14 million Mormons and counting - MormonTimes.com

[_Polygamy-Porter]

Wow. Do you realize what 267,452,000 Mormons means?

Dunno. Today there are over 1 BILLION Catholics. When LDS Inc counts 267 million baptisms(not members) what will the membership count of the Catholics be? 2 Billion??

IF LDS Inc membership numbers ever hit a quarter of a million you can bet it will still be one of the much smaller religions.

[_Baker]

To get to real growth, we would need to know the following about the 14 million:

- percentage that self-identifies as Mormon
- percentage that professes belief or adherence to Mormonism

Real growth would have both those percentages increasing over time. I suspect that those two percentages have decreased over time.

[_stemelbow]

To get to real growth, we would need to know the following about the 14 million:

- percentage that self-identifies as Mormon
- percentage that professes belief or adherence to Mormonism

Real growth would have both those percentages increasing over time. I suspect that those two percentages have decreased over time.

yeppers. If they reported the number of people hwo self-identified as Mormon, whether htey are actual baptized members or not, and whether they actually believe we'd have a better idea. But as of now, they tell us how many people's names are on the rolls of the church. So its members of record.

love ya tons,
stem

[_Baker]

Outside of the Mormon corridor, I don't believe any comparison to Catholics is all that meaningful. Catholic is much more of a long-established cultural identity, as well as religious. Accordingly, even while attendance percentages are way lower for Catholics, and likely professions of faith as well, my guess is that the self-identification percentage is still pretty high. I saw this as a missionary in France.

[_Polygamy-Porter]

To get to real growth, we would need to know the following about the 14 million:

- percentage that self-identifies as Mormon
- percentage that professes belief or adherence to Mormonism

Real growth would have both those percentages increasing over time. I suspect that those two percentages have decreased over time.

And how many of those self-identifying professing members know the right answer to where the Hill Cumorah from the Book of Mormon battles is located. That will give you the right count.

[_Runtu]

yeppers. If they reported the number of people hwo self-identified as Mormon, whether htey are actual baptized members or not, and whether they actually believe we'd have a better idea. But as of now, they tell us how many people's names are on the rolls of the church. So its members of record.

love ya tons,
stem

The nice thing is that many countries report citizens' religious self-identification, so we have a pretty good idea of actual numbers. Check out cumorah.com for a lot of great information about membership around the world.

[_Ray A]

To get to real growth, we would need to know the following about the 14 million:

- percentage that self-identifies as Mormon
- percentage that professes belief or adherence to Mormonism

Real growth would have both those percentages increasing over time. I suspect that those two percentages have decreased over time.

Well here's one example:

Australia

Most wards appear to have between 100 and 150 active members whereas most branches tend to have 50 to 75 active members. Nationwide active LDS membership is estimated between 30,000 and 35,000, or 25-30% of total membership. At least 50-55% of members appear to be totally disengaged and do not identify the LDS Church as their faith of preference, while the remaining 15-25% are less active but still identify themselves as Latter-day Saints.

The last year I was (temporarily) active (2000) I was in a ward with about 100 active members, but with over 700 members of record (the figure I saw was actually 777).

According to Scott Trotter:

Trotter said the LDS Church doesn't make any statistical comparisons with other churches — and does not claim to be the fastest-growing Christian denomination either. "We are not interested in growth for the sake of numbers," Trotter said. "Rather, we are focused on each individual. Each is a son or daughter of God and we love them as such."

(Emphasis added)

Somewhere the system is failing.

[_Fence Sitter]

Somewhere the system is failing.

I was going to say the system is only designed to give people a chance to accept the gospel, but then I realized if the system is focused is on spreading the message, it is failing even worse.

Never mind

[_Ray A]

Somewhere the system is failing.

I was going to say the system is only designed to give people a chance to accept the gospel, but then I realized if the system is focused is on spreading the message, it is failing even worse.

It's failing in part because they're still not telling investigators the full truth. If they did, then they'd probably have less converts, but a higher rate of retention. That would blow Stark's predictions out of the water. Back in the '80s Stark was saying that Mormonism was "now mainstream", but even several Mormon scholars disagreed with him. It's going to look foolish in the end because of this superficial approach and lack of thorough analysis. I don't think Stark has done much to make Mormonism look good at all, and was clearly premature in some of his statements, but many latched on to them like they were gospel. We learned from the Titanic that big and fast doesn't necessarily equal "best". In the immortal words of one of the crewmen from the movie of the same name, "the ship will sink".

[_Fence Sitter]

At one point in my mission were were issuing invitations to baptism after one discussion when were were 'moved' by the spirit. I doubt very many of the people I baptized are still active.