Church attendance
.jpg)
| Part of a series on |
| Christianity |
|---|
 |
Church attendance is a central religious practice for many Christians; some Christian denominations require church attendance on the Lord's Day (Sunday). The Canon Law of the Catholic Church states, "on Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are bound to participate in the Mass".[2] The Westminster Confession of Faith is held by the Reformed Churches and teaches first-day Sabbatarianism (Sunday Sabbatarianism) and the duty of church attendance on this day.[3] Similarly, the General Rules of the Methodist Church also requires "attending upon all the ordinances of God" including "the public worship of God".[4] The Lutheran Christian theologian Balthasar Münter stated that church attendance is the "foundation for the Christian life" as "the Christian Bible and the sacraments provide the framework for the faith"; he also states that it is important for believers because it aids in the prevention of backsliding, as well as offers "the company of other believers".[5] Until 1791, it was a legal requirement in the Kingdom of Great Britain to attend services of the Church of England (the state church) at least twice a year.[6]
In addition to being based upon the spirit of the Ten Commandments,[7] the importance of church attendance in Christian theology is delineated in Hebrews 10:25, which implores the believers: "Let us not neglect our church meetings, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back again is drawing near."[8][9][10] Certain early Christian saints emphasized the necessity of church attendance for the continuance of the faith, such as Saint John Climacus, who declared that "A sure sign of the deadening of the soul is the avoidance of church services."[11]
About two-thirds of Latin American Christians and 90% of African Christians (in Ghana, Nigeria, Rwanda and Zimbabwe), according to the World Values Survey, said they attended church regularly.[12] South Africa is the only African country where just 55% of Christians attend church regularly.[13] According to a 2018 study by the Pew Research Center, Christians in Africa and Latin America and the United States have high levels of commitment to their faith.[14] Data from the European Social Survey in 2012 showed that around a third of European Christians said they attend services once a month or more.[12] The Gallup International, a self-reporting survey conducted via telephone, indicates that 37% of Americans report that they attend religious services weekly or near-weekly in 2013.[15] The Pew Research Center stated, however, that there is a "sharp increase in church attendance around the two most significant Christian holidays, Christmas and Easter."[16] As such, on Christmas (a holy day of obligation in the Catholic Church, a Festival in the Lutheran Churches and a Principal Feast in the Anglican Communion), LifeWay Research found that "six out of 10 Americans typically attend church".[17] Countries that hold or have held a policy of state atheism have actively discouraged church attendance and church membership, often persecuting Christians who continued to worship.[18]
Theology
[edit]
The holding of church services pertains to the observance of the Lord's Day in Christianity.[19] The Bible has a precedent for a pattern of morning and evening worship that has given rise to Sunday morning and Sunday evening services of worship held in the churches of many Christian denominations today, a "structure to help families sanctify the Lord’s Day."[19] In Numbers 28:1–10 and Exodus 29:38–39, "God commanded the daily offerings in the tabernacle to be made once in the morning and then again at twilight".[19] In Psalm 92, which is a prayer concerning the observance of the Sabbath, the prophet David writes "It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to your name, O Most High; to declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night" (cf. Psalm 134:1).[19] Church father Eusebius of Caesarea thus declared: "For it is surely no small sign of God’s power that throughout the whole world in the churches of God at the morning rising of the sun and at the evening hours, hymns, praises, and truly divine delights are offered to God. God’s delights are indeed the hymns sent up everywhere on earth in his Church at the times of morning and evening."[19] The early Christians attended two liturgies on the Lord's Day, worshipping communally in both a morning service and evening service, with the purpose of reading the Scriptures and celebrating the Eucharist.[20] Throughout the rest of the week, Christians assembled at the church every day for morning prayer (which became known as lauds) and evening prayer (which became known as vespers), while praying at the other fixed prayer times privately; Christian monastics came to gather together to corporately pray all of the seven canonical hours communally.[21][22][23]
In addition to being based upon the spirit of the Ten Commandments (which includes the injunction to "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy"), the importance of church attendance in Christian theology is delineated in Hebrews 10:25, which implores the believers: "Let us not neglect our church meetings, as some people do, but encourage and warn each other, especially now that the day of his coming back again is drawing near."[8][9] Among Sunday Sabbatarians (First-day Sabbatarians), observance of the Lord's Day often takes the form of attending the Sunday morning service of worship, receiving catechesis through Sunday School, performing acts of mercy (such as evangelism, visiting prisoners in jails and seeing the sick at hospitals), and attending the Sunday evening service of worship, as well as refraining from Sunday shopping, servile work, playing sports, viewing the television, and dining at restaurants.[24][19][25]
The majority of Christian denominations hold church services on the Lord's Day (with many offering Sunday morning and Sunday evening services); a number of traditions have mid-week Wednesday evening services as well.[A][26] In some Christian denominations, church services are held daily, with these including those in which the canonical hours are prayed, as well as the offering of the Mass, among other forms of worship.[27] In addition to this, many Christians attend services of worship on holy days such as Christmas, Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, Ascension Thursday, among others depending on the Christian denomination.[28]
