Christian population growth is the population growth of the global Christian community. According to a 2011 Pew Research Center survey, there were more than 2.2 billion Christians around the world in 2010, more than three times as many as the 600 million recorded in 1910. However, this rate of growth is slower than the overall population growth over the same time period.[1] In 2020, Pew estimated the number of Christians worldwide to be around 2.38 billion.[2] According to various scholars and sources, high birth rates and conversions in the Global South were cited as the reasons for the Christian population growth.[3][4][5][6][7][8] In 2023, it was reported: "There will be over 2.6 billion Christians worldwide by the middle of 2023 and around 3.3 billion by 2050, according to a report published in early January by the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary."[9][10]
Summary
This section needs to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (September 2021)
The Christian fertility rate is 2.7 children per woman, which is higher than the global average fertility rate of 2.5. Globally, Christians were only slightly older (median age of 30) than the global average median age of 28 in 2010. According to Pew Research religious switching is projected to have a modest impact on changes in the Christian population.[13] According to various scholars and sources, Pentecostalism is the fastest-growing religious movement in the world;[14][15][16][17][18] this growth is primarily due to religious conversion to Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity.[19][20]
According to the World Christian Encyclopedia, approximately 2.7 million converting to Christianity from another religion, World Christian Encyclopedia also cited that Christianity rank at first place in net gains through religious conversion.[21] While according to "The Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion", approximately 15.5 million converting to Christianity from another religion, while approximately 11.7 million leave Christianity, and most of them become irreligious, resulting in a net gain of 3.8 million.[22] Christianity earns about 65.1 million people due to factors such as birth rate and religious conversion while losing 27.4 million people due to factors such as death rate and religious apostasy. Most of the net growth in the numbers of Christians are in Africa, Latin America and Asia.[22]
Fertility rate
The Christian fertility rate has varied throughout history, as with other fertility figures. The Christian fertility rate also varies from country to country. In the 20-year period from 1989 to 2009, the average world fertility rate decreased from 3.50 to 2.58, a fall of 0.92 children per woman, or 26%. The weighted average fertility rate for Christian nations decreased in the same period from 3.26 to 2.58, a fall of 0.68 children per woman, or 21%. The weighted average fertility rate for Muslim nations decreased in the same period from 5.17 to 3.23, a fall of 1.94 children per woman, or 38%. While Muslims have an average of 3.1 children per woman—the highest rate of all religious groups—Christians are second, with 2.7 children per woman.[23]
The gap in fertility between the Christian- and Muslim-dominated nations fell from 67% in 1990 to 17% in 2010. According to a study published by the Pew Research Center in 2017, births to Muslims between the years of 2010 and 2015 made up an estimated 31% of all babies born around the world. By the Pew Research Center's estimates, the Muslim fertility rate and Christian fertility rate will converge by 2040.[24]
According to the World Christian Encyclopedia, approximately 2.7 million convert to Christianity annually from another religion; World Christian Encyclopedia also stated that Christianity ranks in first place in net gains through religious conversion.[21] While, according to book "The Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion", which published by the professor of Christian mission Charles E. Farhadian,[26] and the professor of psychology Lewis Ray Rambo,[27] between 1990 and 2000, approximately 1.9 million people converted to Christianity from another religion, with Christianity ranking first in net gains through religious conversion.[28]
According to "The Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion", in mid-2005 approximately 15.5 million converted to Christianity from another religion, approximately 11.7 million left Christianity, and most of them became irreligious, resulting in a net gain of 3.8 million.[22] Christianity added about 65.1 million people due to factors such as birth rate and religious conversion, while it lost 27.4 million people due to factors such as death rate and religious apostasy in mid-2005. Most of the net growth in the numbers of Christians is in Africa, Latin America and Asia.[22]
Christianity is expected to lose a net of 66 million adherents (40 million converts versus 106 million apostate) mostly to religiously unaffiliated category between 2010 and 2050, it is also expected that Christianity may have the largest net loses in terms of religious conversion. However, these forecasts lack reliable data on religious conversion in China, but according to media reports and expert assessments, it is possible that the rapid growth of Christianity in China may maintain, or even increase, the current numerical advantage of Christianity as the largest religion in the world. This scenario (Chinese scenario) is based primarily on sensitivity tests.[13][29]
According to scholar Philip Jenkins Christianity is growing rapidly in China and some other Asian countries and sub-Saharan Africa.[30]
According to a report by the Singapore Management University, more people in Southeast Asia are converting to Christianity, and these new converts are mostly Chinese business managers.[33] According to scholar Juliette Koning and Heidi Dahles of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam there is a "rapid expansion of charismatic Christianity from the 1980s onwards. Singapore, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Indonesia, and Malaysia are said to have the fastest-growing Christian communities and the majority of the new believers are "upwardly mobile, urban, middle-class Chinese". Asia has the second largest Pentecostal-charismatic Christians of any continent, with the number growing from 10 million to 135 million between 1970 and 2000".[33] According to scholar Wang Zuoa, 500,000 Chinese converts to Protestantism annually.[34] According to scholar Todd Hartch of Eastern Kentucky University, by 2005, around 6 million Africans converted to Christianity annually.[35]
Conversion into Christianity has significantly increased among Korean,[36] Chinese,[37] and Japanese in the United States.[38] In 2012, the percentage of Christians in these communities were 71%, 30% and 37% respectively.[39]
Due to conversion, the number of Chinese Christians increased significantly from 4 million before 1949 to 67 million in 2010.[40][41]
The 2015 Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background: A Global Census study published by Baylor University institute for studies of religion estimates that 10.2 million Muslims converted to Christianity based on global missionary data.[53] Countries with the largest numbers of Muslims converted to Christianity according to this study include Indonesia (6,500,000),[54] Nigeria (600,000),[54] Iran (500,000 versus only 500 in 1979),[54] the United States (450,000),[55] Ethiopia (400,000) and Algeria (380,000).[54]Indonesia is home to the largest Christian community made up of converts from their former Islamic faith; according to various sources, since the mid and late 1960s, between two million and 2.5 million Muslims converted to Christianity.[56][57][58][59][60][61][62]
According to the Council on Foreign Relations in 2007, experts estimated that thousands of Muslims in the Western world converted to Christianity annually, but were not publicized due to fear of retribution.[63]
Church membership in 2019 was 1.34 billion people[64] (18% of the global population at the time), increasing from the 1950 figure of 437 million[65] and 654 million in 1970.[66][67] On 31 December 2008, membership was 1.166 billion, an increase of 11.54% over the same date in 2000,[68] and slightly greater than the rate of increase of the world population (10.77%). The increase was 33.02% in Africa,[68] but only 1.17% in Europe. It was 15.91% in Asia, 11.39% in Oceania, and 10.93% in Americas.[68] As a result, Catholics were 17.77% of the total population in Africa, 63.10% in Americas, 3.05% in Asia, 39.97% in Europe, 26.21% in Oceania, and 17.40% of the world population. Of the world's Catholics, the proportion living in Africa grew from 12.44% in 2000 to 14.84% in 2008, while those living in Europe fell from 26.81% to 24.31%. However, Catholic numbers have grown in Scandinavia where the Catholics in Nordic dioceses have tripled or even quadrupled. For example, in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland, 330,000 Catholics have now registered in their dioceses.[69][70] Membership of the Catholic Church is attained through baptism,[71] and from 1983 to 2009, if someone formally left the Church, that fact was noted in the register of the person's baptism.
