Data source: Gina A. Zurlo, ed., World Christian Database (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2025).
| Glossary item | Definition |
|---|---|
| Bible | This term is always used to describe only the whole or complete Bible of 66 books (sometimes plus deuterocanon). |
| birth rate | The number of births per year in a population, expressed as a percentage or permillage of the total population. |
| Buddhists | Followers of the Buddha, mostly across Asia, including three main traditions: (a) Mahayana (Greater Vehicle); (b) Theravada (Teaching of the Elders); (c) Tibetan (Lamaists); plus (d) traditional Buddhist groups, but excluding neo-Buddhist new religions or religious movements. |
| cardinals | In the Catholic Church, the highest ecclesiastical officials below papal rank, appointed to assist the pope in the College of Cardinals. |
| cargo cults | Religious movements in Oceania based on prophecies that if appropriate religious rites are performed, God will send ships and aircraft filled with cargo and goods. |
| catechist | Church worker who instructs catechumens (qv) in the fundamentals of the Christian faith before baptism. |
| catechumen | Non-member of a church receiving instruction in Christian doctrine, ethics and morality, prior to admission into the church through baptism. |
| Catholic Charismatics | Catholics who have come into an experience of baptism or renewal in the Holy Spirit. |
| catholicos | Leading bishop or patriarch of an Orthodox church or denomination. |
| catholicosate | The area (territorial or otherwise) over which a catholicos (qv) has responsibility. |
| Catholics | All Christians in communion with the Church of Rome, also known as Roman Catholics. Affiliated Catholics are defined here as baptised Catholics plus catechumens. |
| Catholics, non-Roman | Old Catholics and others in secessions from the Church of Rome since 1700 in the Western world and other Catholic-type sacramentalist or hierarchical secessions from Protestantism. |
| census | Large-scale formal act of counting or evaluating of people and property. |
| chaplain | A clergy person officially attached to a school, hospital, the armed forces or other public institution. |
| Charismatic Renewal | The Pentecostal or neo-Pentecostal renewal or revival movement within the mainline Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox churches, characterised by healings, tongues, prophesyings, etc. |
| Charismatics | Baptised members affiliated to non-Pentecostal denominations who have entered into the experience of being filled with the Holy Spirit. |
| children | All persons under 15 years old, though often a distinction is made between infants (0–4 years old) and children proper, 5–14 years old. |
| Chinese folk-religionists | Followers of traditional Chinese religion (comprising a mixture of some or all of the following: local deities including Daoist ones, ancestor veneration, Confucian ethics, Chinese universism, divination and magic, some Buddhist elements). |
| Christian | Brethren Independent Fundamentalist Protestant tradition formed in 1828 out of the Church of England; also called Open Brethren. |
| Christians | Followers of Jesus Christ of all kinds: all traditions and confessions and all degrees of commitment. |
| church | (1) A building set apart for Christian worship, or the services that go on in it. (2) A local congregation or worshipping body. |
| Classical Pentecostals | Blanket term for three traditional Protestant types of Pentecostal: Pentecostal Apostolic, Baptistic-Pentecostal and Holiness-Pentecostal. |
| clergy | Men and women ordained to service in a church: bishops, priests, deacons, ministers, deaconesses and other ordained persons. |
| clerical order | Large-order/congregation/institute/society of full-time ordained workers (clergy, monks, brothers, nuns), often functioning as itself a separate autonomous religion. |
| colporteur | In itinerant evangelist whose main function is the sale and dissemination of scripture copies; usually in the employ of a Bible society. |
Data on 18 categories of religion, including non-religious, by country, province, and people.
Data on all religions, Christian activities, and trends.
Membership data, year begun, and rates of change.
Population and religion data on all major cities & provinces.
Detailed information covering religion, culture, and geography.
A repository of historical data, including a chronology of Christianity from the 1st to 21st centuries.