Statistics
[edit]
The Gallup International, a self-reporting survey conducted via telephone, indicates that 37% of Americans report that they attend religious services weekly or near-weekly in 2013.[15] Self-reporting surveys conducted online indicate substantially lower weekly attendance rates,[30] and methods of measurement that do not rely on self-reporting estimate even lower rates; for instance, a 2005 study published in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion found that just 22% of Americans attend services weekly.[31] This compares to other countries' claims such as 15% of French citizens, 10% of British citizens,[32] 8.8% of Australian citizens and 5.6% of Dutch citizens.[33] In the U.K., in 2011, an average once-a-week attendance in Anglican churches went down by 0.3% compared with 2012, thus exhibiting a stabilizing trend.[34] Previously, starting from 2000, an average rate of weekly church attendance in Britain was dropping down 1% annually. In 2013, the Pew Research Center reported that 37% of all Americans attended church on a weekly basis.[35] In its turn, Gallup estimated the once-a-week church attendance of the Americans in 2013 as 39%.[36]
Based on 1990–1991 data, it was estimated that the country with the highest rate of church attendance in the world was Nigeria (89%) and with the lowest – the Soviet Union (2%).[37] Nigeria's data was notable, as Nigeria is very religiously diverse – the population is 50.1% Muslim and 48.2% Christian. The state authorities in the USSR, which dissolved in 1991, discouraged church construction; they had a hostile relationship with traditional organized religions and instead promoted Marxist-Leninist ideology, which espoused state atheism.[38][39] A survey commissioned by the Época Magazine in 2005 showed that 29% of Brazilians attend church weekly, and indicated that it is lesser than in the United States but higher than in Western Europe and Japan, indeed showing that contrary to the local popular belief, Brazilians of the time could indeed be regarded as a religious people even in practice (though it is ponderable that the growth of the population declaring to be solely irreligious in nationwide censuses grew about 100% between 2000 and 2010, and 200% between 2000 and 2013, from 4% to 12%, and general secularization also grew among the portion of the population that remained religious).[40]
A 2006 Financial Times (FT)/Harris Poll conducted online surveyed 12,507 adults over 16 years old in the United States (2,010 U.S. adults were surveyed) and five European countries (France, Italy, Germany, Great Britain and Spain). The survey found that only 26% of those polled attended religious services "every week or more often", 9% went "once or twice a month", 21% went "a few times a year", 3% went "once a year", 22% went "less than once a year", and 18% never attend religious services. Harris Interactive stated that the magnitude of errors cannot be estimated due to sampling errors and non-response bias.[41] A previous nearly identical survey by Harris in 2003 found that only 26% of those surveyed attended religious services "every week or more often", 11% went "once or twice a month" 19% went "a few times a year", 4% went "once a year", 16% went "less than once a year", and 25% never attend religious services.
Calculating the church's average weekend attendance is important since it determines the size of a given church. For example, in the U.S., an average weekend attendance of more than 2,000 people separates a mega church from a large church, and an average weekend attendance between 51 and 300 people defines the large church; while a small church is the church with an attendance lower than 50 people.[42] (Alternative definitions, such as house church, simple church, intentional community, were proposed by the Barna Group, an American private consulting firm).[43] A narrow definition of a regular church attendee can be viewed as a synonym for a Sunday service visitation, while a broad definition, names as a regular attendee a person who comes to church during three out of eight weekends.[44]
Attendance by country
[edit]
The frequency with which Christians attend church services varies greatly around the world. In some countries weekly attendance at religious services is common among Christians, while in others weekly attendance is rare. The following attendance statistics are mostly based on self-reporting surveys and may not accurately reflect real attendance figures.
The following church attendance statistics are taken from the 2004 Gallup report, based on self-reporting telephone surveys. However, it is unclear whether the survey was solely of Christians in the respective country or the entire population (including non-Christians).
| Country | Year | Attendance (%) |
|---|---|---|
| Austria | 2004 | 18%[69] |
| Cyprus | 2004 | 22%[69] |
| Denmark | 2004 | 3%[69] |
| Czech Republic | 2004 | 11%[69] |
| Estonia | 2004 | 4%[69] |
| Finland | 2004 | 5%[69] |
| Greece | 2004 | 27%[69] |
| Hungary | 2004 | 12%[69] |
| Ireland | 2004 | 54%[69] |
| Italy | 2004 | 31%[69] |
| Latvia | 2004 | 7%[69] |
| Lithuania | 2004 | 14%[69] |
| Malta | 2004 | 74%[69] |
| Norway | 2002 | 3%[70] |
| Poland | 2004 | 63%[69] |
| Portugal | 2004 | 29%[69] |
| Slovakia | 2004 | 33%[69] |
| Slovenia | 2004 | 18%[69] |
| Spain | 2004 | 21%[69] |
| Sweden | 2004 | 5%[69] |
A study by the European Social Survey conducted in 2008 found these rates of respondents never attending religious service (excluding special occasions):[71]
| Percentage | Countries |
|---|---|
| <10% | Cyprus, Greece, Poland, Bosnia-Herzegovina |
| 10–20% | Croatia, Italy, Ukraine |
| 20–30% | Turkey, Portugal, Russia |
| 30–40% | Estonia, Germany, Sweden |
| 40–50% | Israel, Spain, Netherlands |
| 50–60% | Belgium, United Kingdom, France |
| >60% | Czech Republic |
Attendance by U.S. state
[edit]The frequency by which adults attend church services also vary on a state-by-state basis in the United States.
