Posted on 03/30/2006 9:45:17 PM PST by dangus
The National Council of Churches' have just reported church membership for the 2006 yearbook. It's quite an interesting picture:
The Catholic Church is the largest and numerically fastest growing church in America, with 67.8 million members, a growth of about 563,000 members.
Many non-denominational churches, not listed in the report, have been growing rapidly in the recent past.
Proportionally, the fastest growing church in America is the Assemblies of God, (10th largest) growing at a 1.81% rate, by adding 50,000 members. That's over twice the growth rate of the Catholic church, but 1/10th of the increase in members of the Catholic Church, because the Assemblies of God is only 4% of the size of the Catholic Church, having 2.78 million members
The Church of Jesus Christ and Latter Day Saints, (4th largest) with nearly twice (6.0 million) members of the Assemblies of God had nearly the same growth rate, 1.74%.
Looking quickly, one might mistakenly think the Orthodox Church in America (24th largest) is growing amazingly quickly. The Council reports 6.4% more members than it reported last year, but this is the first update in many years. Previously, the Orthodox Church in America had reported simply the same rough estimate year after year: 1 million.
Meanwhile, the Council reported the Greek Orthodox Church (17th largest) as having 1.5 million members; the church doesn't report annually, but just a few years ago, it had nearly 2 million members. Of course, that report itself was quite old, so the decline isn't that amazingly fast. Still, unless there is rapid, unforeseen growth in the smaller Orthodox congregations, it means that overall, the Orthodox Church is likely declining, and what few Orthodox are remaining are switching to the more generic Orthodox church.
Many of the Protestant churches in decline are probably no surprise: United Methodist, 3rd largest, down 0.79% to 8.186 million; Evangelical Lutheran, 7th largest, down 1.09% to 4.93 million; Presbyterian Church (USA), 9th largest, down 1.6% to 3.19 million; Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, 14th, down 1.01% to 2.464 million; Episcopal, 15th, down 1.55% to 2.28 million*; American Baptist, down 0.57% to 1.433 million; and, with the fastest collapse of them all, the United Church of Christ, which has made a strong push to present itself as gay-friendly, dropped 2.48% to only 1.266 million.
What may be surprisin are some of the other denominations in decline. Southern Baptists (2nd) are down again, 1.05% to 16.3 million; and Jehovah's Witnesses, (25th) which were growing just last year, dropped a significant 1.07% to 1.03 million.
Five Baptist conventions, mostly black, (ranked 6th, 12th, 13th, 20th, and 22nd) report very old, and very suspect numbers. Totalled, they would be well over 16 million, but they are believed to actually have far, far fewer members, clinging for political purposes to very old, very rough estimates.
Amazingly, not one of the 25 largest denominations in America was a growing Protestant denomination, except for the Assemblies of God which are not always counted as Protestant.
Combined, the 13 reporting churches had a total membership of 118.7 million. The memberships claimed most recently by the 12 churches that did not issue new reports a combined membership of about 30 million, but is probably closer to 20 million. Even with the very possibly significantly exaggerated estimates of these churches included, however, there are now more members in America of the Catholic Church than in all of the 19 Protestant denominations in the top 25 denominations combined!
[*The National Council of Churches reports 2,463,747 members of the Episcopal Church. This is, however, exactly the same number of members reported by the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, the next largest church, and it creates a data conflict with last years' numbers. The number used last years' numbers as a baseline, and subtracted this years' reported decline. Also, the Episcopal church is not counted among the 17 Protestant denominations, following the practice of the National Council of Churches, the Encyclopedia Britannica, the World Almanac, and many other references.]
I just posted the following on the thread about Savage.:
I have no doubt, since the Episcopal church went down the toilet. After being raised as, and a life long Episcopalian, I left them over six years ago.
Here in Slovakia, the Catholic Church is very strong.
In Bratislava, I have a choice of over 10 different beautiful Catholic churches, all within a 5 minute walk of each other.
Salvation is not about numbers.
Isn't the RC church like the Mafia, once you are on the books, you never leave?
OK, but what about us non-religious? Are we growing? Am I still counted as "Catholic" by this unofficial religious census because I was registered at a Church as recently as five years ago?
They have to go and get registered. If they don't they aren't in the count.
Same, I have heard, with the LDS and Episcopal.
Actually, those numbers are based on head counts of registered families in the parishes. And many, if not most, purge their records from time to time, based on whose contributing and who's known to attend. This has to do with things like baptisms and first communions.
