The components of the Christian population dynamics at the beginning ofthe 21st century: world, region, country

The article is devoted to the problem of identifying the features of the Christian population dynamics in the world as a whole, in its regions and countries. At the global level, an increase in the number of Christians occurs due to natural (the difference between birth rate and death rate) and conversional (the number of those converting to Christianity minus the number of those leaving it) components. The former accounts for about 85 % of the average annual growth during the period 2000-2010, while the latter only for 15%. It is revealed that the Christian population is also growing in all regions of the world. The Global South (Africa, Asia, Latin America) provides a 90 %o increase, the Global North (North America, Europe, Australia and Oceania) the other 10 %o. Africa contributes the most to this increase (41 %) because of its sub-Saharan "part": the world's youngest Christian population living here has the highest fertility rate. The most significant difficulties were noted with the "reproduction" of Christians in Europe: its aging population gives the least number of births in comparison with other regions of the world. As a result, Europe lost its more than a thousand years' leading position in the number of Christians in 2015 in "favor" of Latin America. According to the authors' calculations, Africa - because of the extremely high growth rates of its Christian population - will oust Europe from the second place in 2017 and Latin America from the first in 2019. It is determined that all regions of the world (except Europe) are characterized by the excess of births over deaths in the Christian population. At the same time, there is a great disparity between the ratios of conversional and mechanical "components" of the Christian population change in the Global North and South regions. On the one hand, the excess of conversions from Christianity over to it in North America, Europe, Australia and Oceania is compensated by the positive net migration from the Global South. On the other hand, the decrease of Africa, Asia and Latin America's Christian population as a result of emigration in the Global North is accompanied by the conversional increase. Decline in the number of Christians is observed only in every 12th country. Most of them are located in Europe; moreover, Western and especially Eastern Europe regions were affected to a greater extent than Southern and Northern ones. In addition to some European countries, there are some more states with the declining Christian population: Guyana, Somalia, Japan, Iraq, Israel, Turkey, Georgia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.

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