Data source: Gina A. Zurlo and Todd M. Johnson, eds., World Christian Database (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2024).
| Glossary item | Definition |
|---|---|
| Paschal communicants | Catholic Easter communicants (qv); all who actually take communion at Easter over a 4-week period. |
| passover | Annual Jewish religious festival commemorating deliverance from Egypt; for Christians, symbolic of Christ’s atonement for sin. |
| pastor | A clergyman, priest or minister responsible for the cure of souls. |
| pastoral centers | In Catholic usage, parishes, quasiparishes, mission stations and a few other categories. World totals (1996): 423,064 centers (220,583 parishes and quasiparishes, 112,224 mission stations, 90,257 other centers). |
| pastoral council | In Catholic usage, a diocesan, or a nation-wide, council of bishops, priests, religious and laity. |
| pastoral region | See apostolic region. |
| pastoral reorganization | An updating or modernizing rearrangement of traditional jurisdictions in the Catholic Church in a country, in the interests of more realism, better pastoral care, new urban situations, etc. |
| pastoralia | The study of pastoral work in the church. |
| pastors’ conferences | Protestant conferences for pastors and clergy in developing countries, held frequently, under sponsorship of World Vision. |
| patriarch | The supreme bishop of an autocephalous church, especially Catholic or Orthodox. |
| patriarchal diocese | A diocese administered by a patriarch. |
| patriarchal exarchate | (symbol PE). The jurisdiction of an exarch under a patriarch. |
| patriarchal vicariate | (symbol VP). A vicariate, usually in another city, of one of the traditional patriarchates. |
| patriarchate | The office, dignity, jurisdiction, province, or see of a patriarch. Global total: (1999) 31 traditional Catholic (13) and Orthodox (18) patriarchates, and over 100 more of recent establishment and unsupported historical claim. |
| Patristics | Patrology (qv). |
| patrology | The science or scientific study of the teachings of the Fathers of the Church, defined as in the West all Christian writers up to Gregory the Great (died 604), and in the East to John Damascene (died 749). |
| peak publishers | In Jehovah’s Witnesses’ usage, the maximum number of publishers (qv) in action in any given year. |
| pedigree | A religion’s coded family tree or lineage, relationship to existing religions, ancestry, line of descent. |
| pedobaptist | Pedobaptist churches baptize children and infants of Christian families because they believe that in doing so they are faithful to the teaching and practice of Christ and his apostles and of the Church from the earliest times; they do not receive or give any second baptism, since baptism is by its very nature unrepeatable; they respect the convictions of fellow-Christians in the Baptist traditions (baptizing adults only) and desire fellowships and unity with them. |
| Pedobaptists | Christians in traditions that baptize infants. 92% of global church membership. Some 3.3% of these are doubly-affiliated i.e. also members of non- Pedobaptist churches and traditions. |
| penetration | The extent of evangelization into a people’s or region’s culture and life, usually overcoming difficulties or resistance or opposition. |
| Pentecost | Christian festival on the 7th Sunday after Easter commemorating descent of the Holy Spirit; called Pentecost by Catholics, Whitsunday by Anglicans and others. |
| pentecostal | With a small ‘p’, the noun or adjective refers here to charismatic Christians (l) still within mainline non- Pentecostal denominations, and (2) those in Non-White indigenous pentecostal denominations. |
| Pentecostal | With a capital ‘P’, the noun or adjective refers here to charismatic Christians in separate or distinct Pentecostal denominations of White origin. |
| Pentecostal | A church member, or church, or organization affiliated to a Classical Pentecostal denomination. |
Data on 18 categories of religion, including non-religious, by country, province, and people.
Data on all religions, Christian activities, and trends.
Membership data, year begun, and rates of change.
Population and religion data on all major cities & provinces.
Detailed information covering religion, culture, and geography.
A repository of historical data, including a chronology of Christianity from the 1st to 21st centuries.