Islam on the rise in England - Christianity in dramatic decline (2022-12-01) ​

0:00:03 Some rather astonishing religious news hit the headlines yesterday here in the UK and I want to 0:00:10 focus on how it affects Christians and Muslims here the BBC reported quote for the first time 0:00:17 fewer than half of people in England and Wales describe themselves as Christian the census 0:00:24 2021 has revealed the proportion of people who said they were Christian was 46.2 percent down 0:00:34 from 59.3 percent in the last census in 2011 that's 10 years ago in contrast the number 0:00:43 who said they had no religion increased to 37.2 percent of the population up from a 0:00:51 quarter and interestingly those identifying as Muslim Rose from 4.9 in 2011 to 6.5 last year 0:01:03 now the census is carried out every 10 years by the office for National statistics 0:01:10 Professor Linda Woodhead commented ticking no religion does not mean having no beliefs she 0:01:17 said and Linda is Professor of religious studies at King's College here in London 0:01:23 she said some will be atheists a lot would be agnostic they just say I don't really 0:01:29 know and some will be spiritual and be doing spiritual Things She Said Scotland's census 0:01:36 by the way was due to take place last year but was delayed by a year due to the covid pandemic 0:01:44 now in another report in the guardian we read the census revealed a 5.5 million 0:01:52 four in the number of people who describe themselves as Christian now that's a 17 full 0:02:00 and a 1.2 million rise in the number of people who say they follow Islam bringing the Muslim 0:02:08 population to 3.9 million now that's a 43 increase in the number of people who identify as Muslim 0:02:17 uh the guardian says it's the first time in a census of England and Wales that fewer than 0:02:24 half the population have described themselves as Christian so it's the first time in history that 0:02:31 uh less than half the population call themselves Christians it's a very significant watershed 0:02:37 moment so according to the new census to summarize there are nearly four million Muslims in England 0:02:46 and Wales and all this despite the negative media coverage of Islam in the popular press 0:02:54 Five Pillars the Muslim news site in the UK says and I quote that London 0:03:00 is the place London is the place with the highest concentration of Muslims 0:03:06 15 percent of malandanas describe themselves as Muslim up from 12.6 in 2021 that's just 0:03:15 last year from 12 to 15 this means that over 1.3 million Muslims are living in London alone
0:03:27 commenting on this uh latest Census Data the Muslim Council of Britain Secretary General Zara 0:03:34 Muhammad said and I quote while our nation has an increasingly aging population the contribution to 0:03:42 the workforce of a youthful Muslim population remains a strategic National Asset the last 0:03:50 decade has seen more second and third generation Muslims confident of our faith and place in 0:03:57 society contributing immensely to the economic recovery and vitality of our nation and quote 0:04:07 now why should this matter to The Wider Muslim population what relevance does Islam have well 0:04:15 I'd like to introduce you to a man called Henry stubb and I'm going to be reading uh from this 0:04:22 marvelous book called uh traveling home essays on Islam and Europe by Abdul Hakeem who teaches 0:04:29 uh Islam at the University of Cambridge and um in his book on page 85 he introduces us 0:04:37 to Henry's stub he was a physician a doctor to James the first James the first who died in 1625 0:04:46 was King of England and he famously of course produced the King James version of the Bible 0:04:53 that's why it's called the King James version of the Bible so Henry stubb was his uh his physician 0:04:59 and he wrote uh Stubbs wrote the first according to Tim winter here Abdul Hakim 0:05:05 Murad the first appreciative biography of the Prophet ever written by a Christian 0:05:12 and this indicates he writes the real convergence of which the real conversions which 0:05:19 his contemporaries noticed between Islam and a certain kind of puritanism puritanism was the the 0:05:27 kind of movement of the day of kind of Evangelical renewal in the church and um Henry Stubbs writes 0:05:35 the following and it's kind of the Old English but I'd like to share it with you he writes this 0:05:40 is the sum of muhammadan religion that's what he means by Islam on the one hand not clogging 0:05:48 men's Faith with the necessity of believing a number of obtrusive Notions which they cannot 0:05:55 comprehend and which are often contradictory to the dictates of reason and Common Sense nor on 0:06:04 the other hand loading them with the performance of many Troublesome expensive and superstitious 0:06:11 ceremonies yet in joining a Jew observance of religious worship as the surest method to keep 0:06:21 men in the bounds of their Duty both to God and man end quote now the uh this is taken from his 0:06:30 book Stubbs book which is amazingly entitled an account of the rise and progress of muhammadanism 0:06:37 and a Vindication of him and his religion from the culminaries of the Christians now comrie is 0:06:46 as a way of saying the malicious misrepresentation the lies of the Christians now he is a Christian 0:06:52 of course himself it's interesting the this idea of Christian lies what one perhaps can still find 0:06:58 this at Speaker's Corner where Islam is routinely misrepresented uh quite often maliciously by uh 0:07:06 the Christian missionaries there I don't mean to say that all missionaries are like that of course 0:07:10 so this is a fascinating uh insight into the earliest appreciation in England we have of 0:07:17 Islam from a very senior and distinguished scholar physician to the king himself I 0:07:23 wonder if he had conversations with King James about uh Islam who knows so this tells us that 0:07:33 he was aware stops US aware of the similarity between the beliefs of Islam and his own 0:07:39 Unitarian Christianity and he can be seen as part of a growing Tradition at this time 0:07:45 expressing a dissatisfaction with the intellectual inconsistencies of trinitarianism as he saw it and 0:07:54 he's seeking to discover the original Unitarian roots of the Christian tradition in the Middle 0:08:02 East and this is very interesting because he identifies Islam with this and of course 0:08:07 we can go back to Moses and then to Jesus and to Muhammad peace be upon them all all of them from 0:08:13 the Middle East from the same part of the world and so even this early on there was a awareness 0:08:19 in some courses in England or the authenticity and the truth of Islam so this is the relevance 0:08:26 really of Islam it's a calling back uh to the ab the faith of Moses Abraham Jesus and Muhammad of 0:08:34 course peace be upon them all I believe in one God a Unitarian Faith a god of Mercy a 0:08:40 God of Justice a god of love and so on and this is part of English History it's not alien to it 0:08:47 um and all of these religions as I say find their Roots the historical roots in the Middle East 0:08:52 so if we have accepted Christianity as part of our history in England then Islam is no less a 0:08:59 part of the historical uh Heritage as well so um there we are I just wanted to share with amazing 0:09:06 news Islam is the one religion uh major world religion in Britain that is Bucking the trend 0:09:11 and is increasing its adherence quite dramatically mainly of course through immigration but not just 0:09:18 through immigration also through uh conversion there are hundreds of thousands at least of 0:09:24 English people who have converted to Islam and there's a steady stream of people who 0:09:30 are converting to the faith particularly and interestingly amongst women who are attracted 0:09:36 to the values of the faith the Dignity of women of course is a key theme in Islam spoken of in 0:09:41 the Quran and in the death of the Prophet himself upon whom be peace and this attracts many women 0:09:48 um over against the materialism and the sexualization of gender and and their own 0:09:53 sex of course that they see in wider Society so um this census result is a very interesting news um 0:10:01 the the inexorable I think the inexual decline of Christianity in Britain and the rise of Islam and 0:10:08 other um spiritualities as well not just Islam but Islam is by far the most significant um increase 0:10:15 I think of all and uh and it remains it will in the future I think become the main um focus 0:10:24 of monotheistic energy in Britain as the other abrahamic faiths uh decline anyway till next time