The flood waters are slowly receding, and the roads are drying out.

The Brazilian Pentecostal movement was founded in the early twentieth century by missionaries of the Assemblies of God, a church that continues to boom. The denomination might have 15 or 18 million Brazilian adherents, and there are more followers of the Assemblies of God in the greater São Paulo region alone than in the entire United States. Philip Jenkins

Another beautiful morning. My riding app went berserk yesterday but seemed to be working fine today.

Africa in the twentieth century went from a Catholic population of 1.9 million in 1900 to 130 million in 2000, a growth rate of 6,708 percent, the most rapid expansion of Catholicism in a single continent in two thousand years of church history. Philip Jenkins

It was precisely as Western colonialism ended that Christianity began a period of explosive growth that still continues unchecked, above all in Africa. Just since 1965, the Christian population of Africa has risen from a quarter of the continental total to about 46 percent, stunning growth for so short a period. Philip Jenkins

We had it all this morning. I woke up to a brilliant sunny morning, then fog rolled in. It was lifting by 8 am when I went out. A heavy shower on the way home completed the weather smorgasbord.

It was nice to get out on the bike again after a few days of rain. We have had a lot of rain right through NSW and flooding in many places.

To use the language of revivalism, Africa has now for more than a century been engaged in a continuous encounter with Pentecostal fires, and the independent churches have been the most obvious products of that intensely creative process. Philip Jenkins

As we will see, in modern times, global Christianity is inconceivable except in terms of the role played by women, as spiritual leaders and prophets, as hymn writers and key converts. Philip Jenkins

In 1800 perhaps 1 percent of all Protestant Christians lived outside Europe and North America. By 1900 that number had risen to 10 percent, and this proved enough of a critical mass to support further expansion. Today, the figure stands around two-thirds of all Protestants. Philip Jenkins