How many congregations in america

Brauer notes that population growth is also likely boosting the number of congregations. America grew by 27 million people between and , while a separate US Census Bureau report estimated that 14 to 16 million immigrants entered America. Sections Home. Bible Coronavirus Prayer. Subscribe Member Benefits Give a Gift. Subscribers receive full access to the archives.

Trending: Easter Coronavirus Racism Elections. Rebecca Randall September 14, AM. Current Issue November Subscribe. Read This Issue. Free Newsletters Your daily news briefing from the editors of CT. Reply on Twitter. Join the conversation on Facebook. Churches are only as strong as their membership and are dependent on their members for financial support and service to keep operating. Because it is unlikely that people who do not have a religious preference will become church members, the challenge for church leaders is to encourage those who do affiliate with a specific faith to become formal, and active, church members.

While precise numbers of church closures are elusive, a conservative estimate is that thousands of U. A Gallup study found churchgoers citing sermons as the primary reason they attended church. Majorities also said spiritual programs geared toward children and teenagers, community outreach and volunteer opportunities, and dynamic leaders were also factors in their attendance.

A focus on some of these factors may also help local church leaders encourage people who share their faith to join their church. Learn more about how the Gallup Poll Social Series works. Results for this Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews conducted , with a random sample of 6, adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U. All reported margins of sampling error include computed design effects for weighting. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are selected using random-digit-dial methods.

Search, examine, compare and export nearly a century of primary data. Subscribe to the Gallup News brief and real time alerts. Stay up to date with our latest insights. Gallup's annual update on Americans' satisfaction with seven broad aspects of the way the U. Notice: JavaScript is not enabled.

Please Enable JavaScript Safely. Men 64 58 46 Women 73 65 53 Non-Hispanic White adults 68 62 52 Non-Hispanic Black adults 78 70 59 College graduate 68 65 54 Not college graduate 69 60 47 Married 71 68 58 Not married 64 55 42 Republican 77 75 65 Independent 59 51 41 Democrat 71 60 46 Conservative 78 73 64 Moderate 66 59 45 Liberal 56 46 35 East 69 58 44 Midwest 72 66 54 South 74 70 58 West 57 51 38 Protestant 73 72 64 -9 Catholic 76 73 58 Gallup.

Survey Methods. Sign Up. Although there has been a steep increase in the proportion of Americans who do not have a religious attachment, they remain a small minority of the U. The still-sizable proportion of religious Americans also contribute to declining church membership, as fewer in this group belong to a church than did so two decades ago. It is clear then, that the nature of Americans' orientation to religion is changing, with fewer religious Americans finding membership in a church or other faith institution to be a necessary part of their religious experience.

Religiosity is strongly related to age, with older Americans far more likely than younger adults to be members of churches. However, church membership has dropped among all generational groups over the past two decades, with declines of roughly 10 percentage points among traditionalists, baby boomers and Generation X.

Most millennials were too young to be polled in Now that they have reached adulthood, their church membership rates are exceedingly low and appear to be a major factor in the drop in overall U. The low rates of church membership among millennials conform with the generation's weaker attachment to religion in general. Not only are millennials less likely than older Americans to identify with a religion, but millennials who are religious are significantly less likely to belong to a church.

The lower rate of church membership among religious millennials appears to be more a product of generational differences than of life-stage effects. Given that church membership, and religiosity in general, is greater among older adults, the emergence of an increasingly secular generation to replace far more religious older generations suggests the decline in U.

Gallup has previously reported that church attendance has dropped more among Catholics than among Protestants. Consistent with this, the decline in church membership has been greater among Catholics.

Much of the decline in Protestant membership is attributable to the increasing percentage of Americans who simply identify their religion as "Christian" rather than as a specific Protestant denomination such as Baptist, Lutheran or Methodist. In contrast to the variable changes in church membership among generational and faith subgroups, the declines have been fairly similar among most other demographic subgroups. Although the United States is one of the more religious countries, particularly among Western nations , it is far less religious than it used to be.

Barely three-quarters of Americans now identify with a religion and only about half claim membership in a church, synagogue or mosque. The rate of U. A sharp increase in the proportion of the population with no religious affiliation, a decline in church membership among those who do have a religious preference, and low levels of church membership among millennials are all contributing to the accelerating trend. The challenge is clear for churches, which depend on loyal and active members to keep them open and thriving.

How do they find ways to convince some of the unaffiliated religious adults in society to make a commitment to a particular house of worship of their chosen faith?