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 | Tuesday, Jul 26, 2005, at 09:36 AM Keeping Members A Challenge For LDS Church Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| The claim that Mormonism is the fastest-growing faith in the world has been repeated so routinely by sociologists, anthropologists, journalists and proud Latter-day Saints as to be perceived as unassailable fact.
The trouble is, it isn't true. Today, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has more than 12 million members on its rolls, more than doubling its numbers in the past quarter-century. But since 1990, other faiths - Seventh-day Adventists, Assemblies of God and Pentecostal groups - have grown much faster and in more places around the globe. And most telling, the number of Latter-day Saints who are considered active churchgoers is only about a third of the total, or 4 million in the pews every Sunday, researchers say. http://www.sltrib.com/ci_2890645 |
| | Saturday, Jul 30, 2005, at 05:42 AM More On Real LDS Growth Numbers Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| If you think the SL Tribune articles on pathetic Mormon Church growth were good, then you should check out this church statistics page: http://www.cumorah.com/harvest.html Here are some interesting facts cited from the page: Twice as many missionaries, half the converts "The average missionary in 1989 brought 8 people into the church, while in 2000 the average missionary brought 4.6 people into the church. When one accounts for actual activity and retention rates, with the great majority of LDS convert growth occurring in Latin America and other areas with low retention, and only 20-25% of convert growth occurring in North America, one finds that of the 4.6 persons baptized by the average missionary each year, approximately 1.3 will remain active. This declining growth comes in spite of unprecedented increase in opportunity. From 1990 to 2000, the LDS Church opened an additional59 nations to proselyting." "241,239 LDS convert baptisms were reported for 2004, the lowest number of converts since 1987. Other recent years have also demonstrated decelerating church growth. Over the past decade, LDS missionaries have been challenged to double the number of baptisms, but instead the number of baptisms per missionary has halved." Church growth down to 3% per year "The LDS Church is one of the few Christian groups with a large missionary program to experience declining growth rates in spite of widening opportunities. An analysis of annual LDS statistical reports published in the May Ensigns of each year demonstrates that LDS growth has declined progressively from over 5% annually in the late 1980s to less than 3% annually from 2000 to 2004." Pathetic Mormon presense in Europe "There are over 570,000 active Seventh-day Adventists in Kenya alone, but less than 570,000 Latter-day Saints (of which less than 200,000 are active) in all of continental Europe, Asia, and Africa combined. After more than fifteen years of proselyting in Russia with the largest full-time missionary force of any denomination, LDS membership has risen to only 17,000, with a fraction of those members remaining active. The same period has seen the number of active Jehovah's Witnesses in Russia rise to over 140,000, with some 300,000 individuals attending conferences. There are more active Jehovah's Witnesses in the countries of Georgia or Armenia than active Latter-day Saints in all of Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Russia together. There are fewer than 100,000 active Latter-day Saints in all of Europe, including the United Kingdom." Based on growth, Jehovah's Witnesses is more true church than Mormon Church "Given that the Mormons are generally viewed as the world's most successful new religion and had about an 80-year start on the Witnesses, this is an astonishing achievement.” It is even more astonishingwhen we consider that, since Jehovah's Witness participation significantly surpasses raw membership alone while LDS participation is only a fraction of raw membership, the number of active and participating Jehovah's Witnesses worldwide far surpasses the number of active and participating Latter-day Saints. In 1935, there were 56,000 Jehovah's Witnesses worldwide and 746,384 Latter-day Saints. Since 1935, the number of active Jehovah's Witnesses has multiplied their numbers by a factor of more than a hundredfold, while LDS membership has multiplied by a factor of twenty, with only a fraction of that number representing active members." Christian churches growing much faster than Mormon Church "The Seventh-day Adventist Church was organized in 1849 and recently overtook the LDS Church with 13 million members. Seventh-day Adventists were adding an average of 3,176 new members each day in 2000,15 and have experienced increased growth since that time, adding between 900,000 and1.2 million members each year. In 2004, the LDS Church added an average of 661 converts and 270 children of record each day, from which only a minority go on to experience meaningful church activity. The Assemblies of God are growing at approximately 10% per year, or over three times the growth rate of the LDS Church, while the Seventh-day Adventists report growth two to three times LDS rates at 5.6-8% per year." Only Four Million Active Mormons Worldwide "While the Church makes no claims about member activity rates and no official reports of LDS activity rates are published, the Encyclopedia of Mormonism notes: "Attendance at sacrament meeting varies substantially. Canada, the South Pacific, and the United States average between 40 percent and 50 percent. Europe and Africa average about 35 percent. Asia and Latin America have weekly attendance rates of about 25 percent." While various idiosyncratic definitions of activity exist, the definition of members attending church weekly is the simplest and most meaningful. However, rates calculated by dividing church attendance by total membership may over-represent actual activity if nonmember visitors, small children, and other attendees are counted regardless of membership status. By multiplying the number of members in each area by the fractional activity and summating the data, one comes up with a worldwide LDS activity rate of approximately 35%, or approximately 4 million members. This is very similar to estimates published by the Associate Press in April 2003: 'While the church doesn't release statistics on church activity rates, some research suggests participation in the church is as low as 30 percent.' For comparison, Adventist News Network reported in 2001 that worldwide Seventh-day Adventist member retention rates had fallen from 81% in previous years to a still very impressive 78% at present." Mormonism not sustaining growth from within "Only about four million of the 11.3 millionLDS members worldwide are active, and therefore likely to raise their children in the Church. Fractional annual proportional increases in LDS children of record relative to growth rates of healthy populations around the world correlate closely with low activity rates, suggesting that a large majority of inactive members raise their children outside of the church. Second, birth rates have declined substantially among the lifetime North American LDS members that have traditionally constituted the core membership of the LDS faith. Active LDS in the US average about three children per family, which represents a large decline from twenty years ago. A fertility rate of 2.1 children per couple is required for population replacement. With only 22% of Latter-day Saints born to active families in the U.S. remaining active lifelong and another 44% returning to the Church after periods of inactivity, the natural growth of Latter-day Saints in the U.S. appears to be below the level required even to sustain a stable population." Lower levels of Temple Marriages "The Encyclopedia of Mormonism notes: "The percentage of adults in a temple marriage varies from about 45 percent in Utah to less than 2 percent in Mexico and Central America... For all of South America, with 2.25 million members, less than 1.8% of the total adult membership has been married in the temple." This is a significant finding, since approximately 35% of all LDS members live in Latin America. Sociologist Tim Heaton notes that "Mexico saints have fewer children than the national average." Difficulty in generating new LDS families through temple marriages has been a chronic problem for the church, especially outside of North America, where many young people marry outside of the Church or remain unmarried." Decline in new church units not because of unit size changes "In 2002, LDS unit growth fell further to 0.22%, less than one-seventh of the annual rate of world population growth. Those who insist that the low number of new LDS units being formed is a result of policy changes influencing unit size are uninformed: the average number of LDS members per unit has remained relatively stable, going from 439 per unit in 1973 to 431.7 in 1991 and 437 in 2001." Hinckley lied about the numbers "In 1998, President Gordon B. Hinckley stated: “We are experiencing a combined growth of converts and natural increase of some 400,000 a year. Every single year that is the equivalent of 160 new stakes of 2,500 people each.” This statement has been widely quoted as evidence of the Church’s rapid growth. In fact, the Church has never yet experienced a net gain of 400,000 members in a single year, nor has there ever been a year in the history of the Church when 160 or more stakes were formed. The highest stake gains ever were of 142 in 1995 and 146 in 1996, which were up from annual gains of 32-78 over the preceding decade. Over the most recent five-year period forwhich data are available (1998-2003), the Church gained a total of 119 stakes, or an average of only 24 stakes per year. The low number of congregations and stakes being formed reflects fractional retention of converts." LDS Congregational Growth in Perspective "In comparison to the 26,670 congregations serving the 12.256 million nominal LDS members, the Seventh-day Adventist Church had 12.894 million baptized adult members in 117,020 Sabbath Schools (congregations) meeting in 53,502 churches, while the Jehovah's Witnesses with 6.5 million members list 96,894 congregations in their August 2004 membership annual report. This is not because LDS congregations are particularly large, but because the great majority of LDS members on the rolls are inactive. While on paper the LDS Church appears to be roughly the same size as the Seventh-day Adventist church in terms of members, and much larger than the Jehovah's Witness organization, in reality, the latter two organizations are both far larger in terms of the total number of committed, active, and contributing members." How are TBMs reacting to the truth about church growth? |
| | Friday, Aug 19, 2005, at 10:49 AM The Blame For Lousy Member Retention Rests Squarely On The Shoulders Of One Gordon Bitner Hinckley Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Oh lurking COB minions of the most high, TAKE NOTES and give them to your leader.
