Claims to be the fastest growing religion
Encyclopedia
Most increase in the population of any religious denomination is simply due to births. Still, the world's largest religions that are showing increases that outrun birth-rate include Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism.
There is often little coverage of the "No religious denomination" category (which includes deists, agnostics, atheists, and theists) although some evidence suggests they are growing rapidly. In the United States
the so-called "Nones" are the fastest growing religious status; Australia, Canada and much of Europe have also seen dramatic increases in the numbers of non-religious people.
or because of higher birth rates in a religious group (assuming that children take on the religion of their parents). Religions in particular countries can grow because of immigration.
The fastest growing religion could refer to:
Measures counting absolute numbers tend to favour the larger religions; measures counting percentage growth the smaller ones. For example, if a religion had only 10 followers, a single addition would be a 10% increase, and would therefore dwarf the percentage growth rates of the larger religions.
Statistics for rates of conversion
are the most difficult to gather and the least reliable as religious statistics in general are unreliable: they are often distorted by social taboos such as the ban on apostasy in Islam
, sometimes amplified by governments and policies at social institutions like universities or the reporting of commitments where the individual does not persist. This means that a lot of the data on growth of religions is derived from birth and immigration rates.
There are a large number of people who self-identify themselves as associated to a specific religion, but who are not religiously active. If, for example, asked to choose between Christianity and other religions they would say they were Christians; if asked to choose between Christianity, other religions and "Not religious", they would say "Not religious". This may make categorization difficult.
In countries with mandatory religions
, official statistics will only reflect the official position of the government
fallacy to claim that being the "fastest growing religion" has any logical consequences about the truth of that religion.
While it is possible to find claims that almost any religion is the fastest growing, it is much harder to find ones backed up by scientific data. A selection of the more credible claims are given below, but even these are often contradictory, and most of them only cover a limited period time or a single region of the world.
Buddhism is being recognized as the fastest growing religion in Western societies both in terms of new converts and more so in terms of friends of Buddhism, who seek to study and practice various aspects of Buddhism. As in the United States, Buddhism is ranked among the fastest growing religions in many Western European countries.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics
through statistical analysis held Buddhism
to be the fastest growing spiritual tradition/religion in Australia in terms of percentage gain with a growth of 79.1% for the period 1996 to 2001 (200,000→358,000). However, because Australia is statistically small, no inferences can be drawn from that for the whole world.
Buddhism is the fastest-growing religion in England's jails, with the number of followers rising eightfold over the past decade.
According to a recent report in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Japanese Buddhist sect Nichiren Shoshu of America (NSA) is the fastest growing religion in the United States. Since coming to America in 1960 NSA has launched an aggressive proselytizing program. In 1967 it built a national headquarters and World Culture Center in Santa Monica, California, and has since established offices in most major U.S. cities. According to NSA’s figures the sect, which is part of the Japan based umbrella organization Soka Gakkai (Value Creation Society), now claims a half million members in the U.S. - up 100,000 from a year ago.
at 1.38%. High birth rates and conversions in the Southern Hemisphere
were cited as the main reasons for the increase.
Pentecostalism
, described by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life as a group of charismatic
movements, has grown, according to researchers, from 72 million in the 1960s to 525 million in 2000, though some have criticized these numbers as defining Pentecostalism too broadly. According to a 2005 paper submitted to a meeting of the American Political Science Association
, most of this growth has occurred in non-Western countries and concludes the movement is the fastest growing religion worldwide.
In Vietnam
, the US Department of State estimates that Protestants in Vietnam
may have grown 600% over the last decade. In Nigeria, the numbers of Christians has grown from 21.4% in 1953 to 48.2% in 2003. In South Africa
, Pentecostalism
has grown from 0.2% in 1951 to 7.6% in 2001. In South Korea
, Christianity has grown from 20.7% in 1985 to 29.2% in 2005 according to the Pew Forum.
years), growth boomed
to an average of 6% per year for the decade around 1960, staying around 4% to 5% through 1990. After 1990, average annual growth again slowed steadily to a rate around 2.5% for the first decade of the 21st century, still double the world population
growth rate of 1.2% for the same period.
grew at the rate of 717% between 1990 and 2001. If this were generalized to the US population as a whole, it would make deism the fastest-growing religious classification in the US for that period, with the reported total of 49,000 self-identified adherents representing about 0.02% of the US population at the time.
but as this religion was only established in 1992 most of the growth must have been by conversion
. Estimates for the number of adherents for 1999 range from 2 million to 100 million.
, accounting for about 90% of Hindus worldwide. Their 10-year growth rate is estimated at 20% (based on the period 1991 to 2001), corresponding to a yearly growth close to 2% or a doubling time of about 38 years. However, the percentage of Hindus in the population of India has decreased by 3 percentage points since 1961, dropping from 83.5% in 1961 to 80.5% in 2001 In addition to 80.5% of the population,that identify themselves as Hindus, there are approximately 40 million people (3%)that practice Jainism and Buddhism which evolved from Hinduism. The tradition, practices and goals of Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are very similar. Ancient India had two philosophical streams of religious thoughts: the Shramana
and the Vedic
. These religions have shared paralleled beliefs and have existed side by side for thousands of years.
In a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, "We Are All Hindus Now," Lisa Miller notes that although the vast majority of Americans continue to identify with Christianity, at the same time we "are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." These are pivotal issues, and more and more westerners are coming to view the Hindu understanding of them as both rational and appealing. This does not mean there will be a large number of western converts to Hinduism anytime soon, but it does show the significant effect that Hindu thinking is having on the west. The growing Indian Hindu community in America is also helping to bring about a more realistic view of the tradition. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. The article also pointed out that this is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll.
There is often little coverage of the "No religious denomination" category (which includes deists, agnostics, atheists, and theists) although some evidence suggests they are growing rapidly. In the United States
the so-called "Nones" are the fastest growing religious status; Australia, Canada and much of Europe have also seen dramatic increases in the numbers of non-religious people.
or because of higher birth rates in a religious group (assuming that children take on the religion of their parents). Religions in particular countries can grow because of immigration.
The fastest growing religion could refer to:
Measures counting absolute numbers tend to favour the larger religions; measures counting percentage growth the smaller ones. For example, if a religion had only 10 followers, a single addition would be a 10% increase, and would therefore dwarf the percentage growth rates of the larger religions.
Statistics for rates of conversion
are the most difficult to gather and the least reliable as religious statistics in general are unreliable: they are often distorted by social taboos such as the ban on apostasy in Islam
, sometimes amplified by governments and policies at social institutions like universities or the reporting of commitments where the individual does not persist. This means that a lot of the data on growth of religions is derived from birth and immigration rates.
There are a large number of people who self-identify themselves as associated to a specific religion, but who are not religiously active. If, for example, asked to choose between Christianity and other religions they would say they were Christians; if asked to choose between Christianity, other religions and "Not religious", they would say "Not religious". This may make categorization difficult.
In countries with mandatory religions
, official statistics will only reflect the official position of the government
fallacy to claim that being the "fastest growing religion" has any logical consequences about the truth of that religion.
While it is possible to find claims that almost any religion is the fastest growing, it is much harder to find ones backed up by scientific data. A selection of the more credible claims are given below, but even these are often contradictory, and most of them only cover a limited period time or a single region of the world.
