New 2024 Stats Sees SBC Membership Decline for 18th Straight Year

The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) released its 2024 Annual Church Profile (ACP) last week, highlighting a continued downward trend in membership alongside a significant uptick in baptisms. The data, compiled by Lifeway Research in collaboration with state conventions, marks the 18th consecutive year of membership decline for the denomination.

According to the report, the SBC lost 259,824 members in 2024—a 2% drop—bringing total membership to 12,722,266. This follows a 1.7% decrease in 2023 and a 3.3% drop in 2022. Over the past five years, the SBC has shed 1,803,313 members, a 12.4% decline from the 14,525,579 members recorded in 2019.

However, given those membership numbers are artifically inflated due to a failure to clean up the rolls and cull long inactive or even deceased members, weekly worship attendance at SBC churches is around 4.3 million people, which is more accurate reflection of active members.

Despite the membership losses, the denomination reported a 10.4% increase in baptisms, with 250,643 individuals baptized in 2024—the highest annual total since 2017. The ratio of baptisms to total members likewise improved moving from 1:57 in 2023 to 1:51 in 2024.

The SBC also saw a slight reduction in the number of churches, losing 30 congregations to end the year at 46,876. These losses are not neccesarily a bad thing, however, with some of the departures stemming from congregations choosing to disaffiliate or being removed due to theological misalignment over their egalitarian convictions.

On a positive note, in-person weekly worship attendance rose by 6.3%, reaching 4,304,625, while average attendance for Sunday School, Bible study, and small groups grew by 5.7% to 2,567,048. The number of state conventions and associations remained steady at 41 and 1,067, respectively.

While these losses reflect current trends for declining membership in most denominations, they are in contrast to the theologically conservative PCA denomination, which saw membership increase by 1.84% last year and adult baptisms increasing over 16.%