Demographics
[edit]
The Pew Research Center studied the effects of gender on religiosity throughout the world, finding that women are generally more religious than men, yet the gender gap is greater for Christians than Muslims. Pew Research Center data in 53 countries, found that 53% of Christian women and 46% of Christian men say they attend services at least once a week. While Christians of both genders in African countries are equally likely to regularly attend services.[73]
Church attendance remains stronger among older demographics, and more common for women in the West.[74][75][76] There is evidence that links church attendance with health benefits. The Pew Research Center, which conducts the extensive research and information program Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, has linked regular church attendance with happiness.[77] Several studies associated church attendance with decreased risk of Alzheimer's disease.[78] Research by Rita W. Law and David A. Sbarra demonstrated that "church attendance was found to have a protective effect against the emergence of mood problems among older adults."[79] Graham et al. discovered that "consistent pattern of lower systolic and diastolic blood pressures among frequent church attenders was found compared to that of infrequent attenders which was not due to the effects of age, obesity, cigarette smoking, or socioeconomic status."[80] Oman D et al. found that "infrequent (never or less than weekly) attenders had significantly higher rates of circulatory, cancer, digestive, and respiratory mortality (p < 0.05), but not mortality due to external causes."[81] With respect to students, Glanville et al. found "that religious attendance promotes higher intergenerational closure, friendship networks with higher educational resources and norms, and extracurricular participation."[82] Research conducted at the Harvard School of Public Health found "that regularly attending church services together reduces a couple’s risk of divorce by 47 percent".[83]
A 2018 sociological survey found that in the United States, "Donald Trump voters who attend church regularly are more likely than nonreligious Trump voters to have warmer feelings toward racial and religious minorities, to be more supportive of immigration and trade, and to be more concerned about poverty."[84][85] A 2005 European Union survey found that religious belief increased with age and was higher among women, those who were leaning towards right-wing politics, and those reflecting more upon philosophical and ethical issues.[86] In particular, the Iona Institute documented increasing church attendance in Ireland, despite sex-abuse scandals that plagued the Catholic Church.[87] Some suggest[who?] the rise is due to the effects of the economic recession.
Research shows that there is a correlation between church attendance and the level of education. For instance, in a Pew Research study from 1996, approximately 34% of high school dropouts went to church on a typical Sunday, while 44% of those with a college degree or higher did.[88] 48% of married individuals attended church on a typical Sunday, compared with 29% of divorced and 31% of never-married individuals. While it is likely that the well-educated and married might over-report their church attendance more often, these findings nevertheless demonstrate that they have maintained a stronger church-going identity than other Americans. In the United Kingdom, research in 2018 demonstrated that "Students at Oxford, Cambridge and Durham are twice as likely to worship on a Sunday as the general population"—colleges at these universities maintain approximately fifty-six chapels for worship.[89]
According to a 2017 study by the Pew Research Center, overall, American Christians are more likely to have college degrees than the general population.[90] The study found that highly educated Christians in the United States are more likely to attend church than those with lower education levels.[90] On a scale measuring levels of religious commitment, over 70% of Christians in the United States who are educated demonstrate high levels of religiosity.[90]
Influence of parents
[edit]Several research studies in the USA and Europe found that church attendance practices of parents, especially fathers, can be highly influential in forming the future church attendance practices of their children.
