October 21st, 2025
In this event report, Malcolm Rochefort summarises the thought-provoking talk by Jeremy Rodell, Dialogue Officer for Humanists UK
We last had Jeremy talk to us over 10 years ago, so it was a pleasure to see him return to Ludlow.
He began by outlining what he would talk about – the national and local landscape for belief systems in Britain, covering challenges and some worrying developments, and the dialogue necessary.
In looking at a measure of religious belief, three aspects were important – belief, behaviour and sense of belonging.
Belief: some surprising answers have come from recent surveys: Only 34% of UK Christians believe “Jesus was God in human form, who lived among people in first century CE Palestine”. 33% think he was “a prophet or spiritual leader, not God”; 16% “a normal human being”, and 15% “don’t know”.
54% of UK Catholics think it’s not a sin to engage in homosexual behaviour, 28% think it is a sin, 10% say “it depends” and 9% “don’t know”.
Belonging/identity: British social attitudes survey on the questions – “Do you regard yourself as belonging to any particular religion?”, and, if yes “Which religion or denomination do you consider yourself belonging to?”. 5 year rolling average to 2022 shows “No Religion” as around 50% since ~2016, total Christian being around 40%. Church of England about 13%, declining, Catholic about 7.5%, declining, but ‘other Christian’ being about 19%, and growing, especially evangelical sects. Muslim about 7%, and growing, Hindu is around 2%, Sikh ~1%, Buddhist & Jewish both around 0.5%, and ‘other religions’ about 0.5%. The increase in Muslim and ‘other Christian’ religions is probably closely connected to recent immigration from across the World, especially South Asian and African immigrants.
Across the country, the 2021 Census showed that the area with highest ‘no religion’ response was Scotland (51%), the lowest Northern Ireland (17%), followed by London (27%). The highest Christian response, perhaps unsurprisingly, was Northern Ireland (80%), with the Northwest a distant second at 53%. London had the highest Muslim response at 15%, with Northern Ireland the lowest at 1%.
A recent YouGov poll (August 2025) showed 38% of Brits agreeing with the statement “I do not believe in any sort of god(s) or higher spiritual power”, with 28% agreeing “I believe there is a God or gods”. 22% “do not believe in a god or gods, but do believe there is a spiritual greater power”, whilst 11% “don’t know”. These levels, with a few sampling wobbles, have been fairly constant since 2019.
When religious people were asked to respond in a recent survey to “I worship regularly and accept the authority of the leaders of my faith” the results were: Muslims – 41% agree, Jews – 15% agree, Christian – 14% agree, Hindu – 11% agree, and Buddhist – 6% agree (The-Devils-Gospels-Report_final.pdf)
For the ‘nones’ – non-believers, the Theos think tank in 2022 divided this roughly 50% of the UK population into three groups: the ‘spiritual nones’ (32%, more women than men), the ‘tolerant nones’ (35%, even gender balance), and the ‘campaigning nones’ (34%, more men than women).
A challenge for humanists centres around an apparent resurgence of faith in Gen Z (born mid-1990s to mid-2000s) as reported in April 2025 in the Telegraph and GB News. However, further analysis shows that in Church of England, Catholic and Evangelical faiths this is at least partly a bounce back from low attendance during the pandemic, and overall attendance, in the first two at least, continues on a long-term downward slope. (Religious revival claims fatally undermined by contradictory data – Humanists UK)
The is some recent (August 2025) data to suggest that ‘belief’ among the 18-24 year olds is slightly higher than atheism at 37% vs 32%. This is possibly connected with immigration from deeply religious countries and those born to immigrant parents.
The first worrying development is the connection between the far-right and Christian Nationalism – e.g. Tommy Robinson, Rikki Doolan (Pentecostal), Cerion Dewar (Confessing Anglican) and Brian Tamaki (Leader of Destiny Church, New Zealand). Tim Farron (a well-known religious Liberal Democrat MP and former leader of the party) has warned against this in a recent article in the Guardian in September this year (The Guardian view on Christianity and the UK far right: churches must stand up to the false prophets of division | Editorial | The Guardian).
The second, related development concerns the funding of Nigel Farage’s Reform party by Hedge fund manager Paul Marshall who is on a ‘God driven’ mission to transform the country (Andrew Graystone, March 2024), and the recent defection of Danny Kruger (a supporter of ‘revival of faith’ and ‘Christian politics’) from the Conservatives to Reform. There is also Reform’s recent appointment of James Orr (an anti-abortion theologian supported by US vice-president J D Vance) as a senior advisor. (JD Vance and James Orr’s special relationship and the ‘illiberalizing’ of the US and UK). One positive aspect in the UK is that the population is significantly less religious than the US: for example, over 40% of US population claims to pray daily vs about 20% of the UK population. (Pew Research data (June 2025))
Most religious people in the UK do not support extreme views and tolerance is still valued. This is where dialogue is important.
Dialogue is: “Engagement between people with different approaches to life to build mutual understanding, identify common ground and, where it makes sense, engage in shared action.”
Dialogue isn’t: Adversarial debate, or about trying to convert people or avoiding (good/temperate) disagreement
(Dialogue with others – Humanists UK)
Why Humanists UK is involved in dialogue
- To ensure that Humanism is well understood, and especially to inform and educate religious people about it.
- To make a positive contribution to “building a world where everyone lives cooperatively on the basis of shared human values, respect for human rights, and concern for future generations.”
- To ensure that Humanists UK is recognised as the national voice for the humanist worldview, particularly in respect of dialogue.
- To enrich the personal development of humanists engaged in dialogue.
This fits with other Humanist community actions such as school speaking, pastoral care (hospitals/prisons), ceremonies (weddings, funerals, baby naming) and SACREs/SACs (English and Welsh standing advisory councils on religious, value and ethical education.
Basic dialogue skills
- Dialogue, not debate – you’re not there to “win”
- Maximise trust, build relationships
- Be curious
- Think about language
- Beware generalisations
“We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than the things that divide us”. Quote from Jo Cox (1974-2016), MP & humanist.