How Many Christians Are In The World?

Christianity is a pretty big deal. If you're not familiar, United Religions Initiative says that its practitioners believe "Jesus Christ was the Son of God – fully human and fully divine – and that through believing in him and following his teachings they can inherit eternal life." It also happens to be the most widely practiced religion in the world. 

Just how big do you have to be to qualify as "bigger than Jesus?" According to World Atlas, there are about 2.2 billion Christians in the world, out of a total population of around 7.6 billion. So almost one out of every three people worldwide is a Christian. From there, World Atlas states that the United States is the country with the most Christians, at around 230 million, mostly Protestant, which makes sense considering modern freedom of religion was a prime motivator for European colonists. 

Perhaps unsurprisingly to those who live in the Deep South, Alabama and Mississippi are tied as the "most Christian state," according to Pew Research Center, each with 77 percent of the population identifying as "highly religious." Bearing in mind that this includes any religion, U.S. News and World Report tells us that around 85 percent of the religious populations of these states are Christian. This high concentration of Christianity is why this region of the U.S. is called "The Bible Belt."

The runner-up for "most Christian nation" goes to Brazil, with about 180 million, most Catholic, followed by Mexico and Nigeria, both with about 100 million. 

Regardless of what you believe, it's good to be educated on all religions, as they play a central role in just about every element of sociocultural life anywhere on the planet. So here's one fact for the road to perdition: BC stands for "before Christ," and AD for "anno Domini" (in the year of the Lord), according to Encyclopedia Britannica, meaning if you know what year it is, then we also know how many years it has been since the birth of Jesus.