Buddhism is being recognized as the fastest growing religion in Western societies both in terms of new converts and more so in terms of friends of Buddhism, who seek to study and practice various aspects of Buddhism. As in the United States, Buddhism is ranked among the fastest growing religions in many Western European countries.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics
through statistical analysis held Buddhism
to be the fastest growing spiritual tradition/religion in Australia in terms of percentage gain with a growth of 79.1% for the period 1996 to 2001 (200,000→358,000). However, because Australia is statistically small, no inferences can be drawn from that for the whole world.
Buddhism is the fastest-growing religion in England's jails, with the number of followers rising eightfold over the past decade.
According to a recent report in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Japanese Buddhist sect Nichiren Shoshu of America (NSA) is the fastest growing religion in the United States. Since coming to America in 1960 NSA has launched an aggressive proselytizing program. In 1967 it built a national headquarters and World Culture Center in Santa Monica, California, and has since established offices in most major U.S. cities. According to NSA’s figures the sect, which is part of the Japan based umbrella organization Soka Gakkai (Value Creation Society), now claims a half million members in the U.S. - up 100,000 from a year ago.
Globally, The World Christian Database as of 2007 estimated the growth rate of Christianity
at 1.38%. High birth rates and conversions in the Southern Hemisphere
were cited as the main reasons for the increase.
Pentecostalism
, described by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life as a group of charismatic
movements, has grown, according to researchers, from 72 million in the 1960s to 525 million in 2000, though some have criticized these numbers as defining Pentecostalism too broadly. According to a 2005 paper submitted to a meeting of the American Political Science Association
, most of this growth has occurred in non-Western countries and concludes the movement is the fastest growing religion worldwide.
In Vietnam
, the US Department of State estimates that Protestants in Vietnam
may have grown 600% over the last decade. In Nigeria, the numbers of Christians has grown from 21.4% in 1953 to 48.2% in 2003. In South Africa
, Pentecostalism
has grown from 0.2% in 1951 to 7.6% in 2001. In South Korea
, Christianity has grown from 20.7% in 1985 to 29.2% in 2005 according to the Pew Forum.
years), growth boomed
to an average of 6% per year for the decade around 1960, staying around 4% to 5% through 1990. After 1990, average annual growth again slowed steadily to a rate around 2.5% for the first decade of the 21st century, still double the world population
growth rate of 1.2% for the same period.
grew at the rate of 717% between 1990 and 2001. If this were generalized to the US population as a whole, it would make deism the fastest-growing religious classification in the US for that period, with the reported total of 49,000 self-identified adherents representing about 0.02% of the US population at the time.
but as this religion was only established in 1992 most of the growth must have been by conversion
. Estimates for the number of adherents for 1999 range from 2 million to 100 million.
, accounting for about 90% of Hindus worldwide. Their 10-year growth rate is estimated at 20% (based on the period 1991 to 2001), corresponding to a yearly growth close to 2% or a doubling time of about 38 years. However, the percentage of Hindus in the population of India has decreased by 3 percentage points since 1961, dropping from 83.5% in 1961 to 80.5% in 2001 In addition to 80.5% of the population,that identify themselves as Hindus, there are approximately 40 million people (3%)that practice Jainism and Buddhism which evolved from Hinduism. The tradition, practices and goals of Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are very similar. Ancient India had two philosophical streams of religious thoughts: the Shramana
and the Vedic
. These religions have shared paralleled beliefs and have existed side by side for thousands of years.
In a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, "We Are All Hindus Now," Lisa Miller notes that although the vast majority of Americans continue to identify with Christianity, at the same time we "are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." These are pivotal issues, and more and more westerners are coming to view the Hindu understanding of them as both rational and appealing. This does not mean there will be a large number of western converts to Hinduism anytime soon, but it does show the significant effect that Hindu thinking is having on the west. The growing Indian Hindu community in America is also helping to bring about a more realistic view of the tradition. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. The article also pointed out that this is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll.
Most increase in the population of any religious denomination is simply due to births. Still, the world's largest religions that are showing increases that outrun birth-rate include Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism.
There is often little coverage of the "No religious denomination" category (which includes deists, agnostics, atheists, and theists) although some evidence suggests they are growing rapidly. In the United States
the so-called "Nones" are the fastest growing religious status; Australia, Canada and much of Europe have also seen dramatic increases in the numbers of non-religious people.
or because of higher birth rates in a religious group (assuming that children take on the religion of their parents). Religions in particular countries can grow because of immigration.
The fastest growing religion could refer to:
Measures counting absolute numbers tend to favour the larger religions; measures counting percentage growth the smaller ones. For example, if a religion had only 10 followers, a single addition would be a 10% increase, and would therefore dwarf the percentage growth rates of the larger religions.
Statistics for rates of conversion
are the most difficult to gather and the least reliable as religious statistics in general are unreliable: they are often distorted by social taboos such as the ban on apostasy in Islam
, sometimes amplified by governments and policies at social institutions like universities or the reporting of commitments where the individual does not persist. This means that a lot of the data on growth of religions is derived from birth and immigration rates.
There are a large number of people who self-identify themselves as associated to a specific religion, but who are not religiously active. If, for example, asked to choose between Christianity and other religions they would say they were Christians; if asked to choose between Christianity, other religions and "Not religious", they would say "Not religious". This may make categorization difficult.
In countries with mandatory religions
, official statistics will only reflect the official position of the government
fallacy to claim that being the "fastest growing religion" has any logical consequences about the truth of that religion.
While it is possible to find claims that almost any religion is the fastest growing, it is much harder to find ones backed up by scientific data. A selection of the more credible claims are given below, but even these are often contradictory, and most of them only cover a limited period time or a single region of the world.
Buddhism
Lewis M. Hopfe in his "Religions of the World" suggested that "Buddhism is perhaps on the verge of another great missionary outreach".(1987:170)
Buddhism is being recognized as the fastest growing religion in Western societies both in terms of new converts and more so in terms of friends of Buddhism, who seek to study and practice various aspects of Buddhism. As in the United States, Buddhism is ranked among the fastest growing religions in many Western European countries.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics
through statistical analysis held Buddhism
to be the fastest growing spiritual tradition/religion in Australia in terms of percentage gain with a growth of 79.1% for the period 1996 to 2001 (200,000→358,000). However, because Australia is statistically small, no inferences can be drawn from that for the whole world.
Buddhism is the fastest-growing religion in England's jails, with the number of followers rising eightfold over the past decade.
According to a recent report in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Japanese Buddhist sect Nichiren Shoshu of America (NSA) is the fastest growing religion in the United States. Since coming to America in 1960 NSA has launched an aggressive proselytizing program. In 1967 it built a national headquarters and World Culture Center in Santa Monica, California, and has since established offices in most major U.S. cities. According to NSA’s figures the sect, which is part of the Japan based umbrella organization Soka Gakkai (Value Creation Society), now claims a half million members in the U.S. - up 100,000 from a year ago.
Christianity
Globally, The World Christian Database as of 2007 estimated the growth rate of Christianity
at 1.38%. High birth rates and conversions in the Southern Hemisphere
were cited as the main reasons for the increase.
Pentecostalism
, described by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life as a group of charismatic
movements, has grown, according to researchers, from 72 million in the 1960s to 525 million in 2000, though some have criticized these numbers as defining Pentecostalism too broadly. According to a 2005 paper submitted to a meeting of the American Political Science Association
, most of this growth has occurred in non-Western countries and concludes the movement is the fastest growing religion worldwide.
