Fastest growing religion? (beliefs, hell, America, pagan, religions)

[Buttons*]

Originally Posted by Fluffy

The study in question is rather old and religious tolerance admits many of the problems in conducting it, one of which was highlighted by feathers.

By fastest growing they do not mean number of members. They mean percentage of membership. The statistic they give is doubling in size every 18 months. Islam is getting far far more members than that every 18 months but because it is so large already, the percentage increase is much smaller.

AH HA!

[Bangbang]

Originally Posted by Evenstar

Sorry to hear you have the same problems.

I think people are stuck in their ways, and sadly the Bible is 100% correct.

I could never tell people here I am wiccan... swear I would be run out of town LOL!

I know...I was a so called solitary practioner and when some of my family and friends discovered it I got some very strange looks. Bang lights insence and candles to purify space and prays to the almighty ones . OOOOOOOOOOOuuuuuuuIIIIIIIIIIIeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! Ooga ooga booga!

Actually I was very happy as a "witch" and my house smelled good all the time. I did not have to think....it was very much like being a christian but without the well.....nevermind. Merry Merry.

[jeffrey]

Thank you, fluffy. I believe it also stated that by the year 2012, at the current growth, it will become the 3rd largest religion in North America.

[St0ne]

At the last cencus here in Australia i think Buddhism showed the most growth, maybe it was second. I think there is another cencus this year so it will be interesting to see the results.

[Popeyesays]

Originally Posted by jeffrey

While doing a search to find how fast different religions are growing, I came across a piece in religioustolerance.org stating that Wicca is the fastest growing religion in North America! http://www.religioustolerance.org/wic_nbr1.htm

Check out www.adherents.com for good, as well as, diverse data and a good explanation of how hard it is to reckon what is what in religious adherence statistics.

Regards,
Scott

[nutshell]

***Damn that Harry Potter!!!***

Just kidding.

I know JK Rowling's world doesn't represent you beliefs.

[jeffrey]

LOL! I think alot of it has to do with people being more aware of the earth, and properties of it, and the attitude of some Christians that turn people off, For instance, our 'Christian' neighbor does not like cats. My wife feeds about 7? now. He has taken it upon himself to kill them if they venture onto his property.

[Katzpur]

From adherents.com:

What is the fastest growing religion?

People often ask us about which religion or religions are the fastest growing, so it truly is a "frequently asked question."

People often ask us about growth rates. It may seem odd that a database which has collected tens of thousands of religion statistics does not store growth rates as well. But we don't. It's not unusual for us to come across studies and data sets which mention growth rates. But this type of data is only in the Adherents.com database if it is part of the text that accompanies the adherent statistics which are our main objective.

As mentioned elsewhere on this web site, comparing adherent statistics from different data sources is problematic enough, because there may have been different conditions used in the data collection, different criteria for how adherents are counted, or different sociological implications to religious membership in different regions and cultures.

But when one discusses growth rates, the variables involved are multiplied to such a degree that comparing growth rates from different data sources becomes meaningless. To say that Religion X has a 15% growth rate or Church Y has a 20% growth rate doesn't really convey any information whatsoever unless one knows the parameters used to calculate these rates. One must know:

• What is the geographical area? The U.S.? The world? A single city? A single congregation?
• What years are being used as endpoints? A growth rate can only be calculated as a population change between two different years, or an accumulated average of changes over a period of years.
• What type of growth is being described? If percentage growth, than smaller groups will exhibit fast, even phenomenal growth rates with a small actual number of new adherents. Or is growth in terms of raw numbers being described? If so, larger religions are likely to have a higher growth rate ("5 million more adherents every year") purely through births. Or is something else being measured, such as number of new congregations, increase in commitment, increase in financial contributions, spiritual growth, etc.?
• What is the population growth of the host population? If Avantism is growing at a rate of 5% annually in Wakanda, but the population is growing at a 15% rate, then the religion is actually losing market share.
• How does this compare to the rate of change of other religious groups? A religious group which is declining by 3% annually, in a region where most other religions are declining by 5 to 15%, may actually be one of the strongest, most dynamic groups, when viewed against the overall trends in the region.
• What constitutes a religion? Is the study counting all of Christianity as a single religion, or is it assigning separate growth rates for different branches, such as Evangelicals, Catholics, Latter-day Saints, Anglicans, Eastern Orthodox, Christadelphians, etc.? If one is only counting Evangelicals, how does one define the group? The number of members in selected churches or denominations? Survey data showing what percentage of a city's respondents answer three separate questions a certain way? Church attendance?