Gordon is the one who decided to start hiding the more controversial and "peculiar" points of mormonism. Before he was head old guy, he was head PR spin doctor. He thought he was a shrewd cunning man ever so slightly omitting portions of mormon history.. His plan seemed to be working, but then what happened? While the Hinckster was unraveling his plan to omit and forget mormon history, the technical world was rolling out something else. But first in 1966, Polygamy Porter(me, not the beer) is born. Back in 1969 a communications initiative was launched by the US government known as ARPA-NET which was a wired network of military and science communities via computer mainframes and phone lines. Interestingly enough, the University of Utah was one of the first four universities to connect to the beginning of the internet, the three other universities were in California, University of California at Los Angeles, SRI (in Stanford), and University of California at Santa Barbara. This silly little ARPA-NET continued to grow along with a new operating system known as UNIX, especially among universities. 1974, Polygamy Porter is baptized into the mormon church. 1976, Dr. Robert M. Metcalfe develops Ethernet, which allowed coaxial cable to move data extremely fast. This was a crucial component to the development of LANs. Also, the Department of Defense began to experiment with the TCP/IP protocol and soon decided to require it for use on ARPANET. 1978, Polygamy Porter is inducted into the mormon priesthood with his ordination to the office of deacon. 1983, TCP/IP became the core Internet protocol. The University of Wisconsin created Domain Name System (DNS). This allowed packets to be directed to a domain name, which would be translated by the server database into the corresponding IP number. This made it much easier for people to access other servers, because they no longer had to remember numbers. The "domain name" is born. 1985, the National Science Foundation Network(NSFNET)begins roll out of T1 (1.5 Megabit per second) lines for it's backbone. 1987, Polygamy Porter is inducted into the higher mormon priesthood with his ordination to the office of Elder. Shortly afterwards, he takes out his endowments in the Mormon Salt Lake Temple. He is perplexed by many things he sees and witnesses that day. 1990, A faster backbone protocol is launched, T3 which carried 45 Megabits per second. ARPANET is disbanded and replaced by the NSFNET backbone. Tim Berners-Lee and CERN in Geneva implements a hypertext system to provide efficient information access to the members of the international high-energy physics community, this was the beginning of the Hyper Text Transfer Protocol, the native language of the World Wide Web. 1990 Polygamy Porter marries his hot girlfriend in the mormon temple. While there he realizes the ceremony has changed and things like the sick blood oaths have been completely omitted. He is further perplexed. 1992, Internet Society is chartered. World-Wide Web released by CERN. NSFNET backbone upgraded to T3 (45 Megabits per second) 1993, Marc Andreessen and NCSA and the University of Illinois develops a graphical user interface to the WWW, called "Mosaic for X". Marc and other coworker students from NCSA join a new company called Netscape. 1993-1995 Polygamy Porter serves a local stake mission of mostly wasting local ward member's evenings trying to coerce them into the latest version of the "Member Missionary Program" and driving the missionaries to Dairy Queen to get milk shakes. 1995, beta versions of the Netscape browser begin to proliferate. Soon Microsoft will follow with a bastardized version of the original Mosaic browser from NCSA. 1995, Erik Kettunen launches the beginnings of exmormon.org. 1996, the information age explodes. Polygamy Porter moves his family to the Golden state. September, 21st 1996, Erik Kettunen registers the domain name, EXMORMON.ORG. Over the next eight years, Polygamy Porter attends the temple for family events, and each time is further perplex at the new ceremony and the changes that occurred in 1990. Late April 2004, Polygamy Porter uses the Google internet search engine by searching on the phrase "horses+book+of+mormon". May 2004 - August 2004, Polygamy Porter spends every possible minute researching all of the mormon historical things that Gordon Bitner Hinckley thought that he could omit from my childhood eyes. Temple ceremony changes, not just the 1990 changes but all of them from the beginning. The BoA, JS polygamy, origins of the three degrees of glory, MMM, the real reason JS was killed... etc etc etc etc etc. August 2004, Polygamy Porter, requests he be released of his mormon church callings and attends his last three hour block of mormon church services. August 2005, Polygamy Porter posts this message on the now infamous Recovery from Mormonism board on exmormon.org and publicly tells mormon president Gordon Bitner Hinckley that his discernment failed back in the summer of '69... oh yeah, the summer, the summer of 69! Ya still reading ye minions of the Hinckster? Good. Hear this fools, there are tens of thousands JUST LIKE ME, with thousands more every week. Not inactive members who never attended after their coerced baptism, NO... BIC, raised in the church, previously devout members who served missions, held callings, followed the prophet's counsel, married in the temple, started fast and young on childbearing, and paid 10% tithing on gross American wages. Over the past 4 generations, Gordon attempted to slowly change the view in the rearview mirror of mormonism. Did he not realize we would all find the truth about the real mormon history at the worst time? In our adult lives? What used to take YEARS in terms of researching mormon history can now be done in weeks, thanks to the internet, the great new Nauvoo Expositor. In closing I would like to dole out some thanks to those who broght me the truth. Thank you US military, thank you BBN for constructing the ARPANET, thank you Dr. Metcalfe for developing the TCP/IP protocol, thank you NSF, MCI, IBM, et al. for building the high speed data networks we now call the great infobahn, thank you Tim Berners-Lee and CERN for developing the protocol to request, retrieve, and display truth bearing text and pictures, thank you Marc Andreessen and NCSA for developing a the human interface to the WWW, thank you Netscape Corporation for making the internet so prevalent, thank you Erik Kettunen for having the foresight that Hinckley lacked and registering EXMORMON.COM at the cusp of the information explosion in 1996, thank you Google Inc for crawling the net and finding mormon truths, thank you to all of the authors who have published the real mormon history on the internet for search engines to find, catalog, and display. One last thing.... Fuck you Gordon Bitner Hinckley. FUCK YOU and your church. http://www.exmormon.org/boards/w-agor... |
| | Tuesday, Oct 18, 2005, at 07:19 AM Retention Of New Members Challenge For LDS Church Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Keeping members in the fold is one of LDS Church President Gordon B. Hinckley's stated top priorities. But does the church have a problem with members slipping away? A church authority says "no," but a prominent Mormon scholar says the evidence suggests otherwise.
"We are improving the retention rate over time," said Merrill Bateman, a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' Quorum of the Seventy. "We have seen a nice general upward trend in terms of percent of activity, which means retention is going up." But Bateman was not willing to provide any statistics showing that improvement. He also refused to define who qualifies as an active Mormon, though he says the LDS Church regularly reviews statistics such as attendance at sacrament meetings, tithing payments and the number of people who maintain church requirements to enter temples. "What we don't want to do is categorize people as active or less active, let's be frank about it," Bateman said. "Because we always believe we have a chance to work with those who are not coming to church on a regular basis." Armand Mauss, a Washington State University emeritus professor, said that's exactly what the church should focus on. "The key to the church's future growth will be at least as much a function of retention as conversion," said Mauss, the former president of the Mormon History Association. While baptisms continue in high numbers, the creation of new stakes, which house a handful of congregations, has slowed down. "That is a clear indication of a retention problem," said Mauss, who identifies an active Mormon as someone who attends a church meeting at least once each month. The LDS Church reports that 1,720,434 Mormons resided in Utah in 2004. About 62 percent of those attend church regularly, according to an analysis using statistical statements by Bateman and activity estimates from Brigham Young University professor Tim Heaton, who studies Mormon demographics. That would mean about 43 percent of Utahns are active Mormons. Activity in many other areas of the world is much lower than that. Mauss says the worldwide retention problem stems from missionaries attempting to baptize as many people as possible, some of whom are not prepared for the demands of an LDS life. New members are often not provided the support they need during their first year in the faith. Bateman agrees with Mauss on that point, saying to increase retention, church members must spend more time befriending converts. "Over time, what President Hinckley has asked us to do is to really surround that person with new friends," Bateman said. New Mormons are the most likely to leave the faith, according to Bateman, but he says once those people have children who are raised in Mormon families, the retention rates start to rise. http://www.religionnewsblog.com/12495... |
| | Wednesday, Nov 30, 2005, at 12:05 PM More Lies In The News From LDS.org Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| One of the things that drives me nuts about the Corporation is their lying about damn near everything.
