Talk:List of Christian denominations by number of members/Archive 1

Pentecostalism
Before my edits Pentecostalism listed only 105 million adherents and Orthodoxy about 260 million. But Pentecostalism was listed before Orthodoxy. I think this is misleading. Pentecostalism only has a tenuous connection to Protestantism anymore (Methodist by way of the Holiness Movement), having rejected in principle the creeds and confessions of the Protestant Reformation. They are closer to a Restorationist Movement church like the Campbelites or Millerites who have similar histories. Both began in interdenominational revivals and believe they have restored some primitive Christian norm from the Apostolic era.


 * Pentecostals definitely qualify as Protestants. The goal of the Reformation was to restore biblical Christianity to the church.  This is the goal of Pentecostalism as well, though the way in which they conceive it is different from that of the Magisterial Reformation.  In reality Pentecostalism is yet another expression of radical reformation.  If anything Pentecostalism is a form of hyper-protestantism.Spiritquest (talk) 14:49, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

Another Question is whether the Anglican Communion aught to have its own section rather than being subordinated under Protestantism? It is a middle way between Protestantism and Catholicism.

I think not. Evangelical Anglicans would class themselves as Protestant. High Church Anglicans call themselves Anglo-Catholic. It is a broad-church but a product of the Reformation and thus Protestant.

Questions about the Restoration Movement
Aren't Anabaptist, Brethren, Quakers restorationists. They just aren't Campbelites or Millerites.

And Baptists are evenly divided between those who refuse to call themselves Protestant and others who identify with Protestants, sometimes called Reformed Baptists or Particular Baptists. The First group insist that they were never part of the Catholic Church to begin with and are thus not protesting anything nor reforming anything simply continuing the apostalic doctrine and early church. So shouldn't they be grouped as Restorationists while the Reformed Baptists should be catagorized as decending from the British Particular Baptist / Puritan Independent movement.


 * In a sense all Protestants are restorationist, for Luther's goal in the Reformation was to restore biblical Christianity as he understood it. Zwingli and Calvin took this impulse further than Luther, and the Anabaptists took it yet further than either Luther or Zwingli.  Since that time many other groups have started with the goal of recovering New Testament Christianity as they understood it.  These would include all the groups mentioned above: Brethren, Quakers, Baptists, Campbelites, Millerites.  In a sense Pentecostals would fall in this same category as well.  The Campbellites just happen to be the ones who dubbed themselves Restorationists.  But all these and similar groups have had as their goal to restore New Testament Christianity.


 * What's interesting is that eventually each of the groups have defined themselves over and against the other groups in terms of what they are not; that is, by how they differ from the other restorationist or Protestant groups.Spiritquest (talk) 15:19, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

And Jehovah's Whitnesses are Restorationists also acording to every other page on Wikipedia.

Also, this page does not give denominations by number of adherants rather denominational families acording to number. I suggest expanding this page. To look at this page it would look like Methodists less influencial than Presbyterians when the UMC is actualy larger, I think.

Mistake?
Why is Presbyterianism listed under Pentacostalism in the article? Further, why does Presbyterianism not have a membership number?


 * Looks like it's been fixed. Presbyterians are listed under Reformed Churches.Spiritquest (talk) 13:48, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

adherents of protestantism
the number of protestants is mentioned as 500 million

however adding up the various protestant constituents - the figure comes to less than 375 million - where does the other 125 million come from?
 * I can't speak for where the original author or other editors got their numbers. I'm personally astonished how little backup for its numbers this article provides. However, I would guess that the source of the difference would come from one of two factors (neither of which I'm defending!):
 * (a) the original source having included in the Protestant heading various small groups and independent churches around the world or
 * (b) the original source having included as Protestant the various families that this article chose to break out separately. For example, the Restorationist and Nontrinitarian groups are classed as Protestant under some systems that mostly break it down into Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant (everybody else). After all, if you break it down that way, then Protestant naturally becomes the default category &mdash; and again, I'm not defending this &mdash; because the Catholic and Orthodox families are clearly defined by the member churches' overt affiliation, whereas you'd be hard-pressed to find many Protestant churches that use that name in their official title. Lawikitejana 02:06, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

adherents of denominations in history
Is there any figures available of how the number of adherents to each branch of christianity grown/reduced over time?

For example is there any data about how many catholics, orthodox, protestants were there in the 16th century, 17th century, 18th century, 19th century etc?

Unitarian Universalism
Unitarianism probably shouldn't be listed here, since, as the article on that faith puts it: Today, most Unitarian Universalists do not consider themselves Christians, even if they share some beliefs quite similar to those of mainstream Christians. Chonak 03:12, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


 * The Church originated out of a Christian milieu - it's "post-Christian" perhaps. It seems silly not to list it. john k 10:34, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Hi, john k. Religious movements sometimes do develop into religions distinct from the movements from which they started.  Christianity originated out of a Jewish milieu, but became distinct over time.   Unitarianism has been around for 300+ years, and no longer self-identifies as Christian.   The World Council of Churches, IIRC, does not include the Unitarian Universalist Association as a member, so there seems to be mutual agreement from the two sides.   By the way, in a move to stand back from Christian terminology, the UUA doesn't even use the term "Church" to describe itself (although some individual Unitarian congregations do use the word.)   Chonak 15:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Surely being a member of the World Council of Churches is not required to be considered Christian - the Southern Baptist Convention isn't a member either, as far as I can tell. I will agree I should not have called it a "Church".  Otherwise, I'm not sure we disagree on the substance - the UUA is not explicitly Christian.  Historically, however, Unitarianism was considered a Christian movement.  We don't say that John Adams was the first non-Christian President of the United States, or that Neville Chamberlain was the first non-Christian Prime Minister of the UK.  We should be careful about how we describe unitarianism, but I see no good that would come out of simply excluding it from the article.  We should list it, note that it developed out of the Christian tradition but that it no longer self-identifies as Christian, and leave it at that. john k 22:30, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Seems reasonable; I've made the addition. --Allen (talk) 02:47, 13 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry I have been to a Unitarian Church, sang hymns, listened to a sermon and prayed. They referred to themselves as Christians.  It should definately be considered Christian.


 * In the sense you are talking about the Unitarians are no different than the other "non-Trinitarian" groups listed--they all have Christian roots. However, in my opinion, none of these groups should be listed as "Christian," because Christianity is by definition Trinitarian and holds to the deity of Christ, which most of these groups reject.  The one exception I might make would be the non-Trinitarian Pentecostals, as their view is closest to orthodox Christianity of all the groups listed in this section.Spiritquest (talk) 15:26, 14 May 2010 (UTC)


 * There's a difference, though. Jehovah's witnesses, for example, would consider themselves to be Christian (whether you or I or anyone else would agree with them). However, the point being made was that Unitarians do not consider themselves to be Christian now, though they may have done so in the past. Although it seems from someone else's comments that some do and some don't. Confusing!86.135.198.141 (talk) 18:18, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Church of the East "not Orthodox"?
John Kenney's edit on 2006-09-10 brings up a difficulty in the use of the term Orthodox. His edit replaces the header Orthodox Christianity by Eastern Christianity because, he summarizes: "The Church of the East is surely not "Orthodox" by any reasonable standard". The difficulty is that the article Orthodox Christianity explicitly includes the Church of the East.

If Orthodox is used in two senses: a broader one and a more restrictive one, changing the header to Eastern Christianity to avoid the ambiguity is a good idea. IMHO the Eastern Rite Catholic Churches should be listed under Eastern Christianity. Chonak 07:39, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


 * There are indeed two senses of "Orthodox." Among Protestants the term "orthodox" refers to mainstream (Protestant) biblical Christianity (hence giving rise to the above poster's objection to the use of the term in connection with the Eastern Church).  However, in historical usage "Orthodox" is the name the Eastern church took for itself over time to distinguish themselves from the Western Roman church.  In their own view they are "orthodox" with respect to the first meaning as well.  They see themselves as the only church that has continued the original church since the beginning without corruption.  So "orthodox" is a matter of perspective.  But in terms of Protestant orthodoxy, the Eastern Orthodox church would not qualify, it is true.  But they would strongly object to the Protestant definition of "orthodoxy" to begin with.  As far as the Eastern Church is concerned, Protestants are schismatics and virtual heretics.Spiritquest (talk) 14:05, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

The article "Orthodox Christianity" is a mess, and so shouldn't be a model. Eastern Rite Catholicism is confusing - it should be listed under both Catholicism and Eastern Christianity. I would say that in most cases "Orthodox Christianity" is used as a synonym for "Eastern Orthodoxy." Given that the Oriental Orthodox Churches call themselves "Orthodox," one might include them as well, but the fact is that what makes Eastern Orthodoxy "Orthodox" would make Oriental Orthodoxy "Heterodox," and vice versa - the idea that they have some kind of common "Orthodoxy" is just silly - Eastern Orthodoxy is arguably doctrinally closer to Catholicism. "Orthodox Christianity" is basically a meaningless term, except insofar as it means "Eastern Christianity", and such usage is misleading. john k 10:34, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

NO NO NO! Eastern Rite Roman Catholicism should not be listed twice. They are churches in communion with the Roman Catholic Church who use a form of the Eastern Orthodox liturgy approved for use by he RC church. It is clearly part of the Roman Catholic Church! Eastern Christianity might include them as a side note, but they are not in communion with any Eastern Church such as the Eastern Orthodox Church (225 mil) nor the Oriental Orthodox Churches (72 mil). The last two are the largest groups of Eastern Christianity. That is that Eastern Christianity is made up of 1) Eastern Orthodoxy (225 mil) and 2) Oriental Orthodoxy (72 mil) and 3) The Assyrian Church of the East. What is so hard to understand about that. I had it right on my revision a week or so ago.--Rclose 14:07, 28 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree with the above. Eastern Rite Catholicism is now in full communion with Roman Catholicism, not the Orthodox Church, so the way it's currently listed (under Roman Catholicism) is correct.Spiritquest (talk) 14:05, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

