Getting the October count right

Each October, churches are asked to count the numbers of children and adults attending different services to feed into the Church of England’s Statistics for Mission which need to be submitted before the end of January.

This data was used as part of our recent health and sustainability conversations and during that listening process, the figures were highlighted by some parishes as not giving an accurate picture. The October count is an important part of helping to build an up to date and accurate picture of our diocese and as churchwardens and others begin to think about collecting the data for this year’s count, please do bear the following things in mind:

• Keep an accurate count of both children and adults attending each service as it happens.
• When counting people at services, remember to include any non-traditional services that you hold, for example, a café church or other new worshipping community in your church hall.
• It’s particularly important that we get an accurate picture of the extent to which we are engaging with children and young people, so please do think carefully about all the ways this might be happening within services and other forms of worship. If you have a children and youth worker in your parish, please liaise with them.
• Make sure an individual is identified to enter the data onto the parish returns system and that they have access to all the relevant information.

The data collected in October is used in all kinds of ways, both nationally and locally, and helps us understand the individual context of each parish.  It allows us to celebrate what God is doing through our parishes and to learn where we might grow further. Without good data, we cannot fully understand or communicate how the great things happening in our parishes are helping people of all ages develop a living faith.

Chris Ottershaw, our Parish Resources officer, uses this data with new incumbents, talking with them in their first few months in post, about how things have changed with the numbers over past ten years. This gives the new incumbent a better understanding of what has been happening in their new patch, and what stories there might be behind the data. The data often tells the story of the effect of Covid on our churches, and the following resilience and hard work of our many parishioners.

We know that statistics don’t tell us everything and there are lots of great stories behind these figures. However, it is important that we try to ensure they are as accurate as possible so that we can reflect the green shoots of growth that we know are happening in many places across our diocese.

Judith Nex, as Governance and Pastoral Administrator (JNex@cofe-worcester.org.uk), continues to be available to support parishes with completing the Statistics for Mission. In addition, because of the key importance of this data for shaping our Diocesan Transformation Programme, members of the diocesan transformation support hub are also very happy to offer support to parishes as they complete the returns (contact Ian Thompson – IThompson@cofe-worcester.org.uk).