Click here to see their "Newsroom" and the top two articles are prime examples of what I'm talking about. The first: New film portrays Joseph Smith as "exemplar". A few "lowlights": First Presidency input, historically accurate script and sets, vivid cinematography, and a spiritually minded cast and crew all played a role in the creation of the new feature film on the Prophet Joseph Smith now playing at the Legacy Theater at Temple Square. The new film, which succeeds The Testaments of One Fold and One Shepherd and Legacy, also will begin showing at some visitors' centers at Church historical and temple sites in December. Elder Ronald T. Halverson of the Quorum of the Seventy, an assistant executive director in the Audiovisual Department, said the film's portrayal of the Prophet Joseph's character, difficulties, and accomplishments will encourage viewers to learn "more in-depth of the Prophet so that their testimony is not shallow, but very solid." He feels that everyone who views the film will be affected. "There is a spiritual impact from watching the film. You can't know of the Prophet Joseph and not be changed." (emphasis mine) Than again, maybe Ron is on to something there. I know I haven't been the same since I've come to "know" Smokin' Joe. The second: My favorite, lying about membership numbers in Latin America, in this case Mexico. From the article which appeared in the Miami Herald's Mexico edition: Thanks to converts like Gabriel and his neighbors in San Juan Guichicovi, Mexico now has the second-largest Mormon population in the world, after the United States. And it continues to grow. In 1990, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or LDS, counted 617,455 members here. Today, it reports a membership of 1,037,775: a 15 year growth of 68 percent. In Mexico City alone, LDS officials say they are adding 1,000 new members each month. If they add 1,000 members alone in the capital, that means 12K per year. Which should translate into 6-7 new stakes being formed--anyone know how many were actually created last year there? As for their million members, the census of 2000 showed only slightly more than 200K self-identified as LDS as opposed to the church's claim of 900K at the time. For them to continue to put out the figure of over one million and imply tremendous growth and retention is nothing less than shameful. As a follow up, I sent a letter to the editors of both El Universal and the Miami Herald pointing out the deceptive accounting practices as explained in the SL Tribune's series on membership earlier this year, putting special emphasis on the 110 year time limit. I said a woman born in 1897, baptized in 1940 and who never ever returned to an LDS church again before her death in 1960 would still be counted among the million members until 2007. Come to think of it, I'm going to write a suggestion and turn it into my boss. I work for one of the Big 3 in Detroit--if we used "Morg Math" all our current problems would be over. We'd count anyone who ever bought one of our cars as a current customer, even if their last buy was in the Roosevelt Administration. Happy Days are here again! http://www.aimoo.com/forum/postview.c... |
| | Thursday, Dec 22, 2005, at 12:36 PM There Just Aren't That Many Mormons In Mexico! Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Apparently, in the 2000 census, people were asked to identify themselves in Mexico by religion. A book I am reading entitled, "El Fenomeno Religioso en el Occidente de Mexico" has results for the census. 88% of Mexicans consider themselves Catholics. Almost 5% consider themselves Evangelicals. They have a category called "Others" which includes Seventh Day Adventists, Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses. There were over One million people who categorized themselves as Jehovah's Witnesses, about 489,000 that considered themselves Seventh Day Adventists and only 205,000 people that consider themselves Mormons. So after decades of missionary work in Mexico and all kinds of bragging about growth rates, the LDS badly trail Evangelicals, Jehovah's Witnesses and Adventists in members. They've hardly made any dent in the Catholic population. So much for the idea that Lamanites are going to blossom like a rose in Mexico. The future does not look bright for Mormonism. |
| | Thursday, Jan 12, 2006, at 07:50 AM Some Facts On Church Growth Original Author(s): Preston Bissell MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| The first fact is, we don't have many actual facts. There is a goldmine of data hidden in the bowels of the Great and Spacious COB, but there is NO way that mere mortals can access that data. It is almost certain that "The Brethren" know *exactly* what the situation is, right down to the individual ward/branch level. (I used to be a ward clerk, and we sent very comprehensive reports to SLC every year.)
But, short of a "mole" infiltrating the COB, we aren't going to see that data. However, based on anecdotal evidence, and careful reading of the few tidbits of data that are available, and my training as a professional geographer interested in such things, I think that some generalizations *can* be made. (BTW, the *best* source of information continues to be Cumorah.com. It is owned by a TBM, but he is remarkably candid in his analysis of church growth.)
IOW, while not all is well in Zion, Mormonism is NOT on the verge of total collapse. Simple inertia will keep it going, and probably even growing slightly, for at least another generation. |
| | Thursday, Apr 6, 2006, at 07:51 AM Nearly One Million Resigned Names Are Still Counted In Mormon Membership Numbers Original Author(s): Polygamy Porter MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| http://home.teleport.com/~packham/growth.htm Scroll down to June 20, 2001 According to an insider at the COB here is the resignation request growth since 1995: 1995:...........35,420 1996:...........50,177 1997:...........55,200 1998:...........78,750 1999:...........81,200 2000:...........87,500 2001:..........101,454 2002:..........105,763 If we project that growth and estimate at least 110,000 resignations per year for the last three years this would total almost ONE MILLION resignations. That is significant not only in terms of quantity but more importantly QUALITY. The people who are resigning are not going to be the inactive/never-active members who were tricked into quick baptisms like a 10 year old Brazillian boy who was baptized so he could play baseball... The fact that these people are makeing an concerted effort to request name removal would indicate that the people who are resigning are folks who were probably SIGNIFICANT tithe payers, i.e. Americans and Europeans. The above link to Packham's page claims what many of us have been accusing the church for years, once a member, always a member, at least on statistical records!
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| | Tuesday, Jun 6, 2006, at 09:14 AM LDS Inc vs WLCC Original Author(s): Rev Lakes MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| It's funny that LDS Inc still considers intself the most growing church in the area, a bishop even said so at a DMARC meeting.
Let's evalute that claim. Two units have been disolved. Des Moines 6th Branch and Des Moines 4th ward. Des Moines 5th Branch (spanish) barely has 50 members. Let's review the outlying units in the stake. Lenox Branch doesn't even have a real place of worship as they meet in a residential home. Oskaloosa and Knoxville are nearly 50% William Penn and Central College students. Osceola Ward is the only sizable unit outside the metro area but that is decieving since it is one of the geographically largest wards in exsistance. Centerville, Knoxville, Lennox, Des Moines 7th, and Des Moines 5th are all failing units, losing members. Another important thing to note is that with one exception not a single Bishop or Branch President or counselor in a bishopric or branch presidency was born in Iowa. A majority of the Elder's qourom presidents and Relief Society presidents are either students at DMU medical school or the spouse of a student at DMU medical school. (Would you like to have a high leadership position in the Morg - then come to Iowa! The place in the morg were Utahns are Gods). Another important thing, there has been zero growth in the past 5 years. LDS Inc has lost more members locally then they have picked up, and they know that there inflatted numbers are just medical students here for 2 years and they know that if the number of Mormon students to DMU takes a slide that nearly 3 units might be dissolved. Also they know that DMU plans to be a more regional school instead of a national school and that there will be less and less students from Utah. Compare that to the not yet six month old Word Life Community Church. WLCC needs has to buy more chairs because in the past three Sundays we have ran out of places for people to sit, and I don't count heads but I know that I have seats for 120 and another 60 folding chairs. That easily outnumbers any LDS meeting except for stake conferances. But I think we really beat them in the fact that LDS Inc around here is just "Utah Midwest" for many Utah born and raised Mormons. Utahns run the stake, hold all the leadership positions, and have meetinghouses to gather with their friends from Utah every Sunday. That's why I almost never talk about LDS Inc on Sunday - they aren't even a church here - they are just a club. It may take years but one day LDS Inc will be just a handfull of nutjobs in rural utah. |
| | Friday, Jun 9, 2006, at 07:26 AM TBM Inlaws Admit The Church Membership Is Shrinking At An Alarming Rate Original Author(s): Mormon Inc MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| My inlaws came to visit and they live in Utah Country where LDS meeting houses litter the landscape and more are being built. With all the signs of church growth where they live they admitted the church membership is shrinking.
