The white clapboard meetinghouses with spires puncturing the sky of New England, modest red brick tee-shaped structures with wrap-around cemeteries across the South, grey rock and stained glass transplanted European village churches across the upper Midwest, earth-tone adobe chapels in the southwest--such are the images of the rural church across America. Reality is far more diverse. The rural church is probably the most common social institution found in rural America. In 1990, the Glenmary report counted 116,872 congregations in non-metropolitan counties. Unfortunately, many African-American, independent, and fundamentalist congregations did not cooperate in the study. And there may well be half that many more that see themselves as "rural" although they are located in metropolitan counties. (Of course, many of the congregations in the larger towns or rural cities of the non-metropolitan counties do not readily identify themselves as rural.) It is probable, then, that there are well over 200,000 "rural" churches. The churches in the non-metropolitan counties claim 31.5 million adherents. This is nearly 60 percent of the non-metro population. Most counties are dominated by a specific "faith family" or denomination. In New England and the Great Lakes region it is the Roman Catholics. This is also true along the West Coast and along the Southern border all the way back to New Orleans. The upper Midwest is dominated by the Lutherans. The inter-mountain region is the empire of the Latter Day Saints. The domain of the Methodists runs from Maryland to Colorado, in a strip through the midlands. Portions of this region are shared with the Disciples/Christian churches. And in the South and much of the Southwest lies the heartland of the Baptists. Elsewhere, about 200 hundred scattered counties are dominated by various mainline (United Church of Christ, Presbyterian, and Reformed)and immigrant denominations. However, most non-metropolitan counties offer greater diversity in denominations now than in 1970. The "Churching" of Rural America During the Colonial Period, most colonies established and supported a particular church. Revivalism, immigration, the home mission movement, and territorial expansion modified this considerably since the formation of the United States. Revivalism on the Western frontier in the early 1800s sparked rapid growth of Methodists and of Baptists. It gave birth to the Disciples movement. Indirectly, it birthed the Latter Day Saints. Immigration in the mid-to late nineteenth century brought floods of Roman Catholic and Lutheran farmers to the Midwest and miners to the midlands and Great Plains. In their wake came thousands of pietistic and peace-oriented sectarianists. In that great century of westward settlement, home mission societies strove to plant congregations in the new farm service towns, mining towns, and mill towns that were springing up. Paramount was the American Mission Society, supported primarily by the Congregationalists and the Presbyterians. Second to it was the Northern Methodist Mission Society. This was not an easy task. At first many towns were served by more saloons and brothels than by churches, but in time this usually changed. Six primary patterns developed. Often the community constructed a building in which a Union Sunday School was held, and several different denominations held worship on successive Sundays. If the community grew, then one or all of the denominations formed a separate congregation. Second, a mission society or religious order in Europe or in the East financed the construction of a church house and funded a mission pastor or priest. Often this was an element of the immigration process and a colony would be transported from the Old World to the new. Third, an itinerant preacher came to a community, held a revival meeting, gathered converts, and formed a church. Fourth, an existing congregation encouraged some of its members to form a new congregation in a nearby community and provided financial support. Fifth, earnest lay persons formed a congregation and then asked a denomination to provide a pastor to them, or called one from among their own flock. Sixth, a mining or mill company would provide churches as a part of the amenities afforded in the company village.