--71.245.164.83 (talk) 04:18, 8 January 2011 (UTC)==Figures== I think that it is important for the figures exposed in this article to be the same as those exposed in Major religious groups. Now they are different. Can someone solve this problem? --Checco 20:54, 4 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Gee even simpler than that. What is the units and scale of the Y-axis of the chart?   How does this reflect the change in world population growh over time?  This graph needs work!--71.245.164.83 (talk) 04:18, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

protestant figures
(1) Are the Anglican/Episcolpalian figures excluded from the protestant figures? (2) What is "Historical protestantism"? Is this supposed to mean protestantism which is neither anglican nor recent??? If so, this is a fair enough category, but could be more clearly explained. (3) Are restorationaist really protestant? I think there is evidence they are a seperate category, if they are Christian at all. N-edits 21:19, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * (1) Yes, they are. (2) Historical Protestantism refers to those protestant denominations emerged in XVI, XVII and XVIII centuries. (3) Yes they are protestants and they are definitely Christian: they believe in Jesus Christ. --Checco 21:39, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Restorationists are definitely Protestants. The restorationist movement arose out of mainstream Protestant denominations (Presbyterian and Baptist mostly) as an attempt to restore New Testament Christianity.  For that matter, aren't all Protestants "restorationist" in some sense?  The goal of Luther, Zwingli, and the other 16th century reformers was to restore the church to a more biblical form.  Historic Restorationism is just the Protestant impulse on steroids.  In this sense it's another expression of radical reformation, even though its links to the historic Radical Reformation are tenuous or indirect.Spiritquest (talk) 14:29, 14 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Having added them up, i calculate anglicans must be included in the protestant figures. N-edits 22:34, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Anglicanism is something apart from Protestantism, it is widely considered via media between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism. --Checco 12:57, 21 May 2007 (UTC)


 * But so is Lutheranism. Just because it is a via media between Roman Catholics and Protestants doe snot mean that it is NOT PROTESTANT. Just ask an Eastern Orthodox Christian if Anglicans are Protestant. Historical Protestant in my opinion should be catholic Protestant, from the Magisterial Reformation and therefore should exclude the Radical Reformation and any group which does not baptize infants. But if we want to just categorize it by centuries, the cut off date should be 1699!--Rclose 14:00, 28 July 2007 (UTC)


 * But can Lutheranism really be called a via media in the same way Anglicanism is? Luther began the Protestant movement, so Lutheranism is the most Protestant denomination of all.  The Church of England considers itself a via media because it really did not begin as a Protestant denomination (i.e. "protesting" the Catholic church on doctrinal grounds).  In the beginning the Church of England was the identical to the Catholic church in doctrine and practice; only the source of authority had changed from the Pope to the English king.  It was only after the initial separation that certain leaders in the Church of England began to associate themselves with the Reformation that was happening on the continent.Spiritquest (talk) 14:38, 14 May 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm with Rclose - everyone who is not an Anglo-Catholic accepts that Anglicanism is a protestant group, and it is generally treated as such in most contexts - ECUSA is one of the "Seven sisters of American protestantism," for instance, and episcopalianism is clearly considered part of "mainline protestantism" in the US. The Church of Ireland is the largest protestant church in Ireland. The Act of Settlement safeguards  the protestant succession in the UK by ensuring that the monarch is in communion with the Church of England.  Etc. etc. etc.  We shouldn't privilege Anglo-Catholic views over the views of everybody else. john k 17:57, 2 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Agreed. The 39 articles are very Protestant in tone.  Anglo-Catholicism was/is a movement to recover the Catholic roots of Anglicanism, but despite its questionable beginnings (as a means for Henry VIII to be able to divorce), the Church of England quickly associated itself with the Protestant movement that was happening on the continent at the time.Spiritquest (talk) 14:29, 14 May 2010 (UTC)

groups without numbers
This page is already complicated, so i have removed groups without numbers of members, which are irrelevant on an article about numbers of members. N-edits 22:30, 20 May 2007 (UTC)


 * The article was actually clearer before, so I rollbacked your edits. Before making such changes, you need to reach consensus. --Checco 12:59, 21 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I dont need a consensus either to put current information in a clearer format, or to remove groups without numbers. Your RV needs to be better explained than that. N-edits 22:06, 19 July 2007 (UTC)


 * The version before your changes was far more complete and clearer. I believe that we should stick to that version and make only little changes to the structure. If there is a group without numbers, it doesn't mean that this group is not important: leaving all the groups may lead someone to add more information. --Checco 22:10, 19 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I also notice that you made some serious mistakes with your changes. For instance it is not correct to consider Anglicanism as part of Protestantism: it is a via media between Catholicism and Protestantism, and for many reasons it is closer to the first. Your edits are in general questionable, as the inclusion of nontrinitarians and the the exclusion of restorationists from Protestantism. They're also horrible from a graphical point of view (structure of paragraphs, use of block capitals, show-hide templates). Finally I'm strongly against the cancellation of many denominations and groups as you did.
 * N-edits threatened me about 3RR, but I was only defending the pages from his edits, which seem to me to be at least arbitrary and very near to vandalism. Obviously I presume his good faith, but I notice also that it is not the first time that he tries to make such changes.
 * I hope that other users will join us in this discussion, because I think that the article, as it is now, is very far from Wikipedia standards. The previous version was not perfect, but it was defininitely clearer and more complete. --Checco 07:47, 20 July 2007 (UTC)


 * The discussion continues below, see "Current version". --Checco 09:09, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Percentages don't add up
In the current version, the percentages listed add up to more than 100%. 56% (Catholics) + 30% (Protestants) + 15% (Orthodox Christians) = 101% ...and, that isn't even taking into account the 30 million and 0.5 million listed for Restorationism and Old Catholic Church, which don't have their percentages listed, but if they were factored the same as the Catholics (56% for 590 million), then 30.5 million would be another 3% approximately, which would push it up to 104% total. In other words, it needs to be corrected. (Cardsplayer4life 00:58, 20 July 2007 (UTC))

Current version
The current version is rather horrible -- since when do we use ALL CAPS IN WIKIPEDIA HEADLINES? Looks *extremely* ridiculous currently. — Nightstallion 08:16, 20 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Can we come back to the previous one? (See discussions above). --Checco 08:26, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I would prefer it, but we need to have a version for which there's consensus. If that happens to be your version, fine by me, but the current one is really unbearable from a typographical, structural and stylistic point of view. — Nightstallion 08:38, 20 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree with you, especially on the need to open the discussion to other users. What is sure now is that there's no consensus for the current version. Maybe there's no sufficient consensus also for my version, but at least we are 2 in favour of a rollback and 1 against. --Checco 09:08, 20 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I decided to do the rollback. --Checco 22:54, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Checco, Are you a member of the Anglican Communion or is your opinion of the Church of England completly formed by information from wikipedia. Yes there are some who would consider it not-Protestant group. But there is a lot of latitude within the Anglican Communion. In fact it's demographic is moving south very fast, by that I mean to the very evangelical African contenant. The Anglicans there are much more similer to Conservative (sometimes charismatic) evangelical protestants. (As the main article on Denominations, only Lutherans officially protested anything and they are much more catholic than Calvinists and Evangelicals. I myself come from a High Church Presbyterian tradition and find my friends in Continuing Anglican churches have much in common. Historically, it is more like they are a via media between Calvinism and Lutheranism.

Nonetheless, I am not against separating them out if it creates consensus. I don't agree. But if it is separated out we need to separate Pentecostals. I have absolutely nothing in common with a Pentecostal, except that I was raised pentecostal. We don't share any of the same beliefs. You can not creat a umbrella called "Protestantism" and let every one but Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox in and then arbitrarily yank Anglicans out too. at the very least, Restorationists, Pentecostals and Non-Trinitarians should not be included, the Reformers would be rolling in their grave. And such a position is very inclusive because it does not separate the Radical Reformation (Anabaptists, and Baptists, and Brethren, etc). This craziness is like including the Assyrian Church of the East in with the Autocephulous Churches of the Eastern Orthodox Church.

What we need is a basic taxonomy. I sort of like the one with the CAPS, except we should get rid of the caps. EVEN THOUGH IT INCLUDED THE PENTECOSTALS AND THE NON_TRINITARIANS WITH PROTESTANTISM, at least it was clear and broke those groups out into distinct categories. My primary concern with breaking our the Pentecostals is that it drops them down on the list below Eastern Orthodoxy. What Follows has been and will remain my preferred taxonomy (numbers are approximate):

Roman Catholic - 1116 mil Protestantism - 590 mil (though I would include Anglicans here) Eastern Orthodoxy - 225 Pentecostalism - 105 mil (though this is a kind of Restorationism, it has taken on a life of its own) Anglicanism - 77 mil (Continuing Anglicanism is important to break out, there were never numbers for it. It is growing but more complex than you would expect because in the USA continuing Anglicans are sometimes under the jurisdiction of Bishops in Africa and therefore part of the mainstream Anglican Communion again) Oriental Orthodoxy - 72 mil Non-Trinitarian - 28.5 mil Restorationism - 18 mil (includes Seventh Day Adventists, Church of Christ, Disciples, Mormons and Jehovah's Whitenesses, among others.)

