Church of England launches campaign to counter steep decline in baptisms

This article in the Daily Mail is a bit of a showpiece in journalistic misunderstanding or misleading (take your pick and consider how charitable you feel). Towards the end we are told: "The drop in baptisms mirrors a long-term decline in church attendance overall. The CofE saw its figures for Sunday attendance drop below the million mark at around the turn of the millennium. Roman Catholic churches in much of the country have also seen a fall. However large-scale immigration from Eastern Europe has meant some Catholic churches in London are overflowing on a Sunday."
Now let's just look a bit more at some of that. Actually the drop in baptisms is following a different pattern in some respects especially as recently attendance figures have levelled out and even increased slightly. Note how the article talks about the turn of the millennium rather than the last couple of years which would count against their point. And why pick out RC churches in London? Because to do a similar exercise with Anglican churches would again give the lie to the reporting: Anglican churches in London are very healthy, thank you, because of migration from Africa.
I suspect the real story here, at one level, is one of newspaper journos and editors still running in their minds the old stereotypes about churches, particularly the CofE and finding it hard to come to terms with some new facts. Here they wrote the story they were expecting: the truth is, as Hook says in the film, far more interesting.
Have a look at the comments.
Church of England launches campaign to counter steep decline in baptisms | the Daily Mail: