04/13/2019 Africa (International Christian Concern) – New projections from a leading American research group suggest that the number of Christians in various denominations and sects is steadily rising in Africa and could dominate the faith numerically worldwide for decades to come.
In a study conducted by Pew Research Center, only three African countries in 2015, were included in the top 10 in numbers of Christians in the population: Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Ethiopia. Together, these nations accounted then for just over 216 million Christians.
By 2060, the Pew Center reported recently there will be 727 million Christians in Africa, with six nations in the top 10. They are likely to be (in order of population) Nigeria, Congo, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, and Ethiopia. The size of the Christian population in Nigeria alone is already the largest on the continent and is projected to double by 2060. In addition, Tanzania, Uganda, and Kenya are projected to replace Russia, Germany, and China.
The newly published research also draws comparisons between global Muslim numbers and Christian populations as it foresees Islam catching up with Christianity later in this century.
The Pew Center report states, “Overall, there are about 2.3 billion Christians in the world and 1.8 billion Muslims. That gap is expected to narrow by 2060, when . . . there will be 3 billion Christians and nearly 3 billion Muslims. That’s because Muslims, on average, are younger and have more children than do Christians.”
“The countries with the five highest Muslim populations are all in South and Southeast Asia or in sub-Saharan Africa, rather than the Middle East; and the countries with the three highest Christian populations are in the Americas rather than in the Middle East or Europe,” the Pew data shows.
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