--Rclose 13:55, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that Anglicanism should be counted as protestant. My basic opinion is that pretty much everything other than Catholicism and the eastern churches probably ought to count as protestant, with the exception, perhaps, of non-trinitarians (LDS, Jehovah's Witnesses, Unitarian Universalism, Christian Science, maybe Oneness Pentecostalism). It seems bizarre to me to claim that trinitarian Pentecostals, or Disciples of Christ, or even Seventh-day Adventists, are not protestant. Any loose understanding of "Protestant" would include them. The alternative would be to do away with "protestant" entirely, and just present the broad groupings - Lutheran, Anglican, Presbyterian/Reformed, Methodist/Wesleyan, Baptist, Pentecostal, Restorationist, and so forth. john k 18:03, 2 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree with john k on pentecostalism, not on anglicanism. --Checco 10:36, 13 August 2007 (UTC)


 * So you want to group Pentecostals and Lutherans & Presbyterians into one arbitrary group, even though they have nothing in common with each other (one has liturgy and vestments and baptizes infants, the other has no liturgy and only baptizes adults) and then arbitrarily separate Anglicans away from Presbyterians & Lutherans for no reason. Any study of the Church of England, The Episcopal Church, and the Anglican Communion will show that it is very broad, incorporating many points of view. The Anglican churches in Africa, by far the largest demographic within the Anglican Communion, are charismatic evangelicals.


 * Lutherans, Presbyterians, and Anglicans have much more in common with each other than they do with Pentecostals (groups of these who mimic pentecostals today not withstanding).


 * The dream of a via media is just that a dream. I wish it were true. The words of Rev. Alban Waggener, former continuing Anglican pastor, express my own frustration: "I believe that if things had been different we might have ended up restoring the faith of Holy England as it had been before William the Conqueror... I spent from 1989 until 2006 in that body, the few bodies of that group, hoping I suppose that that might be finally an opportunity to accomplish what I always thought was the true destiny of Anglicanism, to be the Western Orthodox Church. But I and four other people believed that, so it didn't get very far."


 * If Pentecostals are Protestant, then the word Protestant only denotes a category of Christian denominations not Roman Catholic nor Eastern Orthodox. In this case, Anglicans are most assuredly Protestant. They are closest in theology to Lutherans and high church (or small "c" catholic) Presbyterians. Pentecostals have nothing in common with these three "Magesterial Reformation" churches.


 * --76.194.207.158 22:44, 21 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Interesting arguments (really!), but I don't agree with you. --Checco 23:33, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Current version/2
As everyone may read above, some of the last changes by Carlaude are not supported by consensus. This is the reason why I rollbacked his last edit, although retaining his previous ones. For stylistic reasons I consider important not to use such big titles for the sections. And what about Anglicanism? Anglicanism is via media between the Roman Catholic Church and Protestantism, I think that we should continue to consider it as a distinct branch of Christianity. --Checco (talk) 07:59, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

 writes in his edit “these are things on which we discussed before” and makes his edits as a minor in hope his undo is unknown noticed.

A: Anglican is protestant.
This is the only of my three issues I see in discussion. 1.	Checco indicates as if consensus was reached on this issue (and others) to list Anglican as not Protestant, but there is not a consensus. 2.	But if we were to read it as a consensus it looks like Checco is the only one in favor of listing Anglican as not Protestant and other see Anglican as Protestant, and with reasons. 3.	Even if we did count “votes,” Wikipedia is not a democracy. Its primary method of determining consensus is discussion. Let history and the established labels their-of hold sway.

Why would any one call the Church of England something separate? When the Roman Empire left Great Britain about 410 it had been there about three and a half centuries. The people that remained continued to practice Christianity and it advance in unique way (see Celtic Christianity.) In the seventh century the Celtic Church accepted Roman Papal authority after making contact and working together on some missions.

Eleven centuries later Henry VIII of England seems to like Roman Catholicism (the Reformation is under way on the continent) but in 1537 badly wants a divorce and cannot get one under the pope, (both for political reasons.) Someone trots out the idea to him of declaring the Church of England separate (again) from Rome to get his divorce, and justifying it in part with Britain’s history as a separate church. Only Anglicans (and only some of them) would take this seriously as making Anglicanism a new thing from either Catholicism or Protestantism: the story continues.

The whole region thing is in long-term limbo and take a new form and degree of Protestantism (or not) every time a new child takes the throne. Under his last child, Elisabeth I, come the Elizabethan Settlement. Subjects protested when her polices were even more Protestant than that of her half brother Edward VI. Others, returning from a self-imposed exile in Calvin’s Switzerland, spent much of her long reign protesting it was to Catholic. But noting she or her father did made it more like the Celtic Church and no body was arguing that it should be Celtic. They either wanted it less like the Roman Catholic mass and structure, or less like the ideas that were admittedly from the Bible, but directly were from protestant thinkers and authors.--Carlaude 16:54, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Anglicans do not consider themselves as Protestant and are defined by theologians as via media between Protestantism and Catholicism. Moreover most of the articles in en.Wiki and the scheme in this page reflect this. Let the discussion begin. --Checco (talk) 17:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia is not a democracy but not a dictatorship too. Please don't make chages if there is no consensus about it. Let the discussion take its course. --Checco (talk) 17:02, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

How is the Anglican Church any different than the Old Catholic Church? If the Old Catholic Church is lumped under "Catholic Church" then why would the Anglican Church be its own major branch of the Christianity (other than you or some Anglican want it to be so)?

Note: Even the Anglicans church admits on its US web site that:


 * . Other Christians consider them Protestants.
 * . Even the Anglican church is "ambivalent" on being called Protestant.--Carlaude (talk) 17:25, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * The Episcopal Church of the United States is a little bit different from other Anglican churches. The Archibishop of Canterbury would reject you definition of him as a Protestant. I'm sorry, but there is no consensus on you change and I think we need to come back to the previous version, waiting for a new consensus. --Checco (talk) 15:06, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Dear all: Wikipedia is source-based, therefore editors' original research (assumption) should be omitted. Note that legally, by British legislation, the Church of England is described as the "Protestant Episcopal Church". 219.79.166.153 (talk) 17:42, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

The article STILL includes the false statement that Anglicanism is NOT a Protestant denomination. Where do people find such weird nitions?

B: The long list needs sections.
I see no discussion on this, nor consensus.

Without sections the list is a sea of words. A sea of words all the same size that goes on page after page. If you are used to looking at the list then you know the order of group and then can find things, but you still lack a table to jump down to where you interest is located. Both are important reasons to include. --Carlaude (talk) 16:54, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Sections are not ok as this is a list and your proposal of sections with big titles is also bad for stylistic reasons. Let the discussion begin even on this. --Checco (talk) 17:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Huh? Are you say you like list sections but not not with big titles? Are you just approving of dividing this talk in tree sections?--Carlaude (talk) 17:18, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I just think that the article does not need more sections. I think that a list like it is now is better and I strongly disapprove big titles like you used (=XXX=), in any case. --Checco (talk) 17:20, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I'd tend to agree with Checco on this. — Nightstallion 17:28, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

C: Restoration included
At some point the all the Restoration groups were dropped totally from the page (am not sure when, maybe my fault), but as I indicated in my summary, I found them and put them back in. Checco in his clumsy undo removed them again.

I am not sure if Checco is seeking to claim that Restoration Groups are also non-Protestant or what. The Restorations groups had one main idea: Get back to the original ideas and practice of Christianity. They may have gone about it differently than you or I would but everything else came from that. This, however, does not put them outside Protestantism. Protestantism began (among other things) to get back to the original Christianity, again perhaps differently than you or I would. (Luther considered the liturgical rituals a matter of person taste.) Protestants still make changes to “get back to the original Christianity” as Pentecostalism seeks to do in its practices. --Carlaude (talk) 16:54, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I definitely agree with you on this. Sorry about that. --Checco (talk) 17:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

change of format
Attempting to be bold whilst trying to make this list clearer I have changed the principle headings from bullett poioints to sub-titles, thus the contents show a summary of the main groups. Couldn't see a better way making it clearer but what do others think?

Leaving aside the numbers arguments, shouldn't the main headings reflect the lines on the chart? I know it may be impossible to get a consistent split between restorationism and protestantism but is it possible for anabaptists to be identified? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnmarkh (talk • contribs) 19:50, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


 * There is actually no consensus on your proposal. Be bold as you want, but... read the discussions before! --Checco (talk) 23:46, 6 February 2008 (UTC)


 * No one seem to object to small titles, only "sections with big titles." so I am making this change.--Carlaude (talk) 17:10, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I object. I simply don't like it. As we are 1 against 1, I ask you to leave everything as it was before. --Checco (talk) 17:18, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't like it because of the empty spaces and I consider it less clear and simple. --Checco (talk) 17:19, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * But you are the one who who said you did not like "big titles" -- what do you mean if you object to small titles? I just want to know.--Carlaude (talk) 17:32, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * The big titles were something I've never seen in Wikipedia. About the small ones, I simply say that I prefer the current structure of the article. --Checco (talk) 17:48, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * You lack consensus for your change. Even if you change your mind-- both Johnmarkh and I see the merit in this change. You cannot simply revert an improvement based on your own new preferences.--Carlaude (talk) 14:39, 14 February 2008 (UTC)


 * 2 to 1 is not consensus, but I won't revert that edit as my proposal has even less consensus. --Checco (talk) 15:07, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be better to use a list like the one in "List of United States cities by Area", using the number of adherents and the denomination groupings, such as "Protestant", as a column? --Pedroaamaranhao (talk) 19:05, 17 February 2015 (UTC)


 * A different format would be OK to me, but not under that form as the situation is more complicate here: there are branches, denominations, sub-denominations, etc. A simple list would not be an improvement. --Checco (talk) 09:01, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Laughly six?
What does this mean?--T. Anthony (talk) 01:49, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Independents 422.659 million
Who are these and where does the number come from? Does it iclude Oriental Orthordox? I suggest it would be helpful if the megablocks listed at the top (6) corresponded to the categories used in section 2 (7).

