Equality wrote: ↑Fri Apr 10, 2026 7:36 pm
You know who is not telling the "full story"? Your secretive, culty church whose leaders are not being honest in all their dealings with their fellow man, but are instead putting out propagandistic press releases touting the cherry-picked numbers that they believe put the best spin on the church's abysmal growth record.
If the church is going to put its topline membership number, it ought to provide the "full story" by giving out the following:
1. Weekly Sacrament meeting attendance
2. Number of current temple-recommend holders
3. Number of people who have made a full or partial tithe in the last year
These would provide much more context. The folks who say total number of members is less relevant than these other categories are correct.
To illustrate, consider the relative strength and vitality of two different hypothetical organizations, each claiming a membership of, say, 18 million people.
Organization A has 16 million people attending weekly events, making financial contributions, and volunteering their time to serve in the organization.
Organization B has 1 million people attending weekly events, making financial contributions, and volunteering their time to serve in the organization.
In providing an answer to the question "which of these two organizations has greater strength and vitality?" it would be imprudent to look only at the fact that both organizations have total membership of 18 million people, for one would have to conclude (without additional information) that they were of equal strength and vitality.
Of course, the public relations hacks of Organization B, who are handsomely paid to paint Organization B in the best possible light, would not want anyone to know that only 1 million out of their 18 million people were actually engaged meaningfully with the organization, would they?
To illustrate further with a real-world example: in 2006, I started my own religion following my own "Road to Damascus/First Vision" type experience. My epiphany was that we are all one, and that everyone belongs to the the one and only true and living church on the face of the earth, with which I am well pleased; yea, even The Church of Equality. Membership in The Church of Equality is open to all who would receive it--they don't even have to be of good cheer or pure in heart. My church is for everyone. Literally! The only requirement for membership is being born a human being on planet Earth. That's it.
At the founding of The Church of Equality in 2006, we had just 6.6 billion members. This made us the largest religion on Earth. We are now up to 8.3 billion and--miraculously!--are growing at the exact same rate as the growth of the planet's population.
Of course, The Church of Equality respects every individual's religious liberty, and if anyone apostasizes from Equalitarianism, unlike some cults that shall remain nameless, we will immediately remove their name from our membership rolls. All one need do to renounce their membership in The Church of Equality is send a notarized letter requesting name-removal, along with a small processing fee of $99, to The Church's headquarters.
I am happy to report that in 20 years since the founding of The Church (reminder: we ask all media to use the full name of The Church; i.e., The Church of Equality" when referring to The Church for the first time in any communication, and to please use the shorthand phrase "The Church" (with a capitalized "The") when referring to The Church again in the same piece, if necessary for space considerations*), not a single person has ever undertaken the name-removal process!
Inquiring minds who do not respect the sacred nature of the work performed by volunteer Members of The Church of Equality occasionally ask for more information abou the membership activity of Members of The Church of Equality. Given the most sensitive and sacred--not secret!--nature of that work, we do not divulge such information to people who are not prepared to receive it.
But the membership numbers speak for themselves: The Church of Equality is the world's largest and fastest-growing religion.
*We also ask the media to refrain from employing the term "Equalites" to refer to members of The Church, as it is a derogatory nickname invented by enemies of The Church and is considered a hateful slur by the 8+billion members of The Church worldwide. The correct way to refer to a member of The Church is "Member of The Church of Equality," unless referring to Members of The Church who are also members of the Equalitarian Amphitheatre Choir who can properly be referred to as "Equalitarians" but only when discussing their participation in the Equalitarian Amphitheatre Choir, as that world-renowned choir was named at a time when leaders of The Church, following the advice of consultants who had conducted numerous very expensive focus groups, plastered the name "Equalitarian" on every damn thing we did, only to later be told by a different group of high-priced consultants that *their* focus groups thought the name referred to a group of people who sing while riding horseback. So, we dropped it. But because of its historical relevance, we are willing to give some leeway to the media in using the term to describe our globally recognized singers.