My father-in-law said the church has tottaly changed in the past 20 years from a local ward with it's own leaders with authority and budgets to followers who are completely under the authority of the Salt Lake beurocracy. This has made the church more steryle and cold and the members no longer feel they are part of building Zion but cogs in a big buerocratic machine that the individual at the ward level doesn't count for anything anymore. My mother-in-law says the church seems to not need the local members as much because they seem to have plenty of money in Salt Lake to throw at things. She says it all seems like busy work to many people. Both said the church is completely out of touch with the economic hardships and unsteady employment many members deal with. My father-in-law said he worked for the same company for 30 years but those days are gone. Many people are leaving the church because they can't handle the additional stress the church puts on them in a world that unsteady employment is a reality. My mother-in-law said the church should not be a burdon but it should be there to help people get through their problems but she said the wards have become like a machine and so impersonal they add to the ill feelings people have about life's hardships. In short, more and more members feel Salt Lake is out of touch. The ward communities that were a real church asset of the past have been decimated due to the fact that people move so much anymore. Wards are now transient social clubs where a few people throw their authority around and stroke their egos but aren't real communities anymore. Who's leaving the church? The young people. In droves. The number of people serving missions is way down because of the high costs of college. The cost of living has increased so much the average family in the church can't afford to send their kid on a mission and pay for college. The church seems to be popular with wealthy people with big egos to stroke. The middle class and the poor are leaving the church. My father-in-law says the church is heading for another apostasy. He still believes in the doctrine but believes the church has become what Brigham Young said it would become in the last days. Wealthy and full of pride. What's frustrating is I can't convince these people that the whole thing was false. They believe in Joseph Smith still. Oh well, they are right on the membership decreasing. The modern LDS Church is a product of the post WWII economic boom in the US. The once impovershed Utah settlers now had more money and finally the church was out of debt for good. In the 1950's, the temple building increased as did the number of LDS meeting houses. Right now we are at the end of that trend. A half century of economic prosperity has made the church wealthy and less dependant on it's own members. The attitude from the top shows the individual member means less than cost cutting measures and more expenditure in PR. As the average person in the church feels this allienation more, the more likely they will leave or their kids will leave. The church community no longer has the appeal it used to have. If the cost of healthcare, college, energy, and living in general continue, there's just going to be less available for church donations. Once people find out the church isn't going to help them but blame them on their situation, more will leave. |
| | Wednesday, Feb 14, 2007, at 08:19 AM Auditing LDS Membership Stats Original Author(s): Hellmut MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| In light of BBC reports about the Romney campaign, which described the LDS Church as the fastest growing church, I thought it would be fun to quick check LDS exit rates according to the General Conference Statistical Report.
Table 1. Official Membership Statistics 
Colluvium kindly shared his spreadsheet. Although I suspected inconsistencies, the results were so improbable that I had to replicate a part of Colluvium's data collection. The anomalies persisted. From the Statistical Reports in the Ensign available at lds.org, I have compiled a spreadsheet that depicts the total number of Mormons, the number of births, and the number of convert baptisms by year between 1973 and 2005. As the data has been copied and pasted, typos are unlikely. However, I would be grateful if someone would take it upon themself to double check. Please, blame me for any mistakes and report them. Between 1988 and 1996, the Statistical Reports did not contain data about the births or blessings of children, which required the use of baptismal data instead. Table 2. Calculating Exit Data 
I calculated the exit data by adding the number of births and conversions to last year's membership number and subtracting this year's membership number. The subtraction ought to render the number of people that exited the LDS Church, which may include deaths and resignations. Amazingly, a negative number of people left the LDS Church in 1975, 1989, 1990, and 1999. Assuming that not one single member died in 1999, for example, 8,456 Mormons rose from the dead to join the LDS Church. Table 3. Highest to Lowest Exit Rate 
The exit rate is the quotient of the number of exiting people and the member totals. Excluding the nonsensical negative data, the exit rate is as high as 2.48 exits in 1980 and as low .16% in 1991, a difference of almost 1,577 percent! Table 4. Estimates Instead of Measurement 
Clearly, this data is not reliable. Notice, between 1978 and 91 births and membership totals and between 1978 and 82 conversions were reported in thousands (zeros), which indicates that these figures are estimates. The data also cannot dissuade the suspicion that only deaths but not resignations are reported as exits from Mormonism. The LDS Church did not allow for resignations until Norman Hancock settled his law suit in 1989. Please, take a close look at the dates associated with the highest to lowest exit rates. Table 5. Highest to Lowest Exit Rate, Again!
The higher exit rates date before 1989. Paradoxically, exit rates decline for the period when resignation becomes a possibility. According to the CIA World Fact Book, the United States of America had a rate of 8.26 deaths per 1,000 residents. Since Mormons have larger families, especially in the past, it is probable that the Mormon death rate was substantially lower than the American average. The CIA World Fact Book reports death rates of 4.74 and 2.58 per thousand for societies with more traditional family configurations such as Mexico or Saudi Arabia, respectively. Table 6. Exit Rates Since 1989 
Mormons might be traditional but they are not that traditional. If we ignore the nonsensical negative exit rates and focus on the time frame when resignation is an option, then the LDS exit rate is smaller than Mexico's death rate (.00474) in half the cases. In 1991 and 1997, the Mormon exit rate is even smaller than Saudi Arabia's death rate of .00258. Therefore it is implausible that the exit statistics deduced from annual LDS Statistical Reports include resignations. These patterns create doubt about the capacity of the LDS Church to collect reliable data. It can neither contradict the findings of the CUNY Religious Identification Survey, which documents that the LDS Church is no longer growing in the United States, nor the findings of Mexican, Brazilian, and Chilean census collections, which indicate that LDS membership reports might overstate people's attachment to Mormonism. When Mormon public relations officials content that the LDS Church grows the fastest, I am afraid that there are no facts that would support that claim. |
| | Monday, Apr 9, 2007, at 09:06 AM My Take On LDS Growth Stats Released Last Week 4/2007 Original Author(s): winter MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| As I see it one of the fundamental problems with interpreting the stats is that there is a tendency to do it based on the 13 million membership number LDS Inc continually presents. This is a completely bogus number. We all know that.
However, children of record, and convert baptisms are not completely bogus numbers. These represent real babies somebody had, or somebody for whom a real baptismal certificate was filled out. Considering the dropout rate of new converts, these numbers are problematic as well, but at least they start out as real numbers. 13 million members is pure fantasy by any measure. OK, so for comparative purposes, I will assume there are 4 million at least marginally active LDS members. Frankly, I think even that is a tad optimistic, but it is close enough for looking at growth trends. Increase in children of record: 94K. That is slightly more than 2.3% birthrate (based on 4 million members). The last statistic I saw for Utah (which was back in the 1990s, but again, close enough for government work, as they say) was 22 births per 1000 residents, which is a 2.2% birthrate. So, 94K increase in children of record sounds perfectly reasonable for a church of 4 million members with a higher than (US) average birthrate, but a birthrate almost exactly in line with the Utah birthrate. 272,000 converts. This is a 10% jump over last year. I think part of this can be explained by a drop in anti-American opinion (a change from anger to annoyed pity toward America by foreigners). I bet almost all of that increase is in foreign missions, though of course LDS Inc gives us no information about the demographics of who joins LDS Inc, or where they are located. In any case, I think that is a respectable number of converts, if it represented real growth. It represents 6.8% growth (based on 4 million members). Total growth, births and converts, is 9.15% (366K/4000K). Impressive enough. Wards and branches are reported as a group, and increased by 1.4% in 2006. Stakes and districts are reported separately. Stakes increased by 44 (1.6%) and districts decreased by 13 (2.1% decrease). To compare stake/district growth to ward/branch growth, it simplifies calculatiions considerably to combine stakes/districts into a single number. Besides, LDS Inc gives us no way to separate wards and branches. Total stakes/districts: 3375, difference from 2005, 31. Increase of 0.93% (that is nine tenths of 1 percent, not 93 percent). So, growth in stakes/districts was similar to growth in wards/branches - around 1%. OK, HERE IS THE PUNCHLINE - gross increase in number of members was 9% of total (actual) membership. Gross increase in number of wards/branches was 1.4%. If the increase in members times 0.153 equals the increase in wards/branches, then "shrinkage" (deaths, resignations, walk-aways) amounts to 85% of the total growth that year. Jim Huston did some analysis of expected death rates per 1000 in LDS Inc. The US rate is 8.26 deaths per thousand per year. The lower the birthrate of a population, the higher the rate of deaths per thousand. Low birthrate means a higher percentage of older people, and older people are more likely to die in any given year. High birthrate mean a young population, and relatively few deaths. Median age for various states ranges from 41 for Maine to 28 for Utah. I think the US average median age is 33 (AARP has a list of median ages by state). In any case, the deaths per 1000 for Mormons is probably somewhere around 6, plus or minus 1. High birthrate will lower it, lower life expectancy in third world countries will raise it, health practices of Mormons will lower it, ice cream consumption of Mormons will raise it... I will use the figure of 6 per thousand as the Mormon death rate. Close enough. That would be about 24,000 deaths per year (per 4 million members, which I am assuming is the real number of members). Resignations - this is almost a completely blue-sky number. I've seen a number thrown around on RFM, but with very little supporting evidence - 100,000 per year. I'd say that is right, give or take 30,000. That makes it a pretty mushy number. But it does give us something reasonable to work with - resignations are not 5000 per year (clearly too low), nor are they 500,000 per year (clearly too high). 80,000 is somewhere in the ballpark, and that is the number I will use as my "guess". I'd like to think that is a bit on the low side, but it is still 2% of a 4 million member church, which is pretty astonishing loss via a formal resignation process. Given that, we can make an estimate of how many people just walk away each year.
