Christian Daily International

 Photo by Judith Chambers / Unsplash The Assemblies of God Theological Seminary has reached more than 1,200 churches and trained about 6,000 pastors and lay leaders in the first year of a nationwide initiative aimed at supporting rural congregations in the United States, according to a recent report by AG News. The effort, known as the Rural Church Ministry Partnership, is funded by a grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. and focuses on equipping churches in towns of 10,000 or fewer residents with resources, training and connections tailored to their context. The initiative has engaged congregations across 31 states in its first year. According to AG News, the partnership brings together denominational leaders, educational institutions and ministry organizations to develop training opportunities, internships and a centralized resource hub designed to address challenges commonly faced by rural pastors and churches. Keith Jones, director for the Rural Grant Partnership, said the initiative seeks to strengthen the role of churches within their communities. “AGTS wants to see healthy, vibrant churches equipped to be resource centers within their communities, providing an anchor of real hope and assistance,” Jones said. Partners in the initiative include the Assemblies of God USA, Rural Compassion, Trinity Bible College & Graduate School and Rural Advancement, along with 13 regional Assemblies of God network partners that help connect local churches with available resources. The partnership aims to reach 6,040 churches by the end of 2029. The first year’s engagement represents roughly 20% of that target, according to the report. Christopher L. Coble, vice president for religion at Lilly Endowment, said the initiative addresses gaps in support for rural congregations. “Rural and small-town congregations play critical roles in supporting the vitality of their local communities,” Coble said. “Yet many resources available to support congregations do not adequately address the particular challenges faced by churches in rural settings. “Our hope is that these grants will provide much-needed resources and support to rural and small-town churches to help them address their challenges and enhance and extend the many ways they serve their communities.” The update on rural ministry efforts comes as the Assemblies of God USA reports broader growth trends in recent decades. According to its 2024 Annual Church Ministries Report, average church worship attendance increased 6.2% compared to 2023. The number of adherents in the United States has more than doubled since 1975, rising from 1.2 million to more than 3 million. The denomination has also become more diverse. Churches identified as primarily ethnic minority or immigrant congregations grew from 2,260 in 1989 to 5,081 in 2024 and now account for about 40% of all Assemblies of God congregations in the United States.

Punjab Assembly building in Lahore, Pakistan. Sunni Person, Creative Commons A Christian lawmaker on Tuesday (March 31) introduced a bill in the Punjab Assembly seeking to criminalize forced religious conversions with penalties of up to five years in prison, Falbous Christopher, chairman of the assembly’s Standing Committee on Minority Affairs, submitted the Punjab Protection of the Rights of Religious Minorities Bill 2026 in a renewed attempt to address a long-standing human rights challenge affecting Pakistan’s religious minorities, particularly Christian and Hindu women and underage girls. The bill aims to establish a comprehensive legal framework to curb forced conversions, forced marriages and systemic discrimination against minority communities. It comes amid heightened scrutiny following cases such as that of Maria Shahbaz, a 13-year-old Christian girl whose abduction and forced conversion/marriage sparked nationwide protests and renewed calls for stronger legal safeguards for vulnerable minority girls. Under the proposed legislation, anyone who “compels or attempts to compel” a person belonging to a religious minority to convert through threats, coercion or undue influence would face up to five years’ imprisonment and a fine. The bill clearly distinguishes between forced and voluntary conversions, excluding the latter from punishment. Christopher said the formal recognition of forced conversion as a specific crime could help address longstanding gaps in Pakistan’s legal framework, where such cases are often pursued under broader provisions that do not explicitly address religious coercion. “While legislation is essential, its real impact will depend on effective implementation, coordination among institutions and protection mechanisms for vulnerable individuals, especially women and girls,” Christopher told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. Beyond criminal penalties, the bill grants courts expanded authority to intervene in cases involving forced marriages of religious minorities in the 96-percent Muslim country. Judges would be empowered to issue protection orders and conduct independent inquiries, ensuring that victims are not pressured into remaining in abusive or unlawful relationships. The proposed law stipulates that marriages involving minorities can only be declared void through court orders, aligning such decisions with existing marriage, child protection and guardianship laws. It also classifies offenses motivated by religious hatred as aggravated crimes, requiring courts to consider such motives during sentencing. Christopher said these provisions are intended to address recurring patterns seen in previous cases, where girls have struggled to access timely legal remedies or adequate protection from kidnappers. Systemic Discrimination The legislation extends beyond forced conversions to tackle broader structural discrimination faced by minority communities in Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous province and home to a significant Christian population. It proposes a prohibition on religious bias in employment, education, access to public services and entry to public spaces, while mandating state protection of minority places of worship and religious property. “No person shall damage, desecrate or unlawfully occupy any place of worship or religious property belonging to a religious minority,” the bill states. In addition, the proposed law calls for a review of educational curricula to remove material that promotes hatred, intolerance or discrimination, an