2013
New Report: Christianity in its Global Context
The Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary has just released a new report: Christianity in its Global Context, 1970–2020: Society, Religion, and Mission. The report covers major demographic trends in global Christianity, world religions, and mission over the past 40 years, while tracking potential trends for the next 10 years.
The statistics for Africa indicate a growth of the total Christian population on the continent from 38.7% (1970) to 49.3% (2020) – a growth parallel to a decrease of ‘ethnoreligionists’ from 20.5% to 8.7% over the same period, and a slight increase of Muslims (from 40.0 to 41.7%).
I am not sure whether the statistics are really helpful to further understand the growth of Christianity on the continent. The report is based on the World Christian Database, which divides Christianity in six traditions (Anglicans, Independents, Marginals, Orthodox, Protestants, and Roman Catholics) but does not look at Pentecostal Christianity as a separate category. Thus, even though the report states that ‘renewalist Christians’ in Africa will grow from 18.8 million (1970) to 226.2 million by 2020, in the report’s section on Africa itself these Christians and their dramatic growth are not mentioned at all. Instead we read that Catholics remain the largest block and that Anglicans have seen the fastest growth – this may partly be explained from the renewalist movements within these denominations, but what about Pentecostal Christians outside the categories of the WCD?
You can look at the report here
