Young Brits Favor Catholicism Over Anglican Church

Like the majority of young people, they want meaning in their lives, meaning which a Left-wing NGO like the Church of England can't give.

From The European Conservative

By Hélène de Lauzun, PhD

The younger generations, in search of meaning, no longer find what they are looking for in a church that is too submissive to progressivism.

With Easter approaching, a statistic reveals that the number of Catholics among young people is overtaking that of Anglicans in Great Britain due to the massive number of conversions. A revolution is underway.

The statistics appear in a Bible Society report and are conclusive: among the under-25s, the ratio is about to shift to two to one in favor of Catholics. If the trend continues, Catholicism could become numerically the largest Christian denomination in England for the first time since the Reformation. Anglicans could even drop to third place, behind Pentecostals. 

This commitment to Catholicism is indicative of a generation that feels more connected to religion and wants to break away from a mimetic practice of faith without conviction. At the same time as the percentage of non-believers continues to increase, the number of believers who go to church at least once a month is growing.

In 2018, Anglicans accounted for 30% of regular churchgoers and Catholics for 22%. By 2024, the ratio had reversed: Anglicans now accounted for only 20%, while Catholics had jumped to 41%. 

These figures should be compared with those collected by the Catholic Church in Great Britain, which confirm the same trend, namely a dynamic recovery in practice after the dramatic decline recorded at the time of COVID—even if pre-pandemic levels have not yet been regained.

In Northern Ireland, the ratio has shifted in favour of Catholics since 2022.

The dynamism of British Catholicism is not an isolated phenomenon. In 2025, the Church of France is also delighted to witness an increase in church attendance and greater mobilization of the younger generations—Generation Z and Millennials. The beginning of Lent on April 2nd was marked by record attendance at churches for the Ash Wednesday Mass, as well as a display of fervency by young French Catholics, eager to reconnect with the traditional practices of deprivation associated with this liturgical period. The Conference of Bishops of France has also recorded a sharp increase in baptisms among people under the age of 25 expected for Easter night 2025: a rise of 45% is expected compared to 2024.

There are certainly several possible explanations for this religious revival. The increase in baptisms of young people and adults is obviously tempered by the collapse in the number of infant baptisms, which it does not quite manage to compensate for. But it nevertheless testifies to a more active and more conscious faith, which is also more assertive. The growing pressure from Muslim immigrant populations, who ostentatiously display their observance of Ramadan in public, may have pushed many Christians to turn once again to their own traditions to affirm their religious identity. In England, the disaffection with Anglicanism cannot be explained without taking into account the headlong rush of this denomination into unbridled progressivism on all societal issues, in flagrant contradiction with traditional Christian moral teaching.