Good Shepherd’s service with a smile

He’s keen on brevity – he sometimes preaches for two minutes. So says Canon Tony Shepherd. “Our services are never longer than 55 minutes.”

There’s a pause, then he corrects himself: “That’s a lie, but they only run over when I’m not in control…” He stage-whispers: “When the bishop comes.”

He’s trying to explain why his church, St Peter’s, on Cambridge Street, in Harrogate, has seen such a huge increase in attendance – 60 per cent in six years, from 250 to 400 or more on a Sunday.

This is all the more impressive when viewed against the background of free-falling attendances that have seen churches of all denominations close at a rate of two a week.

The Church of England’s latest figures show that average Sunday attendance fell to 944,000 in 2009, or just under two per cent of the English population. Yet people just keep on coming to St Peter’s, and it’s not the old who are filling the pews.

“We have a lot more children now,” says Canon Shepherd. “When I first came here, there were a few boys in the choir, and one baby in the congregation. We now have a lot more young families, and 90-100 children come to the main service on a Sunday.”

A cynic may suggest that the increase in families may have something to do with school selection. Entry to one of Harrogate’s best state schools, St Aidan’s, is heavily influenced by a family’s engagement with the church, and word has it that many parents have mysteriously found their faith right around their eldest child’s tenth birthday.

Canon Shepherd concedes it does go on. “Every year, a certain amount of that happens – parents who are keen to make sure you’ve seen them on a Sunday, but who don’t get involved with the heart of the church. You can tell them quite easily.

“Those who come along for the right reasons – which is the vast majority – do things to develop themselves as people and as Christians, and serve the world.

“There is a clear distinction between those who want to explore their own faith and those who just want to get their children into a good school.”

Canon Shepherd, a liberal vicar who is also one of the 36 Queen’s chaplains, has been at St Peter’s for more than 23 years and during that time has, with his trusted team, overseen the transformation of the church in challenging times.

One of the most important changes, he says, is the proliferation of services. “It was at quite a low ebb when I came here,” he says. “We were doing just four services a week – three of them on a Sunday. Gradually, we’ve developed more services. We do 22 or 23 a week now, sometimes more, and five or six of those are on a Sunday.

“We put on a breakfast for the homeless every morning and give food away every evening,” says the Canon. “We never turn people away. That’s given us quite a lot of street cred because people see that we’re doing something positive.”