Monsignor Vittorio Formenti, who compiles the Vatican's yearbook, said in an interview with the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano that "For the first time in history, we are no longer at the top: Muslims have overtaken us." He said that Catholics accounted for 17.4 percent of the world population—a stable percentage—while Muslims were at 19.2 percent. "It is true that while Muslim families, as is well known, continue to make a lot of children, Christian ones on the contrary tend to have fewer and fewer", the monsignor said,[72] though Africa and parts of Asia are the exception. If the UN report in 2018 is on target, Africa's population will grow to 4.5 billion by 2100, adding to all African religious groups.[73] Muslims in 2010 represented as much as 23.4% of the total world population and this is expected to increase to 26.3% by 2030.[74] The global Catholic population is projected to grow to 1.63 billion in 2050,[75] but by that time Islam will have nearly 3 billion adherents.
According to Mark Jürgensmeyer of the University of California, popular Protestantism is one of the most dynamic religious movements in the contemporary world.[76] Changes in worldwide Protestantism over the last century have been significant.[77] Since 1900, due primarily to conversion, Protestantism has spread rapidly in Africa, Asia, Oceania and Latin America.[78]
There are more than 900 million Protestants worldwide,[1][79][80][81][82][83][84] among approximately 2.4 billion Christians.[79][85][86][87] In 2010, a total of more than 800 million included 300 million in Sub-Saharan Africa, 260 million in the Americas, 140 million in Asia-Pacific region, 100 million in Europe and 2 million in Middle East-North Africa.[1] Protestants account for nearly forty percent of Christians worldwide and more than one tenth of the total human population.[1]
The U.S. Center for World Mission stated a growth rate of Christianity at 2.3% for the period 1970 to 1996 (slightly higher than the world population growth rate at the time). This increased the claimed percentage of adherents of Christianity from 33.7% to 33.9%.[101]
The World Christian Database as of 2007 estimated the growth rate of Christianity at 1.32%. High birth rates and conversions were cited as the main reasons.[102]
Using data from the period 2000–2005 the 2006 Christian World Database estimated that by number of new adherents, Christianity was the fastest growing religion in the world with 30,360,000 new adherents in 2006. This was followed by Islam with 23,920,000 and Hinduism with 13,224,000 estimated new adherents in the same period.[103]
According to 2011 Pew Research Center survey, there are more than 2.2 billion Christians around the world in 2010, up from about 600 million in 1910.[1]
The 2015 "Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background: A Global Census" estimates 10,283,700 Muslim converted to Christianity around the world.[53]
On 2 April 2015, the Pew Research Center published a Demographic Study about "The Future of World Religions: Population Growth Projections, 2010-2050" with projections regarding Christianity.[104] The projection begins with 2010 statistics when "Christianity was by far the world's largest religion, with an estimated 2.2 billion adherents, nearly a third (31%) of all 6.9 billion people on Earth. Islam was second, with 1.6 billion adherents, or 23% of the global population."[104]
Over the 2010-2050 period, Christians will remain the largest religious group with 30.7% of the world's population. However, Islam will grow faster and become 29.7% of the world's population. Therefore, by 2050 there will be 2.8 billion Muslims compared to 2.9 billion Christians.
"In the United States, Christians will decline from more than three-quarters of the population in 2010 to two-thirds in 2050".
"Four out of every 10 Christians in the world will live in sub-Saharan Africa".
Reasons given for the projected growth
Some of the reasons the Study gives are as follows:[104]
The change in the world's religious is "driven primarily by differences in fertility rates and the size of youth populations among the world's major religions, as well as by people switching faiths".
Fertility rates. "Religions with many adherents in developing countries, where birth rates are high, and infant mortality rates generally have been falling, are likely to grow quickly." Therefore, much of the growth of Christianity is projected to take place in sub-Saharan Africa. Globally, Christians have a birth rate of 2.7 children per woman. But Muslims have a higher rate, namely, an average of 3.1 children per woman. This differential is one of the reasons that the Muslim population is growing faster than the Christian.
Size of youth population. "In 2010, more than a quarter of the world's total population (27%) was under the age of 15." Christian youth under 15 were the same as the 27% global average. But an even higher percentage of Muslims (34%) were younger than 15. This higher youth population is one of the reasons that from 2010 to 2050 Muslims are projected to grow faster than Christians.
Size of old population. In 2010, "11% of the world's population was at least 60 years old", 14% of the Christian population was over 60 years old, but only 7% of Muslims were over 60. This is another reason that Muslims are projected to grow faster than Christians.