In Switzerland, the Fertility and Family Survey was commissioned by the Federal Statistical Office (Switzerland) to enable Switzerland to take part in this international project launched by the UNECE Population Activities Unit. The survey was conducted between October 1994 and May 1995, with the results being published in 2000 by the Council of Europe. The results are representative of Switzerland's permanent resident population aged 20–49 and presented in the table below.[91]
Practice of religion according to practice of parents (%)
| Practice of parents | Practice of children | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Father | Mother | Regular | Irregular | Non-practicing |
| Regular | Regular | 32.8 | 41.4 | 25.8 |
| Regular | Irregular | 37.7 | 37.6 | 24.7 |
| Regular | Non-practicing | 44.2 | 22.4 | 33.4 |
| Irregular | Regular | 3.4 | 58.6 | 38.0 |
| Irregular | Irregular | 7.8 | 60.8 | 31.4 |
| Irregular | Non-practicing | 25.4 | 22.8 | 51.8 |
| Non-practicing | Regular | 1.5 | 37.4 | 61.1 |
| Non-practicing | Irregular | 2.3 | 37.8 | 59.9 |
| Non-practicing | Non-practicing | 4.6 | 14.7 | 80.7 |
A non-practicing mother with a regular father will see a minimum of two-thirds of her children ending up at church. In contrast, a non-practicing father with a regular mother will see two-thirds of his children not attending church. If his wife is similarly non-practicing that figure rises to 80 percent.[92][93]
An American study found similar results on the impact of fathers:[94]
- When both parents attend Sunday school, 72% of the children attend Sunday school when grown.
- When only the father attends Sunday school, 55% of the children attend when grown.
- When only the mother attends Sunday school, 15% of the children attend when grown.
- When neither parent attends Sunday school, only 6% of the children attend when grown.
Invitations
[edit]Research on individuals residing in the United States and Canada concluded that "Ninety-six percent of the unchurched are at least somewhat likely to attend church if they are invited."[95] In July 2018, LifeWay Research found that "Nearly two-thirds of Protestant churchgoers say they’ve invited at least one person to visit their church in the past six months".[96]
Trends
[edit]
Church attendance in advanced industrial societies is in gradual general decline with people shifting from weekly to monthly or holiday attendance. Sociologists have attributed this trend to a number of reasons, starting from a simple boredom during services and lack of motivation, to generational incompatibility of belief systems and social changes attributed to modernity.[97] Research across 65 different nations showed that out of 20 advanced industrial countries, 16 demonstrated a declining rate of monthly church attendance.[98]
An article published in the Christianity Today Magazine in 2007 suggested that in America, church attendance since the 1990s had remained stable.[99]
The percent of Americans who regularly attend religious services has fluctuated over time, but presently is at a low point.[100] In Gallup Poll surveys, the yearly aggregate of those who answer "yes" to the question "Did you, yourself, happen to attend church or synagogue in the last seven days, or not?" was 36% in 2014, 2015, and 2016.[101] This is a very long-running Gallup question: "In 1939, when Gallup first asked this question, 41% said 'yes.' That percentage dropped to 37% in 1940 and rose to 39% in 1950. It continued to climb, reaching as high as 49% at multiple points in the 1950s. Attendance then settled down to figures around 40% for decades, before dropping to 36%" beginning in 2014.[100]
The decline in church attendance is more pronounced in developed European countries, where it is suggested that the secular culture overrides interest in religion. In Poland, church attendance has declined from more than 50% in 1979 to 40% in 2012.[102]
Disparity between self reported and actual attendance
[edit]In the early 1990s, American sociologists Kirk Hadaway, Penny Marler, and Mark Chaves found that weekly attendance at Protestant and Catholic churches in one rural county in Ohio was only about 20%, whereas self-reported church attendance was 36%.[103] The following studies confirmed a long-suspected gap between actual and self-reporting church attendance.[104][105] The researchers have been wary of accusing over-reporters of dishonesty, as they found in the study that those who over-report do so mainly to maintain perceptions of themselves as "churched" Americans, not because they are afraid to reveal to the interviewer that they are "bad Christians."[106] The findings point to a bigger issue as many people in the world may be over-reporting church attendance because of their self-perception and identity as churchgoing people, indicating a certain psychological aspect to the over-reporting of church attendance. Although surveys of church attendance are aimed to study religious behavior, many respondents view them as questions about their identity. This is especially true among Americans who consider themselves "regular churchgoers."[107][108]
See also
[edit]- Christian Church
- Christian denomination
- Church membership
- Church service
- Service of worship
- Jumu'ah (Muslim weekly congregation for prayer)
- Shabbat (Jewish weekly day of rest)
References
[edit]Notes
[edit]- ^ The majority of Christian denominations teach that Sunday is the Lord's Day on which all the faithful must assemble to offer worship to God (cf. first-day Sabbatarianism). A minority of Christian denominations that follow seventh-day Sabbatarianism organize worship on Saturdays.[24]
Citations
[edit]- ^ Jespersen, Knud J. V. (21 June 2011). A History of Denmark. Macmillan International Higher Education. p. 91. ISBN 9780230344174.
It is quite normal to go to church on Christmas Eve, and many people like to celebrate a christening or wedding in church. The Church is especially important at the end of a life; by far the majority of funerals are still conducted in a church by a minister.
- ^ Nelson, Matt (1 September 2022). "Even in Summer, You Must Go to Sunday Mass". Catholic Answers. Retrieved 7 October 2024.
- ^ Wigley, John (1980). The Rise and Fall of the Victorian Sunday. Manchester University Press. p. 800. ISBN 9780719007941.
