Church of England schools should cut down to one in 10 the number of places reserved for practising Anglicans, the head of its education board has said.
The Bishop of Oxford, the Rt Rev John Pritchard, said schools’ main function should be serving the wider community.
The Church is reviewing its guidance on admissions in 2,100 schools, some of which currently reserve more than 50% of their places for churchgoers.
Secular campaigners said the comments were “a step in the right direction”.
The Church hopes in the summer to publish updated guidance for the Diocesan boards that run its voluntary aided schools.
Some of these are very popular and are able to give priority to children who attend church regularly when deciding which pupils to accept.
In an interview with the Times Educational Supplement, Bishop Pritchard said: “Every school will have a policy that has a proportion of places for Church youngsters… what I would be saying is that number ought to be minimised because our primary function and our privilege is to serve the wider community.
“Ultimately I hope we can get the number of reserved places right down to 10%.”
‘Safe places’
Some believe that the current system encourages families – particularly from the motivated and educated middle-classes – to start or increase religious activity in the hope of boosting their chances of entry to high-performing schools.
If school admissions were based less on church attendance, Bishop Pritchard said, “we may not get the startling results that some Church schools do because of getting some very able children, but we will make a difference to people’s lives”.
The Church’s mission should not be about “collecting nice Christians into safe places”, he said.
A spokesman for the Church of England said it was reviewing its guidance – but stressed that this was not binding.
“A key feature of the guidance is to emphasise the vital role of Church schools in serving the whole community,” the spokesman said.
The Church says it is committed to reserving at least 25% of places in its new schools for pupils from the local neighbourhood regardless of faith background, and, in practice it says, most new Church of England schools reserve less than 50% for Christian applicants.
The Church of England also points out that it has a further 2,500 or so schools which are “voluntary controlled” and take all of their admissions from the nearby area, reflecting the make-up of the local community.