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• Faith in God Declining Faster Than Church Visits
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• Kirk Membership: a 'Catastrophic' Record Low
• The True Meaning to Life
• Churches Act to Keep Their Flocks
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Churches Act to Keep Their Flocks
FOR more than 1,000 years, religion has burned in Scotland like the wood in a furnace. Few countries in Europe can claim to have had such a turbulent and powerful relationship with God. John Knox, St Columba, St Ninian, St Margaret and a score of others: the teaching and spirituality of these divines has helped forge both the fabric of the nation and the character of the people.

But not any more. After centuries of being subjected to thundering religious fervour, Scots have had quite enough. It doesn’t much matter if it’s Calvinism or Catholicism, the message is now falling on deaf ears.

New figures collected from the 2001 census in Scotland and just released make grim reading for the churches. They show that the number of people north of the Border who identify with a religion is now considerably lower than the figure for the UK as a whole.

The statistics provide yet more proof that Scotland is becoming a secular society. It is depressingly obvious that there is a growing disconnection between the mainstream churches and the people they could once claim to represent.

The warning for both the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Scotland is clear. The news is bad, but it is not disastrous. The cliff face is crumbling but it hasn’t yet given way completely under their feet. There is still time to change the situation before the collapse becomes unstoppable.

Over the past 200 years or so, far too much of Scotland’s religious energy has gone into inter-denominational bickering and schism. The Disruption, Irish immigration and the rise of Orangeism have all helped to create distrust and even hatred.

If the churches are to make themselves relevant and appealing then they should stop fighting battles they cannot win and start trying to reconnect with the issues that worry ordinary Scots - people who, even if they do not currently have much truck with organised religion, do at least have a moral conscience.

Yet again, the churches have received a written warning. But there is time for corrective action. The word they must make flesh, and make it dwell amongst us. If they can do that, then Scotland may yet again regard Christianity as a blessing.