In Vietnam
, the US Department of State estimates that Protestants in Vietnam
may have grown 600% over the last decade. In Nigeria, the numbers of Christians has grown from 21.4% in 1953 to 48.2% in 2003. In South Africa
, Pentecostalism
has grown from 0.2% in 1951 to 7.6% in 2001. In South Korea
, Christianity has grown from 20.7% in 1985 to 29.2% in 2005 according to the Pew Forum.
years), growth boomed
to an average of 6% per year for the decade around 1960, staying around 4% to 5% through 1990. After 1990, average annual growth again slowed steadily to a rate around 2.5% for the first decade of the 21st century, still double the world population
growth rate of 1.2% for the same period.
Deism
The 2001 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) survey, which involved 50,000 participants, reported that the number of participants in the survey identifying themselves as deists
grew at the rate of 717% between 1990 and 2001. If this were generalized to the US population as a whole, it would make deism the fastest-growing religious classification in the US for that period, with the reported total of 49,000 self-identified adherents representing about 0.02% of the US population at the time.
Falun Gong
Hinduism
Some 80% of the population of the Republic of India are Hindus
, accounting for about 90% of Hindus worldwide. Their 10-year growth rate is estimated at 20% (based on the period 1991 to 2001), corresponding to a yearly growth close to 2% or a doubling time of about 38 years. However, the percentage of Hindus in the population of India has decreased by 3 percentage points since 1961, dropping from 83.5% in 1961 to 80.5% in 2001 In addition to 80.5% of the population,that identify themselves as Hindus, there are approximately 40 million people (3%)that practice Jainism and Buddhism which evolved from Hinduism. The tradition, practices and goals of Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are very similar. Ancient India had two philosophical streams of religious thoughts: the Shramana
and the Vedic
. These religions have shared paralleled beliefs and have existed side by side for thousands of years.
In a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, "We Are All Hindus Now," Lisa Miller notes that although the vast majority of Americans continue to identify with Christianity, at the same time we "are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." These are pivotal issues, and more and more westerners are coming to view the Hindu understanding of them as both rational and appealing. This does not mean there will be a large number of western converts to Hinduism anytime soon, but it does show the significant effect that Hindu thinking is having on the west. The growing Indian Hindu community in America is also helping to bring about a more realistic view of the tradition. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. The article also pointed out that this is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll.
Islam
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
using the 2000-2005 edition of the World Christian Database, concluded that high birth rates were the reason for the growth in all six; however, the growth of Christianity was also claimed to be attributed to conversions.
. Its figures for percentage growth come from the 1990 to 2000 version of the World Christian Database given above.
This table illustrates that, globally, one of the largest factors of absolute increase in number of members is simply population growth. This table also neglects the number of conversions to the "No religion" category.
There is often little coverage of the "No religious denomination" category (which includes deists, agnostics, atheists, and theists) although some evidence suggests they are growing rapidly. In the United States
the so-called "Nones" are the fastest growing religious status; Australia, Canada and much of Europe have also seen dramatic increases in the numbers of non-religious people.
Different definitions of "fastest growing"
Religions can grow in numbers because of conversionReligious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
or because of higher birth rates in a religious group (assuming that children take on the religion of their parents). Religions in particular countries can grow because of immigration.
The fastest growing religion could refer to:
- The religion whose absolute number of adherents is growing the fastest (by whatever means).
- The religion that is growing fastest in terms of percentage growth per year (by whatever means).
- The religion that is gaining the greatest number of convertsReligious conversionReligious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
. - The religion that is gaining the greatest number of associative members (those associating themselves via survey, effectively a popularity vote)
Measures counting absolute numbers tend to favour the larger religions; measures counting percentage growth the smaller ones. For example, if a religion had only 10 followers, a single addition would be a 10% increase, and would therefore dwarf the percentage growth rates of the larger religions.
The difficulty of gathering data
Statistics on religious adherence are difficult to gather and often contradictory; statistics for the change of religious adherence are even more so, requiring multiple surveys separated by many years using the same data gathering rules. This has only been achieved in rare cases, and then only for a particular country, such as the American Religious Identification Survey in the USA, or census data from Australia (which has included a voluntary religious question since 1911). Worldwide data are more difficult to gather than data on a particular country.Statistics for rates of conversion
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
are the most difficult to gather and the least reliable as religious statistics in general are unreliable: they are often distorted by social taboos such as the ban on apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam is commonly defined in Islam as the rejection in word or deed of one's former religion by a person who was previously a follower of Islam...
, sometimes amplified by governments and policies at social institutions like universities or the reporting of commitments where the individual does not persist. This means that a lot of the data on growth of religions is derived from birth and immigration rates.
There are a large number of people who self-identify themselves as associated to a specific religion, but who are not religiously active. If, for example, asked to choose between Christianity and other religions they would say they were Christians; if asked to choose between Christianity, other religions and "Not religious", they would say "Not religious". This may make categorization difficult.
In countries with mandatory religions
Freedom of religion
Freedom of religion is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance; the concept is generally recognized also to include the freedom to change religion or not to follow any...
, official statistics will only reflect the official position of the government
Claims to be the fastest growing religion
Note that it would be an argumentum ad populumArgumentum ad populum
In logic, an argumentum ad populum is a fallacious argument that concludes a proposition to be true because many or most people believe it; which alleges: "If many believe so, it is so."...
fallacy to claim that being the "fastest growing religion" has any logical consequences about the truth of that religion.
While it is possible to find claims that almost any religion is the fastest growing, it is much harder to find ones backed up by scientific data. A selection of the more credible claims are given below, but even these are often contradictory, and most of them only cover a limited period time or a single region of the world.
Buddhism
Lewis M. Hopfe in his "Religions of the World" suggested that "Buddhism is perhaps on the verge of another great missionary outreach".(1987:170)Buddhism is being recognized as the fastest growing religion in Western societies both in terms of new converts and more so in terms of friends of Buddhism, who seek to study and practice various aspects of Buddhism. As in the United States, Buddhism is ranked among the fastest growing religions in many Western European countries.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics
Australian Bureau of Statistics
The Australian Bureau of Statistics is Australia's national statistical agency. It was created as the Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics on 8 December 1905, when the Census and Statistics Act 1905 was given Royal assent. It had its beginnings in section 51 of the Constitution of Australia...
through statistical analysis held Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
to be the fastest growing spiritual tradition/religion in Australia in terms of percentage gain with a growth of 79.1% for the period 1996 to 2001 (200,000→358,000). However, because Australia is statistically small, no inferences can be drawn from that for the whole world.
Buddhism is the fastest-growing religion in England's jails, with the number of followers rising eightfold over the past decade.
According to a recent report in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Japanese Buddhist sect Nichiren Shoshu of America (NSA) is the fastest growing religion in the United States. Since coming to America in 1960 NSA has launched an aggressive proselytizing program. In 1967 it built a national headquarters and World Culture Center in Santa Monica, California, and has since established offices in most major U.S. cities. According to NSA’s figures the sect, which is part of the Japan based umbrella organization Soka Gakkai (Value Creation Society), now claims a half million members in the U.S. - up 100,000 from a year ago.
