Senior staff at several major UK Christian charities have expressed their worries for the future of the faith-based charity sector at the annual Faith Charities Forum this week.
After a challenging year for the sector as a whole, leaders from CAFOD, Christian Aid and the Methodist Church all agreed that the “less sympathetic” climate is making it especially difficult for many faith-based charities to operate at optimum efficiency, both at home and overseas.
Their comments come only three months after Christian charity Stewardship published the results of a survey which highlighted that there remains untapped giving potential among many UK Christians. Half of the survey respondents said they were unable to afford to give money, or give more, while 20% said they lacked trust in the church spending the money well.
Christian Aid: ‘Pressure on the cost base is very present’
The key issue faced by the charities is that the need is being outstripped by the rising costs of their operations.
Patrick Watt, chief executive officer of Christian Aid said: “I think the pressure on the cost base is very real, and it has been for the last five to 10 years.
“While in nominal terms, Christian Aid’s income in recent years, particularly our voluntary income, has held up, that money is stretching less far than it did in the past, and the cost of doing business is rising faster than any improvements in our nominal income.
“And obviously lying behind that is a decline in charitable giving over the last five years.”
Watt added that additional demographic issues, such as declining congregation numbers in many UK churches, have added to the decrease, as “both the formal and informal climate has become less sympathetic”.
‘We can’t last 10 years’
Rachel Lampard, director of social justice and social action at the Methodist Church, echoed Watts’ comments, saying: “We are all at full stretch.
“At the moment, we have been through however many years of austerity and the cost-of-living crisis, and we’ve been told by Keir Starmer that we have a decade of renewal ahead. I don’t think that we can last 10 years at this rate. We have got to see change happening soon.”
Gareth McNab, director of external affairs at Christians Against Poverty, reiterated the sentiment that faith charities were being overstretched.
“We’ve sleepwalked and woken up and found ourselves in a place where faith-based social action initiatives are holding the nation together and keeping people alive, and that’s not the role of faith,” said McNab.
Focusing on community building
However, the solution may lie in faith charities’ ability to evolve the services that they are providing, according to Lampard.
“Community building is actually where I think we need to put our money. That’s where we need to be.
“The Methodist Church, along with many other organisations, is investing much more in community organising as this is the transformational stuff that we need to see.”
