Here is the title:

The future of Christianity is feminine… and African.

Gina Zurlo is co-director of the Center for the Study of World Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. The goal of her research is to “shed light on the contributions of Christian women to church and society and to fill the gaps in our data.”

Social scientists have long known that women are more religious than men. The Pew Research Center found that Christian women are more likely to attend weekly church services, pray daily, and say their faith is important in their lives.

Biblically, as Zurlo points out, “women were the last at the foot of Jesus’ cross, the first at his tomb. Research has shown them to be essential to the growth of the early church, being more likely to convert to Christianity than men, and most early Christian communities were overwhelmingly female.

What is most intriguing about Zurlo’s research is that “women are the majority of the church almost everywhere, and its future is about to be shaped by African women, in particular”.

She notes that in 1900, 18% of the world’s Christians lived in Asia, Africa, Latin America and Oceania. Today, this figure is 67% and by 2050 it is expected to be 77%.

Africa is home to 27% of all Christians in the world, and by 2050 that figure will rise to 39%. For comparison, the United States and Canada will represent only 8% by 2050.

Just to be clear:

The anchor for the global growth of Christianity is the Global South, particularly Africa (2.77% growth rate) and Asia (1.5% growth rate). To put this growth into perspective, in 2000, 814 million Christians lived in Europe and North America, compared to 660 million in Africa and Asia. Currently, the entire Global North has only 838 million Christians, while Africa and Asia alone have soared to nearly 1.1 billion followers of Christ. At the top is Africa, whose Christian population is growing faster than any other continent. In fact, more Christians live in Africa than on any other continent in the world. By 2050, Africa will have nearly 1.3 billion Christians. North America? Only 276 million.

The Global North has always been the one that sent missionaries out into the world for the sake of the gospel, usually to the Global South.

Now we need Africa to send them here.

And most of them will undoubtedly be women.

James Emery White

Sources

Gina Zurlo, “Why the future of the world’s largest religion is female – and African”,Yahoo!March 23, 2022, read online.

“The Gender Gap in Religion Around the World”, Pew Research CenterMarch 22, 2016, read online.

About the Author

James Emery White is the founder and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the assistant professor of theology and culture at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, where he also served as their fourth president. His latest book After “I believe” is now available on Amazon or at your favorite bookstore. To take advantage of a free subscription to the Church & Culture blog, visit ChurchAndCulture.org, where you can view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world. Follow Dr. White on TwitterFacebook and Instagram @JamesEmeryWhite.