'd love a Church that does more theology, sadly I find you don't see it nearly enough in Catholic Churches.

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We do two online courses for continuing formation for adults - a Bible one and a theology one. Both are based around video series which we watch together and then have group discussion.

Luckily, I'm in London so there are plenty of lectures available for those who are interested. Not many in my parish access higher-level theology courses/ lectures, but there's always a reasonable turn out for the online series (though still a very small proportion of those who attend Mass).

Helpnifoseeker · 14/11/2024 09:00

The church I attend is nearly every time. It's hard to find a seat in the pews, loads of people stand and it can be hard to find a parking space. It's even more packed when it's someone's Requiem, which I never came across in England but happens regularly here.
It's a Catholic church in a small Irish town, which might have something to do with it, even though a lot of Irish people don't go to Mass every Sunday and Holy Day anymore

chickensandbees · 14/11/2024 09:09

I live in a rural community. There are usually about 20-30 people. There are 3 churches in the parish so we only have 2 Sunday services a month at the church I go to. Numbers have fell off a lot since Covid and there are no young people. My daughter used to come with me pre-Covid but she's a teenager and doesn't come anymore apart from festivals. It's sad. I'm 50 and have been consistently the youngest person in my church since I was 18 and that has been a number of different churches and locations, but all rural.

I could drive to a city and find a more vibrant church I am sure but I prefer to go in my local community and don't want to be another cause of it dying out.

However the people that do go are really committed and lovely and we have a relatively new vicar and assistant priest.

Fink · 14/11/2024 09:12

Helpnifoseeker · 14/11/2024 09:00

The church I attend is nearly every time. It's hard to find a seat in the pews, loads of people stand and it can be hard to find a parking space. It's even more packed when it's someone's Requiem, which I never came across in England but happens regularly here.
It's a Catholic church in a small Irish town, which might have something to do with it, even though a lot of Irish people don't go to Mass every Sunday and Holy Day anymore

We do have a full church for funerals fairly often (England), but you're right that it varies by culture. When we have an Irish, or Caribbean, or Indian funeral, it's pretty common for the whole community to attend. With the people who are several generations English (there aren't many of them in a London Catholic church!), it's more limited to people who knew the deceased directly.

Original poster

Troubledwords · 01/04/2025 08:07

We've had a lot more families and teen attend lately as their confirmation class has been right after Mass, so that's been great. I just hope that they continue to attend once their classes have finished.

OP posts:

Thegreatestoftheseislove · 01/04/2025 11:36

Our church continues to grow and adult baptisms happen regularly when meeting as 'whole church'. We do the 'home church' model and each home church is more or less restricted to around 12 people. We have many home churches plus there are a growing number who, perhaps being 'new' for now, stick with the 'whole church' meetings on a Sunday. So, yes, from my perspective, my church based on good, sound, Biblical teaching/preaching and doctrine, 'church' is growing.

Lifealittleboulder · 04/04/2025 13:35

So our church is one church and we have 8 congregations across our area, when we’re all together we hit about 1,000 including kids. Our congregation is about 250, I’d say 100 of that are under 18 x

Lifealittleboulder · 04/04/2025 13:41

We have a youth camp festival every summer with about 100 teenagers, they camp at a local “fun farm” have teaching prayer and worship and then they do loads of fun stuff like lazerblast, water fights bowling etc. it’s amazing !

VonRyansExpress · 09/04/2025 19:40

I live in a small coastal town and my (Catholic) Church has about 160 on a Sunday morning. It seats 250 so no problem with getting a seat.There is a Sunday School during the main service.

The other Catholic church nearer the docks gets about 80 and our priest has to "leg it" to cover the two services.

The main church has a "bunfight" afterwards and at least 100 turn up for that. We can just fit them in the church hall. They stay for ages and keep drinking coffees !

There are a series of daytime and evening Masses at both churches where we get about 20/25 and we are lucky to have a retired priest who helps with these.

This year so far we have had one Christening and one Wedding. We are also running the RICA course again as it was popular last year.

We have a Catholic primary school next door to both churches so that acts as a "feed",

LeaningOnTheEverlastingArms · 10/04/2025 13:06

Thegreatestoftheseislove · 01/04/2025 11:36

Our church continues to grow and adult baptisms happen regularly when meeting as 'whole church'. We do the 'home church' model and each home church is more or less restricted to around 12 people. We have many home churches plus there are a growing number who, perhaps being 'new' for now, stick with the 'whole church' meetings on a Sunday. So, yes, from my perspective, my church based on good, sound, Biblical teaching/preaching and doctrine, 'church' is growing.

Love this! 💕🙏🏻

Original poster

Troubledwords · 11/04/2025 08:52

VonRyansExpress · 09/04/2025 19:40

I live in a small coastal town and my (Catholic) Church has about 160 on a Sunday morning. It seats 250 so no problem with getting a seat.There is a Sunday School during the main service.

The other Catholic church nearer the docks gets about 80 and our priest has to "leg it" to cover the two services.

The main church has a "bunfight" afterwards and at least 100 turn up for that. We can just fit them in the church hall. They stay for ages and keep drinking coffees !

There are a series of daytime and evening Masses at both churches where we get about 20/25 and we are lucky to have a retired priest who helps with these.

This year so far we have had one Christening and one Wedding. We are also running the RICA course again as it was popular last year.

We have a Catholic primary school next door to both churches so that acts as a "feed",

Edited

The local priest here has to go between towns to do Masses as well.

It's great that RCIA has been popular, and that it's going to continue. I hope more parishes do classes.

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