issue frequently highlighted by rights groups as a key driver of societal prejudice. Christopher emphasized that legal reform must be accompanied by broader societal change. “We must also address the root causes of intolerance through education reform and community engagement to build a more inclusive and peaceful society,” he said. Introduction of the bill follows a series of controversial cases involving the alleged forced conversion of minority girls, particularly from Christian and Hindu communities. The case of Maria Shahbaz drew widespread attention after rights groups alleged that the Christian teenager had been abducted, forcibly converted to Islam and married to a Muslim man twice her age. Courts, including the Federal Constitutional Court, upheld the marriage, prompting outrage among the Christian community and activists who argued that questions of coercion and age determination were not adequately examined. Such cases have become emblematic of broader concerns about the vulnerability of minority women and girls, who advocacy groups say are often targeted due to socio-economic marginalization and weak legal protections. History of Opposition Efforts to enact laws against forced conversions in Pakistan have historically faced strong political and religious opposition. In 2021, a federal bill aimed at preventing forced conversions was effectively shelved following resistance from Islamist parties during the government of former prime minister Imran Khan. Critics argued that the proposed legislation could be misused or infringe upon religious freedoms, while supporters maintained it was necessary to protect vulnerable minorities. The Council of Islamic Ideology, which advises the government on religious matters, and various religious groups raised objections to provisions such as minimum age requirements for conversion and mandatory judicial oversight, contributing to the bill’s withdrawal before it could be passed. The Punjab bill will now be referred to the Standing Committee on Minority Affairs for review and deliberation. If approved, it will be tabled in the provincial assembly for debate and a vote. If enacted, the legislation would represent one of the most comprehensive provincial frameworks aimed at protecting religious minorities in Pakistan addressing not only forced conversions but also discrimination, hate-motivated offenses and the protection of religious sites. Rights advocates, however, caution that legislation alone will not be sufficient to bring meaningful change. “The real test will be implementation,” said prominent Christian attorney Lazar Allah Rakha, noting that police inaction, social pressures and prolonged legal proceedings have historically undermined protections for minority victims. International advocacy groups continue to highlight the challenges faced by religious minorities in Pakistan. In its 2026 World Watch List, Open Doors ranked Pakistan eighth among the 50 countries where it is most difficult to practice Christianity, underscoring the urgency of legal and institutional reforms.

“The Quiet Revival,” a report by the British Bible Society, claimed that church attendance in England and Wales was surging, especially among young men aged 18 to 24, where monthly attendance appeared to have quadrupled from 4% in 2018 to 16% in 2024. That report has now been withdrawn. Zbynek Pospisil/Getty Images Last week, the British Bible Society quietly withdrew one of the most celebrated religious data stories of recent years. Its April 2025 report, “The Quiet Revival,” had claimed that church attendance in England and Wales was surging, especially among young men aged 18 to 24, where monthly attendance appeared to have quadrupled from 4% in 2018 to 16% in 2024. The story spread rapidly, was embraced by evangelical commentators and media outlets worldwide, and was treated as a counternarrative to the long-documented decline of Christianity in the West. It was too good to be true. It was too good to be true. And it was. YouGov, which conducted the surveys, has now admitted that the 2024 data sample contained fraudulent responses and that key anti-fraud quality controls had not been activated. YouGov’s CEO issued a public apology and accepted full responsibility. The Bible Society pulled the report. The “quiet revival” never happened, at least not in the way the data claimed. This episode is instructive on several levels. But its lessons apply more broadly than to Christians alone. The methodology problem nobody wanted to see The first lesson is about method. The Quiet Revival relied on opt-in online polling, a technique long known to be vulnerable to panel contamination, particularly when studying hard-to-reach or socially desirable groups. Pew Research Center raised concerns about the methodology almost immediately after the report was published. Humanists UK and leading demographers, including UCL’s David Voas, called attention to the implausibility of the findings months before the retraction. Objective records from the Church of England and the Catholic Church showed no corresponding growth. Objective records from the Church of England and the Catholic Church showed no corresponding growth. And yet for nearly a year, the Bible Society vigorously defended the report, repeatedly seeking and receiving assurances from YouGov. The problem was not just that the method was flawed. The problem was that very few people asked hard questions about it, because the conclusion was so welcome. Confirmation bias runs in both directions It confirmed what many Christians hoped was true. This brings us to the second and more uncomfortable lesson. The quiet revival narrative spread fast not because the evidence was strong, but because it confirmed what many Christians hoped was true. The story resonated emotionally. It was shared, celebrated, and cited in sermons and strategy documents across denominations. Some church leaders used it to push back against what they saw as the relentlessly negative narrative of secularization research. When data confirms our hopes, we treat it as evidence; when it challenges them, we question the method. Even now, after the retraction, the Bible Society’s CEO has insisted there is “other evidence” that more people are finding faith, and that the wider story of spiritual renewal remains valid. That may or may not be true. But it illustrates a recurring pattern: when data confirms our hopes, we treat it as evidence; when it challenges them, we question