--John Price (talk) 13:20, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Why are all numbers in millions?
I think I saw .0006 million people in this article as one of the numbers. That's 6,000, right? Does it really make sense to have all the numbers listed in millions, or, maybe, should the numbers of less than a million be converted into whole numbers? John Carter (talk) 15:11, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
 * That's only a limit case and I actually prefer all the numbers listed in millions. --Checco (talk) 00:07, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
 * My only objection, as it were, is that for some of the smaller numbers it is a lot harder to figure out what the number at the end of the zeros is supposed to mean. We are supposed to make things as easy to understand as possible, remember. While I can see maybe allowing those in the hundreds of thousands range to stay as decimal, when were in the range of 1% of a million it might be a little too much math for a lot of people to figure out what kind of number we're really talking about. John Carter (talk) 00:44, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Anglican Communion
The Anglican megabloc ought to be subsumed into the broader Protestant one.

There are many ways to define "Protestant," enough that it should more correctly be "protestant." But even the narrowest definition -- Western-rite churches originating in Reformation Europe -- could hardly fail to include the Anglican family, a Western-rite church of Reformation origin.

Of course, this article uses an even broader definition of "Protestant," which makes the segregation of Anglican churches even stranger. For example, this article (wisely, I think) groups Baptists, restorationists, and Pentecostals under "Protestantism," even though these churches are less likely to self-identify as Protestants than Anglican churches are. In sum, if groups from the Radical Reformation, Baptists, restorationists, and Pentecostals are placed under "Protestantism," than Anglicanism cannot be placed apart here.

It is true that many Anglicans consider themselves as being between Protestantism and Catholicism, but so do other "Protestant" groups listed here. It is also true that some Anglicans reject the term "Protestant" specifically. But that is also true of members of other "Protestant" groups listed here. The categorization in this list is clearly bent toward scholarly objectivity and a broad definition of what Protestantism is. A fair application of that standard requires that Anglicanism be placed under Protestantism. -- Queen Elizabeth II, Supreme Governor of the C of E


 * Dear Queen Elizabeth II, I don't agree with you and I oppose any change for the fact that Anglicans represent a via media between Catholicism and Protestantism, and they're even listed as part of Catholicism in the main Wiki template about Christianity (see Template:Christianity)! Apart from the US, nowhere else Anglicans are classified as Protestants and the Episcopal Church of the United States is a small minority within the Anglican Communion (go and tell to a member of the mighty Church of Nigeria that he's a Protestant and you will see if he agrees...).
 * Anyway I have no problems with separating Modern Protestantism or Pentecostalism from the "Protestantism" section, but I definitely prefer the current version, as Pentecostalists are Protestants in many ways, more than most Anglicans are. --Checco (talk) 10:23, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

I am inclined to agree with Her Majesty as Methodists (at least the British ones I don't know about others) who also identify in between catholicism and protestantism are in the protestant section. Lemonade100 (talk) 20:34, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Just wondering: Is the first writer realy HM Queen Elizabeth? Just Asking

To sign Queen Elizabeth is just plain silly if the contributor wants to be taken seriously. Queen Elizabeth is indeed Supreme Governor of the Church of England. That designation of a secular figure as head of the church would be anathema to most Protestants. As for whether Anglicans ought to be grouped among the Protestants along with Baptists, well, few members of the community would be happy with that view. An argument could, and often has, been made that the Church of England is a schismatic Catholic church (a view more popular among "high-church" Anglicans). Of course, the Anglican community tolerates a very broad spectrum of doctrines, with some parishes differing little from Methodists, and others just like Roman Catholics without the Pope. Indeed, it is said that after Vatican II, many Catholics nostalgic for the old liturgy attended high-church Anglican services. They may not have been conducted in Latin, but Elizabethan English was next best. And high-church parishes have all the incense, candles, bells, ecclesiastical vestments and other paraphernalia of the Catholic Church. From Henry Cardinal Newman to today, many Anglican priests have found it very easy to "go over to Rome."

Henry VIII's motives for separation could not have been more different that those of Luther or Calvin. In sum, though opinion varies, few Anglicans would assert that their denomination fits squarely among the Protestants, even if protestantism is narrowly defined to exclude Pentecostals and Anabaptists and refer only to mainstream Presbyterians, Methodists, Congregationalists and Lutherans. Luke Line 07:46, 7 April 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Luke Line (talk • contribs)

Fine tuning the Branches of Christianity diagram
The diagram provides an excellent visual-historic display of the evolution of Christendom. However, regarding Catholicism(Western/Eastern) it might be more correct to deplict Maronite and Italo-Albanian Eastern rites as contiguous with Catholicism at all times; they never departed from the Church to E. Orthodoxy and reunite as is presently displayed.

- The Eastern Catholic Churches| "The gradual evolution of the Latin West and the Greek East culminated in the tragic Schism of the Church in 1054. Nearly all of the remaining Eastern Churches, EXCEPT the Maronites and the Italo-Albanians, joined the Byzantine or Greek Orthodox Church of Constantinople" 5 Roberson, Ronald. The Eastern Christian Churches, Sixth Edition. Editione Orientalia Christiana, Pontificio Istituto Orientalia (Pontifical Oriental Institute), Rome, Italy, pp. 20, 27, 139-188, 1999. Micael (talk) 21:02, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Preview of edited diagram: While I can not figure out how to make a line connecting directly from Early Christianity toward (Eastern rite)...this pretty much suffices to make the point. Micael (talk) 05:01, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

This template is derived from Image:ChristianityBranches.svg. It is intended for placement in categories, as it contains links to other categories.


 * This change is extremely controversial, and discussion here is inappropriate. It should be discussed (and is being discussed) at the talk page for the image in question. Tb (talk) 09:47, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Where are the original Methodists (Wesleyans)
Since John Wesley (1703-1791) started the whole movement, shouldn't his church get a mention? Though he remained his whole life in the Church of England heading an evangelical movement, his followers formally separated in 1795, soon after Wesley's death. The Methodist Church of Great Britain has 6,000 churches. But it is not in the list! This denomination directly gave rise to Methodism in Canada, New Zealand, South Africa and Australia. The latter merged with Congregationalists and most Presbyterians to form the Uniting Church of Australia. Why aren't they in the list, either? On the whole, this list seems a rather American-oriented slapdash affair with many omissions. Perhaps the original compiler, to take a charitable view, assumed the information would be refined over time by other contributors. This seems to me an intellectually impoverished way to set about composing an encyclopedia entry. Sorry if that sounds rude. Luke Line 07:16, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Czechoslovak Hussite Church
What about this? Shouldn't it be in the list as well? – Josef Plch, 27. 5. 2010 —Preceding undated comment added 20:49, 27 May 2010 (UTC).

"Modern Protestantism" numbers do not add up
The source says "According to the World Christian Database, classical Pentecostals number 78 million, Charismatics 192 million and Neo-charismatics 318 million". Our numbers sum up to 274 millions (leaving 314 millions MIA) despite counting 130 million pentecostals. This means that the classification used by the source is not the same as the one used in the article. Unfortunately within the section there's hardly any source. Balabiot (talk) 01:30, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Jehovah´s Witnesses membership disputed
Via the biggest server statistics about religion groups Adherents.com

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adherents.com

http://www.adherents.com/adh_rb.html

http://www.adherents.com/largecom/com_jw.html

have Jehovah's Witnesses more than 16,500,000. They (adherents.com) talk about practizing members, while other religious groups counting its adherents other way (collect all people which include). By this mean, should be changed here, beacuse equal way to entrance to each religion group. Now is about 18,168,323 (as of September 2009) according JW official stats. In this article (List of Christian denominations by number of members) section "Nontrinitarianism - 27 million" and "Jehovah's Witnesses - 7.1 million" should be repaired to "Nontrinitarianism - 38.4 million" (including Latter Day Saints latest data) and "Jehovah's Witnesses - 18.2 million". ... to be equal and fair to all religions.

For example this suggested formula could be applied into the article


 * Jehovah's Witnesses - 7.3 million while number of adherents is probably much higher.

But, JW´s officials stats publicly only that 7.3 million, not 18.2 million. ... As the official opinion of JW´s is count "practizing members only", current formulation in article is correct. http://www.jw-media.org/aboutjw/article41.htm#membership "Practizing members" means "only those who are actively involved in the public Bible educational work" = preachers

Trully, is highly disputed if Wikipedia article should write 7 million, while other religion count all people which is included.

Any other opinions? --89.176.47.126 (talk) 14:08, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

I applied the suggested formulation into the article.

I applied also LDS (Mormons) numbers.

