State Membership Report

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California

Denominational Groups, 2000

2,450,003 1,118,209 142,752 10,079,310 1,823,359 18,258,015
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 1,250 4,759,250 201.1
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, The Other Theology 884 405,441 17.1
Southern Baptist Convention Evangelical Protestant 937 392,451 16.6
United Methodist Church, The Mainline Protestant 714 290,720 12.3
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Mainline Protestant 526 261,279 11.0
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Mainline Protestant 464 205,831 8.7
American Baptist Churches in the USA Mainline Protestant 492 194,594 8.2
Assemblies of God Evangelical Protestant 861 189,375 8.0
Episcopal Church Mainline Protestant 426 184,330 7.8
Seventh-day Adventist Church Evangelical Protestant 429 148,561 6.3
Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod Evangelical Protestant 376 148,292 6.3
Churches of Christ Evangelical Protestant 676 88,415 3.7
Church of the Nazarene Evangelical Protestant 372 82,071 3.5
International Church of the Foursquare Gospel Evangelical Protestant 273 78,133 3.3
Jewish Estimate Other Theology 130 76,539 3.2
United Church of Christ Mainline Protestant 243 67,979 2.9
Christian Churches and Churches of Christ Evangelical Protestant 220 52,294 2.2
Conservative Baptist Association of America Evangelical Protestant 159 51,550 2.2
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) Mainline Protestant 184 50,016 2.1
Baptist General Conference Evangelical Protestant 97 39,981 1.7
Church of God (Anderson, Indiana) Evangelical Protestant 117 34,896 1.5
Reformed Church in America Mainline Protestant 36 30,778 1.3
Salvation Army, The Evangelical Protestant 66 21,105 0.9
Free Methodist Church of North America Evangelical Protestant 75 17,811 0.8
National Association of Congregational Christian Churches Mainline Protestant 33 16,589 0.7
Christian Reformed Church in North America Evangelical Protestant 45 15,097 0.6
Christian and Missionary Alliance, The Evangelical Protestant 87 14,991 0.6
Evangelical Covenant Church, The Evangelical Protestant 63 14,523 0.6
African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church Evangelical Protestant 27 14,484 0.6
American Baptist Association, The Evangelical Protestant 126 13,974 0.6
Evangelical Free Church of America, The Evangelical Protestant 87 13,954 0.6
Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations Other Theology 72 13,575 0.6
Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee) Evangelical Protestant 158 11,706 0.5
Friends (Quakers) Mainline Protestant 64 9,882 0.4
Open Bible Standard Churches, Inc. Evangelical Protestant 30 8,125 0.3
North American Baptist Conference Evangelical Protestant 13 7,310 0.3
Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod Evangelical Protestant 41 7,096 0.3
Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches Mainline Protestant 21 6,700 0.3
Church of the Brethren Evangelical Protestant 32 6,490 0.3
Conservative Congregational Christian Conference Evangelical Protestant 9 6,474 0.3
Christian Brethren Evangelical Protestant 56 6,035 0.3
Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch Orthodox 1 6,025 0.3
Mennonite Brethren Churches, U.S. Conference of Evangelical Protestant 28 5,348 0.2
Missionary Church, The Evangelical Protestant 24 3,267 0.1
Baptist Missionary Association of America Evangelical Protestant 18 2,733 0.1
International Pentecostal Holiness Church Evangelical Protestant 48 2,496 0.1
Orthodox Presbyterian Church, The Evangelical Protestant 23 2,201 0.1
Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Mainline Protestant 5 1,214 0.1
Presbyterian Church in America Evangelical Protestant 15 1,105 0.1
Cumberland Presbyterian Church Evangelical Protestant 3 1,027 0.0
Brethren In Christ Church Evangelical Protestant 11 935 0.0
Moravian Church in America--Northern Province Mainline Protestant 4 912 0.0
Advent Christian Church Evangelical Protestant 9 897 0.0
Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church Mainline Protestant 2 780 0.0
Church of God in Christ, Mennonite Evangelical Protestant 3 685 0.0
Evangelical Methodist Church Evangelical Protestant 9 617 0.0
Church of God (Seventh Day) Evangelical Protestant 12 564 0.0
Seventh Day Baptist General Conference, USA and Canada Evangelical Protestant 2 502 0.0
Brethren Church, The (Ashland, Ohio) Evangelical Protestant 3 312 0.0
Evangelical Lutheran Synod Evangelical Protestant 4 285 0.0
Apostolic Christian Churches (Nazarean) Evangelical Protestant 7 279 0.0
Church of the Lutheran Brethren of America Evangelical Protestant 2 265 0.0
Berean Fundamental Church Evangelical Protestant 3 221 0.0
Protestant Reformed Churches in America Evangelical Protestant 1 148 0.0
Apostolic Lutheran Church of America Evangelical Protestant 1 119 0.0
Church of God General Conference Evangelical Protestant 2 99 0.0
Fire Baptized Holiness Church, (Wesleyan), The Evangelical Protestant 4 48 0.0
Totals (Unadjusted)*: 11,215 8,091,781  

The population of these counties (or equivalent) in 1980 was 23,667,902. The adherent totals of the religious groups listed above (8,091,781) include 34.2% of the total population in 1980.

Source

The 1980 data were collected by the Glenmary Research Center and includes statistics for 111 Judeo-Christian church bodies, including number of churches and adherents. These data originally appeared in Churches and Church Membership in the United States, 1980, published by the Glenmary Research Center.

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.