United Methodist Church Membership Falls by 174,000 in 2025: New Report

174,000. That is how many names disappeared from United Methodist membership rolls in a single year — a 4.4 percent drop that leaves the denomination with about 3.8 million U.S. members. But buried inside the same report that delivered that gut punch is a number nobody expected: professions of faith are rising.

The figures come from a new statistical insights report released by the General Council on Finance and Administration, the agency that collects United Methodist data. Drawing on reports filed by 20,158 U.S. congregations for 2025 — down from 21,176 that filed in 2024 — the report paints a complicated picture: a denomination still shrinking, but with unmistakable signs of life underneath the decline.

"Make no mistake," the denomination's own UM News acknowledged. The United Methodist Church continued its decades-long slide in U.S. membership and worship attendance last year — a trend seen across Christian traditions in the country. In-person average weekly worship attendance dipped by about 3 percent to a bit over 1 million. Another 986,402 worshipped online. All five U.S. jurisdictions saw decreases.

United Methodist Church Membership Decline 2025

The raw numbers tell a sobering story. Between 2024 and 2025, U.S. membership fell by nearly 4.4 percent to about 3.8 million people — roughly 1.1 percent of the U.S. population. Of the congregations in the data set, 20,089 filed reports in both years, while 1,087 filed in 2024 but not 2025, and just 69 filed for the first time last year.

The U.S. decline is part of a larger global contraction. For the first time, the finance agency is sharing interactive dashboards covering the denomination's eight regional conferences in Africa, Europe, and the Philippines. Based on the most recent journals submitted, the global United Methodist Church now counts about 10.3 million members — down from a high of an estimated 12.5 million in 2017.

That drop follows the bruising schism years. From 2019 to 2023, more than 7,600 mostly theologically conservative churches disaffiliated through a temporary exit process tied to the denomination's debate over LGBTQ inclusion. Entire conferences in Russia and Côte d'Ivoire withdrew as well. The 174,000 figure is what remains after the earthquake — the slow erosion continuing even when the dramatic departures have stopped.

"Behind every membership figure is a human life; behind every local church record is a living worshipping community; and behind every annual conference report is a part of our global family that deserves to be accurately seen and known." — Caitlin Congdon, top executive of the General Council on Finance and Administration

UMC Statistical Insights Report: The Bright Spots

Here is where the report gets interesting. The same data set that recorded the losses also recorded this: 25,444 people became professing United Methodist church members through confirmation in 2025 — up 1,363, or nearly 5.7 percent. Most of them are youth. Congregations sustained 63,589 ongoing small groups, up nearly 1.7 percent.

Church closures fell by nearly 44 percent, from 960 in 2024 to 540 last year — and 214 active congregations began as new church starts. Churches' building debt fell by $106.7 million, and budget income ticked up 0.25 percent. Congregations offered 106,512 community ministries, served their neighbors more than 34 million times through food pantries, shelters, recovery groups, and disaster response — essentially the same reach, with fewer members.

"Our local churches are doing remarkable ministry," said Caitlin Congdon, the finance agency's top executive. "We hope this analysis will encourage congregations and conferences as they look at what God is doing through their ministries." It is the language of an institution trying to read its own vital signs honestly — declining and ministering at the same time.

A Texas Church That Refuses to Shrink

If you want to see what the bright spots look like in human form, drive to Portland, Texas. When the Rev. Barbara Aziz arrived at First United Methodist Church in 2023, it had three active youth — all of them children of the volunteers running the program. This year, the church confirmed 10 youth and baptized five of them, in the same month it celebrated its 100th anniversary.

The congregation has about 403 members now, with worship attendance averaging 288 a week and climbing. It survived Hurricane Harvey in 2017, which forced it out of its worship center for a year. It survived COVID. When disaffiliations spiked in 2022 and 2023, it became a "Lighthouse Congregation" — a beacon for people who wanted to stay United Methodist. Through it all, Aziz says, the church kept feeding people, partnering with schools, and building beds for families in need.

"At the end of nearly every church service," Aziz said, "I end my blessing with the words, 'Church starts now.'" Portland sits in the Rio Texas Conference — the only U.S. conference to show positive movement in all nine metrics the new website tracks, including a stunning 132 percent growth in professions of faith through confirmation.

"The first 100 years were a gift. The next 100 years are a calling." — Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey, on First UMC Portland's centennial

What the UMC Decline Means for American Christianity

The United Methodist story is the mainline Protestant story in miniature: a decades-long slide that no single report can reverse, paired with pockets of unmistakable vitality. Fifteen other U.S. conferences saw positive movement in at least seven of the nine measures tracked. The denomination is smaller, leaner, and — by its own data — in some ways more active than the membership line suggests.

There is also a quiet rebuke to despair in the numbers. A church that lost 174,000 members still confirmed 25,444 young people. A denomination that closed 540 churches also started 214. The christain discipleship happening in small groups and food pantries does not show up on a membership chart — but the new dashboards were built precisely to make it visible.

The question hanging over next year's report is whether the bright spots are a blip or a beginning. The confirmations are up. The closures are down. The debt is falling. In Portland, Texas, ten teenagers just stood up in front of a hundred-year-old church and said yes to Jesus — and a bishop called the next century a calling, not a crisis. The membership line keeps falling. The story underneath it is still being written.

Read more on the denomination's recent upheavals in Latest: Texas Megachurch Votes This Sunday on Leaving United Methodist Church and Adam Hamilton Virgin Birth Controversy: Christians Don't Have to Believe, Senate Candidate Says. For mainline trends, see Episcopal Church Sells $52 Million NYC Headquarters to Plant Churches and McLean Bible Church Lawsuit Continues After Virginia Supreme Court Dismisses Appeal.

But the most surprising part of this story is yet to come — keep reading.