I bet something like this is true for all groups who are claimed once in, always in.
No. YOu have to register yearly.
I can tell you that Catholics have declined in terms of their share of the population in New York, as have Jews, while the non-religious have grown.
Of course, where I am writing these words (Washington State) the non-religious are at 28%, the largest "denomination" in the state and the highest proportion of non-religious in the world.
Methinks the Catholic Church growth in strongest in the South and the West, while declining (in terms of percentage of the population) in places like New York, Mass, and (possibly) New Jersey.
"OK, but what about us non-religious? Are we growing?"
Who knows. Most non-religious folks aren't part of any organized group, so it's tough to count them. I'd say that the numbers are, and will remain, unknown.
Actually, the Catholic church does quite a lot to maintain an accurate, annual census.
Your perception isn't baseless: In many polls, people reply that they are Catholic even when they have left the Catholic church, as if to validate their position: "I'm a Catholic, and I think gays should get married; I'm a Catholic, and I think the schools should hand out condoms in the second grade," yadda yadda yadda... Then when they get asked how frequently they go to church, they tell the pollster how much they hate the Catholic church. So they don't go to church, they don't agree with any of the church's most basic teachings, they consider organized religion to be inherently corrupt, and they proudly worship pagan gods, but they tell pollsters that they are Catholic?
Further, there can be confusion as regards to baptism and Catholics in nations with established churches. Once baptized, a person remains forever a part of the church, according to Catholic faith. But that neither means that their salvation is assured, or they are considered Catholic: Baptism removes the stain of original sin, but can increase the judgment of committed sin. And nearly all Christians' rites of baptism are considered valid, so that hardly means they are members of the CATHOLIC Church (tm).
Finally, in many nations, C+P>T, or Catholics + Protestant > Total citizens. I believe... and may totally be wrong... that the reason why the number of Catholics remains higher in several largely apostate nations is that, having formerly had established religions, people continue registering with the Catholic church as they register with the state. I know the registration is not one and the same, but they can be very synchronized.
In Latin American countries, where there are very few priests per capita, there are probably very different registration rules; they'd be lucky to see a priest come to town once a year, let alone register each year! And I have heard that it is quite common for people to register with whoevere comes to town, accumulating several registrations in several sects.
I have a Philippino friend who is fairly ecumenical. She breaks me up. She remains the most devout of Catholics, but she'll never turn down the opportunity to reply affirmatively any time a friend invites her to go to a Protestant preacher. She believes, as the Catholic church teaches, in constant renewal of baptism, so she always goes along with any calls to be be baptized in the spirit, and would never pass up the chance to express her immense love for each member of the trinity, or to be prayed over.
So she'll enthusiastically sign up for any literature (probably inadvertantly registering at the same time); she'll respond to every altar call. The poor girl has probably become a member of 300 denominations just since I've known her!... But she is an everlast Catholic...
The fastest growing group I'm told.
Naturally, I know many actual Catholics from my parish, but the self proclaimed Catholic people I've worked with, or live among in my neighborhood, will have their children baptized so they can get into the parish school, or because their parents are Catholic and it is just something one does when one has a baby.
I think Jewish people also have a cultural component to their self proclaimed religious affiliation, but you rarely hear that one is a Methodist or Lutheran for cultural reasons.
I specifically added in the stuff about nondenominational churches and smaller, conservative, breakaway churches to the main article so as to not sound like I was saying to protestants, "haha, my church is growing; your church is shrinking!" I really have no news at all to report about how they are doing, but thought that silence about them might also communicate a message I don't mean to send.
But frankly, given the scandals the Catholic church has been through -- the corrupt leadership, the supposedly alienating style of church conservatives and Pope Benedict, and the blistering attacks against it from the left (MSM) and the right (incessant sermons against Catholic doctrines) -- I think the Catholic church is doing pretty good to be growing the way it is; and I think its growth says things about conservative values that support ALL conservative religions, in that a church with very large conservative and liberal factions is growing wherever it finds truth, and that ain't among the liberals!
I think you pretty much covered it, dangus.
My own experience is that many of the illegals came here in pursuit of their own god, money, and to escape the confines of their own culture which includes the Church and the morality She teaches.
Not usually. If they don't know you, and you never put an envelope in the collection plate, and you don't have a child in the parish school, they usually try to purge you from the parish registry after 3-4 years.
People typically don't bother to notify the parish office when they (physically) move away, anyway, and there's no central database of parish registrations, so they have to do something like that.
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