--89.176.47.126 (talk) 11:50, 6 September 2010 (UTC)


 * If the number of adherents of JW is around 18 million and you have sources to prove that, we should insert that figure and replace the official figure given by the JW organization. --Checco (talk) 12:56, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * That three links is enough as a source. There are surely many other similar stats in all religions. But I want not to change article info, because the official opninon of JW organization is count only the preachers as members. Probably all which are water-babtisted. They don´t consider all people which have interest and Bible study with them as their members. But if these people will be questioned about their prefered faith, they probably answer to proclaim yourself as Jehovah´s Witness. That is second point of view. Maybe most of them are not members, but they are adherents of JW´ faith. It´s difference in conseguence of two different words (adherent,believer VS member of any church) --89.176.47.126 (talk) 15:55, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * One questionable is. Once Mormons, Catholic, Babtist, Muslims, Buddhists etc. counts those which have "paper-signed-membership" OR automatically count all people which are included (opinion of adherents.com). Nobody can prove data of any of churches, nobody can independently check up their data. .... Where is the right way? Other churches count all .... JW´s count only "real members". --89.176.47.126 (talk) 16:35, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Incomplete list
This list is very incomplete. I looked at the Methodism section and was able to add at least 4 denominations/churches. I do not, however, know the memborship of these churches. I also added the African Orthodox Church under the Anglicanism section and the Liberal Catholic Church under the Catholicism section. This list needs a lot of work. --Willthacheerleader18 (talk) 15:58, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The list has to be incomplete. It is quite impossibile to include all the existing Christian denominations in the world. This is why we chose to include in this list only the notable organizations of any branch of Christianity. An exception was made for the small orthodox churches, while for protestant churches we chose to include only those organizations with at least 0.5 million members. The churches you inserted were not present in the list simply because they were too small to be relevant. If you want we can do a big research and include also all the Christian churches with, say, 0.1+ million members, but we should include all of them, not simply some, and give their membership numbers. This is why I will rollback your additions under Methodism. Including those churches and not others would have been arbitrary. If you want do that big research anyway and anyhow, you're welcome to do it. --Checco (talk) 12:56, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Exactly. For example this.
 * http://www.adherents.com/


 * Adherents.com - Christian Denominations - count for today is 43870


 * At the bottom of page


 * 43,940 adherent records.


 * 4,351 groups.


 * http://www.bringyou.to/apologetics/a106.htm


 * World Christian Encyclopedia - Christian Denominations - count for today is 41911


 * At the bottom of page


 * Your Total "Christian Denominations" Count for today is 41911


 * No-one knows all christian groups. Wikipedia article can´t be complete. But You can help to add many others here. But only the major, big, important ones --89.176.47.126 (talk) 15:20, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Statistics of Apostolic Catholic Church
From where does it come that the "Apostolic Catholic Church" has 5 M members? Can't find any statistics on them anywhere else. --85.231.49.214 (talk) 22:00, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Number of Denominations
Why is having a total number of denominations listed in this article disallowed? I specifically edited it to stat that "this article lists" and didn't imply that those were comprehensive totals. I think people might be curious and not want to have to count a very long list multiple times as I did. Why limit the usability of the entry? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.90.225.214 (talk) 03:32, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not disallowed, but I didn't think it was all that useful. Replace it if you want; we'll see what others think.  But keep in mind that many would consider some of these separate rites within a church, and not a separate denomination.  24.197.208.203 (talk) 03:41, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Grossly Incorrect Count of Orthodox Membership
These numbers are just incorrect. Most of the sources for Orthodox numbers are from a single website which cites no sources for its work. Even worse, this source is written by members of the Roman Catholic church citing orthodox Christians as "The Other Catholics" which implies bias. Other churches such as the Georgian Church are listed with an arbitrary number of .010 Million adherents. The source for them (http://www.intratext.com/IXT/ENG1199/_PR.HTM) has no number whatsoever. The Georgian Church article on wikipedia cites a more reasonable 3.5 million. A possible issue is that most of the information on the Orthodox churches is not in English. These numbers need to be reviewed and updated with real sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jtlloyd (talk • contribs) 04:33, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
 * The churches you are talking about are not part of Eastern Orthodoxy, but are small churches affiliated to the Catholic Church (that is why they are referred as "other Catholics"... no bias at all!). Regarding the Georgian Byzantine-Rite Catholics the Wikipedia article speaks of 500 adherents! --Checco (talk) 22:21, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Anglicanism, Old Catholics and the PIC
Since the Old Catholic Church (mostly) and the Philippine Independent Church are in commmunion with the Archbishop of Canterbury, shouldn't they be counted as part of Anglicanism rather than listed with [Roman] Catholicism? Kranf (talk) 13:14, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

CoC not Mormons
I noticed that User:Checco reverted an edit, here equating Mormonism with the Latter Day Saint movement. The problem with this is that the Latter Day Saint movement is composed primarily of two churches: the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), and the Community of Christ. Members of the LDS Church self-identify as Mormon, while CoC members have rejected the title, mainly because of its association with Polygamy (which they never practiced.) Additionally, the AP Style Guide states that "The term Mormon is not properly applied to the other Latter Day Saints churches that resulted from the split after [Joseph] Smith’s death."

So, equating the Latter Day Saint movement with Mormonism is an error. Mormonism is properly applied to the LDS Church, and the miniscule sects that split from it in the 21st century. – Adjwilley (talk) 01:44, 30 November 2011 (UTC)


 * If you look at List of sects in the Latter Day Saint movement as a reference for the following terms, only sects within one of the major groupings within the movement consider themselves Mormons (i.e. the "Brighamites"), but not even all of the sects in that grouping accept the term. The "Josephites", "Hedrickites", "Rigdonites/Bickertonites", "Cutlerites", and "Strangites" do not consider themselves Mormon. -- 208.81.184.4 (talk) 22:21, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Anglicanism: Christian Demographic sources
Reverted earlier edit: (A)Wikipedia is source-oriented. It's a demographic article and I see no "editors' consensus" here about excluding Anglicans from Protestants. Let's follow the breakdown our sources use: Protestant-populuation-includes-Anglicans. (B)See Protestant and its figure for example. (C)Double standards: If we exclude Anglicanism, why don't we simultaneuously exclude Lutherans who also claim themselves as both Protestant and catholic? (D) Finally, removing citation unreasonably is an act of vandalism. Let's focus on the source instead of creating more Original Research. Read WP:CITE and WP:OR (E) The 800 Million figure is supported by sources and has been adopted for years, I see no reason and no need to exclude Anglicans simply because they possess catholicity. (F) Historical distinctions exist between many Protestant denominations (Anglican~Protestant/Pentecostal~Protestant/Lutheran~Protestant) it thus doesn't neccessarily and totally exclude Anglicans' figure. The tradition statement of Anglican faith, namely Thirty-nine Articles, are theologically Lutheran/Calvinist. Yes, it means definitely Protestant.

42.3.105.206 (talk) 11:18, 11 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Well, many Anglicans believe that the Church of England is the SAME church that existed prior to the Reformation (unlike other Protestant churches, which were founded "from scratch" as it were). They even go so far as to say "We didn't leave Rome, Rome left us" and that there's not much of a difference between pre-Reformation English Christianity and its modern descendant. Granted, many critics (Protestant and Catholic, Anglican and non-Anglican) consider this Anglo-Catholic view of history to be essentially revisionist, however it is a common view held by Anglicans since the Oxford Movement at least. Add that to the fact that the CoE is in full communion with many churches that are decidedly not Protestant (such as the Old Catholics and the Aglipayans), and you have to acknowledge that Anglicanism is hard to categorize theologically, which is why it's listed separately.


 * With respect to Lutherans, it's probably worth drawing a distinction between 1. Confessional Lutheran churches, which are usually non-episcopal and aren't that different from other Protestants, 2. Episcopal churches that subsequently embraced certain aspects of Lutheranism (such as the Church of Sweden, which is very similar to Anglicanism in many respects, and is also in full communion with the CoE), 3. Pietists, who are often hard to distinguish from non-Lutheran evangelicals or Pentecostals (the Mekane Yesus would probably fit here), and 4. Liberal/Mainline Lutheran churches; there is significant overlap between this group and #2 above.


 * Group 2 above could probably be considered "both Protestant and Catholic", but groups 1 and 3 wouldn't really qualify. The recently founded Nordic Catholic Church is another example of such a "Luthero-Catholic" body. FiredanceThroughTheNight (talk) 23:29, 1 December 2013 (UTC)


 * Many thanks for your insights. I totally agree with you on Anglicanism. I agree also with your distinction among Lutheran churches, but I think it's not easy to decide to which sub-category each church should be included. --Checco (talk) 10:49, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

SSPX
Hey guys. I removed SSPX from the list of "Breakaway Catholic Churches" as it is not a Church, not a denomination, nor does it necessarily qualify as "breakaway." It is a priestly society whose members (all of whom are priests - SSPX certainly doesn't have half a million priests as the page implies) are not in good standing with the RCC. All of the other churches listed call themselves churches and are clearly breakaway. That edit was reverted. I don't want to get into a revert war, so it seems appropriate to discuss this here so that we can come to a consensus here. Thanks. --50.4.162.0 (talk) 20:12, 23 November 2012 (UTC)
 * What you say is technically true (SSPX is definitely a priestly society), but it is also a traditionalist organization with half a million followers/faithful (see Society of St. Pius X). As such, it has to be included in the list. --Checco (talk) 10:55, 28 November 2012 (UTC)
 * There are dozens of Priestly societies not mentioned in this article, including Sedevacantists, and they aren't mentioned because they aren't churches or denominations. Unless you can prove that SSPX is a church or denomination, it will be removed. --35.16.1.22 (talk) 14:13, 28 November 2012 (UTC)

I attend Masses at a chapel of the Society of St Pius X as well as Masses celebrated by the Archdiocese of Westminster here in London. Many other faithful do, too. The SSPX is not a "breakaway church", it has never claimed to be a "church" separate from the Mother Church. The SSPX is not in schism, it is not excommunicated, and it is loyal to the Pope and the Church's Magisterium. The SSPX does not belong in this list, as it is properly a part of the Roman Catholic Church as Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos confirmed in an interview. 208.59.156.220 (talk) 20:37, 23 August 2014 (UTC)Joel Gray, Catholic Studies Scholar, DePaul University
 * You are right that the SSPX is not a church and that its relationships with Rome improved recently, but I would still list in the article, as a component of the Catholic Church. This article has to be correct as well as the most complete as possible for readers' sake. --Checco (talk) 11:51, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

