Steady growth in membership

On 31 December 2016 the number of New Apostolics in the world was around nine million. Compared to the previous year, this was an increase of just over one per cent. With nearly 7.6 million New Apostolic Christians, Africa accounts for about 84 per cent of all church members worldwide.

Slight differences in congregation size

The sizes of the 59,000 congregations around the world vary slightly from continent to continent. The global average on the reporting date was 153 members per congregation. This value generally varies between 149 in the Americas to 162 in Australia. The highest average size is found in Europe, with 173 members per congregation.

Big differences in the number of ministers

At the end of 2016, the New Apostolic Church counted well over 251,000 ministers worldwide. About 90 per cent are Priests or Deacons. In terms of numbers this means that every congregation has 4.25 ministers and every minister looks after 36 members.

With an average of nine ministers per congregation, the number of ministers in Germany is twice as high as the worldwide average. Statistically, the congregations in Asia only have 1.8 ministers. This means that every minister has 86 members to care for. The other extreme is found in the south of Germany, where, statistically, every minister has 19 members to look after.

The numbers in detail

• Africa: 7,591,527 members, 50,217 congregations, 209,372 ministers
• North and South America: 230,069 members, 1,547 congregations, 9,194 ministers
• Asia: 626,128 members, 3,985 congregations, 7,249 ministers
• Europe: 442,601 members, 2,548 congregations, 19,848 ministers
• Australia, Oceania: 127,766 members, 787 congregations, 5,910 ministers
• worldwide: 9,018,091 members, 58,994 congregations, 251,573 ministers