Switching. A loss of 66 million Christians is projected to come through switching. Most of the loss is projected to come from Christians "joining the ranks of the religiously unaffiliated".
Christianity has been estimated[1] to be growing rapidly in Latin America, Africa, and Asia.[87] In Africa, for instance, in 1900, there were only 8.7 million[1] adherents of Christianity; now there are 390 million,[1] and it is expected that by 2025 there will be 600 million Christians in Africa.[1] The number of Catholics in Africa has increased from one million in 1902 to 329,882,000.[1] From 2015 to 2016 alone, Africa saw an increase of 49,767,000 Catholics, a larger increase than any other continent.[106] There are now 1.5 million churches whose congregations account for 46 million people.[citation needed]
According to scholar Todd Hartch of Eastern Kentucky University, by 2005, around 6 million Africans converted to Christianity annually.[35]
According to scholar R.V. Dmitriev, over 3.3 million African converted to Christianity in 2010.[107]
A 2015 study estimates 2,161,000 Muslim Africans that convert to Christianity.[53]
Since 1960 a growing number of Algerian Muslims are converting to Christianity.[108][109][110][111][112]
Converts to Christianity may be investigated and searched by the authorities.[113] Conversions to Christianity have been most common in Kabylie, especially in the wilaya of Tizi-Ouzou.[114]
A 2015 study estimates 380,000 Muslims converted to Christianity in Algeria.[53]
Benin
A 2015 study estimates 40,000 Muslims converted to Christianity in Benin.[53]
Burkina Faso
A 2015 study estimates 200,000 Muslims converted to Christianity in Burkina Faso.[53]
Burundi
A 2015 study estimates 2,200 Muslims converted to Christianity in Burundi.[53]
Cameroon
A 2015 study estimates 90,000 Muslims converted to Christianity in Cameroon.[53]
Since 1960 a growing number of Moroccan Muslims are converting to Christianity.[116][117][118][119][120]
On 27 March 2010, the Moroccan magazine TelQuel stated that thousands of Moroccans had converted to Christianity. Pointing out the absence of official data, Service de presse Common Ground cites unspecified sources that stated that about 5,000 Moroccans became Christians between 2005 and 2010.[121] According to the International Religious Freedom Report for 2014 estimate that there may be as many as 8,000 Christian citizens throughout the country, but many reportedly do not meet regularly due to fear of government surveillance and social persecution.[122]
According to different estimates, there are about 25,000-45,000 Moroccan Christians of Berber or Arab descent mostly converted from Islam.[123] Other sources give a number of a bit more than 1,000.[124] A popular Christian program by Brother Rachid has led many former Muslims in North Africa and the Middle East to convert to Christianity. His programs have been credited with assisting in the conversion of over 150,000 former Muslims to Christianity in Morocco.[125]
A 2015 study estimates some 2,200 Christian believers from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism.[115][128]
Data from 2013, show that 64,000 Argentine Jews identify themselves as Christians.[129]
The United States government does not collect religious data in its census. The survey below, the American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) 2008, was a random digit-dialed telephone survey of 54,461 American residential households in the contiguous United States. The 1990 sample size was 113,723; 2001 sample size was 50,281.
Adult respondents were asked the open-ended question, "What is your religion, if any?" Interviewers did not prompt or offer a suggested list of potential answers. The religion of the spouse or partner was also asked. If the initial answer was "Protestant" or "Christian" further questions were asked to probe which particular denomination. About one-third of the sample was asked more detailed demographic questions.
Among the Asian population in the United States, conversion into Christianity is significantly increasing among Korean, Chinese, and Japanese.[131] By 2012 the percentage of Christians in these communities was 71%, 31%, and 38% respectively.[39]
Data from the Pew Research Center states that, as of 2013, about 1.6 million adult American Jews identify themselves as Christians, most as Protestants.[132][133][134] According to the same data, most of the Jews who identify themselves as some sort of Christian (1.6 million) were raised as Jewish or are Jews by ancestry.[133] According to a 2014 study by the Pew Research Center, 19% of those who say they were raised Jewish in the United States, consider themselves Christian.[135]
According to Pew Research, Christianity loses more people than it gains from religious conversion. It found that 23% of Americans raised as Christians no longer identified with Christianity, whereas 6% of current Christians converted.[136] This was in contrast to Islam in America, where the number of people who leave the religion is roughly equal to the number who convert to it.[136] The National Catholic Register claims that in 2015 there were 450,000 American Muslimconverts to Christianity and that 20,000 Muslims convert to Christianity annually in the United States.[137] According to scholar Rob Scott of University of Tasmania in 2010 there were "approximately 180,000 Arab Americans and about 130,000 Iranian Americans who converted from Islam to Christianity".[138]
Religious Self-Identification of the U.S. Adult Population: 1990, 2001, 2008[139] Figures are not adjusted for refusals to reply; investigators suspect refusals are possibly more representative of "no religion" than any other group.
The ARIS 2008 survey was carried out from February–November 2008 and collected answers from 54,461 respondents who were questioned in English or Spanish.
The American population self-identifies as predominantly Christian but Americans are slowly becoming less Christian.
86% of American adults identified as Christians in 1990 and 76% in 2008.
The historic Mainline churches and denominations have experienced the steepest declines while the non-denominational Christian identity has been trending upward particularly since 2001.
The challenge to Christianity in the United States does not come from other religions but rather from a rejection of all forms of organized religion.
34% of American adults considered themselves "Born Again or Evangelical Christians" in 2008.
The U.S. population continues to show signs of becoming less religious, with one out of every seven Americans failing to indicate a religious identity in 2008.
The "Nones" (no stated religious preference, atheist, or agnostic) continue to grow, though at a much slower pace than in the 1990s, from 8.2% in 1990 to 14.1% in 2001, to 15.0% in 2008.
Asian Americans are substantially more likely to indicate no religious identity than other racial or ethnic groups.
