Now Dr Rowan Williams has been installed as Archbishop of Canterbury, he must wonder what is the future for the Church of England.

The church has been in relentless decline for more than a century.

It is probably fanciful to imagine Dr Williams could be the last Archbishop but it's hard to envisage the institution he heads surviving for another century unless it makes the most radical changes in its long history.

At the start of last century, most people went to church on Sundays.

Pews were packed in places like Brighton and Hove, even though there were many churches and each one had hundreds of seats.

Now most congregations can be reckoned in dozens rather than hundreds. Thousands of churches have closed and still more are in danger of closing.

Few people are interested in the church as a vocation any more.

England has become a multi-faith country and in many cases a no-faith country. Many people are agnostics or even atheists.

Religions showing growth tend either to be those of the happy-clappy evangelical type or those such as Islam, which until reasonably recently were strangers to our shores.

The Church still seemed securely based, despite its decline until a few years ago. The monarchy, which heads it, is in trouble and Prince Charles would rather be Defender of the Faiths than the Faith.

The Conservatives, once inextricably linked with the C of E, may be in an even worse plight.

Most marriages used to be in church but this is less so these days.

Even those not so devout couples who went to church for a good show now find there are better venues in secular buildings such as the Royal Pavilion in Brighton.

There is also an accelerating trend towards having non religious funerals as relatives of the dearly departed find they would rather organise their own relevant tributes than have some drivel spouted by a cleric who did not even know the deceased.

Some affection lingers for the C of E but of the kind people reserve for aged and decrepit relatives.

Many of the hymns were terrific and the words of the King James Bible can often scarcely be bettered.

Some people like the writer John Mortimer, in Hove this week to promote his new book, call themselves Christian agnostics.

Millions of people, if they are in deep trouble, will still call on the church in an emergency.

They will try to remember their prayers at these times and religious ceremonies can provide comfort after great disasters such as September 11, mass murders or fatal accidents.

The Church needs to abandon the hope of getting mass attendance at churches and to look at other uses for many of them to provide practical rather than purely spiritual help and to link up with people in their daily lives rather than just at times of crisis.

Projects such as the help given to rough sleepers at St Patrick's Church in Hove, the City Forum in Brighton and the practical schemes of the Chichester Diocesan Housing Association are real examples of what can and should be done.

Without them the C of E, like most of its elderly adherents, will carry on dying with no sign of renewal.