the method. The problem, however, is not uniquely Christian. Supporters of secularization theory are equally susceptible. In August 2025, a study published in Nature Communications by Stolz, de Graaf, Hackett, and colleagues proposed a three-stage model of religious decline, tested across 111 countries: first participation declines, then the personal importance of religion, and finally religious belonging. The study received enormous attention, covered widely by outlets including Religion News Service and Pew Research Center, and was widely read as a definitive vindication of classic secularization theory. But the authors themselves urge caution, noting that “we recommend caution in interpreting longitudinal claims, due to limited data.” More importantly, the model has a structural problem. When a theory can absorb any counterevidence by reclassifying it as a temporary deviation, it risks becoming unfalsifiable. It treats every counterexample, whether Eastern Europe, Israel, or the Pentecostal and Islamic revivals, as countries either at an early stage of the transition or as exceptions requiring further investigation. When a theory can absorb any counterevidence by reclassifying it as a temporary deviation, it risks becoming unfalsifiable. That is not a strength of the model. It is a warning sign. Steve Bruce and Tony Glendinning made a related move in their 2023 article in the journal Religions, titled “Secularization Vindicated,” arguing that the accumulated evidence now decisively supports the secularization thesis for the West. That may well be right for the specific Western contexts they examine. But declaring the debate settled, and extrapolating the conclusion globally, is a different claim, and one the data does not yet fully support. Both sides, in other words, are reading the data they want to see. Christians seized on a flawed poll to announce a revival. Secularization theorists have been too quick to declare religion’s global retreat inevitable and irreversible. Neither position is well supported by the evidence as it currently stands. What the data actually tells us There is no credible evidence of a Christian revival in the West. The honest summary is more modest than either camp would like. There is no credible evidence of a Christian revival in the West. Long-term survey data, church attendance records, and generational trends all point in the opposite direction. The Quiet Revival was a story people wanted to believe, and that desire made them appear too ready to believe anything that confirmed their hopes. There is equally no credible evidence that religion is disappearing globally. But there is equally no credible evidence that religion is disappearing globally. Religious vitality in the Global South, the persistence of faith even in highly modernized societies, and the ongoing role of religion in political and social life across Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia all complicate any simple narrative of irreversible decline. The secularization thesis, even in its more sophisticated sequenced forms, still struggles to account for these realities without special pleading. What the data tells us is that religious change is real, uneven, context-dependent, and poorly served by grand unified theories. What this means for religious freedom research For those of us who work at the intersection of religion, data, and advocacy, the Quiet Revival episode is a useful case study. It illustrates three dynamics we should guard against regardless of our priors. A compelling narrative. First, the seduction of a good story. A revival among young men is a compelling narrative, just as the inevitable march of secularization is a compelling narrative. Both have cultural traction. Neither should substitute for rigorous evidence. Inconvenient evidence. Second, the slow response to inconvenient evidence. Pew flagged problems with the Quiet Revival data early. UCL’s David Voas raised questions publicly, as did NatCen’s John Curtice. The British Social Attitudes Survey showed continued decline. It still took nearly a year for the retraction to happen. Institutions are not neutral processors of evidence; they have interests, donors, and constituencies. That applies to Christian organizations and to secular research institutions alike. Residual belief. Third, the residual belief after refutation. Even after withdrawing the report, the Bible Society maintained that a revival may still be occurring, citing Bible sales and baptism numbers. Secularization theorists, similarly, tend to fold counterexamples into their models rather than question the models themselves. In both cases, the theory survives contact with disconfirming evidence a little too easily. Reliable data about religion is not just an academic concern. It shapes policy, informs advocacy, and influences how governments and institutions respond to the needs of religious communities. The standard we apply to evidence should not depend on whether we like the conclusion. That is true for Christians hoping for revival. It is equally true for researchers hoping to have solved the secularization debate. Caution and nuance are not signs of weakness. They are what good scholarship looks like. Originally published by Five4Faith Substack. Republished with permission. Dennis P. Petri, PhD is the International Director of the International Institute for Religious Freedom and Founder and scholar-at-large of the Observatory of Religious Freedom in Latin America. He is a Professor in International Relations at the Latin American University of Science and Technology. He is the author of The Specific Vulnerability of Religious Minorities, a book on undetected religious freedom challenges in Latin America. The International Institute for Religious Freedom (IIRF) was founded in 2005 with the mission to promote religious freedom for all faiths from an academic perspective. The IIRF aspires to be an authoritative voice on religious freedom. They provide reliable and unbiased data on religious freedom—beyond anecdotal evidence—to strengthen academic research on the topic and to inform public policy at all levels. The IIRF's research results are disseminated through the International Journal for Religious Freedom and other publications. A particular emphasis of the IIRF is to encourage the study of religious freedom in tertiary institutions through its inclusion in educational curricula and by supporting postgraduate students with research projects.