Following the formulation of the Westminster Confession, fully fledged Sabbatarianism quickly took root too, being embodied in an Act of 1661, then spreading northwards and westwards as the Highlands were opened up after the '46, during which time the doctrine lost its original force and vigour in the Lowlands.
- ^ Abraham, William J.; Kirby, James E. (24 September 2009). The Oxford Handbook of Methodist Studies. OUP Oxford. p. 253. ISBN 9780191607431.
- ^ Roos, Merethe (2013-03-08). Enlightened Preaching: Balthasar Münter's Authorship 1772-1793. Brill Academic Publishers. p. 99. ISBN 9789004249899.
- ^ Day, Cathy (26 September 2014). Wiltshire Marriage Patterns 1754-1914: Geographical Mobility, Cousin Marriage and Illegitimacy. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. p. 198. ISBN 9781443867924.
Attendance at an Anglican church service at least twice a year was a legal requirement for all people until 1791 and some parishioners endured the minimum church attendance requirement in order to avoid a fine.
- ^ McKim, Donald K. (2011). More Presbyterian Questions, More Presbyterian Answers: Exploring Christian Faith. Westminster John Knox Press. p. 72. ISBN 9780664503086.
The Westminster Confession urges a strict observance of the Lord's Day as a day of rest and worship, away from "works, words, and thoughts" about "worldly employments and recreations." The whole time is to be devoted to "public and private exercises of [God's) worship, and in duties of necessity and mercy" (BC 6.119). In the United States, many "blue laws" relating to Sunday originated from this general prescription observed by American Puritans of the Reformed tradition.
- ^ a b O’Hare, Terrence D. (1 December 2011). The Sabbath Complete: And the Ascendency of First-Day Worship. Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 228-229. ISBN 978-1-62189-134-5.
- ^ a b Brattston, David W. T. (2014). Traditional Christian Ethics 4. WestBow Press. p. 33. ISBN 978-1-4908-0205-3.
- ^ Richardson, John R. (1966). Christian Economics: Studies in the Christian Message to the Market Place. St. Thomas Press. p. 91.
- ^ "On Avoiding Church Services". ww1.antiochian.org. Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America. 8 February 2017.
- ^ a b Christianity and church attendance
- ^ Mitchell, Travis (2018-06-13). "3. How religious commitment varies by country among people of all ages". Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project. Retrieved 2022-12-26.
- ^ "The world's most committed Christians live in Africa, Latin America – and the U.S." Pew Research Center. 22 August 2018.
- ^ a b "Religion: Gallup Historical Trends". www.gallup.com. Gallup, Inc. 8 June 2007. Retrieved 29 August 2015.
- ^ Kuriakose, Noble (18 April 2014). "When Easter and Christmas near, more Americans search online for "church"". Pew Research Center. Retrieved 27 December 2016.
- ^ Stetzer, Ed (14 December 2015). "What Is Church Attendance Like During Christmastime? New Data From LifeWay Research". Christianity Today. Retrieved 27 December 2016.
- ^ Athena Magazine, Issues 41-55. International Studies Association. 1991. p. 86.
It has also shrunk through the trial, 'as by fire', of decades of totalitarian state atheism, in which simply to profess the Christian Faith automatically ranked one as a dissident and church attendance was not infrequently the first step towards martyrdom.
- ^ a b c d e f "Why an Evening Worship Service?". Christ United Reformed Church. 8 December 2010. Retrieved 6 October 2020.
- ^ Bradshaw, Paul F. (1 October 2008). Daily Prayer in the Early Church: A Study of the Origin and Early Development of the Divine Office. Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 42. ISBN 978-1-60608-105-1.
- ^ González, Justo L. (30 June 2020). Teach Us to Pray: The Lord's Prayer in the Early Church and Today. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4674-5958-7.
These words make it clear that Hippolytus is dealing both with prayers that are to take place at home or during the day's business and with the prayers and times of study that take place in the community of the church. The prayers upon rising, on the third hour either at home or away from it, and before going to bed at night are sometimes held in private and sometimes in the company of other believers in the same household. But Hippolytus refers to other gatherings which offer, besides prayer, an opportunity for instruction and inspiration. Thus, we see here the beginning of the practice of setting aside certain times for private prayer as well as others for communal prayer.
- ^ Bercot, David W. (28 December 2021). Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs: A Reference Guide to More Than 700 Topics Discussed by the Early Church Fathers. Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. ISBN 978-1-61970-168-7.
Morning and Evening Prayer were liturgical services held each day at the local church, during which psalms were sung and prayers were offered to God.
- ^ Beckwith, Roger T. (2005). Calendar, Chronology And Worship: Studies in Ancient Judaism And Early Christianity. Brill Academic Publishers. p. 193. ISBN 978-90-04-14603-7.
- ^ a b Hughes, James R. (2006). "The Sabbath: A Universal and Enduring Ordinance of God" (PDF). Evangelical Presbyterian Church. Archived from the original (PDF) on 9 October 2020. Retrieved 6 October 2020.
