Background: Today the Dutch religious landscape is characterized by two opposite trends. On the one hand, there is a massive and dominant trend of religious disaffiliation which mostly affects the Roman Catholic Church and the mainline Protestant churches, while on the other hand the Netherlands also witnesses the emergence of several independent, evangelical congregations of near megachurch size. Purpose: Against the background of these opposite trends, this paper focuses on the second trend and tries to explain why some people join an evangelical congregation. Methods: For this purpose, quantitative data gathered among the audiences of six thriving evangelical congregations are analyzed in view of the following research questions: (1) What was the previous religious affiliation of the people who switched or converted to one of the six participating evangelical congregations? and (2) Which factors induced the switch or conversion to these congregations? Results: Results of bivariate and multivariate analyses show that these congregations attract both mainline and orthodox Protestant switchers as well as a significant number of secular converts, whose decision to join these evangelical congregations is induced by early socialization experiences, their intrinsic religious orientation and the switching of their partner. Closer scrutiny into the background of the apparent secular converts reveals, however, that several of these converts are probably re-affiliates. Although these secular converts indicated to be a religious none in their early teens, their conversion to evangelicalism is in part still induced by certain, early religious socialization experiences. Conclusions and Implications: This insight puts the alleged success of these evangelical congregations in more perspective. It shows that their success is more a matter of circulating, religious believers and not so much a matter of successfully reaching out to the unchurched. In all likelihood, then, thriving evangelical congregations will remain an exception in secular societies like the Netherlands and evangelical church growth in no way marks a break with the ongoing trend of religious disaffiliation.

中文翻译：

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世俗化时代的教会增长：荷兰加入福音派教会的案例研究

背景：今天，荷兰的宗教景观以两种相反的趋势为特征。一方面，存在大规模且占主导地位的宗教分裂趋势，主要影响罗马天主教会和主流新教教会，而另一方面，荷兰也见证了几个独立的福音派教会的出现，其规模接近巨型教会。目的：在这些相反趋势的背景下，本文重点关注第二个趋势，并试图解释为什么有些人加入福音派会众。方法：为此，针对以下研究问题，分析了在六个蓬勃发展的福音派会众的听众中收集的定量数据：(1) 转换或皈依六个参与的福音派教会之一的人以前的宗教信仰是什么？(2) 哪些因素促使人们转向或皈依这些会众？结果：双变量和多变量分析的结果表明，这些会众既吸引了主流和正统新教转换者，也吸引了大量世俗皈依者，他们决定加入这些福音派教会的决定是由早期的社会经历、他们内在的宗教取向和转换他们的合作伙伴。然而，对明显的世俗皈依者的背景进行更仔细的审查会发现，其中一些皈依者可能是重新附属的。尽管这些世俗的皈依者在他们十几岁的时候就表明自己不信教，他们皈依福音派的部分原因仍然是某些早期的宗教社会化经历。结论和意义：这一见解使这些福音派会众的所谓成功更具前景。它表明，他们的成功更多是一个流传的宗教信徒的问题，而不是成功地接触到未加入教会的人的问题。那么，在荷兰等世俗社会中，蓬勃发展的福音派教会很可能仍然是一个例外，福音派教会的增长绝不标志着与宗教分裂的持续趋势的决裂。它表明，他们的成功更多是一个流传的宗教信徒的问题，而不是成功地接触到未加入教会的人的问题。那么，在荷兰等世俗社会中，蓬勃发展的福音派教会很可能仍然是一个例外，福音派教会的增长绝不标志着与宗教分裂的持续趋势的决裂。它表明，他们的成功更多是一个流传的宗教信徒的问题，而不是成功地接触到未加入教会的人的问题。那么，在荷兰等世俗社会中，蓬勃发展的福音派教会很可能仍然是一个例外，福音派教会的增长绝不标志着与宗教分裂的持续趋势的决裂。