This category "breakaway" 'catholic' groups is exactly for something like SSPX. It is not part of the Catholic Church - it used to be, and then left communion. That is the same as the Anglicans, the Lutherans, and any of the reformers when they started. Maybe they were originally just societies of reform ideas too, but solidified into distinct denominations. The SSPX may be catholic in character, but is no longer part of the Catholic Church, despite the best efforts of Benedict XVI to bring them back into full communion. Accepting Vatican II and the magisterium of the church is part of the price of being part of the Catholic Church, something the SSPX has yet to do. Certainly, there are more groups that could be listed here, like the Society of Pius V or the True Catholic Church, but they tend to be so small it is hardly worth it. SSPX at least has numbers, if not full communion. If the argument is that they have partial communion, pray for the pope, etc - so do a lot of protestants! It is not enough to be counted as Catholic, sorry. They are, sociologically and ecumenically speaking, a distinct ecclesial community/denomination for all intents and purposes. Protoclete (talk) 09:17, 5 September 2014 (UTC)


 * In fact, I agree more with Protoclete than the IP user. --Checco (talk) 18:24, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

No, still erroneous. The SSPX is part of the Catholic Church and in communion with the Roman Pontiff. They are canonically irregular which is not the same as being in schism. Bishop Fella does not consider himself the head of a Church or a Pope, he is merely the Bishop in charge of an apostolate. Get your facts right! Go talk to a Catholic priest of Bishop yourself before making these ignorant claims! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.149.20.50 (talk) 19:26, 18 September 2014 (UTC)


 * I think most priests would rather agree with Protoclete than with you. As a compromise, the SSPX can easily stay next to Catholic Charismatics and Personal Ordinariate's Anglicans. It's a compromise and I hope you (and Protoclete) will accept it. --Checco (talk) 08:42, 19 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Much better. Thanks for understanding. And please read this: http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2014/09/understanding-vatican-statement-sspx.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.99.170.43 (talk) 16:50, 24 September 2014 (UTC)

Myanmar Baptist Convention
Myanmar Baptist Convention is listed twice. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Greg.collver (talk • contribs) 21:31, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

United and Uniting Churches
United churches often include Reformed, Lutheran and Methodist elements. So why are they listed under the Reformed subsection? They should have their own subsection under the Protestant section.

I'm not sure about the Church of Pakistan, the Church of North India and the Church of South India. All three churches include both Anglican and Protestant elements. Why was it decided to put them in the Anglican section and not the Protestant section? 110.174.166.224 (talk) 02:20, 18 April 2014 (UTC)


 * You're right on United and Uniting sources, but you may note that the churches you're thinking of are predominantly Calvinist/Reformed. The opposite is true for the other mentioned churches, predominantly Anglican. That's why I wouldn't change those churches are listed in the article. --Checco (talk) 12:08, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Also in this category, where's the United Church of Canada? It's the largest denomination in Canada, the first denomination to be formed by union rather than division, an important player in the ecumenical movement... I don't know current numbers so am not in a position to add anything, but I was curious to see it absent from this list. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.50.226.20 (talk) 13:29, 30 September 2015 (UTC)


 * The United Church of Canada is predominantly formed by Presbyterians (former affiliates of the Presbyterian Church in Canada) and has a presbyterian polity. That is why it is listed among Presbyterian churches. I would leave the UCC where it is now, but, in case you disagree, I won't mind. --Checco (talk) 14:35, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Anglicanism and Protestantism
I just noticed that the List of the largest Protestant churches article includes the Church of England and many other Anglican churches on the list. So why does this article classify Anglicanism as a separate branch from Protestantism? 110.174.166.224 (talk) 02:43, 18 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Because Anglicanism is both "Protestant" and "Catholic", a via media between Protestantism and the Catholic Church. --Checco (talk) 22:42, 18 April 2014 (UTC)


 * PewResearch Religion & Public Life Project classifies Anglicans and Protestants. The CIA World Factbook also classifies Anglicans as Protestants. Even the Map of Protestantism on this article includes Anglicans. Just as there are High Church Anglicans there are also High Church Lutherans. Anglicans have an episcopal polity but so do some Lutherans. So what is the justification for considering Anglicanism a separate branch from Protestantism.? 110.174.166.224 (talk) 11:07, 21 April 2014 (UTC)


 * That's because the Episcopal Church (which is "Protestant, yet Catholic" btw) is usually considered a Protestant church in the United States. The sources you referred to are in fact from the USA. However, as also the related Wikipedia article states, Anglicanism is one of the branches of Christianity, along with Catholicism, Protestantism, etc. and not merely a denomination within Protestantism. --Checco (talk) 12:08, 21 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Can you find a source outside of Wikipedia that lists Anglicans and Protestants separately? 110.174.166.224 (talk) 01:56, 22 April 2014 (UTC)


 * Oh, there are many! Leaving aside French, German and Italian publications, just take a look to the following links: 1 (notably including a reference also to Encylopedia Britannica), 2, 3, 4, 5, etc. --Checco (talk) 21:11, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Ah, glad to see the Anglo-Catholic stranglehold on how to categorize Anglicanism still holds. The Church of England was always historically considered a Protestant church. Until the Oxford Movement, in fact, "Protestant" in England specifically referred to the Church of England, with members of other Protestant churches typically called "Dissenters." The Act of Settlement, still in force today, says that the throne belongs to the heir of the body of the Electress Sophia, "being Protestant". Tale of the Tub uses "Martin" [that is, Luther] as its stand-in for the Church of England. The via media in the sense you are talking about only showed up in the wake of the Oxford Movement. The idea that Anglicanism represents a branch of Christianity distinct from Protestantism is a specifically Anglo-Catholic view, disagreed with by virtually everybody else - Low and Broad Church Anglicans, most other Protestants, Roman Catholics, and non-Christians have always viewed the Church of England and the Anglican Communion as in a Protestant tradition. john k (talk) 23:29, 1 October 2015 (UTC)
 * There is no "Anglo-Catholic stranglehold" and, by the way, if there were one, we should not replace it with a "Protestant" or "Evangelical" one. The idea that Anglicanism represents a branch of Christianity of its own, distinct from Protestantism, is not simply an Anglo-Catholic view: it is the official position of the Anglican Communion (see here) and, chiefly, the Episcopal Church of the United States (see here: "So is the Episcopal Church Protestant or Catholic?: Both. Neither. Either."). It is also the position held by the Catholic Church (contrarily to what you wrote; see here and Anglican-Roman Catholic dialogue) and by Wikipedia at Anglicanism. --Checco (talk) 10:11, 2 October 2015 (UTC)
 * I didn't read them fully, but I saw nothing in the statements from the Vatican that made any claim one way or the other about this issue. Perhaps you can point me to the quote that you feel expresses this. As to the statement from the Anglican Communion itself, it's actually studiously ambiguous. It says the Anglican Communion is a faith tradition within Christianity, and that other faith traditions include Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant churches. That certainly doesn't contradict the "Anglicanism is a distinct tradition separate from Protestantism," but the lack of any articles means that it doesn't clearly state that the Anglican Communion is not a Protestant church, either. The Episcopal statement is a bit clearer, but still mostly ducks. At any rate, I'm not sure the self-definition of the Anglican Communion or one of its member churches, both of which obviously have to be very careful to alienate neither Low Church nor High Church elements within them, makes sense as a way to understand this. There are numerous Protestant churches which have, through the years, denied being protestant - for instance the Stone-Campbell Restorationists, who claim to simply be "Christians". We still categorize them as Protestants because they fit into our general definitions of Protestant. At the most basic level, the Protestant Churches are the ones whose faith traditions arise out of the Reformation in the 16th century. The Anglican Communion is one such community. Its theology, until very recently, was essentially moderately Calvinist (the 39 Articles, notably). There is no plausible definition of "Protestant" which includes both Lutheran and Calvinist/Reformed Churches but does not include the Anglican Communion. On the other hand, the way in which the Anglican Communion is "Catholic" is simply the way in which every mainstream Protestant church claims to be Catholic on the basis of accepting the Nicene Creed. The Anglican Communion is not "Catholic" in the more commonly used sense of "in communion with Rome." Categorization is a weird thing - most scholarly works on Anglicanism obviously aren't going to put too much energy into an argument of this kind - but simply counting Anglicanism as distinct from Protestantism is taking sides on an issue that is not really settled, and takes sides with the minority viewpoint. Anglicans are theologically, historically, and sociologically protestant. The argument that they are not is a polemical argument based on bad 19th century history that was eventually rejected even by most of the people who actually proposed it. (I won't even respond to the "argument" that another Wikipedia article also written by Anglo-Catholics provides evidence of anything at all). john k (talk) 14:41, 2 October 2015 (UTC)
 * I read with great interest your post and I learned many things from it, but I keep my position. Wikipedia is based on consensus and sources. The article on Anglicanism is the result of consensus and includes many sources, that is why I mentioned it. I much welcome a broad discussion on the issue, but this talk page is not the proper place to have it. In case you start such discussion, please keep me posted: I will make my point and be very happy to hear from others too. --Checco (talk) 15:04, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Protestantism map
The map for Protestantism needs some work. Where is the legend?, not only does it not have a legend, but the color drop-off for low percentages seems extreme... for instance according the the Wikipedia artlicles Religion in Brazil and Religion in Argentina, the percentage of Protestants in those countries is 22% and 15%. However, the map equates the Protestant proportion of Argentina with that of Saudi Arabia, which of course, is officially 0%.

Anyone up to fixing it? Frimmin (talk) 16:38, 26 April 2015 (UTC)Frimmin


 * Agree with Frimmin. In case no-one fixes the maps, they should be removed. --Checco (talk) 19:06, 26 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Legend is placed on this file's page, just click on that map. 7% of Argentina is Protestant, that is below 10% ===> Argentina is not colored just as Saudi Arabia, where the percentage is almost 0%, which is also below 10%.

