Question

How many religious congregations are there in the United States?

Answer
There is no official directory for all the congregations in the county, so sociologists of religion have to rely on statistical estimates extrapolated from surveys. These are often disputed, and to complicate matters, thousands of new churches open each year, while thousands of others close. Hartford Institute estimates there are roughly 335,000 religious congregations in the United States. Of those, about 300,000 are Protestant and other Christian churches, and 22,000 are Catholic and Orthodox churches. Non-Christian religious congregations are estimated at about 12,000.
~Want to know more? An excellent discussion of where these figures come from and how they were arrived at can be found in Kirk Hadaway’s and Penny Marler’s excellent article in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Volume 44, Number 3, September 2005, pp. 307-322.

Question
What’s the size of U.S. churches?

Answer
The median church in the U.S. has 75 regular participants in worship on Sunday mornings, according to the National Congregations Study http://www.soc.duke.edu/natcong/ . Notice that researchers measured the median church size — the point at which half the churches are smaller and half the churches are larger — rather than the average (186 attenders reported by the USCLS survey http://www.uscongregations.org/charact-cong.htm ), which is larger due to the influence of very large churches. But while the United States has a large number of very small churches, most people attend larger churches. The National Congregations Study estimated that the smaller churches draw only 11 percent of those who attend worship. Meanwhile, 50 percent of churchgoers attended the largest 10% of congregations (350 regular participants and up).
~Want to know more? Check the websites for the National Congregations Study at http://www.soc.duke.edu/natcong/ The US Congregational Life Survey (USCLS) website has statistics about congregations by religious traditions at http://www.uscongregations.org/charact-cong.htm

Question
Are U.S. churches multiracial?

Answer
Sadly, no. Eleven o’clock Sunday morning continues to be the most segregated hour in America. A study by sociologist Michael Emerson showed that churches where 20 percent of members were of a racial minority comprised only 7 percent of U.S. congregations. Overall, 5 percent of Protestant churches and 15 percent of Roman Catholic churches were multi-racial. But Sociologist Scott Thumma found that megachurches, in the 2005 “Megachurches Today” study, may be changing that balance. In his study, 35 percent of megachurches claimed to have 20 percent or more minorities. What’s more, 56 percent of megachurches said they were making an intentional effort to become multi-racial.
~Want to know more? Read People of the Dream: Multiracial Congregations in the United States by Michael Emerson, (Princeton University Press, 2006) Also, read the Megachurches Today report at http://hirr.hartsem.edu//megachurch/megachurches_research.html

Question
How many seminaries are there in the United States?

Answer
The Association of Theological Schools reported 251 member schools in the United States and Canada in 2005. (In the U.S., there were 215.) The vast majority of those schools are accredited. Others are working toward accreditation. Of those schools, 141 were Protestant, 53 were non-denominational or inter-denominational, 54 were Roman Catholic, and three were Orthodox Christian. Enrollment in all 251 member schools was 81,302 in 2005.
~Want to know more? Go to the website for the Association of Theological Schools, http://www.ats.edu and click on the 2005/06 Annual Data Tables. You can also find a page with links to all these seminaries at http://www.ats.edu/member_schools/alpha.asp

Question
How many clergymen and women are there in the United States?

Answer
The Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches http://www.electronicchurch.org/ recently reported that there were 600,000 clergy serving in various denominations in the United States. But that figure included retired clergy, chaplains in hospitals, prisons and the military, denominational executives, and ordained faculty at divinity schools and seminaries. The 600,000 figure did not include independent churches, not tied to a denomination. “There’s no way to know how many there are,” said Jackson Carroll, professor emeritus of religion and society at Duke Divinity School. In addition, the figures provided by the denominations to the Yearbook may not be that accurate, Carroll said. Nevertheless, at present it is the best figure to use.
~Want to know more? Read chapter 3 in Jackson Carroll’s God’s Potters: Pastoral Leadership and the Shaping of Congregations, (W.B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2006) or see the brief article about the book at http://hirr.hartsem.edu/louisville/newsletter3-2.htm#featured. The Pulpit and Pew website http://www.pulpitandpew.duke.edu/ has additional information about the characteristics and state of American clergy.

Question
What’s the definition of a megachurch, and how many are there in the United States?

Answer
Megachurches are not all alike, but they do share some common features. Hartford Seminary Sociologist Scott Thumma who compiled the 2005 “Megachurches Today” survey defines a megachurch as a congregation with at least 2,000 people attending each Sunday. These churches tend to have a charismatic senior minister and an active array of social and outreach ministries seven days a week.

At latest count, there were 1,210 Protestant churches in the United States with a weekly attendance of 2,000 people or more. That’s nearly twice the number five years ago, suggesting people are receptive to this new way of worship. The average megachurch had a Sunday attendance of 3,585. But not all megachurches are mega. The survey found that only 16 percent of megachurches had 5,000 people in attendance on a given Sunday.
~Want to know more? Read a detailed description of megachurches at: http://www.hirr.hartsem.edu/megachurch/megachurches.html To find out more about the number of megachurches go to: http://hirr.hartsem.edu/megachurch/megastoday2005_summaryreport.html

Question
Where are megachurches located?

Answer
By 2005, megachurches had become a religious phenomenon spread across the US. All but five states have congregations with more than 2,000 people in attendance on a Sunday morning, according to the 2005 “Megachurches Today” study. The four states with the greatest concentrations of megachurches were California (14 percent), Texas (13 percent), Florida (7 percent), and Georgia (6 percent). But researchers found that megachurches are becoming more popular, not only in Sunbelt states, but across the country. The following map shows the locations of all the U.S. megachurches. Each black dot represents a church, with the large black masses indicating multiple churches within an area:
~Want to know more? Go to: http://hirr.hartsem.edu/megachurch/megastoday2005_summaryreport.html