One sign of the lack of attachment of Americans to religion is that 27% do not expect a religious funeral at their death.
Based on their stated beliefs rather than their religious identification in 2008, 70% of Americans believe in a personal God, roughly 12% of Americans are atheist (no God) or agnostic (unknowable or unsure), and another 12% are deistic (a higher power but no personal God).
America's religious geography has been transformed since 1990. Religious switching along with Hispanic immigration has significantly changed the religious profile of some states and regions. Between 1990 and 2008, the Catholic population proportion of the New England states fell from 50% to 36% and in New York it fell from 44% to 37%, while it rose in California from 29% to 37% and in Texas from 23% to 32%.
Overall the 1990–2008 ARIS time series shows that changes in religious self-identification in the first decade of the 21st century have been moderate in comparison to the 1990s, which was a period of significant shifts in the religious composition of the United States
According to scholar Philip Jenkins Christianity is growing rapidly in China and some other Asian countries.[30]
According to a report by the Singapore Management University, more people in Southeast Asia are converting to Christianity, and these new converts are mostly Chinese business managers.[33]
According to scholar Juliette Koning and Heidi Dahles of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam there is a "rapid expansion of charismatic Christianity from the 1980s onwards. Singapore, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Indonesia, and Malaysia are said to have the fastest-growing Christian communities and the majority of the new believers are "upwardly mobile, urban, middle-class Chinese". Asia has the second largest Pentecostal-charismatic Christians of any continent, with the number growing from 10 million to 135 million between 1970 and 2000".[33]
According to scholars Khalil Bilici, during the Bangladesh Liberation War (March–December 1971), a significant number of Bangladeshis left Islam to join Christianity (because missionaries stood with them during their difficult times during the civil strife) or to atheism after 1971 due to their experience of oppression conducted by fellow Muslims from West Pakistan.[147]
A 2015 study estimates some 130,000 Christians from a Muslim background residing in the Bangladesh, though not all are necessarily citizens.[115]
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated the numbers of the Muslim who convert to Christianity in Bangladesh has risen from two hundred thousand to four hundred thousand between 1971 and 1991.[148]
The Home Office estimated that 91,000 Muslims have converted to Christianity in Bangladesh.[149]
In recent years, the number of Chinese Christians has increased significantly, particularly since the easing of restrictions on religious activity during economic reforms in the late 1970s; Christians were 4 million before 1949 (including Catholics and Protestants), and reaching 67 million (unofficial figure) in 2010.[1][41] Various statistical analyses have found that between 2% and 4% of the Chinese identify as Christian.
The government declared in 2018 that there are over 44 million Christians (Protestant: 38M, Catholic: 6M) in China.[150]
According to a study by a scholar Fenggang Yang from Purdue University, Christianity is "spreading among the Chinese of South-East Asia", and "Evangelical and Pentecostal Christianity is growing more quickly in China",[151] also according to him, more than half of them have university degrees.[151]
According to the Council on Foreign Relations the "number of Chinese Protestants has grown by an average of 10 percent annually since 1979".[152]
Christianity is the third largest religion in India after Hinduism and Islam, with approximately 30 million followers.
A 2015 study estimates some 40,000 Christian believers from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism or Catholicism.[115]
While the exact number of Dalit converts to Christianity in India is not available, scholar William R. Burrow of Colorado State University estimated that about 8% of Dalit have converted to Christianity.[153]
According to a 2021 study by the Pew Research Center, Christianity in India gained an increase from conversion, most of the Christian converts in India are former Hindus.[154]
According to various sources, between 1965 and 1985 about 2.5 million Indonesian converted from Islam to Christianity.[56][57][58][155]
The "Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background: A Global Census" found that between 1960 and 2015 about 6.5 million Indonesian Muslims convert to Christianity.[53]
Some reports also show that many of the Chinese Indonesians minority convert to Christianity.[156][157] Demographer Aris Ananta reported in 2008 that "anecdotal evidence suggests that more Buddhist Chinese have become Christians as they increased their standards of education".[158]
Significant numbers of Muslims convert to Christianity in Iran, estimates range from 300,000 to 500,000 by various sources.[159][160][161][162][163] Other estimates put the numbers between 800,000 and 3 million.[164]
According to scholar Ladan Boroumand "Iran today is witnessing the highest rate of Christianization in the world",[165] and according to scholar Shay Khatiri of Johns Hopkins University "Islam is the fastest shrinking religion in there [Iran], while Christianity is growing the fastest",[166] and in 2018 "up to half a million Iranians are Christian converts from Muslim families, and most of these Christians are evangelicals",[167] and he adds "recent estimates claim that the number might have climbed up to somewhere between 1 million and 3 million".[168]
Christianity is reportedly the fastest growing religion in Iran with an average annual rate of 5.2%.[169] A 2015 study estimates between 100,000 and 500,000 believers Christians from a Muslim background living in Iran, most of them evangelical Christians.[115]
Several thousand Israelis practice Messianic Jewish denominations, which are often considered as Christian sects. The Messianic Jews usually combine Jewish and Christian practices but do recognize Jesus as the Messiah. There are no exact numbers on those communities, but it is believed that several hundred to several thousand ethnic Jews belong to this tradition as well as several thousand Israelis of mixed ancestry (mostly mixed Jewish and Slavic).
The Christian population in Israel has increased significantly with the immigration of many mixed families from the former Soviet Union (1989-late 1990s).
A 2015 study estimates some 300 Christians from a Muslim background in Israel.
Christianity is one of several minority religions in Japan, accounting for about not more than 1 percent of the population.[171][172][173]
According to a poll conducted by the Gallup Organization in 2006, Christianity has increased significantly in Japan, particularly among youth, and a high number of teens are becoming Christians.[48][174][175]
A 2015 study estimates some 300 Christians from a Muslim background in Japan.
