Seventh-day Adventist denomination - said to be 5th largest Christian denomination world-wide

[BobRyan]

How about we share something positive for a change.

I love this Adventist singing group. They have been around for decades. Hopefully this song will cheer you up!

PS If you watch this very short uplifting video, you will see its not doom or gloom for the SDA church. I hope everyone is blessed watching it.

Nice!!

Sang that about a zillion times

Interesting that they sound the same even though there is 20 times as many of them on stage.

 

[BobRyan]

Despite their efforts, there is still a need for more auditing in the Adventist church.

No doubt - some areas of improvement remain for all individuals and groups.

 

[bbbbbbb]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The CoJCoLDS, aka Mormons, make similar claims. In fact, the Russian Orthodox Church claims each and every citizen of Russia as a member. This is particularly useful in the World Council of Churches where member denominations are accorded votes affecting policies and beliefs based on their membership numbers.

 

[SabbathBlessings]

Nice!!

Sang that about a zillion times

Me too.

Interesting that they sound the same even though there is 20 times as many of them on stage.

This was their 45th reunion so I think everyone on stage was current and past members of the group. I noticed Pastor Lomacang on stage and didn’t know until recently he was part of the group a few decades ago.

Sadly the founder Max Mace passed away not too long ago.

Happy Sabbath!

 

[The Liturgist]

My thread is about the undisputed fact that the independent organization ChristianityToday reported that the SDA denomination has grown from zero in 1844 to become the fifth largest Christian denomination in the world - as being a "sign" that it is not in failing state (as if failing due to doctrine or policy during those explosive growth years) but rather a growing one.

And now on this thread we have the additional fact that the top 4 in that list that ChristianityToday put together are very similar to yet another independent source.

My thread points out that all those years of more than 1000 baptisms a year is equivalent to a "pentecost day of 3000 baptisms - every day of the year".

What ChristianityToday reported was in error, as I have shown, beyond any doubt. The SDA is the tenth largest communion and the seventh among integral denominations, at best. We had this conversation before, and I groan that history is repeating itself.

And if those baptisms are of Christians already baptized who are merely changing denominations, while it is not detrimental like the departure of Christians from the faith due to abuses in the RCC coming to light in the 2000s and incompetent lukewarmness in some denominations, it is also not beneficial. The total number of Christians is unchanged.

 

[The Liturgist]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The CoJCoLDS, aka Mormons, make similar claims. In fact, the Russian Orthodox Church claims each and every citizen of Russia as a member. This is particularly useful in the World Council of Churches where member denominations are accorded votes affecting policies and beliefs based on their membership numbers.

That’s completely untrue regarding the Russian Orthodox Church. It is true about some Western European countries where people are by default registered as members of the state church. The Russian Federation, for all its faults, does not do that; there are substantial Muslim, Armenian Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish populations, and a number of minority religions like Tatar shamanism.

 

[bbbbbbb]

That’s completely untrue regarding the Russian Orthodox Church. It is true about some Western European countries where people are by default registered as members of the state church. The Russian Federation, for all its faults, does not do that; there are substantial Muslim, Armenian Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish populations, and a number of minority religions like Tatar shamanism.

Perhaps I did overstate the situation, which was more significant in the 1960's when the Russian Orthodox Church exercised a strong political (Marxist) influence in the World Council of Churches.

However, with an estimated church membership of 90 million (Russian Orthodox Church | History & Facts | Britannica) out of a population in the Russian federation of almost 146 million (Russia Population 1950-2022 | MacroTrends) which translates to almost 62% of the entire population, the marriage of the Russian Orthodox Church with the Putin regime is quite solid. Does it not seem peculiar to have a society which was once officially and thoroughly atheistic suddenly become Orthodox to the extent that a majority of its citizens have rejected atheism and embraced Christianity without any evident evangelization having happened?

 

[BobRyan]

What ChristianityToday reported was in error,

You are free to have our opinion on that of course.

The SDA is the tenth largest communion

A website that shows that sort of grouping - is using almost the same top 4 list as ChristianityToday's top 4 - as already noted here --

Here is another group having a similar top 4 list as ChristianityToday's "Top Four"
The 10 Biggest Christian Denominations in the World - Generation95

Interesting "top four" in that group - are very close to ChristianityToday.

1. - Catholic 1.3 B
2. - Pentecostal ISM (with Assemblies of God as part of it at 67M) - 280 M
3. - Eastern Orthodox 240 M
4. - Anglican 85 M

So when they get to 5 - they take all Baptist denominations and lump them into one single denomination

And when they get to "five" they select a non-denomination instead of a denomination. SDA was a better fit - and that is the choice ChristianityToday made.

 

[The Liturgist]

You are free to have our opinion on that of course.