I also suspect the number of resignations and walk-aways is higher than the 286,000 number I came up with. I think most new wards are created from members moving out of existing wards into new subdivisions, so many existing wards experience slight shrinkage to create the new wards. While some wards are growing, I believe the average ward is shrinking slightly each year. Only time will be able to confirm this (since LDS Inc isn't likely to release the stats we know they have, which could resolve the question right now), but I think LDS Inc is already losing a few more people each year than they are bringing in. 9% gross growth. 0% net growth (at best, IMHO). You can quibble about my numbers, but even if I were to concede all the quibbles, growth would be under 1.4%. I think it is well under 1.4% growth. |
| | Sunday, Oct 12, 2008, at 03:35 PM Lies, Damned Lies, And Statistics Original Author(s): substrate MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| My friend Odell reminded me of the Cumorah For example, you get a pretty good snapshot of Jeffrey Holland's clean-up job in Chile, where 300 wards were dissolved between 2000 and 2004. Comparing the increase in units to the increase in raw membership shows you how well the church is retaining converts. In Spain, for instance, there were 144 units of the church in 1992, with a membership of 23,000. In 2006, there were two fewer units (142), though church membership had increased by 17,000 members. Granted, a lot of the branches became wards, but given an activity rate of 25%, the odds are that attendance in the current wards is much more than the previous branches. Also, the numbers tells us the relative sufficiency of local priesthood (male) members in staffing leadership positions. Again, in Spain there were enough priesthood holders among 39,000 members to staff 142 units of the Church, or approximately 275 members per unit. In Paraguay, with 22,000 more members, there is only one more unit (a branch, it turns out, as the number of wards is identical at 56), meaning there are 426 members per unit. If the web site is accurate in pegging activity rates in both countries at 25%, that would mean that women far outnumber priesthood holders in Paraguay, which would explain the disparity in the numbers of units between the two countries. Another interesting statistic is the growth or decline of membership (and units) in some parts of the world. I always thought that the church built temples in places where the membership was growing and able to staff a temple (again, priesthood leaders are needed). But such doesn't seem to be the case for Italy, where the church announced on Saturday it will be building a new temple. Italy's statistics (activity rate of 25%, 22,000 members, and 110 units) tell us that, with an average unit membership of 200, the church seems to be doing well. However, approximately 5400 members are active at the moment, meaning that attendance averages 49 members a week across the units. And the number of units has been declining from a high of 133 in 2000. Assuming that the activity rate has held steady, average unit attendance in 2000 was 35, and any Mormon can tell you that a branch will have trouble functioning with that few in attendance. Hence the consolidation of units. Even with an average of 49, I'm guessing that most of these units are struggling. Indeed, one active LDS blogger living in Italy mentioned that the unit with the highest attendance in his stake is the Aviano US military ward, with attendance of approximately 100. The construction of a temple, even one of the new mini-temples, doesn't make much sense against this backdrop of a struggling membership. Maybe the leadership believes that a temple will help people rededicate themselves to the gospel. Of course, that recommitment is usually temporary. The novelty of the temple wears off quickly, and soon the temple presidents are assigning wards and stakes to do a "fill the temple" day. |
| | Sunday, Dec 28, 2008, at 09:20 AM The Stone Clunks Forth: Scottish Update Original Author(s): averagejoe MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| The church appears to continue it's shrinkage apace.
We discussed a while back the closure of Johnstone ward a few miles from Paisley due to a lack of members, but it seem too that the Greenock ward has also been closed a few months ago which I was unaware of. This is significant. These are not offshoot units from the small units programme. Greenock was at one time a large ward which had off shoots in other nearby towns like Dunoon and Largs. It is also the largest church building in Scotland, unusually being having two floors and a basement area. I guess hopes were high when it was built. All this means that the Paisley Stake has lost two wards in the space of 6 months. This leaves Paisley, Ayr, Irvine, Kilmarnock & Pollok wards & Beith Branch as the only functioning units left. Paisley Ward has been struggling for a number of years but will be boosted by some of these ward closures and Kilmarnock too is dwindling in numbers. The two coastal wards Irvine & Ayr do OK but mostly because of new road links that have made these places attractive commuter towns. All in all this a serious blow. I haven't heard how they're spinning it. |
| | Wednesday, Jan 7, 2009, at 08:07 AM LDS Leaders To Members: We're Having Explosive Growth! Original Author(s): Measure MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Right in Sunday School Lesson #1:
Church History Gospel Doctrine Teacher's Manual 4. We can each help to move forward this great latter-day work.Keep in mind that Hinckley said this in 1995. But according to the pro-Mormon article at: http://www.cumorah.com/index.php?targ... Annual LDS growth has progressively declined from over 5 percent in the late 1980s to less than 3 percent from 2000 to 2005.[11] Since 1990, LDS missionaries have been challenged to double the number of baptisms, but instead the number of baptisms per missionary has halved. |
 | Sunday, Apr 5, 2009, at 08:29 AM The Membership Slide Continues Original Author(s): Simon Southerton MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| 2007 to 2008
Increase in stakes was 1.0% Increase in wards and branches was 1.0% World population growth was 1.2% US population growth was 0.95% The church is declining relative to the world population. There was a catastrophic drop in church unit growth between 1997 and 2003 (Internet apostasy?). It recovered slightly from 2003 to 2005 but has been steadily sliding downwards ever since. These are figures for wards and branches. Stake figures are similar. Year....Unit growth (%) 1997......4.85 1998......3.57 1999......0.95 2000......0.47 2001......0.65 2002......0.23 2003......0.36 2004......1.65 2005......1.56 2006......1.43 2007......1.28 2008......1.01 I feel for the members who will get a kick up their backsides....AGAIN....for not doing their home or visiting teaching. It must be miserable to be in a stagnating church and even worse to be in a stagnating Mormon Church. |
| | Friday, Apr 17, 2009, at 11:50 AM Number Tweaking Original Author(s): Anonymous MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| The morg made a big deal about growth during gen conference.
