"And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh:" Acts 2:17a
"Perhaps the biggest news about charismatic or Pentecostal Christians is simply that they are no longer news. Not too long ago, charismatics were a point of fascination in our culture. Thanks to the media, they were widely viewed as a bizarre Christian subculture, a group whose beliefs and behavior embarrassed mainstream Christians.
But things have changed—dramatically. Today our survey results show that charismatics are part of the mainstream Christian culture. Relatively few Americans perceive charismatics to be on the lunatic fringe of beliefs or behavior.
Based on several national studies of charismatics conducted by The Barna Group, we have discovered that roughly one-third of the U.S. adult population claims to be a charismatic or Pentecostal Christian. That means up to 80 million adults in the U.S. characterize themselves as charismatic or Pentecostal. That's more than double the population of California and larger than the entire populations of Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Korea, Spain or Thailand.
The actual figure depends on how the group is defined. Because there is no standard understanding embraced by leaders within the charismatic community, we have examined charismatics using three different definitions. In our surveys with more than 1,000 adults randomly selected from across the country, we saw that figure range from 30 percent to 37 percent, depending upon the definition used.
When we recently released information about the magnitude of the charismatic population, the national media reaction was one of disbelief. "Where are all these people?" was a common question from journalists. The simple answer is that charismatics no longer stand out like the odd child in an otherwise normal family. They are now integrated into virtually every dimension of the Christian body in America, attending churches that are known to be charismatic in orientation as well as churches that are not known in that way.
Research shows that at least one in five adults in a wide range of denominations—Baptist, mainline, evangelical and nondenominational churches—claims to be charismatic. A substantial number of Catholic believers—perhaps as many as one-quarter of that group—also consider themselves to be charismatic Christians."
Barna Report: No News Is Good News
By George Barna
Analyzing the growth of Pentecostalism in America.
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