There are, by the latest counting, somewhere near three hundred thousand churches in the United States. They sit on mountain passes and at strip-mall corners; in Manhattan basements and beside Texas cotton fields. Some are four centuries old. Some opened last month, in a rented school gymnasium.
For most of American history there has been no way to find them, all of them, in one place. Denominational directories list their own. Google lists what pays for listing. Neither knows that the Orthodox church two towns over does Vespers on Saturday evening, or that the Baptists up the road have moved their Wednesday study to seven o'clock.
Churches List exists because a person moving to a new town should be able to find the worshipping community they are looking for — or discover one they had not known existed — in the same quiet afternoon they spend looking for a dentist or a grocer.
We are not a review site. We do not rank sermons, and we do not take complaints. We list what is there, as accurately as we can, and we let the churches speak for themselves. Where a church has a history worth reading, we commission an editor to write it. Where it does not, we list the service times and let that be that.
The work is slow. It is done by hand, church by church, by our editors and contributors, most of them members of the traditions they cover. We are wrong sometimes, and when we are wrong we fix it. Readers write to us often. We read every letter.
This is, in the old sense of the word, an almanac: a book of days, made for use. We hope you use it well. — M. W., Editor
Service times, denominations, and addresses are verified against at least one primary source — a diocesan directory, the church itself, or both.
We take worship seriously without being precious. A taco-truck parking lot is as welcome as a cathedral nave, if that is where a congregation gathers.
Every tradition that calls itself Christian has a place here — Catholic and Orthodox; Anglican, Lutheran, Reformed; Baptist and Pentecostal; Independent and house-church.
The directory is free and always will be. Readers who can, subscribe. Readers who cannot, read.
We do not take money from churches, denominations, or vendors to appear on this site, or to appear higher on it.
Every listing is checked by a person before it goes live. Machines help; they do not decide.
Margaret begins a hand-list of churches in New Haven County — 214 churches, one index card each.
The list becomes a spreadsheet, then a website. 1,840 entries. A friend contributes Massachusetts.
Twelve volunteer editors join. Coverage reaches Maine, Vermont, and south to Virginia.
42 states; 188,400 churches; the first print edition of the almanac is mailed to subscribers.
All 50 states represented. 284,000 churches verified against diocesan and denominational registers.
Audio readings of service times; a mobile app in Lent; quarterly print issues in saddle-stitch.
Churches List is set in Cormorant Garamond (display) and the system sans-serif family (body). No images of churches appear on this website without permission; placeholder stained-glass patterns stand in until a church provides its own photography. The directory is a non-profit public service. Its content is released under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial. It is built and maintained by a small editorial team that welcomes your corrections at editors@ecclesia.org.