Christianity
Globally, The World Christian Database as of 2007 estimated the growth rate of ChristianityChristianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
at 1.38%. High birth rates and conversions in the Southern Hemisphere
Southern Hemisphere
The Southern Hemisphere is the part of Earth that lies south of the equator. The word hemisphere literally means 'half ball' or "half sphere"...
were cited as the main reasons for the increase.
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
, described by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life as a group of charismatic
Charismatic Christianity
Charismatic Christianity is a Christian doctrine that maintains that modern-day believers experience miracles, prophecy, speaking in tongues, and other spiritual gifts as described in of the Bible...
movements, has grown, according to researchers, from 72 million in the 1960s to 525 million in 2000, though some have criticized these numbers as defining Pentecostalism too broadly. According to a 2005 paper submitted to a meeting of the American Political Science Association
American Political Science Association
The American Political Science Association is a professional association of political science students and scholars in the United States. Founded in 1903, it publishes three academic journals...
, most of this growth has occurred in non-Western countries and concludes the movement is the fastest growing religion worldwide.
In Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
, the US Department of State estimates that Protestants in Vietnam
Protestants in Vietnam
Protestants in Vietnam are a small religious minority constituting from 0.5 to 2 % of the population or around one million people as the newest government census . However, it is the country's fastest-growing religion, growing at a rate of 600% in the last decade.-Origin:Protestantism was...
may have grown 600% over the last decade. In Nigeria, the numbers of Christians has grown from 21.4% in 1953 to 48.2% in 2003. In South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
has grown from 0.2% in 1951 to 7.6% in 2001. In South Korea
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...
, Christianity has grown from 20.7% in 1985 to 29.2% in 2005 according to the Pew Forum.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
The records of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints show membership growth every decade since its beginning in the 1830s. Following initial growth rates that averaged 10% to 25% per year in the 1830s through 1850s, it grew at about 4% per year through the last four decades of the 19th century. After a steady slowing of growth in the first four decades of the 20th century to a rate of about 2% per year in the 1930s (the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
years), growth boomed
Post-World War II baby boom
The end of World War II brought a baby boom to many countries, especially Western ones. There is some disagreement as to the precise beginning and ending dates of the post-war baby boom, but it is most often agreed to begin in the years immediately after the war, ending more than a decade later;...
to an average of 6% per year for the decade around 1960, staying around 4% to 5% through 1990. After 1990, average annual growth again slowed steadily to a rate around 2.5% for the first decade of the 21st century, still double the world population
World population
The world population is the total number of living humans on the planet Earth. As of today, it is estimated to be billion by the United States Census Bureau...
growth rate of 1.2% for the same period.
Deism
The 2001 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) survey, which involved 50,000 participants, reported that the number of participants in the survey identifying themselves as deistsDeism
Deism in religious philosophy is the belief that reason and observation of the natural world, without the need for organized religion, can determine that the universe is the product of an all-powerful creator. According to deists, the creator does not intervene in human affairs or suspend the...
grew at the rate of 717% between 1990 and 2001. If this were generalized to the US population as a whole, it would make deism the fastest-growing religious classification in the US for that period, with the reported total of 49,000 self-identified adherents representing about 0.02% of the US population at the time.
Falun Gong
No reliable data are available for the number of adherents of Falun GongFalun Gong
Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline first introduced in China in 1992 by its founder, Li Hongzhi, through public lectures. It combines the practice of meditation and slow-moving qigong exercises with the moral philosophy...
but as this religion was only established in 1992 most of the growth must have been by conversion
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
. Estimates for the number of adherents for 1999 range from 2 million to 100 million.
Hinduism
Some 80% of the population of the Republic of India are HindusHinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
, accounting for about 90% of Hindus worldwide. Their 10-year growth rate is estimated at 20% (based on the period 1991 to 2001), corresponding to a yearly growth close to 2% or a doubling time of about 38 years. However, the percentage of Hindus in the population of India has decreased by 3 percentage points since 1961, dropping from 83.5% in 1961 to 80.5% in 2001 In addition to 80.5% of the population,that identify themselves as Hindus, there are approximately 40 million people (3%)that practice Jainism and Buddhism which evolved from Hinduism. The tradition, practices and goals of Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are very similar. Ancient India had two philosophical streams of religious thoughts: the Shramana
Shramana
A shramana is a wandering monk in certain ascetic traditions of ancient India including Jainism, Buddhism, and Ājīvikism. Famous śramaṇas include Mahavira and Gautama Buddha....
and the Vedic
Vedic
Vedic may refer to:* the Vedas, the oldest preserved Indic texts** Vedic Sanskrit, the language of these texts** Vedic period, during which these texts were produced** Vedic pantheon of gods mentioned in Vedas/vedic period...
. These religions have shared paralleled beliefs and have existed side by side for thousands of years.
In a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, "We Are All Hindus Now," Lisa Miller notes that although the vast majority of Americans continue to identify with Christianity, at the same time we "are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." These are pivotal issues, and more and more westerners are coming to view the Hindu understanding of them as both rational and appealing. This does not mean there will be a large number of western converts to Hinduism anytime soon, but it does show the significant effect that Hindu thinking is having on the west. The growing Indian Hindu community in America is also helping to bring about a more realistic view of the tradition. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. The article also pointed out that this is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll.
Islam
Most increase in the population of any religious denomination is simply due to births. Still, the world's largest religions that are showing increases that outrun birth-rate include Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism.There is often little coverage of the "No religious denomination" category (which includes deists, agnostics, atheists, and theists) although some evidence suggests they are growing rapidly. In the United States
the so-called "Nones" are the fastest growing religious status; Australia, Canada and much of Europe have also seen dramatic increases in the numbers of non-religious people.
Different definitions of "fastest growing"
Religions can grow in numbers because of conversionReligious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
or because of higher birth rates in a religious group (assuming that children take on the religion of their parents). Religions in particular countries can grow because of immigration.
The fastest growing religion could refer to:
- The religion whose absolute number of adherents is growing the fastest (by whatever means).
- The religion that is growing fastest in terms of percentage growth per year (by whatever means).
- The religion that is gaining the greatest number of convertsReligious conversionReligious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
. - The religion that is gaining the greatest number of associative members (those associating themselves via survey, effectively a popularity vote)
Measures counting absolute numbers tend to favour the larger religions; measures counting percentage growth the smaller ones. For example, if a religion had only 10 followers, a single addition would be a 10% increase, and would therefore dwarf the percentage growth rates of the larger religions.
The difficulty of gathering data
Statistics on religious adherence are difficult to gather and often contradictory; statistics for the change of religious adherence are even more so, requiring multiple surveys separated by many years using the same data gathering rules. This has only been achieved in rare cases, and then only for a particular country, such as the American Religious Identification Survey in the USA, or census data from Australia (which has included a voluntary religious question since 1911). Worldwide data are more difficult to gather than data on a particular country.Statistics for rates of conversion
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
are the most difficult to gather and the least reliable as religious statistics in general are unreliable: they are often distorted by social taboos such as the ban on apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam is commonly defined in Islam as the rejection in word or deed of one's former religion by a person who was previously a follower of Islam...
, sometimes amplified by governments and policies at social institutions like universities or the reporting of commitments where the individual does not persist. This means that a lot of the data on growth of religions is derived from birth and immigration rates.
