When you consider the popularity of Christianity in a country like the UK, the dominant trend is one of religious decline and secularisation. According to the British Social Attitude Survey in 2019, a majority of Brits do not belong to any religion (52%) or attend religious services (66%). There is a prevailing sense that religion causes conflict and is out of step with modern morality. It’s easy to get the impression that Christianity is on the way out.
How do we respond? I'd suggest that reports of the demise of Christianity have been exaggerated. Not least because Christianity is exploding in many parts of the world. Indeed, there are even a number of encouraging stories of church growth and salvations across the UK. Of course, God is actively at work in the world, through his church, across the world.
When we step away from the macro picture and consider our own context, the reality feels very encouraging! As a central London church, we have the great privilege of regularly meeting folk from a variety of cultural backgrounds who are keen to explore whether the Christian faith offers genuine meaning and hope. Some join us on Sundays, others attend our Salt Live events, or join our Salt Course.
The Salt Course is particularly designed for this purpose. It's a six evening course exploring life’s big questions from a Christian perspective. We spend three evenings engaging with the most popular objections to the Christian faith and then spend three evenings looking at three of the most popular human desires (satisfaction, love and hope). There’s dinner, a short talk and discussion in groups. The last course we ran finished in November. We asked a few of the participants to share their feedback. It is so encouraging to hear how their lives are being changed as a result!
Bella (student): My experience at the Salt Course was simply incredible. Everyone was so welcoming and people seemed really interested in getting to know you. I loved how the smaller discussion group provided a safe space for any number of questions; as a person who has had a complicated journey with their faith, this opportunity to ask a multitude of questions on absolutely anything was so important to me. I really enjoyed the individual talks too, and the topics they addressed. They touched on a wide range of modern issues. I can honestly say that the 6-week course really changed my life in many different ways.
Kevin (sceptic): “SALT did a lot of good for me. It really helped me shape a deeper understanding of faith's practical and theoretical strengths. The theories and ideas given from the main talks to the discussion on our own (very unique) table were always beneficial and I even think I had a pretty enjoyable experience overall. Faith is growing in me but, as you can imagine, there's still a long long way to go. I hope to take the first steps towards something more meaningful and enriching with your church.”
Anonymous (agnostic): “The Salt course gave me the opportunity to ask myself questions that challenged the views that I had. It was an opportunity to discuss the meaning of life with others without judgement. The Salt course gave me a place to come to terms with all the big questions that I have and to accept them rather than resist them. All in all, it has been a part of my journey ‘to return home’”
I’m raising this for two reasons. First, it’s vital that we remember that we worship a God who is living and active in the world, drawing folk to himself (and using us in the process!). We need to raise our expectations of what God is able to do through us in our city. Second, because the next Salt Course is coming up. It's a great opportunity to invite your friends to (or come yourself). It starts on 12th February and you can find out all the details and sign-up here.
If you're bringing a friend, we’re not expecting that you’d join us for all six weeks. Normally, you’d bring your friend to the first week (“Religion: Aren’t we better off without it?”) and then they’d come to the rest of the course without you. Of course, there’s no obligation for them to join us for the whole thing, they can always come along to the first couple of weeks and then decide if they’d like to join us in future weeks.