It is not a matter of opinion, but statistical certainty. The claim that the SDA is the fifth largest in the world, made on ChristianityToday, is plainly erroneous based on all available statistics and using both a communion-based methodology such as CT claimed to use, or an individual church based methodology.

A website that shows that sort of grouping - is using almost the same top 4 list as ChristianityToday's top 4 - as already noted here --

That link does nothing other than validate my claim, precisely, that the SDA is the tenth largest denomination, which I pointed out to you last year and which I am repeating now.

And when they get to "five" they select a non-denomination instead of a denomination. SDA was a better fit - and that is the choice ChristianityToday made.

Umm, no, because if you deleted the Baptists, which would be a mistake, because they constitute a communion, which was the definition used in the ChristianityToday article, that would merely advance the SDA to ninth place.

 

[BobRyan]

Umm, no, because if you deleted the Baptists, which would be a mistake, because they constitute a communion, .

We are not talking about "deleting all Baptist denominations" we are talking about admitting that various Baptist denominations do exist and that a number of them are NOT in communion with the others, nor do the actual Baptist denominations claim to be coordinating with, confirm rulings of .. a higher baptist denomination above them.

Try placing Independent Baptists, Fundamental Baptists, Free Will Baptists, Missionary Baptists, Seventh-day Baptists in a room and telling them they are now supposed to conform to Southern Baptist decisions/rulings/policy/practice etc. Or at the very least that they should share open communion with Southern Baptists -- and see what results.

There is such a thing as "a denomination" as it turns out.

Seventh-day Adventists offer open communion with ALL baptist denominations - but the same cannot be said about the various Baptist denominations between themselves. That does not make us Baptist or part of some larger Baptist denomination.

 

[The Liturgist]

Perhaps I did overstate the situation, which was more significant in the 1960's when the Russian Orthodox Church exercised a strong political (Marxist) influence in the World Council of Churches.

However, with an estimated church membership of 90 million (Russian Orthodox Church | History & Facts | Britannica) out of a population in the Russian federation of almost 146 million (Russia Population 1950-2022 | MacroTrends) which translates to almost 62% of the entire population, the marriage of the Russian Orthodox Church with the Putin regime is quite solid. Does it not seem peculiar to have a society which was once officially and thoroughly atheistic suddenly become Orthodox to the extent that a majority of its citizens have rejected atheism and embraced Christianity without any evident evangelization having happened?

Your argument might have a point if the same kind of renaissance had not happened in, for instance, Ukraine, Georgia, Romania, Bulgaria, the former Yugoslavia, Poland, and Albania, which are not exactly allies of the Russian Federation. In fact the Romanian Orthodox Church, which was more severely repressed by Nicolae Caesescu and the Securitate, is the second largest Orthodox Church worldwide, larger than the Greek Orthodox, and the other Romanian Christian denominations also experienced a Renaissance.

Indeed in Albania religion was totally outlawed. The Soviet program of anti-religious propaganda and secularization was never successful; their attempts to replace the Orthodox Church with “the Living Church” which was a heretical entity not unlike “Positive Christianity” in the Third Reich failed, and then Stalin needed the support of the Church in order to win WWII, and that changed the dynamic. Indeed evidence now suggests that propaganda to the effect that Yuri Gagarin was an atheist and made an atheistic remark in flight was...propaganda, not based in reality.

 

[The Liturgist]

We are not talking about "deleting all Baptist denominations" we are talking about admitting that various Baptist denominations do exist and that a number of them are NOT in communion with the others, nor do the actual Baptist denominations claim to be coordinating with, confirm rulings of .. a higher baptist denomination above them.

Try placing Independent Baptists, Fundamental Baptists, Free Will Baptists, Missionary Baptists, Seventh-day Baptists in a room and telling them they are now supposed to conform to Southern Baptist decisions/rulings/policy/practice etc. Or at the very least that they should share open communion with Southern Baptists -- and see what results.

There is such a thing as "a denomination" as it turns out.

Seventh-day Adventists offer open communion with ALL baptist denominations - but the same cannot be said about the various Baptist denominations between themselves. That does not make us Baptist or part of some larger Baptist denomination.

And again, if I conceded that argument, which is fallacious, because you are ignoring the Baptist World Federation and those baptists who are in communion, you went from tenth to ninth place among communions, and are still in seventh among individual churches. Not fifth.

10 - 1 = 9

 

[tall73]

And when they get to "five" they select a non-denomination instead of a denomination. SDA was a better fit - and that is the choice ChristianityToday made.

And now you go back to the specific denomination argument, when you have avoided the list that the Liturgist gave you of specific denominations that he claims are larger, but you won't address:

the Roman Rite of the Roman Catholic Church
the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate),
the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church,
the Church of Christ in Congo,
the Church of England,
the Calvary Chapel
Assemblies of God in Brazil

There are more than five in that list Bob.