They are doing some subtle things with their record keeping to make it appear as though the growth is greater than it is. The tscc for years publishes figures in the LDS Almanac regarding growth. There is a column on increases in children of record. Since 1970 the avg runs from 70 to 80 thousand. Since 2003 the avg is around 90,000. In 2008 the number increased to 123,502. My friend who follows this closely called the church offices asking why such an increase. Finally he got an answer after much waiting. It turns out that before 2008 the morg dropped children of record on their ninth birthday if they were not baptized. They made a change that they now keep them on the books until Dec 31, of the year they turn nine. There were also some other technical adjustments according to the spokesperson at the church offices. The effect is that if the previous formula was used, the children of record would be around 93,698 (the 2007 # ) The church growth in 2008 would have been 284,704 instead of the reported number of 314,510. This would have been the third lowest growth rate since 1990. Another point is that the missionaries in the Western U.S. spend a good deal of time in going after children of record not yet baptized. There is a good number of them who get dunked after their guardian gives permission even though inactive. These are all counted as convert baptisms leaving a distorted view of the number actually reported. This is not earthshaking news but just an example of ways the GA's keep portraying a phenomenal growth rate that is carefully tweaked by changing the way they keep score. |
| | Thursday, Apr 23, 2009, at 01:14 PM Inactivity Rate In The Morg Continues To Climb Quickly Original Author(s): Bender MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| A good indicator of activity rate is the member to congregation ratio. If it's low, that means many of the members are holding callings and they are able to split the ward or branch and still function. If it's high it shows that many of those members are either inactive or unwilling to hold a calling, so a large number of them are needed to form a functioning ward or branch. Here is a list of the 15 countries with the highest member to congregation ratio. The numbers below are the number of members per congregation. The first number is from the 2007 church stats, the second number is from the newly released 2008 church stats.
Chile - 888 - 908 Hong Kong - 684 - 726 Bolivia - 632 - 660 El Salvador - 619 - 633 Nicaragua - 615 - 687 Ecuador - 598 - 632 Peru - 588 - 616 Colombia - 560 - 618 Mexico - 559 - 586 Brazil - 553 - 574 Honduras - 552 - 580 Uruguay - 551 - 569 South Korea - 546 - 572 Dominican Republic - 543 - 559 Philippines - 533 - 565 The ratio for every single country rose. Some like Nicaragua rose significantly. Chile remains in a class of it's own with over 900 members per congregation. For comparison Utah is at 392 members per congregation. This is certainly a very interesting set of statistics and it inspired expanding it to the reported LDS membership statistics as per each April general conference. Consider the 20 years of LDS published statistics 1989 to 1998 and 1999 to 2009 on a church wide basis: Over the 10 years since 1999 to 2008, when the impact of the internet was beginning to be significant, LDS reported membership grew from 10.75M to 13.51M, a growth of 2.76 million. During this same period, the number of new congregations reported went from 25,793 to 28,109, a growth of 2316 congregations. This results in 1192 new members per new congregation, a figure even higher than the 900 reported above for Chile. Now if we take the 10 years 1989 to 1999 when retention of new members appears to have been better, then there were 10.35M - 7.3M = 3.05 million new members. During this same period, the number of new congregations grew 25,551 - 17,305 = 8,246 new congregations. This results in 370 new members per new congregation pre 1999 compared to the 1192 new members per new congregation since - a dramatic shift. In 1998 there were 405 members per congregation on a church wide basis. These figures speak for themselves. They obviously do not need to increase the number of units to accommodate the new members reported - so these new members are not sticking around. |
| | Thursday, Apr 23, 2009, at 08:18 AM Something To Warm Your Heart From Bremen Germany Original Author(s): Confused MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| http://www.utlm.org/newsletters/no101...
Then, in 1996, a member of the [Bremen] ward encountered a couple of disturbing articles about the early history of the church from the Utah Lighthouse Ministry, a conservative Protestant organization with an anti-Mormon mission. Attempting to come to terms with these, he asked friends in the ward for help and, in so doing, unintentionally started a wave of apostasy. Another brother translated parts of these articles into German and distributed them to members. In the fall discussion circles formed and letters were written to local and regional church authorities, questioning the official version of church history. The issues at stake were, first, the different versions of the First Vision as evidence of a developing concept of God rather than an initially clear and complete picture through revelation; second, differences between the Book of Commandments and the Doctrine and Covenants as evidence of changed (or possibly forged) revelations; and, finally, controversy over whether the Book of Mormon was a fiction or a genuinely ancient record. The members were especially upset because these papers had been written twenty years earlier (when most of them had just begun their membership in the church), but evidently no church response or explanation had ever been made available. In February 1997 the mission president tried to solve the problem in one stroke by inviting everyone to a question-and-answer evening. During that meeting tension became acute between the group questioning the church's truthfulness regarding its history and members affirming their testimonies and high esteem for the Book of Mormon and the First Vision. The mission president did not answer the questions specifically, but called for a spiritual approach when hard historical facts were placed in question. When he defined truth as "whatever the prophet says, if he is not mistaken," some members decided to leave the ward. Two former bishops and a former branch president were among those who left. All together thirty people left, most of them long active in responsible church positions such as branch and district presidencies, district and stake high councils. The wards, of course, were left in an uproar and are still trying to regain composure. The Delmonhorst Branch was subsequently dissolved. The remaining dwarfunits continue to struggle. ("One Hundred Eighteen Years of Attitude: The History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the Free and Hanseatic City of Bremen," by Jorg Dittberner, Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, vol. 36, no. 1, Spring 2003, p. 68) |
| | Tuesday, May 12, 2009, at 07:42 AM So How Has Raising The Bar And "Preach My Gospel" Worked Out For LDS Inc? Original Author(s): Darquestar MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Not so good from the reports at General Conference.
Regardless of the reasons behind the raising of the bar for missionary service (anounced October 2002), and the subsequent drop in missionary numbers, how are they performing? By rights this new chosen generation, from which all none hackers have been weeded out, armed with the new "Preach My Gospel" manual (produced in 2004) should be baptising aplenty. I looked at the statistical report from each April General Conference since 1988 (when i was a mishie, definitely a pre-bar raising generation. In fact from some i met i'm not sure there was a bar). From looking at number of missionaries and number of converts it's possible to determine number of converts per missionary per year. See below.... YEAR RATIO 1988 7.10 1989 8.03 1990 7.58 1991 6.86 1992 5.96 1993 6.26 1994 6.36 1995 6.26 1996 6.07 1997 5.62 1998 5.17 1999 5.23 2000 4.51 2001 4.81 2002 4.59 2003 4.32 2004 4.72 2005 4.67 2006 5.13 2007 5.30 2008 5.06 The missionaries who served in the first full year after the bar was raised were the worst performing missionaries of the last 20 years, possibly ever, with 4.32 converts per full time missionary. In 2006 the missionary force climbed above 5 per mishie for the first time since the new millenium. A modest increase in 2007 but then a sharp downturn last year. I have heard numerous missionaries report that they are being told that they are the best generation, that they are achieving more baptisms with fewer missionaries. All the evidence points to a diminishing return. |
| | Thursday, Aug 13, 2009, at 08:08 AM From 2007-2008, Church Has Net Loss Of Canadian Members Original Author(s): Statsman MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| I just looked at the numbers from Canada between 2007 and 2008, and found that LDS church claims it has lost 502 members between Dec. 31 2007 and Dec. 31 2008. It went from 178,102 to 177,600. In previous years, membership had increased by 2,000 - 3,000 members a year. Note that this is not the actual number of members, which was 104,745 in the 2001 census, putting actual members at around 55-60% of the number claimed by the church. But if even the official numbers show a decline, it might be getting bad out there. Apparently the number of people resigning (maybe taken out of statistics?), dieing, and emigrating is less than those being born, converting, or immigrating. Or maybe they are purging the rolls? Net gain by province Alberta: 747 (down from about 1000 - 1500/year earlier in decade) British Columbia: -572 Manitoba: 67 New Brunswick: -121 Newfoundland: -19 Northwest Territories: -55 Nova Scotia: 35 Nunavut: -3 Ontario: -565 Prince Edward Island: 18 Quebec: 130 Saskatchewan: -151 Yukon: -13 To say the least, when the 2011 census is taken and a question on religion is asked, the results should be interesting to say the least. |
| | Friday, Sep 18, 2009, at 07:57 AM Dying Or Leaving? Comparing Church Statistical Reports From General Conference Original Author(s): Eric Davis MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| I was looking at www.lds.org reading the general conference statistical results for the past couple years. Here are the numbers that I noticed. At the end of 2008 Total Membership: 13,508,509 Total increase of new members: 389,095 children of record baptisms: 123,502 convert baptisms: 265,593 Net growth of church from 2007 to 2008: 314,510 Total membership loss during 2008: 74,585 At the end of 2007 Total Membership: 13,193,999 Total increase of new members: 372,916 children of record baptisms: 93,698 convert baptisms: 279,218 Net growth of church from 2006 to 2007: 325,393 Total membership loss during 2007: 47,523 At the end of 2006 Total Membership: 12,868,606 Total increase of new members: 366,851 children of record baptisms: 94,006 convert baptisms: 272,845 Net growth of church from 2005 to 2006: 307,737 Total membership loss during 2006: 59,114 At the end of 2005 Total Membership: 12,560,869 Total increase of new members: 336,258 children of record baptisms: 93,150 convert baptisms: 243,108 Net growth of church from 2004 to 2005: 285,047 Total membership loss during 2005: 51,211 At the end of 2004 Membership: 12,275,822 I found it interesting that even though the church continues to grow at a slow and steady rate (the percentage is actually dropping a little year to year, about 2.3% in 2008), the numbers of loss of membership over the years have been pretty erratic. What I am curious about is: how many of those numbers represent people who died, who no longer appear on church records, or how many of the numbers represent people who have resigned or been excommunicated? These numbers can't possibly be ALL people who died. Death rates tend to follow similar trends as population growth rates. Let's just assume that during 2007 (the lowest year of membership decline above) that 99% of those were people who died. That means that about 47,048 church members died during 2007. Therefore, about 475 members were excommunicated or resigned that year. 47,048 members dying would represent 0.357% of the total membership of the church in 2007. If (roughly) that percentage of members are dying each year then for each of the other three years in the study: 2008: about 48,170 church members died 2006: about 45,940 2005: about 44,842 If the church lost 74,585 members in 2008, and only about 48,170 were people who died, that would mean some 26,415 people were either excommunicated or resigned that year. My question is, is it possible that the church is experiencing that great of an exodus? And what will the numbers be like in the future? |
| | Thursday, Jul 22, 2010, at 09:43 AM Some Strange Numbers Using Official Church Stats Since 1994 Original Author(s): Bean Counter MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Using official Morg stats. from LDS.org, I've done up a spreadsheet of total membership, new children of record, convert baptisms, no. of mishies, and no. of missions for each year since 1994, the start of the Internet Age. The official 1993 total membership was 8,696,224 (as of Dec. 31 of that year), and I used it as the baseline.