Unless one knows the answers to these questions, one can not properly evaluate a single number calculated as a "growth rate" for a religious group, and one can certainly not compare growth rates extracted from different studies.

While it may not be the definitive answer people hope for, our best answer to the question "What is the fastest growing religion?" is: All religions are the fastest growing religion.

Some religions are the fastest growing on a percentage basis, some by raw numbers. Some are growing fast in some countries, but losing ground in others. Some are growing through increased numbers of congregations, but losing overall market share. Some groups are losing members, but growing by other measures. For instance, the Southern Baptist Convention had a net membership loss in 1998, but the percentage of the remaining membership who were attending church was up, indicating a smaller but more committed membership.

What if one carefully defines the parameters and asks a very specific question such as: What is the fastest growing religion worldwide, on a percentage basis, over the past five years?

It is still difficult to provide a single answer to the question, with data taken out of context. To answer such a question on a percentage basis, one must compare very large religions such as Christianity and Islam, which make up one-third or one-sixth of the world's population, with very small religions, such as Jainism, Zoroastrianism or Neo-Paganism, which have only a few millions or hundreds of thousands of adherents. Such a comparison may show a fast growth rate for Wiccans, and zero percentage growth for Christianity, but the two abstract figures don't convey very much meaningful information.

Even if the overall world growth rate for a given list of religions is known and is accurate (which is unlikely), one must ask about the religions which were left off the list. If a small religion such as Zoroastrianism is included in the statistics, why not an even smaller religion, such as Eckankar? Or what about Samaritans. With only a hundred or so members, this distinct religion can have a tremendous growth rate with just a few births in one year.

If you have seen claims that a certain religious group is the fastest growing religion, this is true. But the same claim might be made by another group as well, using different parameters. Okay, so you won't tell me what THE fastest growing religion is. What are SOME of the fastest growing religions?

Although we don't wish to propose a single religion as the fastest growing religion in the world, it is true that some religious groups really are growing faster than others. Below is a subjective list of some of the groups we think are growing and becoming increasingly important on a worldwide basis. This isn't a list of the most important or largest religions, but a list of those groups which, relative to their own current status, should show the most dramatic gains in some combination of membership, market share, visibility, and/or importance over the next few decades.

(Because of the extreme differences in the sizes of various religions, we don't believe a ranked list with raw numbers is meaningful for comparing religions on a worldwide scale. Also, in some cases it is more meaningful to speak of "religious groups" rather than only entire religions, because different divisions within the religion are experiencing different amounts of growth.)

Some Fast Growing Religious Groups, listed alphabetically.

• animal rights activists
• Assemblies of God
• Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
• environmentalism
• Evangelicals
• Hinduism
• International Church of Christ
• Islam
• Jehovah's Witnesses
• Lubavitcher Hasidic Jews
• non-denominational community churches
• Pentecostalism
• primal-indigenous religion/revitalized tribal and "first peoples" organizations
• Seventh-day Adventists
• Soka Gakkai
• Sufism
• Unitarian Universalists/Unitarians
• Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches
• Wicca
• Zen Buddhism

This list is not comprehensive. There are doubtless many religious groups which are certainly growing and dynamic, but are not listed here. Also, it should be noted that religious groups rarely disappear. Those which have declining numbers usually merge with other groups, forming larger groups. So, although there will probably be fewer people in the years to come who call themselves Congregationalists or Methodists, there will be more members of the heirs of these groups: nationally-based United churches and liberal or conservative "post-denominational" Protestant groups.

[Buttons*]

Originally Posted by jeffrey

He has taken it upon himself to kill them if they venture onto his property.

.... if i ever met that guy.... there would be blood.... (so much for forgiveness and love)