GENEVA -- Lutheran church membership worldwide has grown by more than 1.4 million since 2000 to 65.4 million in 2001, according to the Lutheran World Federation (LWF). The growth represents a 2.2 percent increase.
The largest increase was in Africa, which gained 1.4 million members for a total of nearly 12 million, according to a news release.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the second-largest LWF member, had 5.1 million members, representing a 24,000-member loss from 2000. The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, which is not an LWF member, reported an unchanged membership of 2.6 million in the United States and Canada.
The LWF represents 133 Lutheran churches throughout the world. According to its estimates, the number of Lutherans belonging to non-LWF-member churches decreased by nearly 92,000 from 2000 to 3.7 million in 2001.