- ^ Jones, M. (12 June 2015). "Organized Sports on Sundays?". Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals. Retrieved 6 October 2020.
- ^ The Korean Repository, Volume 3. Trilingual Press. 21 August 1896. p. 361.
The Sunday morning service has been well attended, as have also the Sunday evening and Wednesday evening services.
- ^ "Times of Worship". Saint Paul's Free Methodist Church. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
- ^ Morgan, Bonnie (19 December 2019). Ordinary Saints: Women, Work, and Faith in Newfoundland. McGill-Queen's Press. ISBN 978-0-2280-0028-0.
Starting with Shrove Tuesday (locally known as Pancake Day), and proceeding through Ash Wednesday to Good Friday, families increased their church attendance and, especially, engaged in the embodies practices of fasting and/or "giving up something for Lent."
- ^ The Living Church, Volume 138. Morehouse-Gorham Company. 1959. p. 221.
Case after case was noted where parish church attendance had doubled, tripled, and in some cases, quadrupled at all services on Ash Wednesday. As the weeks of Lent rolled along, reports continued to come in mentioning that attendance at all services during Lent was far greater than at any other period during many of the churches' histories.
- ^ Grossman, Cathy Lynn (2014-05-17). "Poll: Americans stretch the truth on attending church". Religion News Service. Religion News LLC. Retrieved 29 August 2015.
- ^ Hadaway, C. Kirk; Marler, Penny Long (2005). "How Many Americans Attend Worship Each Week? An Alternative Approach to Measurement". Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 44 (3): 307–22. doi:10.1111/j.1468-5906.2005.00288.x. JSTOR 3590599.
- ^ One in 10 attends church weekly BBC News.
- ^ NCLS releases latest estimates of church attendance. National Church Life Survey, Media release.
- ^ Baker, David. New church attendance figures – do the numbers add up? Comment, 16 May 2013.
- ^ Lipka, Michael. What surveys say about worship attendance – and why some stay home. Pewresearch.org, September 13, 2013.
- ^ Church Attendance Today Similar to 1940s Archived 2014-01-22 at the Wayback Machine. Gallup, January 19, 2014.
- ^ How many people outside of North America go regularly to religious services?
- ^ Bourdeaux, Michael (2002). Eastern Europe, Russia and Central Asia 2003. Taylor & Francis. p. 46. ISBN 9781857431377.
The experiment forcibly to impose gosateizm (state atheism) in the USSR lasted just 70 years. Until Lenin--Vladimir Ilych Ulyanov's first Decree on the Separation of Church and State of January 1918, no government in history had sought to enforce a system that rejected all forms of religion.
- ^ Brugger, Winfried (2007). "On the Relationship between Structural Norms and Constitutional Rights in Church-State-Relations". In Brugger, Winfried; Karayanni, Michael (eds.). Religion in the Public Sphere: A Comparative Analysis of German, Israeli, American and International Law. Beiträge zum ausländischen öffentlichen Recht und Völkerrecht. Vol. 190. pp. 21–86. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-73357-7_2. ISBN 978-3-540-73355-3.
- ^ Época – O brasileiro em números (in Portuguese) Archived 2013-10-29 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Religious Views and Beliefs Vary Greatly by Country, According to the Latest Financial Times/Harris Poll". Harrisinteractive.com. 2006-12-20. Archived from the original on 2012-05-23. Retrieved 2012-03-17.
- ^ Church Sizes. USA Churches.org. Accessed on January 19, 2014.
- ^ New Statistics on Church Attendance and Avoidance Archived 2014-01-20 at archive.today. Barna Group, March 3, 2008.
- ^ Barnes, Rebecca and Lindy Lowry. 7 Startling Facts: An Up Close Look at Church Attendance in America. Churchleaders.com. Accessed on 19 January 2014.
- ^ Bilangan Research Center. "Gereja Sudah Tidak Menarik Bagi Kaum Muda". Bilangan Research Center (in Indonesian). Retrieved 2018-10-30.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r "Tolerance and Tension: Christianity and Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 April 2018. Retrieved 9 February 2017.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r "Archived copy" (PDF). www.pewforum.org. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 January 2016. Retrieved 15 January 2022.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ "Missions to East Asia's People". omf.org. Retrieved 12 April 2020.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Religious Belief and National Belonging in Central and Eastern Europe". pewforum.org. Pew Research Center. May 10, 2017.
- ^ "World's most committed Christians live in Africa, Latin America, U.S."
- ^ Israel’s Religiously Divided Society
- ^ "In Italy, views of Church from the papers and the pews seem very different".
- ^ The Independent |Census finds increasingly aging church-going population; only 36.1% of Catholics attend Mass
- ^ "Caucasus Barometer 2017 Armenia".
- ^ "After Francis: what's the future for the church in Ireland?". RTE. 23 August 2018. Retrieved 2 October 2019.