A 2015 study estimates some 6,500 Christian believers from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Eastern Orthodoxy.[115]
In spite of the persecution of converts from Islam to Christianity, a 2015 study estimates some 50,000 believers in Christ from a Muslim background residing in the country.[115][176]
There are a number of believers in Christ from a Muslim background in the country, though many are not citizens. A 2015 study estimates that around 350 people in the country follow these beliefs.[115]
A 2015 study estimates some 19,000 Christians from a Muslim background residing in the country, though not all are necessarily citizens of Kyrgyzstan.[115]
Exact numbers of Muslim Kyrgyz converts to Christianity vary but an estimate of around 20,000 is generally accepted among scholars[177][178]
There is no well researched agreement on the actual number of Malaysian Muslim converts to Christianity in Malaysia.[179] But according to Tan Sri Dr Harussani Zakaria, they are 260,000.[179][180]
A 2015 study estimates some 2,000 Muslims who converted to Christianity in Syria, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism or Oriental Orthodoxy.[115]
In spite of opposition in relation to conversion from Islam to Christianity, a 2015 study estimates some 2,600 to 3,000 Christians with Muslim backgrounds reside in the country.[115][188]
A 2015 study estimates some 10,000 believers in Christ from a Muslim background in the country,[199] most of them belonging to some sort of evangelical or charismatic Protestant community.[53]
A 2015 study estimated some 13,000 followers of Christ from a Muslim background, though it is not clear to which Christian churches these people had converted.[115]
Reports estimated that thousands of Muslims (mostly Bulgarian Turks) convert every year to Christianity in Bulgaria.[209][210][211] A 2015 study estimates 45,000 Christian believers from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism.[115]
There are around 8,000 Christians who have converted from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism.[115][212][213]
According to Roman Silantyev the executive secretary of the Inter-religious Council in Russia, about 2 million Muslims in Russia have converted to Christianity between during the last fifteen years while only 2,500 Russians converted to Islam.[229]
In recent years a number of Swedish Muslims have converted from Islam to the Church of Sweden, most noticeably by Iranians, but also by Arabs and Pakistanis.[232][233][234]
^W. Kling, David (2020). A History of Christian Conversion. Oxford University Press. pp. 586–587. ISBN9780195320923.
^R. Ross, Kenneth (2017). Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa: Edinburgh Companions to Global Christianity. Edinburgh University Press. p. 17. ISBN9781474412049.
^Woodhea, Linda (2004). An Introduction to Christianity. Cambridge University Press. p. 386. ISBN9780521786553. Growth is related not only to conversion but also to a high rate of population growth.
^Tomalin, Emma (2013). Religions and Development. Routledge. p. 6. ISBN9781136827488.
^R.V, Dmitriev (2018). African Studies in Russia: Works of the Institute for African Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yearbook 2014-2016. MeaBooks Inc. p. 60. ISBN9781988391069. Consequently, conversion influences the growth of the Christian community to a far greater degree than the Muslim one, delivering nearly 29% of the Christian population's annual growth.
^ abc"Witnessing The New Reach of Pentecostalism". The Washington Post. 3 August 2002. Pentecostalism is widely recognized by religious scholars as the fastest-growing Christian movement in the world, reaching into many different denominations.
^ abc"Canadian Pentecostalism". McGill–Queen's University Press. 9 February 2009. One of the most significant transformations in twentieth-century Christianity is the emergence and development of Pentecostalism. With over five hundred million followers, it is the fastest-growing movement in the world. An incredibly diverse movement, it has influenced many sectors of Christianity, flourishing in Africa, Latin America, and Asia and having an equally significant effect on Canada.
^ abc"Protestantism: The fastest growing religion in the developing world". The Manila Times. 18 November 2017. At the heart of this religious resurgence are Islam and Pentecostalism, a branch of Protestant Christianity. Islam grew at an annual average of 1.9 percent between 2000 and 2017, mainly as the result of a high birth rate. Pentecostalism grew at 2.2 percent each year, mainly by conversion. Half of developing-world Christians are Pentecostal, evangelical or charismatic (all branches of the faith emphasize the authority of the Bible and the need for a spiritual rebirth). Why are people so attracted to it?.
^ abc"The Economist". The Economists. 18 November 2017. Pentecostalism grew at 2.2 percent each year, mainly by conversion. Half of developing-world Christians are Pentecostal, evangelical or charismatic.((cite magazine)): Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)
^ abBarrett, David B.; Kurian, George Thomas; Johnson, Todd M., eds. (15 February 2001). World Christian Encyclopedia p.360. Oxford University Press USA. ISBN0195079639.
^ abcdRambo, Lewis Ray; Farhadian, Charles E., eds. (2014). The Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion p.59. Oxford University Press. ISBN9780195338522.
^"Why the Chinese government is targeting young Christians in its latest crackdown". America magazine. 14 May 2018. A study of the religious lives of university students in Beijing published in a mainland Chinese academic journal Science and Atheism in 2013 showed Christianity to be the religion that interested students most and the most active on campuses. It concluded there was a "religious fever" in society and "religious forces were infiltrating colleges." With the support of "overseas religious forces," it said, there was a rapid growth in Christianity among university students. It said Christian fellowships on campus mostly refused to succumb to the leadership of the state-backed churches and thus posed "a problem" in the government's administration of religious affairs.
^Tan, Chee-beng (2014). After Migration And Religious Affiliation: Religions, Chinese Identities And Transnational Networks. World Scientific. p. XXV. ISBN9789814590013. They also point out that more educated migrants and those from Hong Kong are more likely to become Christians than those from mainland China.
^"Religion and Education in Indonesia"(PDF). Gavin W. Jones. 30 January 2017. Finally, during this century there has been a rapid growth in the number of Chinese Christians. Very few Chinese were Christians at the turn of the century. Today Christians constitute approximately 10 or 15 percent of the Chinese population in Indonesia, and probably a higher percentage among the young. Conversion of Chinese to Christianity accelerated in the 1960s, especially in East Java, and for Indonesia as a whole the proportion of Chinese who were Catholics rose from 2 percent in 1957 to 6 percent in 19.