 

[BobRyan]

And now you go back to the specific denomination argument, when you have avoided the list that the Liturgist gave you

1. I did not publish any list at all.

2. I point to two independent sources (also independent from Liturgist, not just independent from Adventists) that have an almost identical list for the first four places in their top 5.

Those two points are still irrefutable.

The third point that is irrefutable is the one I posted from wikipedia which is that the SBC is the largest baptist denomination.

 

[BobRyan]

And again, if I conceded that argument, which is fallacious, because you are ignoring the Baptist World Federation

If Adventists were part of a "World federation" and someone said that whatever "World federation" Adventists were in with other denominations -- was not as lard as the "world federation" that Baptist denominations are part of - we would be having a different conversation.

Even so - here is "Seventh-day Baptist World Federation"

World Federation | Seventh Day Baptist General Conference

Many federations / alliances exist where denominations are members.

"World Evangelical Alliance"
"World Council of Churches"
"The Baptist World Alliance " also called "Baptist World Federation" alliance

In any case you are welcome to view it however you wish .. the same is true for ChristianityToday.

Here is another group having a similar top 4 list as ChristianityToday's "Top Four"
The 10 Biggest Christian Denominations in the World - Generation95

====================

However you wish to think of it - these facts are irrefutable

1. The SDA denomination is a real denomination with a single Administrative body voting on doctrine, policy and practice.
2. The ChristianityToday article exists just as I have claimed and states what I have said.
3. You and I continue to differ in how we view this.

Given those irrefutable facts - it is not "reasonable" to expect you to post that you and I have come to an agreement and now at some later point you are "still surprised" to find that irrefutable point #3 above is "still true".

 

[tall73]

BobRyan said: ↑

And when they get to "five" they select a non-denomination instead of a denomination. SDA was a better fit - and that is the choice ChristianityToday made.

BobRyan said: ↑

1. I did not publish any list at all.


You said the SDA was a better fit for five. That is in fact giving your opinion on where they rank.

So now that you have weighed in, are these specific churches larger than the Adventist church?

the Roman Rite of the Roman Catholic Church
the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate),
the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church,
the Church of Christ in Congo,
the Church of England,
the Calvary Chapel
Assemblies of God in Brazil

 

[tall73]

2. The ChristianityToday article exists just as I have claimed and states what I have said.

Do you accept every statement Christianity Today publishes, since they are independent? Or do you try to find out if their claims are valid?

Are these specific churches larger than the Adventist church?

the Roman Rite of the Roman Catholic Church
the Russian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate),
the Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church,
the Church of Christ in Congo,
the Church of England,
the Calvary Chapel
Assemblies of God in Brazil

 

[The Liturgist]

1. I did not publish any list at all.

2. I point to two independent sources (also independent from Liturgist, not just independent from Adventists) that have an almost identical list for the first four places in their top 5.

Those two points are still irrefutable.

The third point that is irrefutable is the one I posted from wikipedia which is that the SBC is the largest baptist denomination.

These points are also irrelevant because if we delete the Baptists, which using ChristianityToday’s method of counting, we shouldn’t, that makes the SDA the ninth largest, not the fifth.

And if we count the way you’re counting, you’d have to prove a size superiority to the churches enumerated by @tall73, which with all due respect, you can’t. I should add that I suspect the Evangelical Church in Germany and the SBC are larger than the SDA based on my data; the Evangelical Church in Germany almost certainly, because of the variance in how SBC statistics are tabulated and the fact that the SDA and the Evangelical Church in Germany are within what appears to be a reasonable statistical margin of error of each other, yet we know the Evangelical Church in Germany has some of the best retention values for members in the world (because people want to use it for weddings and funerals), whereas the SDA has a very worrisomely low retention rate.

 

[tall73]

And if we count the way you’re counting, you’d have to prove a size superiority to the churches enumerated by @tall73, which with all due respect, you can’t.

And he certainly hasn't tried.

 

[BobRyan]

1. I did not publish any list at all.

2. I point to two independent sources (also independent from Liturgist, not just independent from Adventists) that have an almost identical list for the first four places in their top 5.

Those two points are still irrefutable.

The third point that is irrefutable is the one I posted from wikipedia which is that the SBC is the largest baptist denomination.

Which obviously - is key to the title of this thread and the OP.

These points are also irrelevant

Only if you prefer some other POV/Topic.

because if we delete the Baptists, which using ChristianityToday’s method of counting

No need to "Delete the Baptists" since we already know that the SBC is the largest Baptist denomination. (Which is now noted in the OP)

, we shouldn’t, that makes the SDA the ninth largest, not the fifth.

Not in the list referenced by ChristianityToday which was the statement made in the OP. You can't refute the existence of their claim - you can only say your own method of categorizing does not come up with the same results as theirs - and you still don't know what criteria they were using for grouping.