- ^ "Notes on International Mass Attendance". georgetown.edu. Retrieved 2020-04-12.
- ^ "Religious Belief and National Belonging in Central and Easter Europe" (PDF). pewresearch.org. Retrieved 12 April 2020.[page needed]
- ^ Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas (Centre for Sociological Research) (October 2019). "Macrobarómetro de octubre 2019, Banco de datos - Document 'Población con derecho a voto en elecciones generales y residente en España, nacional (con Ceuta y Melilla)" (PDF) (in Spanish). p. 77. Retrieved 4 February 2020. The question was "¿Cómo se define Ud. en materia religiosa: católico/a practicante, católico/a no practicante, creyente de otra religión, agnóstico/a, indiferente o no creyente, o ateo/a?", the weight used was "PESOCCAA" which reflects the population sizes of the Autonomous communities of Spain.
- ^ "Missas dominicais perderam 23 mil fiéis desde 2001".
- ^ Mallimac, Fortunato; Giménez Béliveau, Verónica; Esquivel, Juan Cruz; Irrazábal, Gabriela (2019). "Sociedad y Religión en Movimiento. Segunda Encuesta Nacional sobre Creencias y Actitudes Religiosas en la Argentina" (PDF) (in Spanish). Centro de Estudios e Investigaciones Laborales (CEIL). CONICET. ISSN 1515-7466. Retrieved November 19, 2019.
- ^ "Church attendance in decline". cbs.nl. 23 December 2013. Retrieved 12 April 2020.
- ^ "Who Turns Off the Lights by 2050?: Evangelical Affiliation Dropping in Canada". Fellowship.ca. June 29, 2020. Retrieved November 1, 2023.
- ^ "Частота посещения религиозных служб" [Religious service attendance]. Sreda (in Russian). 27 August 2013.
- ^ Willander, Erika. "The Religious Landscape of Sweden" (PDF). www.myndighetensst.se. p. 27. Retrieved 17 May 2020.
- ^ "Christianity in the UK - Measuring the Christian population in the UK". Faith Survey. Retrieved 15 May 2022.
- ^ "Hvor mange aktive kristne finnes i Norge?" [How many active Christians are there in Norway?]. idag.no (in Norwegian). 5 December 2004. Archived from " the original on 24 July 2011.
- ^ "Comunidades de Fe en Cuba: Primera parte de la serie de fondo de WOLA sobre la religión en Cuba" [Communities of Faith in Cuba: First part of WOLA's background series on religion in Cuba]. wola.org (in Spanish). 26 March 2012. Retrieved 11 April 2020.
- ^ Rasmusse, Morten (10 June 2008). "Kun 2,4 procent går i kirke hver uge" [Only 2.4 percent attend church each week]. kristeligt-dagblad.dk (in Danish). Retrieved 12 April 2020.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Religion in Europe: Trust Not Filling the Pews, Gallup, September 21, 2004.
- ^ Norway: Church attendance.
- ^ In which European countries are people least likely to attend religious services? The Economist, August 9, 2010. Based on a European Social Survey.
- ^ "Religion in America: U.S. Religious Data, Demographics and Statistics".
- ^ "The Gender Gap in Religion Around the World". Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project. 2016-03-22. Retrieved 2020-09-17.
- ^ Gender profile of church attenders. 2013 NCLS Research.
- ^ Attender Demographics. 2013 NCLS Research.
- ^ "Young Americans more loyal to religion than Boomers". Reuters. 2010-08-06.
- ^ How Income and Church Attendance Affects Happiness. Pewsocialtrends.org, November 3, 2010.
- ^ Church attendance helps combat depression study finds, The Church of England Newspaper, May 28, 2010 p. 7.
- ^ Law, R. W.; Sbarra, D. A. (2009). "The Effects of Church Attendance and Marital Status on the Longitudinal Trajectories of Depressed Mood Among Older Adults". Journal of Aging and Health. 21 (6): 803–23. doi:10.1177/0898264309338300. PMID 19535821. S2CID 24049609.
- ^ Graham, T. W.; Kaplan, B. H.; Cornoni-Huntley, J. C.; James, S. A.; Becker, C; Hames, C. G.; Heyden, S (1978). "Frequency of church attendance and blood pressure elevation". Journal of Behavioral Medicine. 1 (1): 37–43. doi:10.1007/bf00846585. PMID 556112. S2CID 9777385.
- ^ Oman, D; Kurata, J. H.; Strawbridge, W. J.; Cohen, R. D. (2002). "Religious attendance and cause of death over 31 years". International Journal of Psychiatry in Medicine. 32 (1): 69–89. doi:10.2190/rjy7-crr1-hcw5-xveg. PMID 12075917. S2CID 12521030.
