A new survey of Protestant churches says attendance at worship services during 1999 declined slightly in keeping with the trend of recent years.
The survey also found that smaller churches continue to dominate the American scene.
The Barna Research Group survey, released Dec. 6, found the median adult attendance for worship services at more than 600 churches polled across the United States to be 90 people.
That figure was down five people from the 1998 survey, 10 people from the 1997 average and 12 people from the 1992 figure, according to Barna.
Attendance figures were highest for 1999 among suburban churches (120) and African-American churches (100 people).
Rural churches, which have smaller population concentrations to draw from, reported the lowest average attendance (70).
“In spite of the mass media attention devoted to megachurches (those attracting 1,000 or more adults on a typical weekend),” Barna said in a news release, “those congregations remain just 1 percent of the Protestant church landscape.”
The survey also found that donations to churches increased slightly during 1999, up 5 percent to an average of $110,000.
That figure is 59 percent above the 1987 average and 34 percent above the 1992 figure.
Pastoral compensation packages remained virtually unchanged during 1999, said Barna, an evangelically oriented firm based in Ventura, Calif.
The median value of such packages – which include salary, housing, an automobile allowance and other benefits – was $35,195 annually.
The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percent.
The telephone survey was conducted in October and November and included fundamentalist, charismatic, mainline, African-American and other categories of Protestant congregations.
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