According to the online info., in 1994 (for example), 44,923 Mormons died, were excommunicated, and resigned (assuming TSCC doesn't include excommunicated and resigned members - still 'members', just a different category of 'member'? - in its annual statistical report). Based on the numbers on LDS.org, 1998 ended with a total church membership of 10,354,241 people, and during 1999, no Mormon died, was excommunicated or resigned. It was a miraculous year, no?! Assuming TSCC's published no.'s can be trusted, in 1998 92,246 Latter-day Saints died, were excommunicated or resigned, but just the previous year, only 17,037 'moved on'. Clearly, when Stan...errr...Satan...yes...SATAN was working overtime in '98! More recently, in 2007, the no. was 47,523, and two years ago (2008), it jumped to 74,585. IMO, membership no.'s published by TSCC are very suspect. |
| | Wednesday, Aug 11, 2010, at 07:50 AM Church Decline In Brasilia, Brazil Original Author(s): Susan MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
After I mentioned that Asa Sul Ward in Brasilia Brazil is about to be closed, Anon-b wrote:
"Forty years ago that building was used by a single branch that included all of Brasilia. But at that time almost all of the members actually lived in Asa Sul -- and there were more of them than seem to attend the Asa Sul ward today. It would seem that even in South America the church has stopped growing."Yes, the Asa Sul wardhouse was dedicated in 1966. Back then it was home to the Brasilia Branch, that has been split several times ever since, giving birth to the five stakes in the metropolitan area of Brasilia today. After so many splits to show "phenomenal growth", the Asa Sul ward has been hurting badly in the last 25 years or so. Asa Sul has become a VERY expensive neighborhood, mostly inhabited by elderly rich people. (Exactly those who would NEVER open their doors to LDS missionaries.) Younger members move away to the less expensive suburbs, and as people die off, so does the ward. This is typical of rich areas in Brazil. The cult boasts "fabulous" growth, but it is only the case in slums and other areas inhabited by illiterate, gullible people. (Who, in turn, fall away shortly after baptism.) Here goes a small list of wards that have been shut down in the last few years in rich neighborhoods of Rio and Sao Paulo (the two biggest cites of Brazil): Sao Paulo:
In Brasilia, the Lago Sul Ward was shut down in the early 1990s. (It's the richest area in town.) The wardhouse was left unoccupied for several years, and the few members reassigned to Asa Sul. Then in the late 90s the surrounding areas (formerly occupied by ranches) were illegaly divided into parcels and gave birth to new middle-class neighborhoods ("condominios"). Lots of mormons moved into these illegal parcels, and the Lago Sul Ward was reopened. (Mormons everywhere LOVE illegal stuff.) But all this with zero baptisms in the wealthy areas, of course. Lago Norte, the other very rich neighborhood, never became a ward, not even a branch. Still part of Asa Norte Ward. Same for "Park Way" neighborhood, part of Nucleo Bandeirante Ward. (Except for a few members from there who prefer to go to Lago Sul Ward. Nucleo Bandeirante is not fancy enough...) |
| | Friday, Dec 3, 2010, at 12:57 PM Is The Stone Cut Without Hands Even Rolling? Negative Church Trends Original Author(s): Lloyd Dobler MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
The Standard of Truth.
"The Standard of Truth has been erected. No unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing. Persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame. But the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and dependent till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, until the purposes of God shall be accomplished and the Great Jehovah will say, 'The work is done.'" Joseph SmithPretty heady stuff indeed. If you ask any tbm if their church is the fastest growing church in the country/world, they would say yes. The church news, ensign, mormontimes, Deseret News all basically place the mormon church as the center of the universe where AMAZING things are constantly HAPPENING to bring about the Lord's work. So and so just got called as mission presidents to the Philippines! Sam Jensen just got called to China! Did you hear about the new stake in Mongolia!..............All the while the church never actually shares any real data regarding their success......or failure. When I was tbm and trying to work my mind around all the cog dis and the church possibly not being true, one of the real stumbling blocks for me was the blind tbm assumption that the church is bulletproof. The church does not have negative numbers. The church is always successful. There is a cult of personality built around the church itself. Failure and the church just never go together when you are tbm. In this way, the church really was somehow better and more amazing and more unstoppable. The church just went from being successful to more successful. However, when I started investigating the church, I was shocked to find negative demographics and trends associated with the church. Church growth, retention, resignations, temple attendance, all of it negative. ALL OF IT. In fact, I could not really see how the church was spreading or succeeding at all at the level that GOD cared about.....you know, the whole D&C 1:39 thing. So I thought it would be good to compile as many random, one off negative trends, percentages, numbers etc. regarding the great "stone cut without hands" Like just the other day over at common consent they were talking about how 70% of the youth are inactive along the Wasatch front. Wow. That is bad. Combined, the church sends only 30% of eligible boys on missions from the US and Canada. In my stake, super rich tbm stake in Gilbert, only 43% of boys are going on missions. (btw, the stk pres says that is the fault of parents who are not faithful enough) Of the 300,000 aprox annual baptisms, 80% are outside the US. (from cumorah.com) There are over a million members of record in Mexico but only MAYBE 220,000 active members. The church keeps members on their rolls until their are 110. The church is building a new temple in Rome, wow, except there are maybe, maybe 5000 active or semi active members in THE WHOLE FREAKING COUNTRY. The church are experts in projecting a veneer of success and growth to their members. The only problem is that like everything else with the church, it is not true. |
| | Monday, Mar 14, 2011, at 07:31 AM First Stake Closure In Australia (Sydney) Original Author(s): Simon Southerton MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| The Parramatta Australia Stake was closed a couple of weeks ago. This is the first stake closure in Australia. My father was in the inaugural stake presidency and we were members of the stake for most of my early years in the church.
http://www.lds.org.au/index.php/news/... The PR spin is predictable in the news release created for the sheeple. There is no mention of a stake closure. The news appears in an article headed "New Local Leadership for Sydney Saints". Even this heading is inaccurate because the new stake president has been a stake president several times before. They are clearly running out of talented leadership. The real news of the stake closure is quite accurately portrayed on the LDS Church "Growth" website. http://ldschurchgrowth.blogspot.com/ Stake discontinued in Australia "For the first time in LDS Church history in Australia, a stake was discontinued. The Sydney Australia Parramatta Stake was consolidated into several neighboring stakes in the Sydney area. The number of congregations in many Australian stakes is much lower than other nations, which jeopardizes the continued operation of some stakes if large numbers of members move away and few new converts are baptized and retained. Overall Australia has experienced moderate membership growth rates among industrialized nations but has experienced stagnant congregational growth."If it wasn't for the dramatic increase in Polynesian membership in the church in Sydney due to immigration from New Zealand, Samoa and Tonga, the church would be in very serious decline. |
| | Monday, Mar 14, 2011, at 07:23 AM Is The Mormon Church A Big Presence In Japan? Original Author(s): Yuko Cardon MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| The number is shrinking.