There are a large number of people who self-identify themselves as associated to a specific religion, but who are not religiously active. If, for example, asked to choose between Christianity and other religions they would say they were Christians; if asked to choose between Christianity, other religions and "Not religious", they would say "Not religious". This may make categorization difficult.
In countries with mandatory religions
Freedom of religion
Freedom of religion is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance; the concept is generally recognized also to include the freedom to change religion or not to follow any...
, official statistics will only reflect the official position of the government
Claims to be the fastest growing religion
Note that it would be an argumentum ad populumArgumentum ad populum
In logic, an argumentum ad populum is a fallacious argument that concludes a proposition to be true because many or most people believe it; which alleges: "If many believe so, it is so."...
fallacy to claim that being the "fastest growing religion" has any logical consequences about the truth of that religion.
While it is possible to find claims that almost any religion is the fastest growing, it is much harder to find ones backed up by scientific data. A selection of the more credible claims are given below, but even these are often contradictory, and most of them only cover a limited period time or a single region of the world.
Buddhism
Lewis M. Hopfe in his "Religions of the World" suggested that "Buddhism is perhaps on the verge of another great missionary outreach".(1987:170)Buddhism is being recognized as the fastest growing religion in Western societies both in terms of new converts and more so in terms of friends of Buddhism, who seek to study and practice various aspects of Buddhism. As in the United States, Buddhism is ranked among the fastest growing religions in many Western European countries.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics
Australian Bureau of Statistics
The Australian Bureau of Statistics is Australia's national statistical agency. It was created as the Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics on 8 December 1905, when the Census and Statistics Act 1905 was given Royal assent. It had its beginnings in section 51 of the Constitution of Australia...
through statistical analysis held Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
to be the fastest growing spiritual tradition/religion in Australia in terms of percentage gain with a growth of 79.1% for the period 1996 to 2001 (200,000→358,000). However, because Australia is statistically small, no inferences can be drawn from that for the whole world.
Buddhism is the fastest-growing religion in England's jails, with the number of followers rising eightfold over the past decade.
According to a recent report in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Japanese Buddhist sect Nichiren Shoshu of America (NSA) is the fastest growing religion in the United States. Since coming to America in 1960 NSA has launched an aggressive proselytizing program. In 1967 it built a national headquarters and World Culture Center in Santa Monica, California, and has since established offices in most major U.S. cities. According to NSA’s figures the sect, which is part of the Japan based umbrella organization Soka Gakkai (Value Creation Society), now claims a half million members in the U.S. - up 100,000 from a year ago.
Christianity
Globally, The World Christian Database as of 2007 estimated the growth rate of Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
at 1.38%. High birth rates and conversions in the Southern Hemisphere
Southern Hemisphere
The Southern Hemisphere is the part of Earth that lies south of the equator. The word hemisphere literally means 'half ball' or "half sphere"...
were cited as the main reasons for the increase.
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
, described by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life as a group of charismatic
Charismatic Christianity
Charismatic Christianity is a Christian doctrine that maintains that modern-day believers experience miracles, prophecy, speaking in tongues, and other spiritual gifts as described in of the Bible...
movements, has grown, according to researchers, from 72 million in the 1960s to 525 million in 2000, though some have criticized these numbers as defining Pentecostalism too broadly. According to a 2005 paper submitted to a meeting of the American Political Science Association
American Political Science Association
The American Political Science Association is a professional association of political science students and scholars in the United States. Founded in 1903, it publishes three academic journals...
, most of this growth has occurred in non-Western countries and concludes the movement is the fastest growing religion worldwide.
In Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
, the US Department of State estimates that Protestants in Vietnam
Protestants in Vietnam
Protestants in Vietnam are a small religious minority constituting from 0.5 to 2 % of the population or around one million people as the newest government census . However, it is the country's fastest-growing religion, growing at a rate of 600% in the last decade.-Origin:Protestantism was...
may have grown 600% over the last decade. In Nigeria, the numbers of Christians has grown from 21.4% in 1953 to 48.2% in 2003. In South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
has grown from 0.2% in 1951 to 7.6% in 2001. In South Korea
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...
, Christianity has grown from 20.7% in 1985 to 29.2% in 2005 according to the Pew Forum.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
The records of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints show membership growth every decade since its beginning in the 1830s. Following initial growth rates that averaged 10% to 25% per year in the 1830s through 1850s, it grew at about 4% per year through the last four decades of the 19th century. After a steady slowing of growth in the first four decades of the 20th century to a rate of about 2% per year in the 1930s (the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
years), growth boomed
Post-World War II baby boom
The end of World War II brought a baby boom to many countries, especially Western ones. There is some disagreement as to the precise beginning and ending dates of the post-war baby boom, but it is most often agreed to begin in the years immediately after the war, ending more than a decade later;...
to an average of 6% per year for the decade around 1960, staying around 4% to 5% through 1990. After 1990, average annual growth again slowed steadily to a rate around 2.5% for the first decade of the 21st century, still double the world population
World population
The world population is the total number of living humans on the planet Earth. As of today, it is estimated to be billion by the United States Census Bureau...
growth rate of 1.2% for the same period.
Deism
The 2001 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) survey, which involved 50,000 participants, reported that the number of participants in the survey identifying themselves as deistsDeism
Deism in religious philosophy is the belief that reason and observation of the natural world, without the need for organized religion, can determine that the universe is the product of an all-powerful creator. According to deists, the creator does not intervene in human affairs or suspend the...
grew at the rate of 717% between 1990 and 2001. If this were generalized to the US population as a whole, it would make deism the fastest-growing religious classification in the US for that period, with the reported total of 49,000 self-identified adherents representing about 0.02% of the US population at the time.
Falun Gong
No reliable data are available for the number of adherents of Falun GongFalun Gong
Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline first introduced in China in 1992 by its founder, Li Hongzhi, through public lectures. It combines the practice of meditation and slow-moving qigong exercises with the moral philosophy...
but as this religion was only established in 1992 most of the growth must have been by conversion
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
. Estimates for the number of adherents for 1999 range from 2 million to 100 million.
Hinduism
Some 80% of the population of the Republic of India are HindusHinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
, accounting for about 90% of Hindus worldwide. Their 10-year growth rate is estimated at 20% (based on the period 1991 to 2001), corresponding to a yearly growth close to 2% or a doubling time of about 38 years. However, the percentage of Hindus in the population of India has decreased by 3 percentage points since 1961, dropping from 83.5% in 1961 to 80.5% in 2001 In addition to 80.5% of the population,that identify themselves as Hindus, there are approximately 40 million people (3%)that practice Jainism and Buddhism which evolved from Hinduism. The tradition, practices and goals of Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are very similar. Ancient India had two philosophical streams of religious thoughts: the Shramana
Shramana
A shramana is a wandering monk in certain ascetic traditions of ancient India including Jainism, Buddhism, and Ājīvikism. Famous śramaṇas include Mahavira and Gautama Buddha....
and the Vedic
Vedic
Vedic may refer to:* the Vedas, the oldest preserved Indic texts** Vedic Sanskrit, the language of these texts** Vedic period, during which these texts were produced** Vedic pantheon of gods mentioned in Vedas/vedic period...
. These religions have shared paralleled beliefs and have existed side by side for thousands of years.
