page_title: Religion in Nigeria
section_title: Christian distribution
hierarchical_section_title: Religion in Nigeria / Abrahamic religions / Christianity / Christian distribution
caption_attribution_description: English: This art is at the fence of palace of Ime-Obi Ezechima, Onitsha
context_page_description: Nigeria, the most populous African country, is divided between adherents of Christianity, Islam and traditional religion quite similar to polytheism though the exact ratio is uncertain. The majority of Nigerian Muslims are either non-denominational Muslims or Sunni and are concentrated in mostly the northern region of the country with some Christian population, the same way Christians dominate in the south with some Muslim population. Most Nigerian Christians are Protestant though about a quarter are Catholic.
  Nigeria has the largest Muslim population in sub-Saharan Africa. Islam dominates the north and has a number of supporters in the southwestern, Yoruba part of the country. In terms of Nigeria's major ethnic groups' religious affiliations, the Hausa ethnic group in the north is mostly Muslim, the Yoruba tribe in the west is divided among mainly Muslim, Christian and traditional religions, while the Igbos of the east and the Ijaw in the south are predominantly Christians and some practitioners of traditional religions.
context_section_description: The majority of Christians are found in the south east, South-South, south west and Middle-belt region. An increasing number of mission stations and mission bookstores, along with churches serving southern enclaves and northern Christians in the northern cities and larger towns, are found in the Muslim north. Christianity in Yoruba area traditionally has been Protestant and Anglican, currently Protestant Pentecostal/evangelicals, whereas Igboland has always been the area of greatest activity by the Roman Catholic Church with current infusions of Protestantism. Other denominations abounded as well.
  Presbyterians arrived in the late 17th century in the Ibibio, Annang and Efik land and the Niger Delta area and had missions in the middle belt as well. The works of the Presbyterian Church in Calabar from Scotland by missionaries like Rev Hope M. Waddell, who arrived in Calabar 10 April 1846, in the 19th century and that of Mary Slessor of Calabar are examples. Small missionary movements were allowed to start up, generally in the 1920s, after the middle belt was considered pacified. Each denomination set up rural networks by providing schooling and health facilities. Most such facilities remained in 1990, although in many cases schools had been taken over by the local state government in order to standardize curricula and indigenize the teaching staff.
  Pentecostals arrived mostly as indigenous workers in the post-independence period, and in the 1980s, Evangelical and Apostolic Pentecostalism were spreading rapidly throughout the south western and middle belt, having major success in hitherto Roman Catholic and Protestant towns of the south as well. There were also breakaway, or Africanized churches, that blended traditional Christian symbols with indigenous symbols. Among these was the Aladura (prayer) movement that was spreading rapidly throughout Yoruba land and into the non-Muslim middle belt areas.
caption: The Holy Ghost depicted on a relief in Onitsha
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