There are different estimates on the total number of Christians in China when attendance at unregistered churches is taken into account, with figures ranging from 40 million to 130 million.

Christians in China now number just over 23 million, according to the results of the Communist country’s first official faith survey.

Although that figure amounts to only 1.8 percent of the total population, it represents 73 percent of China’s religious population.

The figures were contained in the newly published Blue Book on China Religions, compiled by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, an academic unit under the control of the Chinese government, according to China Daily.

The academy looked at the responses of over 60,000 questionnaires carried out in more than 300 counties across China.

Among the Christians interviewed, 69 percent of them said that they had converted to Christianity because they or their family members had fallen ill. A staggering 70 percent of those describing themselves as Christian were female and 67 percent of all Christians surveyed said they had been baptized.

The academy attributed the growth to societal reform over the last three decades, with 73 percent of Chinese Christians having joined the church after 1993, and only 18 percent having joined the church between 1982 and 1992.

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