The Best Thing You Can Do To Help Mormons on YouTube.com

[jonathanncrm]

Thanks for the pointers Heather.

[AlexanderX]

With approximately 13 million LDS members, why does that video only have 500 views?

Because most members are inactive?

[Canuck Mormon]

Originally Posted by AlexanderX

Because most members are inactive?

References please. Where are you statistics to back this claim. If you have no proof, how can you make such a claim?

[HiJolly]

Originally Posted by AlexanderX

Because most members are inactive?

I'd have to agree with you, if we were limiting our view to central & south America... But I think the Church has taken profound and meaningful steps in the last 15 years to correct this.

Sure hope it works.


HiJolly

[AlexanderX]

References please. Where are you statistics to back this claim. If you have no proof, how can you make such a claim?

Are you serious? Church membership figures are horrific when it comes to activity. This is not strictly limited to S. America either. I know this from experience in every ward I have worked in. Check any ward membership roll. In my ward in Atlanta there were nearly a thousand people who had been at some point in their lives, baptized LDS. Yet, we could only fill up 75% of the pews each sunday. On my mission in Madrid there were supposedly tens of thousands of members, yet when Gordon B. Hinckley came to give a talk with three other GAs, we only managed to get about 2500 LDS to show up, about 15% of which were missionaries from all the missions.

David Stewart over at Cumoroah.com estimates that the Church is about 35% active worldwide. So it is a bit misleading to keep saying the Church has 13 million strong. I doubt we even have five million. One thing is for sure. The internet is killing the Church. More information is available and it is easier to access now. People don't jump into things as easily as they once did. They want to investigate it. Not just the good things, but they also want to get testimonies from people who used to be a part of the organization, and unfortunately, there are more ex-Mormons in the world today than there are Mormons.

[HiJolly]

Originally Posted by AlexanderX

Are you serious? Church membership figures are horrific when it comes to activity. This is not strictly limited to S. America either. I know this from experience in every ward I have worked in. Check any ward membership roll. In my ward in Atlanta there were nearly a thousand people who had been at some point in their lives, baptized LDS. Yet, we could only fill up 75% of the pews each sunday. On my mission in Madrid there were supposedly tens of thousands of members, yet when Gordon B. Hinckley came to give a talk with three other GAs, we only managed to get about 2500 LDS to show up, about 15% of which were missionaries from all the missions.

David Stewart over at Cumoroah.com estimates that the Church is about 35% active worldwide. So it is a bit misleading to keep saying the Church has 13 million strong. I doubt we even have five million. One thing is for sure. The internet is killing the Church. More information is available and it is easier to access now. People don't jump into things as easily as they once did. They want to investigate it. Not just the good things, but they also want to get testimonies from people who used to be a part of the organization, and unfortunately, there are more ex-Mormons in the world today than there are Mormons.

There are two statements above that I don't agree with:

"The internet is killing the Church" and "there are more ex-Mormons in the world today than there are Mormons"

For the first, I suppose this is an opinion and cannot be expected to be confirmed via some solid data gathering...

For that second one, though, I would hope that in making such a measurable claim, you could justify it? With, maybe, some numbers? Seems way outta line, to me, but I'm willing to be convinced (as long as it wasn't some dishonorable person like Bill Keller or Ed Decker saying it).

HiJolly

[AlexanderX]

There are two statements above that I don't agree with:

"The internet is killing the Church" and "there are more ex-Mormons in the world today than there are Mormons"

For the first, I suppose this is an opinion and cannot be expected to be confirmed via some solid data gathering...

Well, the first was not to be taken literally (I have a penchant for hyperbole) but it can hardly be ignored that baptisms per missionary has dropped dramatically since the internet. Just a basic fact check in the Church Almanacs should prove this point. I thought it was common knowledge. The Mormon process conversion requires a missionary to control the enivironment so that no negative information can be known to the "investigator." That is impossible on the internet. The best we can do is create message forums - set the rules so strict that disallows any information that would dissuade an investigator from baptism - and hope anyone interested in Mormonism will go there instead of Google. But not only do most people not come to these forums, many LDS go to google and find out things that they would have otherwise never known from missionaries.

For that second one, though, I would hope that in making such a measurable claim, you could justify it? With, maybe, some numbers?

I already mentioned the most exhaustive study avbailable by Davie Stewart at Cumorah Project LDS Mission Resources. Even in the United states activity rates around around 40%. And that's is responsible for almost half of the claimed membership in the global Church. Activity rates are generally worse outside the USA, with some exceptions in smaller populations.

Seems way outta line, to me, but I'm willing to be convinced (as long as it wasn't some dishonorable person like Bill Keller or Ed Decker saying it).

I guess it would seem that way if you've already been believing something entirely different. But the facts speak for themselves. ANd yes, there have been hard surveys taken in some cases, such as Mexico and Chile. For example in 2001 the Church claimed there were more than a half million baptized members. Yet in 2002 the government took a survey that revealed only 100,000 Chileans identified themselves as LDS. That means the ex-Mormons outnumbered the Mormons by a ration of 4 to 1.

