The Family According to Other Born Again Christians

A comprehensive demographic study of more than 200 countries finds that there are 2.18 billion Christians of all ages around the world, representing nearly a tertiary of the estimated 2010 global population of half-dozen.9 billion. Christians are also geographically widespread – so far-flung, in fact, that no unmarried continent or region tin can indisputably merits to exist the middle of global Christianity.

A century ago, this was not the case. In 1910, about 2-thirds of the world's Christians lived in Europe, where the bulk of Christians had been for a millennium, according to historical estimates past the Center for the Study of Global Christianity.ⁱⁱ Today, simply virtually a quarter of all Christians live in Europe (26%). A plurality – more than a third – at present are in the Americas (37%). Nearly one in every four Christians lives in sub-Saharan Africa (24%), and about 1-in-eight is found in Asia and the Pacific (13%).

The number of Christians around the earth has well-nigh quadrupled in the terminal 100 years, from about 600 meg in 1910 to more than 2 billion in 2010. But the world's overall population also has risen rapidly, from an estimated ane.viii billion in 1910 to half-dozen.9 billion in 2010. As a event, Christians brand up well-nigh the same portion of the world's population today (32%) as they did a century agone (35%).

This credible stability, yet, masks a momentous shift. Although Europe and the Americas still are domicile to a majority of the world'south Christians (63%), that share is much lower than it was in 1910 (93%). And the proportion of Europeans and Americans who are Christian has dropped from 95% in 1910 to 76% in 2010 in Europe equally a whole, and from 96% to 86% in the Americas every bit a whole.

At the same time, Christianity has grown enormously in sub-Saharan Africa and the Asia-Pacific region, where at that place were relatively few Christians at the kickoff of the 20th century. The share of the population that is Christian in sub-Saharan Africa climbed from 9% in 1910 to 63% in 2010, while in the Asia-Pacific region it rose from 3% to seven%. Christianity today – unlike a century ago – is truly a global faith. (Meet world maps weighted past Christian population in 1910 and 2010.)

These are some of the central findings of Global Christianity: A Study on the Size and Distribution of the World's Christian Population, a new study by the Pew Inquiry Center'due south Forum on Religion & Public Life.

The written report is based primarily on a country-past-country analysis of most two,400 information sources, including censuses and nationally representative population surveys. For some countries, such as China, the Pew Forum's estimates also take into account statistics from church groups, government reports and other sources. (See Appendix C [PDF] for more details on the range of estimates available for China.)

Christians are various theologically also as geographically, the new study finds. Well-nigh half are Cosmic. Protestants, broadly defined, brand upwardly 37%. Orthodox Christians comprise 12% of Christians worldwide. Other Christians, such equally Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses, make upwardly the remaining 1% of the global Christian population. (Run across Defining Christian Traditions.)

Taken as a whole, however, Christians are by far the world'south largest religious grouping. Muslims, the second-largest grouping, make upward a little less than a quarter of the world's population, according to previous studies past the Pew Forum.³

Well-nigh one-half (48%) of all Christians live in the 10 countries with the largest number of Christians. Three of the top ten countries are in the Americas (the U.s.a., Brazil and Mexico). Two are in Europe (Russia and Germany), 2 are in the Asia-Pacific region (the Philippines and China), and iii are in sub-Saharan Africa (Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia), reflecting Christianity's global reach.

Clearly, Christianity has spread far from its historical origins. For instance:

• Though Christianity began in the Middle Eastward-Northward Africa, today that region has both the lowest concentration of Christians (most 4% of the region'southward population) and the smallest number of Christians (nigh 13 million) of any major geographic region.
• Indonesia, a Muslim-bulk country, is home to more Christians than all twenty countries in the Middle Due east-N Africa region combined.
• Nigeria now has more than twice as many Protestants (broadly divers to include Anglicans and independent churches) equally Germany, the birthplace of the Protestant Reformation.
• Brazil has more than than twice as many Catholics as Italy.
• Although Christians comprise only under a 3rd of the globe's people, they form a majority of the population in 158 countries and territories, about two-thirds of all the countries and territories in the world.
• Well-nigh 90% of Christians live in countries where Christians are in the majority; but about 10% of Christians worldwide live as minorities.

Global Distribution of Christians

So where are the bulk of the earth's Christians today? The Pew Forum study suggests at least four possible answers, depending on how one divides upwards the world:

The Global South

In recent years, a number of scholarly books and manufactures have discussed the rapid growth of Christianity in the developing countries of the "Global South" – peculiarly Africa, Asia and Latin America – and debated whether the influence of Christians in the "Global Northward" is waning, or not.⁴ A century ago, the Global North (commonly divers equally N America, Europe, Australia, Nihon and New Zealand) contained more four times every bit many Christians every bit the Global South (the rest of the globe).^five Today, the Pew Forum study finds, more than i.iii billion Christians live in the Global South (61%), compared with nearly 860 million in the Global North (39%).