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 3 one external links on List of Christian denominations by number of members. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20110521140202/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/sudan/presbyterian-church-of-the-sudan.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/sudan/presbyterian-church-of-the-sudan.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20100912051738/http://www.salvationarmy.org:80/ihq/www_sa.nsf/vw-dynamic-arrays/D46980EA862CD1FD80256D4F00411840?openDocument to http://www.salvationarmy.org/ihq/www_sa.nsf/vw-dynamic-arrays/D46980EA862CD1FD80256D4F00411840?openDocument
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20080720024801/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/sudan/episcopal-church-of-the-sudan.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/sudan/episcopal-church-of-the-sudan.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 01:58, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on List of Christian denominations by number of members. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20130208080117/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/india/mar-thoma-syrian-church-of-malabar.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/india/mar-thoma-syrian-church-of-malabar.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 05:22, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 one external links on List of Christian denominations by number of members. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20130208075639/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/indonesia/protestant-church-in-western-indonesia.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/indonesia/protestant-church-in-western-indonesia.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20110722000238/http://www.crcna.org/pages/aboutthecrc.cfm to http://www.crcna.org/pages/aboutthecrc.cfm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at ).

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 03:52, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 7 December 2016

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: no consensus for a move at this time. (non-admin closure) Brad  v  14:11, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

List of Christian denominations by number of members → List of largest Christian denominations – Per WP:Consistency with equivalent lists of quantities. Not all listed denominations apply, count or estimate membership so that the terminology could be applied generally over the board. Although almost the same thing, "largest" would probably apply more suitably. Chicbyaccident (talk) 20:39, 7 December 2016 (UTC) --Relisting. JudgeRM   (talk to me)  03:02, 16 December 2016 (UTC)
 * You seem to be indicating that only internal statistics would be relevant, and I don't think that is necessarily the case, particularly as some groups have markedly different standards for inclusion and exclusion. Having said that, are you perhaps indicating that you think organizing the entries by something other than numbers is what you would prefer? John Carter (talk) 20:51, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm just suggesting a less precise - albeit more accurate - wording than "member(s)". Chicbyaccident (talk) 23:12, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I have no opinion on this. The proposed name would be shorter, but not necessarily more accurate. --Checco (talk) 14:22, 8 December 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

, Would you consider relisting the proposal, now that we have a Category:Lists of Christian denominations to refer to, presenting an overveiw of the equivalent articles for the argument of WP:Consistency? Chicbyaccident (talk) 09:14, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Sections
I made the following change: "Eastern Orthodox Church" → "Eastern Orthodoxy". The latter is more accurate because some of the churches listed are not actually in communion with the main Eastern Orthodox churches. In fact, also "Anglicanism" includes some denominations which are not part of the Anglican Communion. This said, I think that the section of the Catholic Church should be moved back to "Catholicism" in order to include again in it the independent Catholic denominations. The article should reflect both "Christian families" and denominations: Eastern Orthodox churches not in communion with the main Eastern Orthodox Churches are definitely part of the Eastern Orthodox family/tradition, Anglican churches not part of the Anglican Communion are part of the Anglican family/tradition, independent Catholic denominations are part of the Catholic family/tradition. It the problem is just the Church of the East, let's include it somewhere. --Checco (talk) 16:19, 14 December 2016 (UTC)


 * There is no consensus that I know of that define Catholicism or Catholic to include anything that self-identify as such. As for statistically, we're speaking if a few million people in movements which have been around since the 19th century in opposition to the Catholic Church. Chicbyaccident (talk) 11:04, 27 December 2016 (UTC)


 * More evidently, there was no consensus on your edits.
 * Your English is very difficult to understand. Can you write more clealy?
 * --Checco (talk) 11:12, 27 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Thanks for correcting the spelling of "consensus", but I still do not understand most of your comment. More specifically, I would like to understand why dissident Catholics should not be included in "Catholicism" (please note "Catholicism", not the "Catholic Church"!), while dissident Eastern Othodox are included in Eastern Orthodoxy, Anglican dissidents in Anglicanism, etc. Consistency! --Checco (talk) 07:44, 2 January 2017 (UTC)


 * I don't understand how you contribute here. You haven't answered to my remarks yet, if not partially, but you are going on with unilateral edits, which are not supported by consensus. I have actually tolerated several of these edits, including the ones I am opposing in this very talk. Your latest edit was a total rollback, without even considering the different issues involved. That's why I rollbacked it. Please stop and discuss such edits. In fact, you haven't convinced me yet of the edits I mentioned above and which look quite nonsensical to me. Please discuss and answer to my questions before doing more edits. The main question is: why should dissident Catholics be treated differently from dissident Orthodox and dissident Anglicans? --Checco (talk) 07:56, 9 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Regarding this edit of yours (which I rollbacked), I would like to point out two things:
 * 1) Wikipedia articles need to have an adequate lead section in terms of quality and quantity;
 * 2) this particular lead section is important because it explains which denominations are or are to be included.
 * This said, I'm still waiting for you to answer to my question: why should dissident Catholics be treated differently from dissident Orthodox and dissident Anglicans? Thanks in advance for your answer. --Checco (talk) 20:43, 9 January 2017 (UTC)

Eastern Orthodoxy
In line with this edit by User:Nillurcheier, I made some more additions. They are far from perfect and, in fact, that is the article's section with less sources (almost none, indeed). We should find sources on Eastern Orthodoxy in general and on each and every Church. Only in that case additions might not add up, as with Protestantism. As of now, the only sources we have talk about 225–300 million Orthodox faithful. Can someone help? --Checco (talk) 08:11, 9 January 2017 (UTC) Ps: Also Eastern Catholic Churches need an overhaul, in order to match the data included at their article (Eastern Catholic Churches) or, in case those data are wrong, to have identical data in the two articles. The same should be done with Oriental Orthodoxy. This article is always a work-in-progress!

Anglicanism
Regarding this edit by Chicbyaccident on Anglicanism and Protestantism (edit summary: "According to the main pewforum source, and as established consensus in article Anglicanism, Category:Anglicanism, Christianity, and many more sites over a broad spectra of Wikipedia content"), which I oppose, I have a few things to say. Consistency is very important to me, but neither that edit nor its edit summary are the case. First and foremost, the article's lead at Anglicanism clearly explains how this Christian branch is a sort of via media between Protestantism and Catholicism (that is to say Anglican churches are both Protestant and Catholic, on different accounts). Thus, secondly, it is no surprise that Anglicanism is also categorised also within Protestantism. Thirdly, the article on Christianity offers only a general account of the different Christian branches: for instance, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and the Church of the East are in the same section, while supporting very different Christologies. Finally, the Pew Forum: it is a good and respected source, but it is too much influenced by the United States, where the "Episcopal Church" is often classified as a Protestant church and, in fact, its orginal name was "Protestant Episcopal Church". For these reasons and in respect to a long-established consensus in this article, I am going to rollback the aforementioned edit by Chicbyaccident and... let the discussion go on. --Checco (talk) 07:26, 10 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Is or considers itself to be? Chicbyaccident (talk) 18:55, 12 January 2017 (UTC)
 * It consinders itself to be—and it is as well. --Checco (talk) 07:07, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Where is it explicitely determinated in the article, please? Chicbyaccident (talk) 09:18, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Here is what the article says: In the first half of the 17th century the Church of England and its associated Church of Ireland were presented by some Anglican divines as comprising a distinct Christian tradition, with theologies, structures and forms of worship representing a different kind of middle way, or via media, between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism — a perspective that came to be highly influential in later theories of Anglican identity and expressed in the description of Anglicanism as "Catholic and Reformed". Of course, a Wikipedia article can't be a source for another Wikipedia article, but there are plenty of sources on the issue. Take a quick look to Google and you will find several useful sources, like this. Anglicanism is a via media between the Catholic Church and Protestantism on several accounts: theology, liturgy, etc. --Checco (talk) 09:31, 13 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Thanks. Naturally a matter of debate with different positions from differents perspectives. Chicbyaccident (talk) 10:29, 13 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Whether Anglicans are more Catholic or more Protestant is a never-ending debate. The balance has differed over the centuries, and differs among regions of the world. That is why considering Anglicans a via media is a safe bet. --Checco (talk) 10:54, 13 January 2017 (UTC)


 * Anglicans are protestant. In parts of the world where Anglicanism is dominant, the word protestant essentially means Anglican.  If you any of the articles about figures involved in or periods of history key to the Anglican church, the word "protestant" will be littered throughout, specifically to refer to Anglicans.  People don't talk about the Northern Ireland conflict between Catholic and different type of Catholic Christians.  Pub quiz: who did Bloody Mary burn?  We don't talk about emancipation of "the other catholics".  We don't talk about the acts of toleration as "protestant emancipation" either, because the bill refers to the nation and C of E as protestant, multiple times.  Unless your mission is to go through every article on any history or politics of the British Isles and probably half of colonial Africa and substitute the word "protestant" for "Anglican" then this article makes no sense with regards to the rest of wikipedia, because Anglicans are rightly referred to as "Protestants" (often with no clarification) throughout it.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.28.84.117 (talk) 23:40, 19 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Anglicans are not Protetants per se. To be more specific, they are also Protestant, but not just Protestant. They are a via media between the Catholic Church and Protestantism. I do not understand your reference to Northern Ireland, where most republicans are Catholic and most unionists are Presbyterians, thus Protestants, while Anglicans are a minority. --Checco (talk) 06:12, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

