Size and Shape of World Christianity | What is its portion, and why?
THE PORTION
In 2013 Gordon-Conwell’s Center for the Study of Global Christianity published a report based on the World Christian Database resource and data. It covered the decades between 1970 through 2020 (see their data for mid 2019). What its predictions for 2020 were, and how they compare to actual numbers are not all processed, and will not be the focus here. However, it is more likely than not relatively close to the current population totals of Christianity (2019- 32.8%) and other religions in the world. Here the one particular aspect of global Christianity will be mentioned, and its meaning wrestled out.
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The Center for the Study of Global Christianity’s (CSGC from now on) document and Wilbert Shenk’s 2000 work, “Enlarging the Story” , presents an interesting aspect of Christianity as a percentage of the worldwide population. Shenk’s data goes back to the 19th century, while CSGC’s looked a little ahead to 2020. Both present Christianity’s population and peoples as dynamic. There are communities of Christians which shrink and expand, and growth where there once was little to no Christian representation. However, it can be seen in the two below chart’s that the overall percentage of those who self-identify as Christian to remain the same. In Shenk’s pie charts below, we see that the total percentage of Christians out the world from 1800 to 2000 averages out to 31% (the lowest being 23% in 1800, and the highest maintained for half of the 20th century at 34%, then dropping to 32% by 2000). In the CSGC report (second table below) we see that in 1970 Christians were 33.2% of the world population and were predicted to only change by a tenth of a percentage point by 2020. (By 2050, CSGS projects the percentage to be 35%).
Shenk, Wilbert, ed., Enlarging the Story: Perspective on Writing World Christian History (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2000), xii.
Since 1800 the geographical proportions of Christianity have been changing drastically, as both Shenk and CSGC point out (among many other scholars). Shenk’s pie charts give a decent visual for this. The grey represents Christians outside of Western nations (or what scholars refer to as the “global South”). The white represents Western Christians. As the centuries pass, we can see the proportions change. A cursory look at Shenk’s pie charts growing in size could lead to misinterpretation- this escalation in size is not to communicate that the Christian population growing in percentage, but that the world’s population continues to grow. The number of Christians continues to grow, as well, but their growth is not outpacing the growth of the world population (it remains at about 31%).
THE WHY
There are many vantage points from which to ask why has Christianity maintained about 30% of the world’s population since the beginning of the 19th century. One vantage point could be from a historical perspective, and another sociological. These might try to understand its growth in either assessing events, principals, literature, or human behavior. From another vantage point, either as an evangelical Christian, or a scholar in World Christianity, one might point at the “pilgrim principle” (a historical theory utilized by Andrew Walls and others) or attempt to define limits to transmission of beliefs between cultures and peoples. These would be very interesting avenues of research and study. Here, I will take a point of view (possibly) of an evangelical Christian (which often represents Christians in the global South) and posit particular questions and ideas below:
Is Christianity stuck at a maximum percentage of world population? What would that mean?
From an evangelical point of view, what could a two century long percentage stagnation mean theologically? Would some Western and Majority World Christians find this disconcerting with emphasis of missions over the last two centuries? Or would there be plenty of encouragement to harvest from it?
Does this give an understanding of Christian transmission that emphasizes not expansion but exchange? In other words, once Christians from one people/culture transmit their beliefs to another group, does it necessitate death of that belief in the transmitting group’s population? Is this pattern played out in particular historical instances both of a large scale (say, from first century Jewish background Christians to the Greeks) and on a small scale?
Is it typical of a transmitting faith (Islam, Buddhism, etc.) to hold a certain percentage out any select population? Would this percentage be related to when the religion becomes less intentionally and actively transmitted within a population itself and so more traditionally identified with a culture or certain ethnicity?
If anyone has insights, thoughts, responses, or further questions, please share them below or discuss via twitter (@goconnecting).