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Largest Religious Groups in the United States of America

By Preston D. Hunter, Adherents.com
Last updated 2 April 1999

Many people have written to us at Adherents.com asking what are the major religions or churches in just the United States. All of our data is, of course, available on this web site in the main Adherents.com listings (listed by name and by location). For most places it is fairly simple to look up an individual country, state or province in the Location Index. There the user will usually find between 15 to 100 adherent statistics, which provide a good idea of what the major religions are for that place.

But the United States has a greater number of religious groups than any other country in the world, and Adherents.com has literally thousands of adherent statistics for the U.S. This page provides some summary lists of the largest religious groups in the United States:

Unlike some countries, the United States does not include a question about religion in its census, and has not done so for over fifty years. Religious adherent statistics in the U.S. are obtained from surveys and organizational reporting.

The largest, most comprehensive survey on religious identification was done in 1990: the National Survey of Religious Identification (NSRI), conducted by the Graduate School of the City University of New York (led by Barry A. Kosmin and Seymour P. Lachman). This scientific nationwide survey of 113,000 Americans asked about religious preference, along with other questions. The following two tables come from the NSRI data.

Ten Largest Religions in the United States

(self-identification, 1990)

Religion Estimated
Adult Pop.		 Estimated
% of Adult Pop.
Christianity 151,225,000 86.2%
Nonreligious 13,116,000 7.5%
Judaism 3,137,000 1.8%
Agnostic 1,186,000 0.7%
Islam 527,000 * 0.5%
Unitarian Universalist 502,000 0.3%
Buddhism 401,000 * 0.4%
Hinduism 227,000 * 0.2%
Native American
Religion		 47,000 --
Scientologist 45,000 --

* Islam, Buddhist, Hindu: Adjusted up for possible undercount.

The NSRI identified broad denominational loyalty as well, as shown in the table below. (Except possibly for Jews, who are grouped here as a single denominational family although they are divided into distinct branches, all the largest denominations in the United States are Christian. According to the NSRI, America's third largest major religion -- Islam -- is smaller than about fifteen of the country's largest Christian denominations.)

Largest denominations/denominational families in U.S.

(self-identification, 1990)

Religious Denomination Estimated
Adult Pop.		 Estimated
% of Adult Pop.
Catholic 46,004,000 26.2%
Baptist 33,964,000 19.4%
Methodist 14,116,000 8.0%
Lutheran 9,110,000 5.2%
Presbyterian 4,985,000 2.8%
Jewish 3,137,000 1.8%
Pentecostal 3,116,000 1.8%
Episcopalian 3,042,000 1.7%
Latter-day Saints
(Mormon)		 2,487,000 1.4%
Churches of Christ 1,608,000 1.0%
Jehovah's Witnesses 1,381,000 0.8%

Each year the annual Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches publishes information on North America's largest religious bodies. The membership counts published in this work are primarily based on organizational reporting. The Yearbook's data are used in U.S. Government publications and various almanacs. Below are the largest U.S. religious bodies (distinct churches) according the 1997 Yearbook:

Ten Largest Religious Bodies in the United States (1997)

Religious Body Membership
Roman Catholic Church 60,280,454
Southern Baptist Convention 15,663,296
United Methodist Church 8,538,662
Church of God in Christ 5,449,875
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America 5,190,489
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
(Mormon)		 4,711,500
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) 3,669,489
African Methodist Episcopal Church 3,500,000
National Baptist Convention of America 3,500,000
Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod 2,594,555
NOTES:
The Southern Baptist Convention was formed in 1845 when it split from Northern Baptists because of Nothern Baptists' anti-slavery stance.

Since 1979 the SBC has been split internally between Moderate and Conservative (also called "Fundamentalist" or "Inerrant") parties. With a slightly higher number of delegates and, more importantly, greater political unity amongst themselves, the Conservatives have maintained control of the convention. In response, moderates have formed multiple sub-groups. The SBC places great emphasis on congregational polity and autonomy, and prefers to not be called a "denomination."

