The New Apostolic Church is active in almost all countries on all continents. Africa is home to the majority of members. Countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia top the list. At its recent conference in Johannesburg, the District Apostle Meeting made a slight adjustment to the worldwide membership figures.
The District Apostles and their administrative offices in the respective countries all agree: to accurately determine the number of members and to keep track of the changes is a challenge. In a lengthy and meticulous process, the administration of the New Apostolic Church International—NACI Administration—found that over the past twenty years, the focus was on the registration of sealings, that is the recording of new members. Deaths, however, were not recorded everywhere or not accurately registered. There were serious reasons for this, unfortunately: wars and displaced people being only two of them.
Looking at these figures over the long term, it is clear that the systems in place to keep track of the membership figures could often not keep up with the rapid growth in membership. This led to discrepancies between the figures registered in databases and the actual number of members in the Church.
A lengthy, worldwide review
In a lengthy process, the worldwide membership figures were reviewed for plausibility. Local statistics on life expectancy served as a guide. In addition, the procedure for registering and administering membership figures has been improved and will continue to be improved.
Nearly nine million members
For these reasons, the District Apostle Meeting has decided to moderately reduce the membership figures of the New Apostolic Church. After a careful review, the Church has arrived at a more realistic worldwide membership of approximately 8.8 million. NACI underlines that this lower number does not reflect a reduction in membership. It is merely a correction of earlier membership figures, which were clearly too high. The membership is distributed as follows:
Africa:
7,391,328 members
50,647 congregations
213,585 ministers
America:
225,852 members
1,590 congregations
9,639 ministers
Asia:
627,210 members
4,534 congregations
8,861 ministers
Australia:
121,567 members
832 congregations
5,500 ministers
Europe:
451,033 members
2,740 congregations
21,511 ministers
Worldwide total:
8,816,990 members
60,343 congregations
259,096 ministers
as of 1 January 2015