In a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, "We Are All Hindus Now," Lisa Miller notes that although the vast majority of Americans continue to identify with Christianity, at the same time we "are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." These are pivotal issues, and more and more westerners are coming to view the Hindu understanding of them as both rational and appealing. This does not mean there will be a large number of western converts to Hinduism anytime soon, but it does show the significant effect that Hindu thinking is having on the west. The growing Indian Hindu community in America is also helping to bring about a more realistic view of the tradition. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. The article also pointed out that this is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll.
Islam
Most increase in the population of any religious denomination is simply due to births. Still, the world's largest religions that are showing increases that outrun birth-rate include Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism.
There is often little coverage of the "No religious denomination" category (which includes deists, agnostics, atheists, and theists) although some evidence suggests they are growing rapidly. In the United States
the so-called "Nones" are the fastest growing religious status; Australia, Canada and much of Europe have also seen dramatic increases in the numbers of non-religious people.
Different definitions of "fastest growing"
Religions can grow in numbers because of conversionReligious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
or because of higher birth rates in a religious group (assuming that children take on the religion of their parents). Religions in particular countries can grow because of immigration.
The fastest growing religion could refer to:
- The religion whose absolute number of adherents is growing the fastest (by whatever means).
- The religion that is growing fastest in terms of percentage growth per year (by whatever means).
- The religion that is gaining the greatest number of convertsReligious conversionReligious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
. - The religion that is gaining the greatest number of associative members (those associating themselves via survey, effectively a popularity vote)
Measures counting absolute numbers tend to favour the larger religions; measures counting percentage growth the smaller ones. For example, if a religion had only 10 followers, a single addition would be a 10% increase, and would therefore dwarf the percentage growth rates of the larger religions.
The difficulty of gathering data
Statistics on religious adherence are difficult to gather and often contradictory; statistics for the change of religious adherence are even more so, requiring multiple surveys separated by many years using the same data gathering rules. This has only been achieved in rare cases, and then only for a particular country, such as the American Religious Identification Survey in the USA, or census data from Australia (which has included a voluntary religious question since 1911). Worldwide data are more difficult to gather than data on a particular country.Statistics for rates of conversion
Religious conversion
Religious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
are the most difficult to gather and the least reliable as religious statistics in general are unreliable: they are often distorted by social taboos such as the ban on apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam
Apostasy in Islam is commonly defined in Islam as the rejection in word or deed of one's former religion by a person who was previously a follower of Islam...
, sometimes amplified by governments and policies at social institutions like universities or the reporting of commitments where the individual does not persist. This means that a lot of the data on growth of religions is derived from birth and immigration rates.
There are a large number of people who self-identify themselves as associated to a specific religion, but who are not religiously active. If, for example, asked to choose between Christianity and other religions they would say they were Christians; if asked to choose between Christianity, other religions and "Not religious", they would say "Not religious". This may make categorization difficult.
In countries with mandatory religions
Freedom of religion
Freedom of religion is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance; the concept is generally recognized also to include the freedom to change religion or not to follow any...
, official statistics will only reflect the official position of the government
Claims to be the fastest growing religion
Note that it would be an argumentum ad populumArgumentum ad populum
In logic, an argumentum ad populum is a fallacious argument that concludes a proposition to be true because many or most people believe it; which alleges: "If many believe so, it is so."...
fallacy to claim that being the "fastest growing religion" has any logical consequences about the truth of that religion.
While it is possible to find claims that almost any religion is the fastest growing, it is much harder to find ones backed up by scientific data. A selection of the more credible claims are given below, but even these are often contradictory, and most of them only cover a limited period time or a single region of the world.
Buddhism
Lewis M. Hopfe in his "Religions of the World" suggested that "Buddhism is perhaps on the verge of another great missionary outreach".(1987:170)
Buddhism is being recognized as the fastest growing religion in Western societies both in terms of new converts and more so in terms of friends of Buddhism, who seek to study and practice various aspects of Buddhism. As in the United States, Buddhism is ranked among the fastest growing religions in many Western European countries.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics
Australian Bureau of Statistics
The Australian Bureau of Statistics is Australia's national statistical agency. It was created as the Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics on 8 December 1905, when the Census and Statistics Act 1905 was given Royal assent. It had its beginnings in section 51 of the Constitution of Australia...
through statistical analysis held Buddhism
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...
to be the fastest growing spiritual tradition/religion in Australia in terms of percentage gain with a growth of 79.1% for the period 1996 to 2001 (200,000→358,000). However, because Australia is statistically small, no inferences can be drawn from that for the whole world.
Buddhism is the fastest-growing religion in England's jails, with the number of followers rising eightfold over the past decade.
According to a recent report in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, the Japanese Buddhist sect Nichiren Shoshu of America (NSA) is the fastest growing religion in the United States. Since coming to America in 1960 NSA has launched an aggressive proselytizing program. In 1967 it built a national headquarters and World Culture Center in Santa Monica, California, and has since established offices in most major U.S. cities. According to NSA’s figures the sect, which is part of the Japan based umbrella organization Soka Gakkai (Value Creation Society), now claims a half million members in the U.S. - up 100,000 from a year ago.
Christianity
Globally, The World Christian Database as of 2007 estimated the growth rate of Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
at 1.38%. High birth rates and conversions in the Southern Hemisphere
Southern Hemisphere
The Southern Hemisphere is the part of Earth that lies south of the equator. The word hemisphere literally means 'half ball' or "half sphere"...
were cited as the main reasons for the increase.
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
, described by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life as a group of charismatic
Charismatic Christianity
Charismatic Christianity is a Christian doctrine that maintains that modern-day believers experience miracles, prophecy, speaking in tongues, and other spiritual gifts as described in of the Bible...
movements, has grown, according to researchers, from 72 million in the 1960s to 525 million in 2000, though some have criticized these numbers as defining Pentecostalism too broadly. According to a 2005 paper submitted to a meeting of the American Political Science Association
American Political Science Association
The American Political Science Association is a professional association of political science students and scholars in the United States. Founded in 1903, it publishes three academic journals...
, most of this growth has occurred in non-Western countries and concludes the movement is the fastest growing religion worldwide.
In Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
, the US Department of State estimates that Protestants in Vietnam
Protestants in Vietnam
Protestants in Vietnam are a small religious minority constituting from 0.5 to 2 % of the population or around one million people as the newest government census . However, it is the country's fastest-growing religion, growing at a rate of 600% in the last decade.-Origin:Protestantism was...
may have grown 600% over the last decade. In Nigeria, the numbers of Christians has grown from 21.4% in 1953 to 48.2% in 2003. In South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism
Pentecostalism is a diverse and complex movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit, has an eschatological focus, and is an experiential religion. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, the Greek...
has grown from 0.2% in 1951 to 7.6% in 2001. In South Korea
South Korea
The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...
, Christianity has grown from 20.7% in 1985 to 29.2% in 2005 according to the Pew Forum.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
The records of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints show membership growth every decade since its beginning in the 1830s. Following initial growth rates that averaged 10% to 25% per year in the 1830s through 1850s, it grew at about 4% per year through the last four decades of the 19th century. After a steady slowing of growth in the first four decades of the 20th century to a rate of about 2% per year in the 1930s (the Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
years), growth boomed
Post-World War II baby boom
The end of World War II brought a baby boom to many countries, especially Western ones. There is some disagreement as to the precise beginning and ending dates of the post-war baby boom, but it is most often agreed to begin in the years immediately after the war, ending more than a decade later;...
to an average of 6% per year for the decade around 1960, staying around 4% to 5% through 1990. After 1990, average annual growth again slowed steadily to a rate around 2.5% for the first decade of the 21st century, still double the world population
World population
The world population is the total number of living humans on the planet Earth. As of today, it is estimated to be billion by the United States Census Bureau...
growth rate of 1.2% for the same period.