For 1998 the SBC reported a decline of 1.02%, or 162,158 members, giving the denomination a world total of 15,729,356 people (almost all in the U.S.). The SBC reported weekly attendance averaging 5,398,692 for 1998.

The United Methodist Church was formed in 1968 by a merger of the Methodist Church, the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, and The Evangelical Association.

The Church of God in Christ is a Pentecostal body and perhaps the nation's largest black denomination. It was formed in 1897 by C. H. Mason, who severed ties with Baptists.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America was formed in Columbus, Ohio, April 30-May 3, 1987 by a merger of three Lutheran bodies: the Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches (AELC), the Lutheran Church in America (LCA) and The American Lutheran Church (ALC). These bodies had been formed by previous mergers during the 1960s and 70s.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized in 1830 in Fayette, New York.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was "formed in 1983 as a result of reunion between the Presbyterian Church in the U.S. (PCUS), the so-called 'southern branch,' and the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. (UPCUSA), the so-called 'northern branch.'" [Source: PCUSA official web site]

The African Methodist Episcopal Church is the second largest Methodist body in the United States. It was formed in 1787 by black Methodists withdrawing from the white-led Methodist Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, in protest against practices of discrimination.

The National Baptist Convention of America is a different group from the National Baptist Convention, U.S.A., Inc., and is sometimes referred to as the "unincorporated" National Baptist Convention. It formed in 1915 when it split off from the National Baptist Convention, U.S.A. over a disagreement about ownership of the convention's publishing house.

The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod was recognized in 1847 under the name German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States.

Other groups:
Many books have published membership totals for the National Baptist Convention, U.S.A., Inc. which indicate a membership of 8.5 million, which would make it one of the largest religious bodies in the country. However, during the recent trial of now-jailed church convention president Henry J. Lyons, prosecutors revealed that these figures were fabricated and the convention actually has closer to one million members, many of whom left during the Lyons fraud trial. It is important to note that Lyons took sole responsibility for fraud charges. Lyons' misuse of church funds and subsequent fraud conviction are not a reflection of the leaders and members of the National Baptist Convention, U.S.A. as a whole. Even if membership is around one million members rather than 8.5 million, the convention remains an influential religious body with a longstanding, loyal following and is among the 30 largest religious bodies in the U.S.


Episcopalians: Observant readers of these lists may notice that the Episcopalians appear on the list of largest denominational families, yet the Episcopal Church (the only Episcopalian/Anglican body of a statistically appreciably size in the U.S.) is not listed as one of the largest religious bodies.

One reason for this discrepancy is the difference in years between the two lists. Between 1990 (when the NSRI study was conducted) and 1997 (list of religious bodies) there was some decline in the size of the Episcopal Church, and fairly dramatic growth on the part of some religious bodies, such as the Church of God in Christ and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But much more importantly than this is the fact that a large number of Americans who consider themselves Episcopalian (the basis for the NSRI self-identification list) are not affiliated officially with the Episcopal Church and not included in Episcopal Church membership counts. Kosmin reports that "The Episcopal church, which has 1.7 million fully confirmed members on its current roll, had nearly twice as many, over 3 million, appear on the NSRI" (Kosmin; One Nation Under God; 1991).


Another study:
In a 1990 study which published denominational statistics for every county and every state in the United States, the National Baptist Convention (U.S.A.), the National Baptist Convention of America, the Church of God in Christ, and the African Methodist Episcopal Church were not among the 133 denominations data was collected for. The other religious bodies in this list were detailed in this particular study. (The entire data set is available at American Religion Data Archive; this is a different study from Kosmin/NSRI.)

Please feel free to send comments, questions, adherent statistics, spelling corrections, etc. to
Preston D. Hunter at pdhunter@wtd.net.

This document is copyright (1999) Preston Hunter.


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