Editorial: twenty five years of Anvil

Anvil first appeared in 1984, and this issue marks a quarter of a century of publication. It is a good moment to look back at the movement the journal was founded to serve, and forward to what it might become.

A changing movement

Over fifty years British evangelicalism has changed in many ways. The most recognisable marks have endured, but anti Catholicism has faded, older teaching on the Christian life has receded, and the movement has become both more diverse and more engaged with the wider churches. Black led congregations have grown, gender has become contested, and social and political involvement has increased.

The state of the nation

A second article surveys the condition of Britain and argues that the church serves the country best when it recovers its memory, brings Christian conviction into public life, and makes its worship visible rather than discreet.

Evangelism and the institution

A third piece asks whether the Church of England can learn to evangelise again. Its answer is that decline is not inevitable, but that four inherited habits stand in the way, and that new churches flourish when they are freed from tight central control.

A global church

The issue closes with a personal account of Anglican growth in Africa, written by a former Archbishop of Canterbury, which reminds European readers that vitality is not evenly distributed and that the church's centre of gravity has moved.