MassGIS Data: Places of Worship

February 2025

This point datalayer shows the locations of more than 2,000 churches, mosques and synagogues in Massachusetts.

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Overview

Places of worship in Massachusetts, including churches, synagogues, and mosques. Places appearing in this layer are those overseen/listed by the Massachusetts Council of Churches, Massachusetts Roman Catholic Dioceses, Anglican Diocese of New England, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, JewishBoston, Shiva, or Islamic Council of New England.

The layer is stored in ArcSDE and distributed as PLACES_OF_WORSHIP_PT.

Production

MassGIS generated this dataset by address-matching (geocoding) lists of places of worship data to MassGIS Master Address Database (MAD) points. In cases where addresses did not immediately match to the MAD, development locations were manually refined using the most current Google imagery and other web sources.

The dataset was compiled from these sources between November 2023 and December 2024:

Churches

Churches in this layer belong to a governing body that consolidates the information for all of their congregations.

Many of the churches in this layer were obtained from the Massachusetts Council of Churches for their 16 member denominations:

  • African Methodist Episcopal
  • American Baptist
  • Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
  • Diocese of the Armenian Church in America
  • Evangelical Covenant
  • Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts
  • Episcopal Diocese of Western Massachusetts
  • Evangelical Lutheran Church
  • Greek Orthodox
  • Presbyterian Church USA
  • Religious Society of Friends
  • Salvation Army
  • Swedenborgian Church
  • United Church of Christ
  • United Methodist Church
  • Unitarian Universalist

The council does not oversee Roman Catholic churches. For these, data was gathered from the websites of the Archdiocese of Boston, the Eparchy of Newton, the Diocese of Fall River, the Diocese of Springfield, and the Diocese of Worcester.

Anglican Churches were collected from the Anglican Diocese of New England.

Orthodox Churches were collected from the Orthodox Church in America, Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America, and the Eastern American Diocese Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.

Mosques

The Mosques in this layer were obtained from the website of the Islamic Council of New England.

Synagogues

The Synagogues in this layer were obtained from Shiva and JewishBoston (the Synagogue Council of Massachusetts appears to be closed based on MassGIS research).

Attributes

The Places of Worship datalayer's point attribute table has the following fields:

FieldDescription
NAMEName of the place of worship
ADDRESSPlace of worship's physical address
CITYPlace of worship's city or town (postal)
GEOG_CITYPlace of worship's city or town (geographical, based on MassGIS' TOWNS_POLY layer)
ZIPCODEPlace of worship's zip code
TELEPHONEPlace of worship's phone number
EMAILPlace of worship's email address
WEBSITEPlace of worship's website URL
MAIL_ADDRPlace of worship's mailing address
LEADERSHIPName of place of worship's religious leader
YEAR_ESTYear that the place of worship was established
DENOMDenomination; for churches, the sect of Christianity
ORGLocal or regional organization for the denomination
TYPEPlace of worship type
 Church
 Mosque
 Synagogue
SOURCESource that provided the place of worship's data
MAD_IDMaster Address ID from table MAD.MAD_MASTER_ADDRESS for linking to MassGIS' Master Address Database. (Not applicable to data in Boston.)

Maintenance

MassGIS maintains this datalayer and will make periodic updates based on information from the Councils.

In February 2025, places of worship from the Orthodox Church in America, Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America, and Eastern American Diocese Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia were added based on public feedback.

In 2022, Anglican and Evangelical Lutheran churches were added, as well as one independent church (South Congregational Church - Church by the Lake in Braintree). One Synagogue was also moved, Congregation Dorshei Tzedek in West Newton.

Date published: February 3, 2025

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