As the Christmas season continues in full swing, pastors and congregations prepare for the influx of church visitors who will make their way to Christmas services this year. Pastors identified Christmas as the second-highest attendance day for church services, according to a study by Lifeway Research, with Easter being in first place and Mothers’ Day in third. Eighty-one percent of pastors planned for larger turnouts during Christmas according to the study. The number of Americans who are planning to attend services, however, has slowly been in decline.

According to a new survey released by Lifeway Research, less than half of Americans (47 percent) stated they typically attend church services at Christmas time, while 48 percent stated they don’t. The remaining five percent were unsure. The survey was taken from 1,200 American adults from August 14-30. The number a church attenders is down from a 2013 Pew Research study where 54 percent stated they planned to attend church services over Christmas time.

Not unusually, the number of Americans planning to attend services was higher amongst those who regularly attend church than those who hardly or never attended church. Ninety-five percent of those who attended church services more than once during the week planned to attend services over Christmas. Only 21 percent of those who identified as religiously unaffiliated planned to attend services. Of those who do plan to attend services, 60 percent stated their motivation is to honor Jesus. Those who attended service less frequently or never were more likely to cite “tradition” as their reason to attend services.

Overall, 90 percent of Americans plan to celebrate Christmas in some way, with most planning to get together with family. And while less than half may be planning to attend a service, the study did find that many who weren’t planning to attend a service would be open to an invitation to attend over Christmas time. According to the study, of those who would normally not go to a service, 56 percent would attend if someone invited them. Even 40 percent of those who are religiously unaffiliated said they would attend. Such numbers should be an encouragement to regular church goers to invite those who might not normally attend services. Scott McConnell, Executive Director of Lifeway Research, encouraged church goers to invite their friends and family for a love of the Gospel, and not just in anticipation of a positive response. “[A]nticipating a positive response may not be the best motivation for a churchgoer to invite people to a Christmas service,” he said. He then referenced the popular spiritual “Go Tell it on the Mountain” as the best motivation for inviting others to church. “This chorus suggests that the Hallelujah-inspiring good news of Jesus being born is reason enough to tell it on the mountain or on the city wall.”