The Church of England's second most senior figure said yesterday that he would be "hard-pushed" to describe Britain as a Christian country.
The Archbishop of York, Dr David Hope, said people were less committed to the Church and secularist tendencies were on the increase.
While many described themselves as Christians, how they expressed their Christianity had changed enormously, he said.
"I would be hard-pushed to say we were a Christian country because of the secularist tendencies, the fact that commitment to the Christian church is less than it was," said Dr Hope. The Archbishop is the latest senior Church figure to warn of the decline of Christianity in Britain. Last week Jayne Ozane, a senior member of the Archbishop's Council, said she felt the outlook was bleak.
Dr Hope is giving up his job to take up a post as a parish priest in Ilkley, near Bradford. He said that was what God wanted him to do.
He told BBC1's Breakfast with Frost: "I have always felt I would like to finish my ministry as I began it."
Dr Hope, a traditionalist, warned against a schism over the ordination of actively homosexual clergy in the US, saying Church unity was fundamentally important.