The comment by 92.28.84.117 should settle the matter. That the Church of England considers itself "via media" is no convincing argument that it is "via media". Even if it was, that wouldn't make it less Protestant, given its history etc. In fact, if you would ask represenatives of any Protestant denomination, chances are a lot of them would consider their denomination something equivalent in terms of balancing Christian orthodoxy and ecclesiology. Chicbyaccident (talk) 07:43, 20 April 2017 (UTC)


 * All the Anglican Communion, including the United States' Episcopal Church, considers itself a via media. --Checco (talk) 09:56, 20 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Yes, you may well extend above conclusion to include Anglican Communion as well as all of Anglicanism. Chicbyaccident (talk) 10:14, 20 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Exactly. The related articles' intros are indeed in line with what I said above and this list as well. Cheers, --Checco (talk) 10:20, 20 April 2017 (UTC)


 * - As referred to within the Protestantism spectra, that is. Chicbyaccident (talk) 11:18, 20 April 2017 (UTC)


 * All the intros: they are very balanced. Interestingly enough, the Anglican Communion says of itself in its website: "Anglicanism is one of the traditions, or expressions, of this Christian faith. Other Christian traditions include Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Protestant Churches, which include Lutheran, Baptist, and Pentecostal Churches" (see http://www.anglicancommunion.org/identity/about.aspx). Thus, according to Anglicans, Anglicanism is one of the five major branches of Christianity. --Checco (talk) 13:20, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 10 external links on List of Christian denominations by number of members. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/bmoraski/Democratization/Woodberry04_JOD.pdf
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/south-korea/korean-methodist-church.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110904212501/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/south-africa/presbyterian-church-of-africa.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/south-africa/presbyterian-church-of-africa.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110906101707/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/democratic-republic-of-congo/church-of-christ-in-congo-presbyterian-community-of-congo.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/democratic-republic-of-congo/church-of-christ-in-congo-presbyterian-community-of-congo.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110905063341/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/indonesia/protestant-evangelical-church-in-timor.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/indonesia/protestant-evangelical-church-in-timor.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110521144434/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/europe/hungary/reformed-church-in-hungary.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/europe/hungary/reformed-church-in-hungary.html
 * Added archive http://www.webcitation.org/6KKWk56jd?url=http://www.aina.org/brief.html to http://www.aina.org/brief.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070927065421/http://www.anglican-nig.org/enuguconsecration.htm to http://www.anglican-nig.org/enuguconsecration.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110521180222/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/pacific/solomon-islands/church-of-melanesia.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/pacific/solomon-islands/church-of-melanesia.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110725184128/http://www.cofchrist.org/news/GeneralInfo.asp to http://www.cofchrist.org/news/GeneralInfo.asp

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 14:12, 17 May 2017 (UTC)

Catholics v Protestants - counting apples and oranges
Catholic (and Orthodox) doctrine claims everyone baptised as babies as members - and will continue to do so even if they end up in another denomination. Protestant theology varies - but the figures we are seeing here are usually for active membership - though admitted the Church of England is for baptised! - so is not a comparable figure. Not sure what to propose - but this does give an an unreasonably high figure for Catholics, as well as effectively underepresenting the relative strength of Protestantism. Ender&#39;s Shadow Snr (talk) 00:41, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

Unitarian Universalism and Quakers
There's a certain inconsistency here in treating these two groups in different ways. Both have roots in the 17th and 18th century. Both are 'Christian in origin' though both now have limited requirements on members to conform to any 'creed'. Yet one is in the 'Historic Protestantism' section, whilst the other is in the 'Minor Denominations'. Let's be consistent here! Ender&#39;s Shadow Snr (talk) 00:54, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

Number of Anglican Communion members
If you add up everything listed under that heading, it comes to 84.6 million. So, something is wrong there: either the individual entries are wrong, or the main header for the section is wrong. You have to fix it one way or the other. The ref is dated 2011, so it's likely about 6 years out of date. ··· 日本穣 ·  投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 06:46, 14 June 2017 (UTC)


 * It is not a big deal. Numbers do not have to be added up, as long as they are sourced. It is OK to add up figures when we do not have a source, it is not necessary that figures add up otherwise. Most data are disputable and it is impossible to have figures for each and every denomination from the same year, the same source, etc. in order to operate a perfect comparison. In fact, the article's lead reads: "[The list] is inevitably partial and generally based on claims by the denominations themselves. The numbers should therefore be considered approximate and the article an ongoing work-in-progress". --Checco (talk) 11:00, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Merge proposal of List of Christian denominations by number of members into List of Christian denominations
For details, please see Talk:List of Christian_denominations. Chicbyaccident (talk) 19:29, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 10 external links on List of Christian denominations by number of members. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110721185505/http://www.baptistene.info/asia.php to http://www.baptistene.info/asia.php
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110726061329/http://www.fmwm.org/about/index/facts.php to http://www.fmwm.org/about/index/facts.php
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110521155709/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/ghana/methodist-church-ghana.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/ghana/methodist-church-ghana.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110722152110/http://www.efca.org/about-efca/who-we-are/statistics to http://www.efca.org/about-efca/who-we-are/statistics
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20141027032357/http://wcrc.ch/our-story/ to http://wcrc.ch/our-story/
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080213020135/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/indonesia/evangelical-christian-church-in-tanah-papua.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/indonesia/evangelical-christian-church-in-tanah-papua.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120921021303/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/nigeria/reformed-church-of-christ-in-nigeria.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/africa/nigeria/reformed-church-of-christ-in-nigeria.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110520194306/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/india/church-of-north-india.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/asia/india/church-of-north-india.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110905233538/http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/europe/ireland/church-of-ireland.html to http://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/regions/europe/ireland/church-of-ireland.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20160305032325/https://c119b78671d19b8aee34-1ab073aa91389396dfc8b6aabc9b141e.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/Provincial_Meeting_Journal_web.pdf to https://c119b78671d19b8aee34-1ab073aa91389396dfc8b6aabc9b141e.ssl.cf2.rackcdn.com/Provincial_Meeting_Journal_web.pdf

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 21:55, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Evangelical Free not Methodist
Isn't the free church movement, including the EFCA, a break from Scandinavian Lutheranism? I think the Evangelical Free church has thusly been miscategorized. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1700:5020:95D0:68D4:8914:2E05:5213 (talk) 08:09, 13 March 2018 (UTC)
 * I moved the EFCA from Methodism to Lutheranism. --Checco (talk) 08:22, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

who to count as a member of a Church?
On the Salvation Army International statistics page (https://www.salvationarmy.org/ihq/statistics) is current information about the number of people in the organisation, in different categories. There are Officers (ministers of religion), Soldiers, Junior Soldiers and Adherents (who attend worship services, are formally members and recognise the Salvation Army as their church) and other employees.

Current numbers:

Officers: 28,053 Soldiers: 1,182,100 Adherents: 175,811 Junior Soldiers: 411,327

Total: 1,797,291

Other categories on the page may include duplicates of the above: Songsters: 115,050 Sunday school members: 706,325

I think this category: Number of employees: 111,859 is too broad as it covers all employees and is more related to the organisation as a business than a church.

Adrian816 (talk) 00:12, 27 March 2018 (UTC)

Merger?
After several months of inactivity, the merger discussion (this article with List of Christian denominations) at Talk:List of Christian_denominations is still ongoing. --Checco (talk) 07:18, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * And I now oppose, after learning the truth. Thank you for clarifying . --TheTexasNationalist99 (talk) 14:06, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Could you please explain? Chicbyaccident (talk) 11:19, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Everything was already explained clearly enough. The answers will always remain the same...so just...stop--TheTexasNationalist99 (talk) 03:19, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Russian Orthodox Church no longer in communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople
As of 15 October 2018, the Russian Orthodox Church is no longer in full communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople. As such, I believe it should be moved from the Autocephalous Churches section, under Eastern Orthodox Church, to the Autonomous Churches section, under the same section. The Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate also moved towards granting autocephaly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and withdraw the Russian Orthodox Church's jurisdiction over the Ukrainian Church on 11 October, and this should perhaps be reflected in the list. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Charliemccombie (talk • contribs) 00:35, 22 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Surely, we will need to fix that. I would wait a little bit, anyway. However, feel free to be bold and edit the article! --Checco (talk) 07:26, 22 October 2018 (UTC)


 * This is a controversial topic. Since Eastern Orthodox Church has no central doctrinal or governmental authority (analogous to the Pope of Rome in Catholic Church), one could as well move the Greek Orthodox Church of Constantinople instead. I recommend to keep the article as is, at least until all the autocephalous churches take positions. Hlucho (talk) 05:18, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Sections and maps
Seems quite unfair to have put together Protestants and Anglicans together, but then having separated Eastern and Oriental Orthodoxs, since there is less difference between the later. Another issue is: why "Eastern" Orthodox? Is there a "Western" Orthodox? "Central" Orthodox? FkpCascais (talk) 02:14, 25 October 2018 (UTC)


 * There are no "Western" or "Central" or, by the way, "Northern" or "Southern" Orthodox Christians, but, according to literature, there are "Eastern" and "Oriental" Orthodox Christians. The theologial differences betwen the two are relevant and we should keep them separate.
 * On Anglicanism, instead, I agree with you. In fact, I have long argued that Protestantism and Anglicanism should be treated separately. Despite some contexts in which the distinctions between the two are blurred—I am thinking primarily of the United States, where the local Anglican province, namely the Episcopal Church, is also known as the Protestant Episcopal Church and is usually cathegorised among the "seven sisters of American (mainline) Protestantism", Anglicanism as a whole is better described as a via media between (Roman) Catholicism and Protestantism. --Checco (talk) 06:29, 25 October 2018 (UTC)