World Christian Database: glossary

Data source: Gina A. Zurlo and Todd M. Johnson, eds., World Christian Database (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2024).

Glossary item	Definition
nondenominational	Of a parachurch agency, unrelated to any denomination or denominations, not accountable to any, outside their control.
non-denominational	(no-church groups). Churches or movements which, in reaction to Western missionary work, reject all ecclesiastical labels even including ‘Christian’, and all ecclesiastical practices including baptism.
non-diocesan	A term describing clergy and other staff in a diocese who are not on the diocesan payroll but are employed by a province, other Christian body, or a secular agency.
non-evangelizing Christians	Nominal Christians and nonpracticing Christians who although themselves evangelized, contribute nothing to the ongoing process of the evangelization of their own people or country or of the world.
non-historical Catholic	Churches or Christians who regard themselves as in the Catholic tradition but who have no historical continuity supporting their claim.
non-historical Orthodox	Churches or Christians who regard themselves as in the Orthodox tradition but who have no historical continuity supporting their claim.
non-native language	Any language understood by a people although not their mother tongue.
non-native speakers	Speakers of a language as a second or third or other language.
non-participating member	A church member or affiliated Christian who does not practice regularly; a non-practicing Christian (qv).
non-receiving countries	From the standpoint of foreign mission, countries which prohibit the receiving of foreign missionaries from other countries.
nonreligion	Absence of religion, replaced by either non-militant agnosticism or militant atheism.
nonreligionists	Term encompassing both (a) agnostics; and (b) atheists.
nonreligionists	Term encompassing the 2 varieties of unbeliever: (a) agnostics or secularists or materialists, who are nonreligious but not hostile to religion, and (b) atheists or anti-religious/anti-religionists militantly opposed or hostile to religion.
non-religious Buddhists	Persons whose family religion is Buddhism but who as individuals profess to have no personal religion.
non-religious quasi-religionists	Adherents of non-religious quasi-religions (some forms of agnosticism, fascism, humanism, liberal humanism, nationalism, Nazism, some forms of non-religion or secularism).
nonresidential missionary	A fulltime foreign missionary committed to evangelizing an ethnolinguistic people living in a country or countries where foreign missionaries are prohibited; and conducting his or her ministry from an open city in another country permitting full freedom of missionary action.
non-sending	Countries, areas or churches which, for various reasons, never send, or are not permitted by the state to send, foreign missionaries abroad.
nonsighted persons	The blind.
nonsovereign country	A political entity or country which is not free of external control, hence not a nation but a colony or other dependent territory.
non-sovereign territory	A country listed in the United Nations’ list of territories but not completely autonomous or independent or self-governing.
non-trinitarian	A Christian tradition not emphasizing the doctrine of the Trinity, hence often regarded as unitarian.
Non-White indigenous Christians	Independent believers, on every continent, who form their own autonomous churches, mostly pentecostal or charismatic in emphasis.
no-party states	Independent nations ruled without a political party.
norm	A model, type, pattern; an authoritative rule or standard.
normative	Prescriptive, regulative, didactic.

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Religions

Data on 18 categories of religion, including non-religious, by country, province, and people.

Countries and regions

Data on all religions, Christian activities, and trends.

Denominations

Membership data, year begun, and rates of change.

Cities & provinces

Population and religion data on all major cities & provinces.

Peoples & languages

Detailed information covering religion, culture, and geography.