The two fastest-growing churches in the United States and Canada are Jehovah’s Witnesses and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, according to the National Council of Churches’ 2008 Yearbook of American & Canadian Churches.
Although Jehovah’s Witnesses currently rank 25th in size with over 1.06 million members, they reported a 2.25 percent increase in membership in a year. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints grew 1.56 percent and is listed as the fourth largest “church.”
The following are the largest 25 churches in the US and Canada (ranked by membership):
1. The Catholic Church – 67,515,016
2. Southern Baptist Convention – 16,306,246
3. The United Methodist Church – 7,995,456
4. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – 5,779,316
5. The Church of God in Christ – 5,499,875
6. National Baptist Convention, U.S.A., Inc. – 5,000,000
7. Evangelical Lutheran Church in America – 4,774,203
8. National Baptist Convention of America, Inc. – 3,500,000
9. Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) – 3,025,740
10. Assemblies of God – 2,836,174
11. African Methodist Episcopal Church – 2,500,000
12. National Missionary Baptist Convention of America – 2,500,000
13. Progressive National Baptist Convention, Inc. – 2,500,000
14. The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod (LCMS) – 2,417,997
15. Episcopal Church – 2,154,572
16. Churches of Christ – 1,639,495
17. Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America – 1,500,000
18. Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, Inc. – 1,500,000
19. The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church – 1,443,405
20. American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A. – 1,371,278
21. United Church of Christ – 1,218,541
22. Baptist Bible Fellowship International – 1,200,000
23. Christian Churches and Churches of Christ – 1,071,616
24. The Orthodox Church in America – 1,064,000
25. Jehovah’s Witnesses – 1,069,530
Read more at The Christian Post.
Is there a numerical breakdown for membership worldwide, as opposed to just U.S. and Canada?
If 1.56% is fast growth, what’s the growth rate of the top 3? Are they shrinking?
This report is misleading in some ways. First, all the different denominations/churches report membership in different ways. Catholics and Mormons count everyone that’s ever been baptized regardless of whether they are active or not, unless they’ve been officially excommunicated or officially resigned. Many other denominations only count currently active members. For a truly fair comparison all the denominations would need to use the same reporting methods.
Also, this report only lists the top 25 Christian churches size wise. I’ve read other reports that the 7th Day Adventists are actually the largest growing denomination percentage wise, but they aren’t large enough yet to make the top 25. Other reports list Wicca as growing very fast percentage wise, but that would never be counted in this report because it’s not a Christian religion.
BYU professor David Wright has a project trying to figure out accurate LDs statistics. He claims that only 33-35% of the total Mormon membership is actually active and practicing. So if you went strictly by adherents, that would move total numbers to 4-4.5 million. He says about half of those are in the US, so 2 – 2.25 million US active adherents. You should be able to easily find references to his work to verify. I don’t currently have it handy.
I think the information to be focused on, for your purposes, may be comparing growth rates of the LDS over the past 20 years. In the late 80s the growth rate was 8%, in 2000 it was down to 3%, now it’s down to 1.56%. And that’s with counting everyone, regardless of whether they are active or not. There could actually be a negative growth rate if only the numbers for the active adherents were used.
It seems more logical to focus on ways to keep the members the church has acquired, as opposed to wasting time on concerns of what a ranking might be, especially since because reporting methods vary, the reports really are not accurate. Like I said, only if every denomination used the same reporting method would there actually be an accurate comparison.
A couple links talking about church sizes/growth and reporting methods I have offhand:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_prac2.htm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/04/AR2008020401526.html
It would seem that the pentecostal movement is the fastest growing movement in the US and the world.