The Global N

But even though Christians are more numerous in the Global Due south, the concentration of Christians is much higher in the Global North, where 69% of the population is Christian. By contrast, 24% of the people living in the Global Southward are Christian. This reflects the fact that the total population of the Global South is about 4.5 times greater than the population of the Global Northward.

Another way of looking at the distribution of Christians around the globe is by region. Numerically, at least, Europe no longer dominates global Christianity the fashion it did 100 years ago. Rather, the bulk of Christians are in:

The Americas

Of the earth's 5 major geographic regions, the Americas have both the largest number and the highest proportion of Christians. More than a third of Christians worldwide (37%) live in the Americas, where nearly nine-in-ten people (86%) are Christian. The 3 countries with the largest Christian populations – the United States, Brazil and Mexico – are in the Americas. Together, these 3 countries alone business relationship for nearly one in every four Christians in the world (24%), about the aforementioned proportion as the whole of Europe (26%) and all of sub-Saharan Africa (24%). Although Christians make up a smaller portion of the 2010 population in the Americas (86%) than they did in 1910 (96%), the Americas business relationship for a higher share of the world's Christians (37%, up from 27% in 1910).⁶

Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia-Pacific

Just sub-Saharan Africa and the Asia-Pacific region now accept a combined population of near 800 million Christians, roughly the same as the Americas. And five of the meridian 10 countries with the largest Christian populations are either in Africa (Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia) or Asia (Philippines and China). Moreover, the fastest growth in the number of Christians over the past century has been in sub-Saharan Africa (a roughly sixty-fold increase, from fewer than 9 one thousand thousand in 1910 to more than than 516 million in 2010) and in the Asia-Pacific region (a roughly 10-fold increment, from about 28 million in 1910 to more than 285 million in 2010).

How Estimates Were Generated

The Pew Forum, in consultation with demographers at the International Establish for Practical Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Laxenburg, Austria, acquired and analyzed about 2,400 data sources, including censuses and general population surveys, to arrive at Christian population figures for 232 countries and self-administering territories – all the countries and territories for which the United Nations Population Division provides overall population estimates. (See Appendix A [PDF] for a more than detailed caption of how the estimates were made; see Appendix D [PDF] for a list of data sources by country.)

In many countries, nonetheless, censuses and surveys do not contain detailed data on denominational and religious motion affiliations. Christian organizations remain in many cases the only source of information on the size of global movements within Christianity (such as evangelicalism and pentecostalism) and on Protestant denominational families (such as Baptists and Methodists). The figures in this report on pentecostal, charismatic and evangelical Christians and on Protestant denominational families were commissioned past the Pew Forum from the Center for the Report of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in S Hamilton, Mass., whose researchers generated estimates based in large part on figures provided past Christian organizations effectually the world. Readers should deport in mind that these breakdowns were derived differently from the overall Christian population estimates.

According to the Heart for the Study of Global Christianity, in that location are about 279 meg pentecostal Christians and 305 million charismatic Christians worldwide. (Charismatic Christians belong to non-pentecostal denominations even so engage in spiritual practices associated with pentecostalism, such as speaking in tongues and divine healing; see Defining Christian Movements.)

In addition, more than 285 million Christians can exist classified as evangelicals because they either belong to churches affiliated with regional or global evangelical associations, or because they identify as evangelicals. Since many pentecostals and charismatics are too evangelicals, these categories are not mutually sectional. (For more than details, see Christian Movements and Denominations.)

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Footnotes:

2 Historical figures throughout the executive summary are courtesy of Todd 1000. Johnson of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in South Hamilton, Mass. Johnson is co-editor of the Atlas of Global Christianity, Edinburgh Academy Press, 2009. (return to text)

3 As of 2010, in that location were well-nigh i.vi billion Muslims worldwide, representing 23.4% of the global population. For more details, come across the Pew Research Eye's Forum on Organized religion & Public Life, The Future of the Global Muslim Population: Projections for 2010-2030, Jan 2011, and Pew Inquiry Center's Forum on Organized religion & Public Life, Mapping the Global Muslim Population: A Report on the Size and Distribution of the Earth'due south Muslim Population, October 2009. As noted in the preface of this report, the Pew Forum is gradually compiling baseline population estimates and projecting future growth rates for the world's major faiths. (return to text)

iv See, for example, Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity, Oxford University Printing, 2002; Robert Wuthnow, Dizzying Organized religion: The Global Outreach of American Churches, University of California Press, 2009; and Mark A. Noll, The New Shape of Earth Christianity: How American Experience Reflects Global Faith, InterVarsity Press, 2009. (render to text)

5 This common definition of Global North and Global South is non a simple geographic division of the world into Northern and Southern hemispheres. Rather, information technology takes into account levels of economic development also every bit geography. Figures for 1910 are from a Pew Forum analysis of data from the Center for the Study of Global Christianity. (return to text)

half dozen Figures for 1910 are from a Pew Forum analysis of information from the Heart for the Written report of Global Christianity. (return to text)

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Source: https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2011/12/19/global-christianity-exec/