Deism
The 2001 American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) survey, which involved 50,000 participants, reported that the number of participants in the survey identifying themselves as deists
Deism
Deism in religious philosophy is the belief that reason and observation of the natural world, without the need for organized religion, can determine that the universe is the product of an all-powerful creator. According to deists, the creator does not intervene in human affairs or suspend the...
grew at the rate of 717% between 1990 and 2001. If this were generalized to the US population as a whole, it would make deism the fastest-growing religious classification in the US for that period, with the reported total of 49,000 self-identified adherents representing about 0.02% of the US population at the time.
Falun Gong
No reliable data are available for the number of adherents of Falun GongFalun GongFalun Gong is a spiritual discipline first introduced in China in 1992 by its founder, Li Hongzhi, through public lectures. It combines the practice of meditation and slow-moving qigong exercises with the moral philosophy...
but as this religion was only established in 1992 most of the growth must have been by conversionReligious conversionReligious conversion is the adoption of a new religion that differs from the convert's previous religion. Changing from one denomination to another within the same religion is usually described as reaffiliation rather than conversion.People convert to a different religion for various reasons,...
. Estimates for the number of adherents for 1999 range from 2 million to 100 million.
HinduismSome 80% of the population of the Republic of India are Hindus
Hinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
, accounting for about 90% of Hindus worldwide. Their 10-year growth rate is estimated at 20% (based on the period 1991 to 2001), corresponding to a yearly growth close to 2% or a doubling time of about 38 years. However, the percentage of Hindus in the population of India has decreased by 3 percentage points since 1961, dropping from 83.5% in 1961 to 80.5% in 2001 In addition to 80.5% of the population,that identify themselves as Hindus, there are approximately 40 million people (3%)that practice Jainism and Buddhism which evolved from Hinduism. The tradition, practices and goals of Buddhism, Jainism and Hinduism are very similar. Ancient India had two philosophical streams of religious thoughts: the Shramana
Shramana
A shramana is a wandering monk in certain ascetic traditions of ancient India including Jainism, Buddhism, and Ājīvikism. Famous śramaṇas include Mahavira and Gautama Buddha....
and the Vedic
Vedic
Vedic may refer to:* the Vedas, the oldest preserved Indic texts** Vedic Sanskrit, the language of these texts** Vedic period, during which these texts were produced** Vedic pantheon of gods mentioned in Vedas/vedic period...
. These religions have shared paralleled beliefs and have existed side by side for thousands of years.
In a 2009 Newsweek article entitled, "We Are All Hindus Now," Lisa Miller notes that although the vast majority of Americans continue to identify with Christianity, at the same time we "are slowly becoming more like Hindus and less like traditional Christians in the ways we think about God, our selves, each other, and eternity." These are pivotal issues, and more and more westerners are coming to view the Hindu understanding of them as both rational and appealing. This does not mean there will be a large number of western converts to Hinduism anytime soon, but it does show the significant effect that Hindu thinking is having on the west. The growing Indian Hindu community in America is also helping to bring about a more realistic view of the tradition. In reincarnation, central to Hinduism, selves come back to earth again and again in different bodies. The article also pointed out that this is another way in which Americans are becoming more Hindu: 24 percent of Americans say they believe in reincarnation, according to a 2008 Harris poll.
Islam
According to Guinness Book of World Records, Islam is the world’s fastest-growing religion by number of conversionConversion-Economy and Finance:* Currency conversion or exchange rate* Conversion , one of the options strategies* Economic conversion-Law:* Conversion , conversion by taking a chattel out of the possession of another with the intent of exercising a permanent or temporary dominion over it, despite the...
s each year: Although the religion began in Arabia, by 2002 80% of all believers in Islam lived outside the Arab worldArab worldThe Arab world refers to Arabic-speaking states, territories and populations in North Africa, Western Asia and elsewhere.The standard definition of the Arab world comprises the 22 states and territories of the Arab League stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the...
. In the period 1990-2000, approximately 12.5 million more people converted to Islam than to Christianity. In 1990, 935 million people were Muslims and this figure had risen to around 1.2 billion by the year 2000, meaning that around this time one in five people were followers of Islam. According to the BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, a comprehensive American study concluded in 2009 the number stood at 1 in 4 with 60% of Muslims spread all over the Asian continentAsiaAsia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
: A report from an American think-tank has estimated 1.57 billion Muslims populate the world - with 60% in Asia. The report was done by the Pew Forum Research Centre. The forum also projected that in 2010 out of the total number of Muslims in the world 62.1% will live in Asia.
However the report also included a statement saying While the global Muslim population is expected to grow at a faster rate than the non-Muslim population, the Muslim population nevertheless is expected to grow at a slower pace in the next two decades than it did in the previous two decades. From 1990 to 2010, the global Muslim population increased at an average annual rate of 2.2%, compared with the projected rate of 1.5% for the period from 2010 to 2030. The report also made reference to the fact that Muslims are estimated to make up 23.4% of the total global population in 2010 (out of a total of 6.9 billion people) and that by 2030 Muslims will represent about 26.4% of the global population (out of a total of 8.9 billion people).
According to the Christian magazine titled The Plain TruthThe Plain TruthThe Plain Truth is a U.S.-based magazine founded by Herbert W. Armstrong, who also founded the Radio Church of God , Ambassador College, and The World Tomorrow radio and television programs. Herbert W...
(Issue 2 February 1984) and also published in an edition of the Readers Digest magazine, shows statistics of the growth of the major world religion, with Islam at the highest increase at 235% with Christianity second place at 46%. This data was acquired by comparing numbers from 1934 to 1984, across half a century.
Wicca
- The American Religious Identification Survey gives WiccaWiccaWicca , is a modern Pagan religious movement. Developing in England in the first half of the 20th century, Wicca was popularised in the 1950s and early 1960s by a Wiccan High Priest named Gerald Gardner, who at the time called it the "witch cult" and "witchcraft," and its adherents "the Wica."...
an average annual growth of 143% / 11,454 for the period 1990 to 2001 (8,000→134,000 - U.S. data / similar for Canada & Australia).
Non-religious
- The American Religious Identification Survey gave Non-ReligiousIrreligionIrreligion is defined as an absence of religion or an indifference towards religion. Sometimes it may also be defined more narrowly as hostility towards religion. When characterized as hostility to religion, it includes antitheism, anticlericalism and antireligion. When characterized as...
groups the largest gain in terms of absolute numbers - 14,300,000 (8.4% of the population) to 29,400,000 (14.1% of the population) for the period 1990 to 2001 in the USA.
- In Australia, census data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics give "no religion" the largest gains in absolute numbers over the 15 years from 1991 to 2006, from 2,948,888 (18.2% of the population that answered the question) to 3,706,555 (21.0% of the population that answered the question).
- ReutersReutersReuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...
describes how a study profiling the "No religion" demographic found that the so-called "Nones", at least in the U.S., are the fastest growing religious affiliation category. The "Nones" comprise 33% agnostics, 33% theists, and 10% atheists.
