Where do adherent statistics come from?
There are five main methods for determining the number of adherents in a faith group: • Organizational reporting: Religious bodies (such as churches or denominations) are asked how many adherents or members they have. This is the simplest and least expensive method, but it can be unreliable. Different faith groups measure membership differently. Some count as members only those who are actively attending services or who have passed through a lengthy initiation process. Others groups count all who have been baptized as infants and are thus on the church records, even though some of those people may have joined other faith groups as adults. Some groups over-report membership and others under-report membership. When asked what religion they consider themselves to be a part of, many may name a religion that does not have them on their rolls. For instance, three times as many people claim to be Unitarian Universalists in the United States as are actually on church records. • Census records:
