My post is up at Christianity Today's Leadership Journal Out of Ur blog:
Catalyst, Liturgy, and Innovation What liturgical church leaders and the Catalyst Conference can learn from each other.
It has also been published in a slightly different form at Duke Divinity School's Faith & Leadership website on the Call & Response blog:
What Liturgical and Free Church leaders can learn from each other.
Make your comments there. Thanks.
Free Churches and Liturgical Churches: Behind the Numbers
The first two sentences in the post attempt to show that there is a significant split in the United States between liturgical churches and free churches.
According to data from the National Congregations Study (2006-2007), 38%
of people in the United States associate themselves with liturgical
churches (Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Episcopal, etc.); while 46%
associate themselves with free churches (Baptist, Pentecostal,
non-denominational, etc.). The 14% of people associated with Methodist
and Reformed/Presbyterian churches sit atop this watershed—some sliding
down the liturgical slope, others down the free church slope.
The data I draw from in these sentences is from the following chart. I have marked the liturgical numbers yellow, free church numbers pink and Reformed/Methodist green.
Explore the Data: Wave 2 – 2006/07
| Denomination | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Response | Frequency | Percent | Valid Percent | Cumulative Percent |
| ROMAN CATHOLIC | 421 | 27.9 | 27.9 | |
| BAPTIST | 312 | 20.7 | 20.7 | 48.7 |
| METHODIST | 136 | 9.1 | 9.1 | 57.7 |
| LUTHERAN | 77 | 5.1 | 5.1 | 62.9 |
| PRESBYTERIAN OR REFORMED | 68 | 4.5 | 4.5 | 67.3 |
| PENTECOSTAL | 84 | 5.6 | 5.6 | 73.0 |
| OTHER MODERATE OR LIBERAL PROTESTANTS | 26 | 1.7 | 1.7 | 74.6 |
| EPISCOPAL CHURCH | 43 | 2.9 | 2.9 | 77.5 |
| OTHER CONSERVATIVE, EVANGELICAL, OR SECTARIAN PROTESTANTS | 97 | 6.5 | 6.5 | 84.0 |
| OTHER CHRISTIAN, NOT OTHERWISE SPECIFIED | 191 | 12.7 | 12.7 | 96.7 |
| NON-CHRISTIAN | 50 | 3.3 | 3.3 | 100.0 |
NOTE: this table reflects the number of persons in congregations.
To get it:
- I went to the National Congregations home page.
- Clicked explore the data
- Clicked on Basic Findings for each Variable in the Surveys: Wave 2: 2006-2007 data
- Clicked under the Variables. "Denomiation."
- Clicked: "I want my tables to reflect the number of persons in congregations"
- Clicked: Create Frequency Table.
The same information is presented slightly differently on page 27 of The National Congregations Study report "American Congregations at the Beginning of the 21st Century" by Mark Chaves
RELIGIOUS TRADITION:
Percent with no denominational affiliation 13.9
Percent associated with each denomination or tradition:
Roman Catholic 27.9
Baptist conventions/denominations 20.7
Methodist denominations 9.1
Lutheran/Episcopal denominations 7.9
Pentecostal 5.6
Denominations in the reformed tradition 4.5
Other Christian 20.9
Jewish 1.6
Non-Christian and Non-Jewish 1.7
I reflected on the Report at:
Two new reports: Thumma / Bird on Megachurches and Chaves on American Congregations
Duke sociologist Mark Chaves has written the 2004 Harvard University Press book:
More raw unweighted data is available at:
National Congregations Study, Cumulative Dataset (1998 and 2006-2007)
From this type of data (if it was properly weighted), one would begin to form the chart above.
- 9) Denominational affiliation (collapsed 1) (DENCODE)
-
TOTAL % 0) No denomination 313 11.4 1) Roman Catholic 663 24.2 2) Southern Baptist Convention 285 10.4 3) Black Baptist 91 3.3 4) American Baptist Churches 26 0.9 5) Other Baptist 120 4.4 6) United Methodist Church 245 8.9 7) Black Methodist 23 0.8 8) Other Methodist 9 0.3 9) Evangelical Lutheran Church in America 111 4.1 10) Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod 52 1.9 11) Other Lutheran 19 0.7 12) Presbyterian Church (USA) 82 3.0 13) Other Presbyterian 9 0.3 14) Assembly of God 48 1.8 15) Other Pentecostal 54 2.0 16) Church of God in Christ 21 0.8 17) Disciples of Christ 17 0.6 18) Episcopal Church 77 2.8 19) United Church of Christ 51 1.9 20) Reformed Church in America 8 0.3 21) Church of the Brethren 7 0.3 22) Jehovah's Witness 28 1.0 23) Mennonite 7 0.3 24) Church of the Nazarene 20 0.7 25) Seventh-day Adventists 15 0.5 26) Unitarian Universalist Association 16 0.6 27) Eastern Orthodox 13 0.5 28) Church/Churches of Christ 16 0.6 29) Various Church of God 26 0.9 30) Latter-day Saints (LDS, Mormon) 45 1.6 31) Jewish 45 1.6 32) Non-Christian/non-Jewish 53 1.9 35) Evangelical 13 0.5 36) Christian and Missionary Alliance 13 0.5 37) Other Mainline/Liberal 9 0.3 38) Other Conservative/Evangelical 34 1.2 39) Other Christian, nec 56 2.0 TOTAL 2740 100.0 - [ Add to Question Bank | View Question Bank ]