DAWN Fridayfax 2001 #7

World

State of Christianity 2001

David B. Barrett, Professor for Missionmetrics at Regent University, Virginia Beach and publisher of the World Christian Encyclopedia, and Todd M. Johnson, Director of the World Evangelisation Research Center in Richmond, USA, recently published their annual report of Christian statistics. The following is an extract.

Year	1900	1970	2000	Mid 2001	2025
Global population	1,619,626,000	3,696,148,000	6,055,049,000	6,128,512,000	7,823,703,000
Urban population	232,695,000	1,353,370,000	2,881,079,000	2,916,034,000	4,611,677,000
Population under 15	545,568,000	1,385,605,000	1,800,402,000	1,799,941,000	1,836,624,000
Illiterate	777,800,000	835,349,000	993,302,000	1,010,561,000	940,442,000
Agglomerations with pop. over 300	2,400	4,050	4,100	6,500	100,000
Cities with pop. over 1 million	20	161	402	410	650
Slum population	20 million	260 million	700 million	720 million	1,500 million
Christians of all types	558,132,000	1,236,374,000	1,999,564,000	2,024,929,000	2,616,670,000
Moslems	199,941,000	553,528,000	1,188,243,000	1,213,370,000	1,784,876,000
Non-religious	3,024,000	532,096,000	768,159,000	774,333,000	875,121,000
Hindus	203,003,000	462,598,000	811,336,000	823,843,000	1,049,231,000
Buddhists	127,077,000	233,424,000	359,982,000	363,740,000	418,345,000
Atheists	226,000	165,400,000	150,090,000	150,447,000	159,544,000
New Age	5,910,000	77,762,000	102,356,000	103,313,000	114,720,000
Ethnic religions	117,558,000	160,278,000	228,367,000	231,335,000	277,247,000
Sikhs	2,962,000	10,618,000	23,258,000	23,687,000	31,378,000
Jews	12,292,000	14,763,000	14,434,000	14,552,000	16,053,000
Non-Christians	1,061,494,000	2,459,774,000	4,055,485,000	4,103,583,000	5,207,033,000
Christians without a church	36,489.000	106,268,000	111,125,000	111,850,000	125,712,000
Crypto-Christians	3,571,000	59,195,000	123,727,000	126,421,000	190,490,000
"Missionary Christians"	77,931,000	277,152,000	647,821,000	657,163,000	887,579,000
Church attendance	469,303,000	885,777,000	1,359,420,000	1,373,554,000	1,760,568,000
Evangelicals	71,726,000	93,449,000	210,603,000	214,219,000	327,835,000
Pentecostals & Charismatics	981,000	72,223,000	523,767,000	533,581,000	811,552,000
Martyrs per year	35,600	230,000	165,000	167,000	210,000
Members of major church groups
- Anglicans	30,571,000	47,501,000	79,650,000	80,717,000	113,746,000
- Independent	7,931,000	95,605,000	385,745,000	394,102,000	581,642,000
- Orthodox	115,844,000	139,662,000	215,129,000	216,247,000	252,716,000
- Protestants	103,024,000	210,759,000	342,002,000	346,650,000	468,633,000
- Roman Catholics	266,548,000	665,594,000	1,057,328,000	1,070,547,000	1,361,965,000
Christian workers	1,050,000	2,350,000	5,104,000	5,154,000	6,500,000
Missionaries	62,000	240,000	420,000	425,000	550,000
Church members' income (US$)	270 bn	4,100 bn	15,198 bn	15,500 bn	26,000 bn
Computers used by Christians	0	1,000	400,000,000	424,000,000	1.7 bn
New books each year	2,200	17,100	25,000	26,100	70,000
Christian periodicals	3,500	23,000	35,000	36,500	100,000
Radio/TV-Stations	0	1,230	4,000	4,050	5,400
World mission plans since AD 30	250	510	1,500	1540	3,000

According to Barrett, the rise of the so-called 'neo-apostolics' is particularly marked, now numbering over 20,000 movements and networks with a total of 394 million church members. They reject historical denominationalism and restrictive or overbearing central authority, and seek a more effective missionary lifestyle. They are one of the fastest-growing church movements in the world, and, in Barrett's estimation, will have 581 million members in 2025 - 120 million more than all Protestant movements.
Source: David B. Barrett & Todd M. Johnson. Homepage:http://gem-werc.org

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