Easter Sunday: Best-Attended Sunday for Protestant Churches

23 hours ago

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For many churches, Easter Sunday remains the most important event of the year. According to a new survey, “While many churches consider high attendance as something from their prepandemic past, seasonal changes have resumed,” said Scott McConnell, executive director of Lifeway Research. “Church attendance is predictable again, with periods of consistency in the fall and early spring, as well as holiday crowds at Christmas and Easter.”

Today, 90 percent of pastors identify Easter as the day their church has its highest, second-highest or third-highest attendance for worship service, a new Lifeway survey found. Eight in 10 say the same for Christmas, and 51 percent identify Mother’s Day. However, fewer pastors point to high attendance on those three days compared to 2011. Easter, down from 93 percent to 90 percent. Christmas, down from 84 percent to 81 percent, dropped three percentage points, while Mother’s Day fell eight points from 59 percent to 51 percent. A day the church designates to invite friends is the only day to have a statistically significant increase in the past decade, climbing from 14 percent in 2011 to 20 percent in 2024.

More than half of U.S. Protestant pastors identify Easter as the day their church typically has its highest attendance for worship services, statistically unchanged from the 55 percent who said the same in 2011. Another 30 percent say Easter is the second-most-attended day at their congregation, while 8 percent identify it as the third-highest-attendance worship service. For many, it’s a time to explore various Easter traditions.

Nondenominational pastors are more likely than Presbyterian or Reformed pastors to have their largest crowds on Easter (64 percent v. 45 percent). Also, Lutherans (98 percent) and Methodists (95 percent) are more likely to have Easter near the top than Presbyterian/Reformed (87 percent), Pentecostal (84) or Restorationist Movement pastors (78 percent). Understanding church attendance trends can help churches better plan for the future.

“On any given Sunday, a large minority of a congregation may not be present for worship,” McConnell said. “Easter is the day when the most church members get to church — and for a good reason: No other theme is as profound to a Christian than celebrating that they died with Christ and as Jesus was raised to life, so too Christians are now alive to God in Christ Jesus.” Many look to Protestant Easter services as a cornerstone of their faith.

For those interested in attending, planning ahead for Easter services is crucial. Moreover, understanding strategies for church growth can help congregations thrive throughout the year.