^Taher, Amir (2020). The Persian Night: Iran Under the Khomeinist Revolution. Encounter Books. p. 343. ISBN9781594034794. The reason is that a growing number of Iranians, especially the young, are converting to Zoroastrianism or Christianity.
^ abW. Robinson, David (2012). International Handbook of Protestant Education. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 521. ISBN9789400723870. A 2006 Gallup survey, however, is the largest to date and puts the number at 6%, which is much higher than its previous surveys. It notes a major increase among Japanese youth professing Christ.
^ abcd"The Perilous Path from Muslim to Christian". The National Interest. 12 June 2021. Reports of widespread conversions of Muslims to Christianity come from regions as disparate as Algeria, Albania, Syria, and Kurdistan. Countries with the largest indigenous numbers include Algeria, 380,000; Ethiopia, 400,000; Iran, 500,000 (versus only 500 in 1979); Nigeria, 600,000; and Indonesia, an astounding 6,500,000.
^"The Perilous Path from Muslim to Christian". The National Interest. 12 June 2021. MBBs also live in the West, with the United States hosting by far the most (450,000) and Bulgaria the most in Europe (45,000).
^ abAnderson, Allan (2013). An Introduction to Pentecostalism: Global Charismatic Christianity. Cambridge University Press. p. 145. ISBN9781107033993. estimated that over 2 million Javanese Muslims became Christians between 1965 and 1971, and Pentecostal churches gained the most members
^ abMadinier, Rémy (2011). The Politics of Religion in Indonesia: Syncretism, Orthodoxy, and Religious Contention in Java and Bali. Routledge. p. 86. ISBN9781136726408. Between 1966 and 1976, almost two million ethnic Javanese, most from abangan Islamic backgrounds, converted to Christianity.
^Bresnan, John (2005). Indonesia: The Great Transition. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 107. ISBN9780742540118. Between 1966 and 1976, almost 2 million ethnic Javanese, most from nominally Islamic backgrounds, converted to Christianity. Another 250,000 to 400,000 became Hindu.
^P. Daniels, Timothy (2017). Sharia Dynamics: Islamic Law and Sociopolitical Processes. Springer. p. 102. ISBN9783319456928. almost two million nominal Muslims to convert to Christianity
^Madan, T. N. (2011). Sociological Traditions: Methods and Perspectives in the Sociology of India. SAGE Publications India. p. 53. ISBN9788132107699. Simultaneously, a considerable number of muslims (about 2 million) converted to Christianity and Hinduism, a most unique event.
^L. Berger, Peter (2018). The Limits Of Social Cohesion: Conflict And Mediation In Pluralist Societies. Routledge. p. 53. ISBN9780429975950. Some 2 million nominally Islamic Javanese reacted against the violence of their Muslim brethren by converting to Christianity
^"Religious Conversion and Sharia Law". Council on Foreign Relations. 6 June 2007. In the West, experts estimate thousands of Muslims switch to Christianity every year but keep their conversions secret for fear of retribution. "Converts from Islam, especially those who become involved in Christian ministries, often use assumed names, or only their first names, in order to protect themselves and their families," writes Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a Washington-based terrorism analyst in Commentary.
^Todd M. Johnson, Gina A. Zurlo, Albert W. Hickman, and Peter F. Grossing, "Christianity 2016: Latin America and Projecting Religions to 2050", International Bulletin of Mission Research, 2016, Vol. 40 (1), 22-29.
^Hillerbrand, Hans J., "Encyclopedia of Protestantism: 4-volume Set", p. 1815, "Observers carefully comparing all these figures in the total context will have observed the even more startling finding that for the first time ever in the history of Protestantism, Wider Protestants will by 2050 have become almost exactly as numerous as Roman Catholics - each with just over 1.5 billion followers, or 17 percent of the world, with Protestants growing considerably faster than Catholics each year."
^R.V, Dmitriev (2018). African Studies in Russia: Works of the Institute for African Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yearbook 2014-2016. MeaBooks Inc. p. 60. ISBN9781988391069.
^"Kabylia: Christian Churches Closed by Algerian Authorities". Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization. 28 May 2019. Since 2000, thousands of Algerian Muslims have put their faith in Christ. Algerian officials estimate the number of Christians at 50,000, but others say it could be twice that number.
^"Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada". Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. 30 June 2015. Archived from the original on 15 July 2021. Retrieved 27 October 2022. there is an estimated 20,000 to 100,000 evangelical Christians in Algeria, who practice their faith in mainly unregistered churches in the Kabyle region
^P S Rowe, Paul (2018). Routledge Handbook of Minorities in the Middle East. Routledge. p. 133. ISBN9781317233794.
^"U.S. Report on Religious Freedom in Middle East". Wilson Center. 30 May 2013. some Algerian Muslims who converted to Christianity kept a low profile due to concern for their personal safety and potential legal and social problem
^Chapman, Colin (2012). Christians in the Middle East – Past, Present and Future. Sage Publications, Inc. p. 5. ISBN9781608991167. many as 20,000 to 40,000 Algerians, mostly Berbers, who have become Christian
^Carnes, Nat (2012). Al-Maghred, the Barbary Lion: A Look at Islam. University of Cambridge Press. p. 253. ISBN9781475903423. . In all an estimated 40,000 Moroccans have converted to Christianity
^"MOROCCO2019INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS FREEDOM REPORT"(PDF). RELIGIOUS FREEDOM REPORT. 30 January 2019. the Moroccan Association of Human Rights estimates there are 25,000 Christian citizens. One media source reported that while most Christians in the country are foreigners, there are an estimated 8,000 Christian citizens and that "several thousand" citizens have converted, mostly to Protestant churches..
^"Morocco's Christian converts emerge from the shadows". Time of Israel. 30 April 2017. Converts to Christianity form a tiny minority of Moroccans. While no official statistics exist, the US State Department estimates their numbers at between 2,000 and 6,000.
