The Church of England is proposing to bring families with young children back into the fold by starting sports and homework clubs, after admitting past efforts to recruit young people have largely failed.

The U.K.-based church has traditionally run Sunday school classes and choirs to attract children, but says new ways must be found to boost falling congregation numbers.

The church has always engaged with children, so the plans are simply another way to "seek to respond to the changing nature of childhood," spokesman Ben Wilson said.

The new proposals suggest that the church set up breakfast and homework clubs where children can eat and study together. It also recommends the church campaign on topics young people are interested in, such as the environment.

The report, Going for Growth, has not been made public, but extracts have been published in the Guardian newspaper.

"We need to reconsider how we engage with and express God's love to this generation of children and young people, whoever and wherever they may be," reads parts of the document.

"The tragedy is that we appear to be failing even those with whom we have already connected. The challenge is how to creatively offer children and young people encounters with the Christian faith and the person of Jesus Christ," it says.

The report also suggests launching a campaign to supply schools with materials to encourage them to fulfil their "legal duty" to conduct a daily act of worship.

Daily collective worship is a legal requirement for England's schools, but according to a 2005 report just 25 per cent of secondary schools actually comply.

The report will be one of many discussed at the Anglican governing body — the general synod — in February, he said.

The Archbishop of Canterbury and spiritual leader of the Anglican communion, Rowan Williams, has already increased the church's involvement in education. The Church of England sponsors 27 academies — high schools that are overseen by the government but are funded by independent institutions that have some control over how the school is run.

With files from The Associated Press