Church transition statistics (OneNewsNow.com)

Church transition statistics

Allie Martin - OneNewsNow - 5/27/2008 10:30:00 AM

Church Survey_Big A new survey finds that most Americans who attend worship services have changed where they worship at some time in their lives.

The study shows that while many individuals will change their place of worship, there is not a broad, overall trend favoring a particular denomination, music style, or location. Also, the survey found that more than half of adults who changed where they worship said their new church is about the same, theologically, as their old one.

The survey, conducted by Ellison Research, asked Americans who attend worship services whether they have regularly attended a different place of worship from the one they are currently attending. Sixty-nine percent of Americans who currently attend church have attended more than one place of worship as an adult, while 31 percent say their current place of worship is the only one they have regularly attended since they became an adult.

Ron Sellers, president of Ellison Research, says the number varies by faith group. "Just slightly over half of all Roman Catholics have moved to a different parish at some point, compared to 76 percent of Protestants. And among Protestants, it was particularly likely for evangelicals to have switched. Eighty-one percent have at some point changed where they worship," Sellers explains.

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Results from our related poll question

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According to Sellers, the survey may surprise some who believe that many people are leaving smaller congregations for mega-churches.

"There's sort of an assumption out there that traditional forms of worship are dying out and that smaller churches are really in danger of dying out," he shares. "And while that may be true of individual smaller churches, still the average church in the United States has around a hundred people attending. You've got a lot of smaller churches that are out there, that are very active, that are very involved and people are involved in them -- and there's no evidence that the smaller churches are giving up a lot of congregants to the mega-churches," Sellers points out.

The researcher says when people change where they worship, it usually involves a change in worship style. Overall, he says the findings show a lot of individual change, but not a lot of broad trends.