^Newman, Barbara (2005). Lightning Out of Lebanon: Hezbollah Terrorists on American Soil. Random House Publishing Group. ISBN9780345481856. Many of the minority of Muslims who came in this wave married Argentinean women and converted to Catholicism
^"Jewish Americans in 2020". Pew Research Center. 11 May 2021. That means that one-third of those raised Jewish or by Jewish parent(s) are not Jewish today, either because they identify with a religion other than Judaism (including 19% who consider themselves Christian) or because they do not currently identify as Jewish either by religion or aside from religion.
^Scott, Rob (2017). Mount Taylor. University of Tasmania Press. ISBN9781387230914. Although approximately 20,000 Muslims convert to Christianity annually, ... In 2010 were approximately 180,000 and about 130,000 Iranian Americans who converted from Islam to Christianity.[permanent dead link]
^A El Shafie, Majed (2012). Freedom Fighter: One Man's Fight for One Free World. Destiny Image Publishers. ISBN9780768487732. It estimated the Afghan Christian community ranges from 500 to 8,000 people. For all practical purposes, there are no native Afghan Christians; they are all converts from Islam who worship in secret to avoid being killed for apostasy..
^The 2011 International Religious Freedom Repor. University of California Press. 2018. p. 86. ISBN9780160905346. all indigenous Christians ( whose numbers are impossible to determine but have been estimated by the State Department at 500-8,000 ) are converts from Islam
^Aras, Bülent (1999). Oil and Geopolitics in the Caspian Sea Region. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 166. ISBN9780275963958. According to Iranian sources in Baku, Western "religious front associations" have converted some 5,000 Azerbaijanis to various Christian evangelical denominations since 1991
^Monnier, F. le (2009). Rivista di studi politici internazionali. Facoltà di scienze politiche "Cesare Alfieri. p. 69. ISBN9780275963958. the 1990s these front organizations succeeded in converting some 5,000 Azeris to various Christian evangelical
^"The treatment of Christians in Bangladesh"(PDF). Refugee Review Tribunal: Australia. 23 November 2006. In the last thirty years, there has been an increase in the number of Muslims converting to Christianity. According to one estimate, in the period between 1971 and 1991, the number of Christian converts in Bangladesh has risen from two hundred thousand to four hundred thousand..
^Barrett, David B.; Kurian, George Thomas; Johnson, Todd M., eds. (15 February 2001). World Christian Encyclopedia p.374. Oxford University Press USA. ISBN0195079639.
^"2019 Report on International Religious Freedom: Iran". United States Department of State. 12 May 2019. estimates citing figures lower than 10,000, and others, such as Open Doors USA, citing numbers above 800,000, Many Protestants and converts to Christianity from Islam reportedly practice in secret.
^"Are Iran's Christian converts at greater risk after Soleimani's demise?". The Jerusalem Post. 7 February 2018. Conservative estimates place the number of Christians in Iran between 500,000 to 800,000 believers, but others claim there are more than one million. Traditionally, Christian families amount to around 250,000, while the remainder consists of converts from Islam. Most converts from Islam belong to the underground Protestant house-church movement, which Iran considers to be illegal. Meanwhile, according to Islamic and Iranian law, conversion from Islam is a capital offense.
^"Iran: Christians and Christian converts - Department of Justice". Home Office. 20 February 2020. Archived from the original on 1 November 2020. Retrieved 27 October 2022. Open Doors, interviewed by the UK Home Office on 8 August 2017, stated that many converts do not publicly report their faith due to persecution, so it is difficult to record the exact numbers of Iranian Christian converts. Open Doors believes the number to be 800,000, although this is a conservative estimate. Other estimates put the number between 400,000-500,000 right up to 3 million... A March 2019 US Congressional Research Service report on Iran put the 300,000
^"Iran's Christian Boom". JewishPress. 29 June 2021. Shay Khatiri of Johns Hopkins University wrote last year about Iran that "Islam is the fastest shrinking religion there, while Christianity is growing the fastest."
^"America Must Focus on Religious Persecution against Iranian Christian Converts". providence. 3 August 2020. Speaking of faith and Iran, most people think of Islam. Yet Islam is the fastest shrinking religion there, while Christianity is growing the fastest. According to a report by the Department of State from 2018, up to half a million Iranians are Christian converts from Muslim families, and most of these Christians are evangelicals. Recent estimates claim that the number might have climbed up to somewhere between one million and three million. This is up from 100,000 in 1994, and a majority of these converts are reportedly women. A recent documentary, Sheep among Wolves, documents the lives of these converts and shows how Iran is the "fastest-growing church" in the world.
^Kato, Mariko (24 February 2009). "Christianity's long history in the margins". Japan Times. The Christian community itself counts only those who have been baptized and are currently regular churchgoers – some 1 million people, or less than 1 percent of the population, according to Nobuhisa Yamakita, moderator of the United Church of Christ in Japan
^"After fatalism, Japan opens to faith". mercatornet. 17 October 2007. Archived from the original on 20 July 2021. Retrieved 27 October 2022. The 2006 Gallup poll, however, disclosed that an astounding 12 per cent of Japanese who claim a religion are now Christian, making six per cent of the entire nation Christian.
^Radford, David (2015). Religious Identity and Social Change: Explaining Christian conversion in a Muslim world. Routledge. ISBN9781317691716. Today it is possible to speak of thousand of Kyrgyz and Kazakhs converted to Protestantism. This new phenomenon has clashed with the common belief that all native people must be Muslim
^Akçalı, Pınar (2013). Politics, Identity and Education in Central Asia: Post-Soviet Kyrgyzstan. Routledge. ISBN9781135627676.
^"Religion and the Secular State in Kyrgyzstan"(PDF). The Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies. 20 June 2020. P.25: By the early 2000s, some scholars estimated the total number of Kyrgyz converts to Christianity to about 25,000
^ abAhmad Farouk Musa; Mohd Radziq Jalaluddin; Ahmad Fuad Rahmat; Edry Faizal Eddy Yusuf (22 October 2011). "What is Himpun about?". The Star. Retrieved 16 December 2011.