Similarly, in 1999 the Church claimed about 850,000 members inMexico. Yet, in a 2000 government census, only 200,000 citizens identified themselves as LDS. All of this can be read about in the summer 2005 issue of Dialogue, in an article written by LDS researcher, David Clark Knowlton.

The same holds true in every country where activity is below 50%, and this includes the United States as well:

Cumorah Project International LDS Database

Well, there's your hard facts.

[HiJolly]

Originally Posted by AlexanderX

Well, the first was not to be taken literally (I have a penchant for hyperbole) but it can hardly be ignored that baptisms per missionary has dropped dramatically since the internet. Just a basic fact check in the Church Almanacs should prove this point. I thought it was common knowledge.

Yeah, THAT is common knowledge, at least in my crowd. But that's not what you claimed, originally, is it? ...and I might add that the subjective term "dramatically" will vary widely, depending on whom you are speaking to.

Originally Posted by AlexanderX

The Mormon process conversion requires a missionary to control the enivironment so that no negative information can be known to the "investigator."

Bologna. What a stupid thing to say.

As to the rest of your post, you are confirming what *I* said. It's essentially limited to central & south America, and the Church has been addressing the problem there for some time.

HiJolly

[MaidservantX]

Hopefully there are only 500 views on a You Tube video because the others are out doing their home teaching or raising their children rather than surfing You Tube?

[AlexanderX]

Yeah, THAT is common knowledge, at least in my crowd. But that's not what you claimed, originally, is it? ...and I might add that the subjective term "dramatically" will vary widely, depending on whom you are speaking to.

I joined the Church in 1989. The hoopla at the time was that the Church was the fastest growing Church in the world. With somewhere around 30,000 missionaries there were more than 400,000 baptisms the next year. I served a mission two years later and the number of missionaries went up, eventually peaking around 60,000, while the number of convert baptisms dropped and then leveled off, fluxuating between 270-350,000 a year.
The average missionary baptized more than 13 people in the late 80's. It is less than 6 now.

That's a dramatic decrease by anyone's standard.

Bologna. What a stupid thing to say.

It is a factual thing to say. Missionaries cannot continue a discussion unless they have the environment controlled. This is common kowledge to anyone who has actually served a mission. If critics are there with an investigator, ready to test missionary claims, the missionaries are instructed to reschedule for another day. Of course, their explanation is that the "spirit" isn't around when "anti-mormonism" is around. However you want to look at it, the principle is the same. The game is rigged from the start. Missionaries never win "Bible bash" debates and win over investigators. Ever.

As to the rest of your post, you are confirming what *I* said.

No, you said I was wrong to say there are more ex-Mormons than Mormons. But I am right about that, and the statistics support this. Most people who get baptized end up leaving the Church, usually sooner than later. Of the 40+ people I baptized, I know of only 7 who are still active.

It's essentially limited to central & south America, and the Church has been addressing the problem there for some time.

Addressing the problem how?

The problem is that missionaries rush investigators through the process as quickly as possible. They presume to know what an investigator should and shouldn't know before making an educated decision. So they feel justified in neglecting to share information that would otherwise dissuade them. For instance, most African American investigators are not told about the previous priesthood ban. The Elders think that since it doesn't change their own testimonies, then it shouldn't have an effect on the investigator either. The problem is that Mormons cannot continue to control the environment after the person walks outside into the real world, no matter how hard they try. The new member will eventually find out the information ("anti-Mormon propaganda" as most LDS are conditioned to call it) on his own and then rebel against the institution for neglecting to inform him about it before he made his decision to be baptized. This is why so many ex-LDS are frustrated. For most people, hard facts like these do more to prove the Church is false, than a fuzzy feeling does to prove it is true. But missionaries aren't interested in sharing all the information; only information that makes the church sound good.

And yes, investigators are rushed through the process.

Even though there are six discussions, missionaries are instructed to get a baptismal "commitment" after the second discussion! This means that a person is pushed to commit long before they hear anything about the restoration, temple's, tithes, law of chastity, etc. And of course after they commit, it makes it difficult for them to back down if they learn something they don't like in the last four discussions. Why? Because the missionaries make them feel badly by saying, "But you said God already told you it was true... remember your feelings when we prayed together"? This is why missionaries are told to constantly ask them how they feel, usually after the missionary shares a tear-jerking story. Naturally the person says he feels "good." At that point the missionary breaks out Galatians 5:22 and uses that to argue God is using emotion in telling him the Church is true.

So yes, controlling the environment is the first thing we learned at the MTC.

And Central and South America represent a huge chunk of the Church. The activity rate in North America is an abysmal 35-40%. In Central and S. America it is only slightly worse at about 20-25%. Taken both continents together, we are talking about roughly 85% of the global Church with an activity rate well below 50%.

The country with the highest activity rate (60%) is Khazakstan, but it only has 61 active members in the entire country! In fact there are only nine countries with an activity rate above 50%, and none of them have more than 10,000 members. So yes, my statement is well grounded in fact. There are far more ex-Mormons in the world today than their are Mormons. In fact, if they were so inclined to organize themselves, they could be considered one of the fastest growing churches in the world.

In reality, the LDS Church has probably 4-5 million members that could be considered "active" in any real sense. Considering it is a Church that's been around for more than 170 years, this isn't very impressive. The SDA Church is kicking our butts.