For me, being a member was a such a burden, but I did it because I wanted a huge blessing. Many active members think that way, too, even now. What are the burdens? 1) Tithing! It is very expensive to live in Tokyo. People become financially successful not because they pay to the church but their hard works and special talents which they worked hard to develop. 2) Attending so many useless meetings everyday (Mon:FHE,Tue:Temple,Wed:VT or HM,Thu:Home making/youth activity/other meeting held at church,Fri:helping missionary discussion/baptism/church activity/conference), Sun:all day church (8 am to 8 pm & at least 1 hour for each way as a commuting time),and the early morning seminary and Institute. My friend was a seminary teacher and said that was not worth it at all. 3) So much pressure on marriage and full-time mission as if there are anything else that important. People give up good careers, schools, and their personal goals to show a complete salute to the prophet. But they soon find there aren't any result and leave the church. 4) Word of Wisdom. Drinking green tea is a traditional custom in Japan. It is very rude to decline tea when the host tries his/her very best to show you hospitality. The Mormon have to explain each time(many times a day!)at every occasion(in a company too!)why they don't drink. It is Ok for the foreigners to decline but not the natives. I know some active Mormons died from cancer at relatively young age. Perhaps they should have sipped some teas. 5) Students do not have enough time to study. There are just too many meetings that students do not have enough time, unless the one is very smart and that one can memorize and retain information very easily. The church leaders tell us the church callings and meeting are more important than the school works. 6) The leaders constantly press us to work even harder to bring in more investigators, do more volunteer works in a community,attend temple more often, do VT and HT 100 %,attend all the meeting to support the church and bro. and sis., and do everything else perfectly!! Not possible! 7) Everything! They ask us to give the church everything! But the blessings they promise are in the heaven. We just need to wait or we haven't work hard enough so there are no blessings. Because of all these burdens, in addition to some weird doctrines(racism, plural marriage, Mormon history,location of the Garden of Eden, origin of American Indians), they quit church. It is NOT growing. I wish the church will give me some refund. Many companies would give me, if I am not satisfied with their products. Why not church? |
| | Wednesday, Nov 16, 2011, at 07:43 AM Membership Records Of The Excommunicated Original Author(s): londonuk MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| I found the post about resigned member records interesting.
What I know and can evidence is the records of former members who were excommunicated. I say 'former members' because when you are excommunicated you are no longer a member of the church - even if you still attend. I was excommunicated and have legally obtained a copy of my full membership record and what was interesting is that it not only listed my former ward/stake but my current one. My current ward being "EXCOMMUNICATED RECORDS" which has a unit number and my stake being "MEMBERSHIP SYSTEM" (if I remember correctly - the document is currently in storage) which had it's own unit number as well. But how can I be on the membership system (and presumably statistically counted as a member) when I am not one? I'm certain resigned members will also have a ward and stake that acts as a folder/filing system to organise all resigned former members in one section of the membership record database. Try getting baptised again and see what they say! I have a hunch that they are also count resigned members in statistics too. Of couse we have no proof but some strong indicators. It would be interesting to look at the fall in numbers (difference between increase in new members both convert and children of record and the previous years membership total) and see how death rates worldwide fit into each countries membership total to see what the figures suggest. Yes I live in London, UK. It took a request under the Data Protection Act 1998. I initially wanted all the records to do with my disciplinary council and a membership record is counted with these in the church handbook. I wasn't sent a copy of anything to start with but I didn't accept their response and they eventually cut their contact with me, i.e. Adminstration staff told not to talk to me and they responded only via their solicitors. At one point their solicitors said I was given a copy of my nembership record after my first request, but I wasn't - they eventually gave me a copy - but it wasn't too hard to get that information - as well as a copy of the temples living ordinance records they keep and the record of my tith/offering contributions (because they are contributions to a UK charity here in the UK). They wouldn't give me a copy of anything that had been sent to church headquarters. The data protection authorities in the UK in fact have assessed my complaint against the church and said that they are "unlikely" to have complied with the data protection act. But so far the church has done nothing to put things right and are saying their reasons why they don't need to give me copies of disciplinary reports. It's still being dealt with my the authority in the UK but I'm sure the church is going to continue to challenge then every step of the way. Of course I will continue, because we haven't come to an agreement yet. The UK Church (as in the incorporated company that holds the church's assests/money in the UK - the church itself is an unincorporated religious association) got a barrister to give the data protection authority an "Opinion" - while I do not agree with much of what he says - he agrees that a contractual document between the UK incorporated church and the church's subordinate organisations in the US five me rights. i.e. The Corp. President, the Corp. Of the Presiding Bishop and Intellectual Reserve Inc. Have agreed to give me the right of access to my records that they hold. Yet it's the general consul in Utah dealing with the UK requests, acting as the UK company. I say this because they're trying to make out the UK and US companies are entirely seperate and not connected. |
| | Wednesday, Nov 16, 2011, at 08:10 AM Congregational Growth = Real Mormon Growth Rate? Original Author(s): Ex-CultMember, Crathes MORMON MEMBERSHIP -Guid- | ↑ |
| Forget the numbers they spout off in General Conference about the growth of the church. We know those numbers aren't reliable. However I would think that the growth in units (wards, branches, stakes) can indicate the real growth rate of Mormonism and the approximate number of active members.
It appears that they ARE growing just by looking at the increase in the number of wards, branches and stakes, though the growth doesn't seem to be nearly as large when compared to the gross number of membership increase. I wonder though if, in the short term, the Morg leaders are decreasing the number of members required to open up new wards and stakes, just to make the unit growth look good too. For example, if they used to require 8 wards in a stake and decreased it to 7, just to increase the gross number of stakes. Same with wards. If they used to require say 300 active members but they decrease it to 150, they could increase the number of wards by 100%. Now obviously they can't do this forever because there HAS to be a minimum number of members for a fully functioning ward. I know they shuffle membership between wards and branches too which can skew the unit growth. I'd love to be able to see real growth just by looking at the unit growth, which should be an accurate, but I am afraid that the Morg is adjusting requirements for a unit to be a ward by lowering the numbers or splitting a ward into two branches. Does any know if there is an officially required number of active ward members for a unit to become a ward? or the number of wards/branches for an area to become a stake? Does any have any insider knowledge or experience of this process? Are the requirements different geographically or is it uniform throughout the world? -- The requirements vary by country and by state. In Utah, there are very concise requirements, including number of active MP, families, etc. In other areas, not so much. Long term trends indicate that the number of units per stake has stayed about the same at 8 units. The number of members of record per unit has trended upward over the past decade or so, from about 450 to nearly 500. I think this indicates a retention issue, not one of growth. In the past year, most of the stakes created were in Utah and reflected the creation of YSA stakes and wards. So, a unit (branch or ward) was pulled from each stake that had a YSA unit, and placed in a YSA stake. No actual growth, just realignment. Typically, a stake is not created unless there is actual growth to support a stake. Growth in members of record continues, although much slower than 30 years ago. So, if one were to compare growth in membership as a percent against growth in stakes as a percent, one can assume that long term retention is running about 1/3. Not so great. Another long term trend I see as part of the lack of member retention is the increase in children of record. If one takes a projected birth rate of 14/1000 (US avg.) against the membership as a whole, it indicates that the church is loosing babies. In other words, typically even among the hard core "less active", the grandfather takes the new born to church for naming and blessing, thus creating a child of record, but never to be seen again. Even this appears to be not happening, since the imputed birth rate of members (typically much higher than national average) is running at about 9/1000. Is it any wonder that the church is pushing its young members to get married and have kids? The only solid growth is in children. |