Young People and Liturgical Renewal in the Anglican Diocese of Toronto: Perspectives on Ecclesiology and Mission from the Pews

It is crucial to consider the perspectives of people in the pews—active lay Anglicans—to understand the operative ecclesiologies and lived missiologies present in the Anglican Communion today (Watkins, 2020). Attention to the perspectives of lay Anglicans in Canada reveals a dominant operative ecclesiology focused on the survival of individual local parishes in familiar forms, and a transactional conception of mission that emphasizes liturgical change to attract younger people. In addition to being theologically problematic, these ecclesiologies and missiologies are disconnected from the contextual realities of the Canadian religious landscape. However, openness to change and a desire for more emotionally energetic liturgy that is relevant to everyday life also have a potential to empower people in the pews to connect their liturgical lives with the Five Marks of Mission of the Anglican Communion (2012) and Transformational Aspirations of the Anglican Church of Canada (2023).

In this paper, I draw on data from forty-five focus groups conducted with over four hundred lay people in the Anglican Diocese of Toronto in 2023. The Diocese of Toronto consists of more than 200 church communities and is both the largest urban and largest rural diocese in the Anglican Church of Canada. The focus groups were part of a diocesan visioning process undertaken in the wake of COVID-19 called “Cast the Net.” Focus groups were invited to reflect on John 21:1-14, imagine their local church and the diocese five years in the future as having new life, and consider how they might get there by “casting the net on the other side.” I was hired as a consultant to listen deeply to this qualitative data, which I coded in MaxQDA and analyzed thematically (https://www.toronto.anglican.ca/about-us/cast-the-net/).  

In response to these prompts, many focus group participants nostalgically envision full pews on Sunday, thriving children’s ministries, and the church as the centre of the life of the wider community. “Younger people” is the dominant theme in the focus groups by a wide margin. Participants identify attracting younger participants as key to the survival of their parishes. As recorded in the notes, “We are in crisis mode. We have to do things differently to attract more people, especially the youth. We have to think of ways to get people in the pews. The time is NOW. We have to do it NOW.” The underlying transactional assumption is that the church must identify the needs of younger people, and that meeting these needs will bring them back into the church, which will in turn meet the needs of the church. Participants often presume this will require changes to worship style, and especially music: “We have a vision of our church filled with families with children—we’ve attracted them because we have changed our ways to do things to appeal to families through our music, language, and style of worship. We have learned how to be more appealing!”

It is crucial to situate these operative ecclesiologies and missiologies in the context of the contemporary Canadian religious landscape. First, the Canadian population is aging. Even if Anglican parishes had retained all the participants from the mid-twentieth century (and they have not) congregations would be older now than in the past (Clarke and Macdonald, 2017). Second, younger Canadians are more likely to be recent immigrants and very unlikely to be Anglican (Bibby, 2017). Many identify with non-Christian religions and those who are Christian are more likely to be Catholic or Free Church. Whatever their tradition, immigrants often and understandably prefer to worship with their own cultural and linguistic communities. Third, generational religious change is shaping the religious landscape across the Global North. Over the past century, each generation has been successively less religious than the preceding generation (Voas and Chaves, 2016; Cornelissen, 2021). While there will be individuals who are exceptions to all of these patterns, and there will be certain congregations that defy these trends, it is not reasonable to expect a congregation or even a diocese to redirect these powerful and sweeping social forces. The Canadian population looks very different in 2024 than it did in 1960 and Anglican parishes are going to look different as well. The data suggests that people in the pew do not know this or have not taken it to heart.

In addition, it is essential to temper claims that liturgical change will attract younger worshipers. While there is a surprising lack of research on young people and Christian worship, Winfield Bevins explores how younger people are attracted to a range of liturgical practices, including traditional liturgical forms (Bevins, 2019). In relation to music specifically, Gerardo Marti’s research with multiracial churches makes a case that it is not the style of music, but certain communal practices associated with music making that shape multiracial congregations (Marti, 2012), which may also apply to intergenerational congregations.

While the dominant ecclesiology and missiology espoused by focus group participants emphasize transactional efforts to attract younger people to sustain local parishes, focus group participants also point toward a vision for liturgical renewal that can be of benefit to all worshipers and foster a more robust sense of mission. Specifically, there is a consistent desire for liturgy that is more energetic, informal, and emotionally engaging: “we need some vibrancy for all Anglicans, not just young people.” Participants see music as a key area for introducing this affect: “that kind of stirring music can get people more committed—even elderly parishioners.” In addition, there is a longing for liturgy that is immediately relevant, especially in terms of liturgical language and preaching that supports an everyday ethic of compassion and justice. The desire to connect empowering liturgy with everyday life is an opening for deeper liturgical engagement with the Five Marks of Mission and Transformational Aspirations (including dismantling the unjust social structures of colonialism and racism, caring for creation, and responding to human need), and may be a starting point for active lay Anglicans to espouse an ecclesiology and missiology better aligned with the contextual realities of the contemporary Canadian religious landscape.