- According to INEGI, in Mexico, the number of atheists grows annually by 5.2%, while the number of Catholics grows by 1.7%.
- According to statistics in Canada, the number of "Nones" more than doubled (an increase of about 60%) between 1985 and 2004.
World Christian Database
The World Christian Database (WCD) and its predecessor the World Christian EncyclopediaWorld Christian EncyclopediaWorld Christian Encyclopedia is a reference work published by Oxford University Press, known for providing membership statistics for major and minor world religions in every country of the world, including historical data and projections of future populations.The first edition, by David B. Barrett,...
contains large amounts of data on numbers and growths of religions. It is used as a source for many web and newspaper articles. The following is a tabulation of their results: (Note: The annual growth in the world population over the same period is 1.41%). However the World Christian Database does not cite sources in obtaining the data.
- The American Religious Identification Survey gives WiccaWiccaWicca , is a modern Pagan religious movement. Developing in England in the first half of the 20th century, Wicca was popularised in the 1950s and early 1960s by a Wiccan High Priest named Gerald Gardner, who at the time called it the "witch cult" and "witchcraft," and its adherents "the Wica."...
an average annual growth of 143% / 11,454 for the period 1990 to 2001 (8,000→134,000 - U.S. data / similar for Canada & Australia).
Irreligion
Irreligion is defined as an absence of religion or an indifference towards religion. Sometimes it may also be defined more narrowly as hostility towards religion. When characterized as hostility to religion, it includes antitheism, anticlericalism and antireligion. When characterized as...
groups the largest gain in terms of absolute numbers - 14,300,000 (8.4% of the population) to 29,400,000 (14.1% of the population) for the period 1990 to 2001 in the USA.
Reuters
Reuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...
describes how a study profiling the "No religion" demographic found that the so-called "Nones", at least in the U.S., are the fastest growing religious affiliation category. The "Nones" comprise 33% agnostics, 33% theists, and 10% atheists.
| 1970-1985 | 1990-2000 | 2000-2005 |
|---|---|---|
| 3.65% - Bahá'í Faith | 2.65% - Zoroastrianism | 1.94% - Islam |
| 2.74% - Islam | 2.28% - Bahá'í Faith | 1.70% - Bahá'í Faith |
| 2.30% - Hinduism | 1.44% - Islam | 1.62% - Sikhism |
| 1.67% - Buddhism | 1.87% - Sikhism | 1.57% - Jainism |
| 1.21% - Christianity | 1.69% - Hinduism | 1.52% - Hinduism |
| 1.09% - Judaism | 1.36% - Christianity | 1.38% - Christianity |
| 1.09% - Buddhism | ||
| 0.91% - Judaism |
| |Estimated 2000 | |Projected 2050 | Christianity Christianity Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings... | 1,999,563,838 | 33.0% | 3,016,670,052 | 33.4% | 3,651,564,342 | 35.3% | 1,052,000,504 | 52.61% | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Islam Islam Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~... |
1,188,242,789 | 19.6% | 2,184,875,653 | 26.1% | 2,629,281,610 | 28.0% | 1,041,038,821 | 87.61% | ||||
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace is a foreign-policy think tank based in Washington, D.C. The organization describes itself as being dedicated to advancing cooperation between nations and promoting active international engagement by the United States...
using the 2000-2005 edition of the World Christian Database, concluded that high birth rates were the reason for the growth in all six; however, the growth of Christianity was also claimed to be attributed to conversions.
Encyclopædia Britannica
The following table has been quoted as taken from the 2005 Encyclopædia BritannicaEncyclopædia Britannica
The Encyclopædia Britannica , published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia that is available in print, as a DVD, and on the Internet. It is written and continuously updated by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 expert...
. Its figures for percentage growth come from the 1990 to 2000 version of the World Christian Database given above.
| Religion | Births | Conversions | New adherents per year | Growth rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Christianity Christianity Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings... |
22,708,799 | 2,501,396 | 25,210,195 | 1.36% |
| Islam Islam Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~... |
21,723,118 | 865,558 | 22,588,676 | 2.13% |
| Hinduism Hinduism Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions... |
13,194,111 | -660,377 | 12,533,734 | 1.69% |
| Buddhism Buddhism Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th... |
3,530,918 | 156,609 | 3,687,527 | 1.09% |
| Sikhism Sikhism Sikhism is a monotheistic religion founded during the 15th century in the Punjab region, by Guru Nanak Dev and continued to progress with ten successive Sikh Gurus . It is the fifth-largest organized religion in the world and one of the fastest-growing... |
363,677 | 28,961 | 392,638 | 1.87% |
| Judaism Judaism Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people... |
194,962 | -70,447 | 124,515 | 0.91% |
| Baha'i Faith Bahá'í Faith The Bahá'í Faith is a monotheistic religion founded by Bahá'u'lláh in 19th-century Persia, emphasizing the spiritual unity of all humankind. There are an estimated five to six million Bahá'ís around the world in more than 200 countries and territories.... |
117,158 | 26,333 | 143,491 | 2.28% |
| Confucianism Confucianism Confucianism is a Chinese ethical and philosophical system developed from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius . Confucianism originated as an "ethical-sociopolitical teaching" during the Spring and Autumn Period, but later developed metaphysical and cosmological elements in the Han... |
55,739 | -11,434 | 44,305 | 0.73% |
| Jainism Jainism Jainism is an Indian religion that prescribes a path of non-violence towards all living beings. Its philosophy and practice emphasize the necessity of self-effort to move the soul towards divine consciousness and liberation. Any soul that has conquered its own inner enemies and achieved the state... |
74,539 | -39,588 | 34,951 | 0.87% |
| Shinto Shinto or Shintoism, also kami-no-michi, is the indigenous spirituality of Japan and the Japanese people. It is a set of practices, to be carried out diligently, to establish a connection between present day Japan and its ancient past. Shinto practices were first recorded and codified in the written... |
8,534 | -40,527 | -31,993 | -1.09% |
| Taoism Taoism Taoism refers to a philosophical or religious tradition in which the basic concept is to establish harmony with the Tao , which is the mechanism of everything that exists... |
25,397 | -155 | 25,242 | 1.00% |
| Zoroastrianism Zoroastrianism Zoroastrianism is a religion and philosophy based on the teachings of prophet Zoroaster and was formerly among the world's largest religions. It was probably founded some time before the 6th century BCE in Greater Iran.In Zoroastrianism, the Creator Ahura Mazda is all good, and no evil... |
45,391 | 13,080 | 58,471 | 2.65% |
| Global population | 78,860,791 | N/A | 78,860,791 | 1.41% |
This table illustrates that, globally, one of the largest factors of absolute increase in number of members is simply population growth. This table also neglects the number of conversions to the "No religion" category.
See also
- Trends in adherence
- Major religious groupsMajor religious groupsThe world's principal religions and spiritual traditions may be classified into a small number of major groups, although this is by no means a uniform practice...
- Claims to the oldest religion
External links
- Tables from David A. Barrett, World Christian Encyclopaedia, 2001
- FAQ from Adherents.com describing why it is difficult to measure the fastest growing religion
- Religious Projections for the Next 200 Years from World Network of Religious Futurists
- Estimate from Carnegie Endowment for International Peace using data from World Christian Database