They comprised 0.9% of the total population in 2011.[1] Half of the Protestants in Bulgaria are newly converted Roma, while the other half are for the most part Bulgarians. The Union of Evangelical Congregational Churches in Bulgaria is a fruit of American missionaries in the 19th century. A 2015 study estimated 45,000 Christian believers from a Muslim background in the country, most of them belonging to some form of Protestantism.[12]