Church significantly overstates membership numbers in Canada

[IHAQ]

The Canadian Government has recently published the results of a 2021 Census.
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en ... 9810034201

In the census 85,315 people stated their religion as Latter-day Saint.
The Church currently reports a Canadian membership of 199,534.
https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.or ... try/canada

The claimed membership count that the Church reports at Conference is delusional. And they know it's delusional.

[Moksha]

Yeah, but... many people are taught to put their best foot forward. Mormons believe larger numbers are best.

[BeNotDeceived]

The Canadian Government has recently published the results of a 2021 Census.
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en ... 9810034201

In the census 85,315 people stated their religion as Latter-day Saint.
The Church currently reports a Canadian membership of 199,534.
https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.or ... try/canada

The claimed membership count that the Church reports at Conference is delusional. And they know it's delusional.

This has been going on for a long time. Lower and truthful figures aren't 'faith-promoting'. Sort of reminds me of BKP's remarks about disliking historians because they idolize the truth, which sometimes isn't very useful.

[Philo Sofee]

Yeah, but... many people are taught to put their best foot forward. Mormons believe larger numbers are best.

Most ESPECIALLY with their MONEY. Larger numbers is their foremost goal as the witnesses and evidence clearly attest.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgxGYUyvJio&t=17s

[Dr Moore]

Any survey will likely show self identification rates at 1/4 to 1/3 of what the church claims for total membership. That’s just logical, applying activity rates. I see the canada numbers as spot on what would be expected.

[Gabriel]

Any survey will likely show self identification rates at 1/4 to 1/3 of what the church claims for total membership. That’s just logical, applying activity rates. I see the canada numbers as spot on what would be expected.

In contrast, the Jehovah's Witnesses only report active membership:

As of 2021, Jehovah's Witnesses reported a monthly average membership of approximately 8.5 million actively involved in preaching, with a peak of about 8.7 million

To be counted as an active member, an individual must be a publisher, and report some amount of time preaching to non-members, normally at least an hour per month. Under certain circumstances, such as chronic and debilitating illness, members may report increments of 15 minutes. Jehovah's Witnesses' preaching activity is self-reported, and members are directed to submit a 'Field Service Report' each month. Baptized members who fail to submit a report every month are termed 'irregular'. Those who do not submit a report for six continuous months are termed 'inactive'.[2] For 2021, about 1.4 billion hours of preaching were reported and nearly 171,400 new members were baptized.

This results in the following anomaly where Pew numbers exceed what is officially reported by the JW's themselves:

Jehovah's Witnesses' official statistics only count as members those who submit reports for preaching activity, usually resulting in lower membership numbers than those found by external surveys. For example, Jehovah's Witnesses report approximately 1.2 million active publishers in the United States, whereas the Pew Research Center reported that Jehovah's Witnesses make up 0.8% of the US population (approximately 2.5 million).[

According to official statistics, nearly 21.4 million people worldwide attended Jehovah's Witnesses' 2021 observance of the Memorial of Christ's death (also termed the Lord's Evening Meal).

Demographics of Jehovah's Witnesses

[Dr Moore]

That is very interesting, Gabriel! An instance in which the JW are more transparent and honest than the Mormons are.