DiscussMormonism.com

How often do you all see people leaving the church - in real life?

I live in Utah county, and just this week, I found out that yet another acquaintance is leaving the church (well, the wife of this guy I know is leaving). I would say this past year, we've 'known' 4 people that have left the church. The year before, it was about 5.

Just curious how our (me and my wife's) experiences match up with others.



.

Honestly, rarely. I think in my years in a two bishoprics (9 year) I saw maybe 20 names removed.Many of those were never that active. I can think of 5 or 6 that were. Some were short lived convert too. But there may be others that just leave and don't ask for name removal. If I add those that just dropped out it would be much higher.

I concur with Jason to a degree. I have known more than a few long-standing members who have left, though, including two former bishops other than myself. One of the bishops lost his testimony while a bishop and asked to be released. This was about 1989 and he never returned to the Church. The other bishop denies he ever had a "real testimony", and was fooling himself.

On those who leave without asking for name-removal, they make up the vast majority. I'll give you the figures from one of the wards: members of record: 668 Active membership: 120 (that includes those who only show up on Sunday and accept no callings).

There's a lot of "going through the motions" stuff, or what one stake president called, "Anglican Mormons".

Jason Bourne wrote:Honestly, rarely. I think in my years in a two bishoprics (9 year) I saw maybe 20 names removed.Many of those were never that active. I can think of 5 or 6 that were. Some were short lived convert too. But there may be others that just leave and don't ask for name removal. If I add those that just dropped out it would be much higher.

Although name removal is a definitive measureable number, how many people just left and never came back?

I'm basically talking about your average, regularly attending TBM, who just does a 180, doesn't believe it any more, stops going, takes off the garments, etc.

Who Knows wrote:I'm basically talking about your average, regularly attending TBM, who just does a 180, doesn't believe it any more, stops going, takes off the garments, etc.

In that case I know of only 3 or 4 in my adult life.

Here's an interesting bit of trivia: I am good friends with the president of a stake here in SoCal, and we were discussing Prop 8 at a Christmas party. Before Prop 8, he would get about 1 letter of resignation a month. In the weeks after, he was getting about 4 a week.

Don't know if the trend will continue, but I thought that was interesting.

In the past week, I have had 2 girls tell me they DO NOT want to know about the troublesome church history because they know too many people who have lost their testimony over it.

As to the question, I've known one. He has told me of a few of his family members that have left.

I still think the church needs to take inoculation seriously. I don't care when or where they teach the troublesome history, but the problem is only going to get worse.

Jason Bourne wrote:

Who Knows wrote:I'm basically talking about your average, regularly attending TBM, who just does a 180, doesn't believe it any more, stops going, takes off the garments, etc.

In that case I know of only 3 or 4 in my adult life.

To the best of my knowledge, I've never had any such cases in any ward that I've been attending -- though I do know of some such cases, elsewhere.

Who Knows wrote:I'm basically talking about your average, regularly attending TBM, who just does a 180, doesn't believe it any more, stops going, takes off the garments, etc.

I've known at least 9 (off the top of my head) within the last 2 years, including myself and all 3 of my closest friends growing up and 2 of their spouses. Only 1 of these has requested, to my knowledge, that their names be removed or undergone any official formalization of this change.