- ^ Glanville, Jennifer L.; Sikkink, David; Hernández, Edwin I. (2008). "Religious involvement and educational outcomes: The role of social capital and extracurricular participation". Sociological Quarterly. 49 (1): 105–37. doi:10.1111/j.1533-8525.2007.00108.x. JSTOR 40220059. S2CID 143311606.
- ^ Stanton, Glenn (22 March 2018). "Does Faith Reduce Divorce Risk?". The Witherspoon Institute. Retrieved 1 April 2018.
Most recently, research conducted at Harvard's School of Public Health reveals that regularly attending church services together reduces a couple's risk of divorce by a remarkable 47 percent. Many studies, they report, have similar results ranging from 30 to 50 percent reduction in divorce risk. Happily, this holds largely true for white, black, Asian and Latino couples.
- ^ Ekins, Emily (5 February 2019). "Religious Trump Voters: How Faith Moderates Attitudes about Immigration, Race, and Identity". Cato Institute. Retrieved 21 February 2020.
- ^ Ekins, Emily (24 September 2018). "How Faith Moderates Attitudes About Immigration, Race, Identity". RealClearReligion.
- ^ "Eurobarometer 225: Social values, Science & Technology" (PDF). Eurostat. 2005. Retrieved 2007-07-21.
- ^ Press Release by the Iona Institute, 2 November 2009.
- ^ Religion and Politics Survey, 1996. The Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA). Accessed on 19 January 2014.
- ^ Burgess, Kaya (28 March 2018). "Holier than thou: students most likely to attend church". The Times.
- ^ a b c "In America, Does More Education Equal Less Religion?" (PDF). Pew Research Center.
- ^ Werner Haug; Philippe Wanner (January 2000). "IV. The demographic characteristics of linguistic and religious groups in Switzerland". The Demographic Characteristics of National Minorities in Certain European States. Population Studies No. 31. Vol. 2. Germany: Council of Europe. p. 154. ISBN 978-92-871-4159-0. Retrieved 12 November 2013.
- ^ Low, Robbie (June 2003). "The Truth About Men & Church". Touchstone. 16 (5). The Fellowship of St. James. Retrieved 2013-12-01.
- ^ Egan, Richard (September 2002). "Church Attendance: The family, feminism and the declining role of fatherhood". AD2000. 15 (8). Archived from the original on 2016-12-30. Retrieved 2016-12-30.
- ^ Bruce, Robert; Bruce, Debra Fulghum (1996). Becoming Spiritual Soulmates With Your Child. Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers. p. 52. ISBN 978-0-8054-6269-2.
- ^ Rainer, Thomas. "Ten Surprises About the Unchurched". Christianity Today.
- ^ Smietana, Bob (12 July 2018). "Two-Thirds of Churchgoers Have Invited Someone to Church". LifeWay Research.
- ^ Why People Don't Go to Church... . Accessed through Internet Archives on 19 January 2014.
- ^ Inglehart, Ronald; Baker, Wayne E. (2000). "Modernization, Cultural Change, and the Persistence of Traditional Values" (PDF). American Sociological Review. 65 (1): 19–51. doi:10.2307/2657288. JSTOR 2657288. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2010-07-14. Retrieved 2014-01-20.
- ^ Hunter Baker. Is Church Attendance Declining?, 11 August 2007.
- ^ a b Frank Newport, Five Key Findings on Religion in the US, Gallup Poll (December 23, 2017).
- ^ Religion, Gallup Poll (last accessed May 12, 2017).
- ^ "Praktyki niedzielne Polaków (dominicantes)". iskk.pl. Archived from the original on 2015-12-22. Retrieved 2015-12-21.
- ^ Hadaway, C. Kirk; Marler, Penny Long; Chaves, Mark (December 1993). "What the polls don't show: A closer look at U.S. church attendance" (PDF). American Sociological Review. 58 (6): 741–52. doi:10.2307/2095948. JSTOR 2095948.
- ^ Hadaway, C. Kirk; Marler, Penny Long (May 6, 1998). "Did You Really Go To Church This Week? Behind the Poll Data". The Christian Century. 115 (14): 472–5. Archived from the original on April 16, 2012. Retrieved January 19, 2014.
- ^ Hadaway, C. Kirk; Marler, Penny Long; Chaves, Mark (February 1998). "Overreporting church attendance in America: Evidence that demands the same verdict" (PDF). American Sociological Review. 63 (1): 122–30. doi:10.2307/2657484. JSTOR 2657484.
- ^ Marler, Penny Long; Hadaway, C. Kirk (1999). "Testing the Attendance Gap in a Conservative Church". Sociology of Religion. 60 (2): 175–86. doi:10.2307/3711747. JSTOR 3711747.
- ^ The Church Attendance Gap: A look at two older studies whose findings should be taken more seriously Archived 2013-11-30 at the Wayback Machine. Hartford Institutes for Religious Research News and Notes, Vol. IV, No. 1.
- ^ Pew Research: Religious Landscape Survey.[dead link][full citation needed]