Metro Area Membership Report

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Boston-Worcester-Lawrence-Lowell-Brockton, MA-NH NECMA

Denominational Groups, 2000

151,955 350,841 78,796 2,951,971 348,935 2,175,328
Evangelical Protestant Mainline Protestant Orthodox Catholic Other Unclaimed

Congregational "adherents" include all full members, their children, and others who regularly attend services. The historically African American denominations are not included in the 2000 congregation and membership totals. Many are also missing in 1990 and most historically African American denominations are missing in the 1980 reports.
[More information on the data sources]

Reports


Religious Bodies Theology Congregations Adherents Adherence Rate
Catholic Church Catholic 694 2,723,555 479.0
Jewish Estimate Other Theology 184 268,210 47.2
United Church of Christ Mainline Protestant 362 117,431 20.7
Episcopal Church Mainline Protestant 221 107,705 18.9
United Methodist Church, The Mainline Protestant 218 66,375 11.7
American Baptist Churches in the USA Mainline Protestant 250 62,420 11.0
Black Baptists Estimate Evangelical Protestant n.a. 61,109 10.8
Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations Other Theology 139 33,766 5.9
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Mainline Protestant 63 24,462 4.3
Assemblies of God Evangelical Protestant 96 18,082 3.2
Armenian Apostolic Church / Catholicossate of Cilicia Orthodox 4 15,250 2.7
Independent, Non-Charismatic Churches Evangelical Protestant 18 12,264 2.2
Seventh-day Adventist Church Evangelical Protestant 63 12,243 2.2
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, The Other Theology 35 11,806 2.1
Southern Baptist Convention Evangelical Protestant 45 11,794 2.1
African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church Evangelical Protestant 15 9,351 1.6
National Association of Congregational Christian Churches Mainline Protestant 25 8,425 1.5
Church of the Nazarene Evangelical Protestant 38 6,914 1.2
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Mainline Protestant 37 6,934 1.2
Churches of Christ Evangelical Protestant 30 6,650 1.2
Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod Evangelical Protestant 21 5,891 1.0
Conservative Congregational Christian Conference Evangelical Protestant 25 5,412 1.0
Congregational Christian Churches, Additional (not part of any national CCC body) Mainline Protestant 19 4,935 0.9
Baptist General Conference Evangelical Protestant 24 4,120 0.7
Christian and Missionary Alliance, The Evangelical Protestant 29 2,937 0.5
Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee) Evangelical Protestant 28 2,535 0.5
Salvation Army, The Evangelical Protestant 27 2,520 0.4
Friends (Quakers) Mainline Protestant 28 2,158 0.4
Independent, Charismatic Churches Evangelical Protestant 1 1,600 0.3
Christian Brethren Evangelical Protestant 17 1,525 0.3
Apostolic Lutheran Church of America Evangelical Protestant 2 1,430 0.3
Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch Orthodox 2 1,400 0.3
Christian Reformed Church in North America Evangelical Protestant 4 1,372 0.2
Advent Christian Church Evangelical Protestant 16 1,179 0.2
Church of God (Anderson, Indiana) Evangelical Protestant 5 1,102 0.2
International Church of the Foursquare Gospel Evangelical Protestant 15 1,038 0.2
Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Mainline Protestant 2 883 0.2
Christian Churches and Churches of Christ Evangelical Protestant 7 731 0.1
Evangelical Free Church of America, The Evangelical Protestant 6 655 0.1
Primitive Methodist Church in the USA Evangelical Protestant 8 650 0.1
Church of God of Prophecy Evangelical Protestant 15 514 0.1
Free Methodist Church of North America Evangelical Protestant 7 489 0.1
Mennonite Church USA Evangelical Protestant 5 277 0.1
Reformed Church in America Mainline Protestant 1 166 0.0
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) Mainline Protestant 3 154 0.0
Presbyterian Church in America Evangelical Protestant 3 144 0.0
Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod Evangelical Protestant 1 144 0.0
National Association of Free Will Baptists Evangelical Protestant 1 121 0.0
Evangelical Lutheran Synod Evangelical Protestant 1 111 0.0
International Pentecostal Holiness Church Evangelical Protestant 1 50 0.0
Wesleyan Church, The Evangelical Protestant 2 55 0.0
Association of Free Lutheran Congregations, The Evangelical Protestant 1 24 0.0
Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East, North American Dioceses Orthodox 0 27 0.0
Church of Christ, Scientist Other Theology 61 n.a. n.a.
Albanian Orthodox Diocese of America Orthodox 1 n.a. n.a.
Orthodox Church in America: Territorial Dioceses Orthodox 5 n.a. n.a.
Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America Orthodox 39 n.a. n.a.
Conservative Baptist Association of America Evangelical Protestant 53 n.a. n.a.
Orthodox Church in America: Albanian Orthodox Archdiocese Orthodox 5 n.a. n.a.
Totals (Unadjusted)*: 3,028 3,631,095  
The population of these counties (or equivalents) in 1990 was 5,685,998. The adherent totals of the religious groups listed above (3,631,095) include 63.9% of the total population in 1990.

Source

The 1990 data were collected by the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB) and include statistics for 132 religious groups, including number of churches and adherents. Martin B. Bradley, Norman M. Green, Jr., Dale E. Jones, Mac Lynn, and Lou McNeil supervised the collection. These data originally appeared in Churches and Church Membership in the United States, 1990, published by the Glenmary Research Center.

[More information on the data collection]

The adherence rate provides the number of adherents of a particular group per 1,000 population. For example, in 2000 the Episcopal Church had an adherence rate of approximately 8 (8.1) in Autauga County, Alabama. This means that 8 out of every 1,000 people in Autauga county are Episcopalian.