^RChinyong Liow, Joseph (2016). Religion and Nationalism in Southeast Asia. Cambridge University Press. p. 142. ISBN9781107167728. Harussani Zakaria, publicly fulminated that up to 260,000 Muslims in Malaysia had left the faith and converted to Christianity
^Nai-Chiu Poon, Michael (2010). Christian Movements in Southeast Asia: A Theological Exploration. Trinity Theological College (Singapore). pp. 60–61. ISBN9789814305150. The social influence of Christianity, however, extends far beyond its membership especially in the sphere of education, giving Christianity a middle-class identity... Conversion is increasing among Chinese in Singapore, both into Christianity and into Buddhism.
^Abdullaev, Kamoludin (2018). Historical Dictionary of Tajikistan. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 370. ISBN9781538102527. In 2016, the government estimated the number of Christian converts at up to 3,000 persons.
^"Fearing a new holy empire: Just when Turks are worried about Christians, here comes the Pope". Maclean's. 4 December 2006. Archived from the original on 19 July 2021. Retrieved 27 October 2022. More tangibly, figures published in January 2004 in Turkey's mainstream Milliyet newspaper claimed that 35,000 Muslims, the vast majority of them in Istanbul, had converted to Christianity in 2003. While impossible to confirm (the Turkish government does not release these figures), the rate of conversion, according to Christian leaders in Turkey, is on the rise.
^report, MRG international (2007). A Quest for Equality: Minorities in Turkey. Minority Rights Group International. p. 13. ISBN9781904584636. The estimated number of Protestants in Turkey is 3,000–10,000, most of whom live in Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir. Protestantism has been a part of Turkey's history for 200 years, first spreading among the non-Muslim minorities. Conversion from Islam to Protestantism was very rare until the 1960s, but Muslim converts currently constitute the majority of Protestants..
^White, Jenny (2014). Muslim Nationalism and the New Turks: Updated Edition. Princeton University Press. p. 82. ISBN9781400851256. a number that vastly exceeds the size of present-day Turkish-speaking Protestant churches, of whose 3,000 members are converts from Islam
^"Christian Converts Live In Fear in Intolerant Turkey". Der Spiegel. 23 April 2007. The liberal newspaper Radikal estimates that there are about 10,000 converts in Turkey, expressing surprise that they could be seen as a "threat" in a country of 73 million people, 99 percent of whom are Muslim.
^"The Perilous Path from Muslim to Christian". The National Interest. 12 June 2021. Reports of widespread conversions of Muslims to Christianity come from regions as disparate as Algeria, Albania, Syria, and Kurdistan.
^ abBlumi, Isa; Krasniqi, Gëzim (2014). "Albanians' Islam". In Cesari, Jocelyne (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of European Islam. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 480–482. ISBN9780191026409.
^P. Chall, Leo (1998). Sociological Abstracts. Michigan University Press. p. 3844. In 1990, as the situation began to worsen, many Muslim Albanians contemplated a mass conversion to Catholicism
^"Islam in Denmark – an historical overview". Nordic.info. 4 April 2019. Conversion to Christianity also surfaced, not least among the group of refugees arriving from the early 1980s from different areas in the Muslim world hit by civil wars or inter-state conflicts.
^ abVisser, Nadette De (25 May 2016). "Why Are So Many Muslim Refugees in Europe Suddenly Finding Jesus?". The Daily Beast. In the Netherlands and Denmark, as well, many are converting from Islam to Christianity, and the trend appears to be growing. Indeed, converts are filling up some European churches largely forsaken by their old Christian flocks.
^Fahlbusch, Erwin; Bromiley, Geoffrey William; Lochman, Jan Milic; Mbiti, John; Pelikan, Jaroslav; Vischer, Lukas; Barrett, David B. (2003). The Encyclopedia of Christianity: J-O. Wm. B. Eerdmans. ISBN9780802824158.
^M. Davis, Stephen (2020). Rise of French Laicite: French Secularism from the Reformation to the Twenty-first Century. Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 199. ISBN9781725264090. Richard Kronk has extensively researched Muslim conversion in France. He provides examples of the challenges faced by Muslim converts to Christianity. His research primarily deals with Christians of Maghrebi background (CMB) From Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia.
^A. West, Barbara (2010). Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania. Infobase Publishing. p. 3. ISBN9781438119137. more than 20,000 Abkhazian Muslims converted to Christianity
^Özyürek, Esra (2008). Convert Alert: German Muslims and Turkish Christians as Threats to Security in the New Europe. Cambridge University Press. p. 76. ISBN9781725264090. gained through ethnographic research with Turkish and Kurdish converts to Christianity in both Turkey and German.
^Hann, Chris (2006). The Postsocialist Religious Question: Faith and Power in Central Asia and East-Central Europe. LIT Verlag Münster. ISBN9783825899042.
^Wilfred, Felix (2014). The Oxford Handbook of Christianity in Asia. Oxford University Press. ISBN9780199329069.
^"Iranian refugees turn to Christianity in the Netherlands". BBC. 25 August 2017. In the Netherlands, thousands of Iranian Muslim migrants and refugees are converting to Christianity, despite conversion from Islam being considered apostasy in Iran and punishable by death.
^Mostafavi Mobasher, Mohsen (2018). The Iranian Diaspora: Challenges, Negotiations, and Transformations. University of Texas Press. p. 82. ISBN9781477316672. There is no space to elaborate here, but the research carried out by Spellman (2004b) and Miller (2014) sheds light on the growth of Iranian Muslim conversion to born-again Christianity in England and Scotland
^"Iranian Christians in Leeds: xperiences of Church Membership"(PDF). University of Leeds. 17 September 2018. P.9: Iranian Christian converts in Britain form three distinguishable groups depending on where they've converted: 1. Those who converted in Iran 2. Those who converted in transit (mostly Turkey) 3. Those who converted in Britain
