Southern Baptists see membership drop for sixth straight year

Southern Baptists see membership drop for sixth straight year

Annual baptisms in Southern Baptist churches have declined by 100,000 in the last 12 years, with last year dropping to the smallest number in 64 years.

According to the Annual Church Profile (ACP) released by LifeWay Christian Resources, total membership of 15,872,404 marked the sixth straight year of statistical decline for the nation’s second-largest faith group behind Roman Catholics. 

Membership dropped by 105,000 — two-thirds of a percent. Weekly worship attendance, meanwhile, fell below 6 million to 5,966,735, down 3 percent.

Although baptisms were a bright spot in last year’s report, increasing 0.7 percent, this year’s report shows a decline of 5.5 percent to 314,956 people. Reported baptisms have declined six of the last eight years, with 2012 the lowest since 1948. The ratio of baptisms to total members increased to one baptism for every 50 members.

“While we celebrate every new baptized believer represented by these numbers, fewer reported baptisms is heartbreaking,” said Thom S. Rainer, president and CEO of LifeWay. “Southern Baptists cannot rest on what God accomplished through us in prior years. The message of the gospel is alive, relevant and powerful today, and the Great Commission task of sharing it should excite and embolden us as Christians.”

Southern Baptists experienced growth in the number of churches affiliated with the convention in 2012 and the total amount given for denominational missions causes. The number of churches in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) grew by 270 to 46,034, a 0.6 percent increase over the previous year. SBC churches also reported 4,992 church-type missions last year, 40 more than in 2011, although some state conventions no longer use that designation, which may have impacted the total.

Although the number of SBC-related congregations grew, reported membership of those churches declined more than 100,000, down 0.7 percent to 15.9 million members. 

Frank Page, SBC Executive Committee president, said, “When I first heard the report of our ACP, I said, ‘God forgive us and God help us.’ We are thankful for every person won to Christ and every person enrolled in Bible study and discipleship and involved in missions. We are thankful for the millions who are a part of worship in our Southern Baptist churches. 

“However, my heart breaks when we realize the overall decline in our numbers,” Page said.

“Let’s get perspective on this,” he said. “Where are people won to Christ? Where do people go to church? Everything depends on the local level. It is where everything of significance occurs. The questions that every Southern Baptist must answer are, ‘What am I doing for the Lord? Am I winning more or less people to Christ? Am I giving more or less to missions? Am I being faithful in my support of my church?’ These are serious questions that I must ask myself. Will you join me?”

Concerned leaders offer various explanations for the trend, which experts say began in the 1960s. Professor William Day of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary cited two factors in a 2003 article in the Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry.

One is an increasing ratio between church membership and baptism rates. Before 1935, Southern Baptists baptized one person for every 20 members. Between 1935 and 1959 the ratio was less than 25 to 1. In 2012, it took 50 church members to baptize one person. Day said that indicates an overall loss of evangelistic zeal.

Another factor is the changing role of Sunday School. During the 1950s, Southern Baptists viewed it as the “outreach arm of the church,” he said. In most churches today Sunday School functions to assimilate members in small groups after they walk the aisle in worship to join.

Recent leaders have tried various approaches to fix the problem. After his election as SBC president in 2004, Florida pastor Bobby Welch embarked on a cross-country bus tour to promote his personal goal of 1 million baptisms a year. Baptisms that year reached 387,947 before falling the next two years to the lowest number since 1993.

Johnny Hunt, SBC president from 2008 to 2010, called for a “Great Commission Resurgence,” a renewed zeal for proclaiming the gospel.

He appointed a “Great Commission Task Force,” which after two years of study returned a report in 2010 calling on the denomination to reprioritize spending so that maximum resources go toward reaching the unreached.

It is difficult to track missions giving since then, as some new categories have been added and not all Baptist state conventions gather the same data. However, total and undesignated receipts reported through the ACP were down 2.4 percent and 1.5 percent respectively.

Total missions expenditures reported by the churches declined 1 percent in 2012, although reported giving to Southern Baptist missions causes increased more than $48 million (7 percent) to $744 million. The “Great Commission Giving” category was added to the ACP reporting form in 2011 as a reflection of each church’s financial gifts to local, state and national SBC missions causes. Although two more state conventions reported Great Commission Giving in 2012 than the previous year, two states have yet to add the statistic to their annual survey.

Giving through the SBC’s Cooperative Program (CP) missions initiative is not included in the ACP annual report because those totals are more accurately available through Baptist state conventions and the SBC Executive Committee, which processes the missions gifts. However, giving through the CP in fiscal year 2011 was virtually the same as the previous year. CP giving the first eight months of this year was reported June 3 to be 1.6 percent behind the same period the year before.

Statistics for the national ACP are reported by individual churches to their local association and/or state convention, and national totals cannot be compiled and released until all cooperating state conventions have reported. Scott McConnell, LifeWay’s director of research, said the files are due in February but some final data was not received this year until the last week of May.    

(ABP, BP)