Parish and School News

Parishes to receive National Church Life Survey results

Wednesday 22 August 2012

By Dr Bob Dixon
Kairos Catholic Journal

THIRTY  Melbourne parishes that took part in the 2011 National Church Life Survey (NCLS) will be receiving their results about now.

Then, in a few months time, every parish will receive a detailed profile of their population based on the 2011 Australian Census.

The NCLS, held every five years, is a joint project of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference, Australian Catholic University, the Uniting Church (NSW) Board of Mission and Education, and Anglicare (Diocese of Sydney). Each of the four partner organisations contributes staff to the project.

The 30 Melbourne parishes were among about 400 Catholic parishes from all parts of Australia, along with more than 4000 Anglican and Protestant congregations, that took part in last year’s NCLS, Australia’s second largest survey after the national Census.

The participating parishes will receive their results in the form of a Church Life Pack that contains a detailed profile of the parish based on the responses to questionnaires completed by the people at Mass, as well as a workbook that explains the research behind the survey, and a directory of people who are available to help them understand their results and put them to work in the service of the parish.

All these resources help parishes assess how they are going in relation to nine ‘core qualities’ of healthy churches; qualities such as the vitality of the liturgy, the strength of belonging to the parish community, and the extent of their outreach and service. For parishes that took part in the 2006 or 2001 surveys, they also offer a valuable indication of how things have changed over the years.

While the main purpose of the NCLS is to help local churches, the survey is also of enormous importance for the bishops and for Church organisations, since it provides a detailed picture of the demography, religious practices, beliefs and attitudes of Mass-attending Catholics around Australia. From the NCLS data, we know, for example, the age profile of Mass attenders and how many were born in non-English speaking countries, how many had taken part in the sacrament of Reconciliation in the previous 12 months, how they make moral decisions, how they think of God, and why they go to Mass.

Although it has taken several months for the questionnaires to be processed and the Church Life Packs to be mailed to parishes, the pastoral benefits of the survey started right from the time in November last year when people stopped to reflect and fill in the questionnaire at Mass. Filling in a questionnaire during the time normally reserved for the priest’s homily can feel like an intrusion into the liturgy, but it is really a prayerful exercise in which the people take time to reflect on how the parish is meeting their needs, how they participate in it, and how their faith impacts on the wider community.

Complementing the NCLS picture of church attenders is the Australian Census, which everyone in Australia completes every five years. Information from the Census gives us a comprehensive demographic picture based on everyone who said they were Catholic in response to the Census question ‘What is your religion?’ In contrast to the NCLS, the Census does not tell us anything about a person’s religious beliefs or practices. It does not ask ‘Do you believe in God?’ or ‘Do you go to church?’ Nevertheless, Census data is an important planning and pastoral tool for parishes, as it enables parish priests and parish pastoral councils to understand their local context and to respond appropriately to it.

The Pastoral Research Office acquires from the Australian Bureau of Statistics Census data about the Catholic population living within parish geographic boundaries for every parish in Australia, and with that data we are able to prepare a detailed demographic profile for every parish. These profiles will be prepared over the next few months and will be sent free of charge to all parishes. As well, they will be available for free download from www.pro.catholic.org.au (where the 2006 profiles are still currently available).

Dr Bob Dixon is Director of the ACBC Pastoral Research Office.

Photo by Fiona Basile