Secularisation in Local and Longitudinal Perspective: Churchgoing in Bolton Since c.1800

This article offers a local and longitudinal study of churchgoing, a key metric of secularisation, with reference to Bolton since 1800. Quantitative sources are privileged but carefully reviewed from the perspective of methodology and comparability. They include three Victorian religious censuses (1851–1895) and four from the late twentieth century (1979–2005), as well as Mass Observation research in 1937–1940 and 1960. Measured by an index of attendance (IA), at no time has a majority of Boltonians attended church on an average Sunday. Adjusted for multiple attendance, the highest proportion of the population in the pews was just over one quarter in 1881, with a probable slump to 4 per cent in 2024 (when only 47 per cent of the town’s residents were Christian, with 23 per cent non-Christian and 26 per cent without religion). In so far as churchgoing in Bolton has held up better than in other places, it is due to the high proportion of Roman Catholics.