Comments on: The Implied Statistical Report, 2008

By: Ken

Ken — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 21:02:02 +0000

E, devo também lhe perguntar: Fala a língua de Deus, a língua portuguesa?

No quiéro darle ofensa, pero está equivocado: ¡la lengua de Diós es español!

;-D Sorry. Couldn’t resist!

By: queuno

queuno — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 02:00:22 +0000

bfwebster (34) – I know in my clerking history that for every “cannot find” member that was been sent to SLC, I created a record for a 2-to-4-year-old who was blessed but never had a record created (my brother in Utah has two children that didn’t have records until he was called to the bishopric and fixed).

I’m serious in that I think there have been various efforts in some places to go create records for new children of less active members that haven’t been blessed. I know that there’s more of an emphasis today to NOT to do that, to simply record those children on the inactive member’s record (without creating a record for the child).

By: Matt W.

Matt W. — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:35:01 +0000

And I had an error in my computation it should be

Previous total membership – [current total membership -current converts] = (+) re-baptisms (-)Excommunicated or removed (-) deceased (+) births

Childen baptised shoud not be subtracted from total membership because they are part of total membership at birth, not baptism. Mea culpa.

By: Matt W.

Matt W. — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:32:19 +0000

Kent:

While births should be pretty linear (and declining), deaths, excommunictions, name removals, and “reversals of excummunication” should be erratic. It makes sense for this number to be all over the board.

By: Ziff

Ziff — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 15:58:17 +0000

Kent, thanks for this fascinating post and the discussion following it. I had lots to say and wanted to make graphs to look at some of the data, so I slapped it all up at Zelophehad's Daughters, if anyone's interested in taking a look.

By: Kent Larsen

Kent Larsen — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 09:52:38 +0000

Dennis, Stark based his projection on a 50% growth rate per decade — which requires an increase of over 4% each year. We haven’t seen 4% for more than a decade, and currently the rate is between 2.3% and 2.5% each year.

At 2.25% a year, (about 25% per decade) we will end up with 67 million members in 2080, far less than Stark’s 265 million projection. At 2.5% a year (about 28% per decade), membership will total 80 million.

Of course, the problem with all these projections is that they don’t even attempt to take into account the underlying reasons for growth — and without attempting to do that, no projection is worth much.

By: Dennis

Dennis — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 05:30:33 +0000

Can anyone venture a forecast on church membership in ten or twenty years. Is Rodney Stark’s prediction way off or not? Dennis

By: Kent Larsen

Kent Larsen — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 02:57:59 +0000

Geoff B (43 & 44), Great to know there are other stats nuts. Perhaps we need an LDS Stats group to pull together statistics like this and sort it all out.

E, devo também lhe perguntar: Fala a língua de Deus, a língua portuguesa?

By: Ray

Ray — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 02:34:56 +0000

Almost eight years ago – 9/11/2001.

I know; it doesn’t fit quite right, but I immediately thought of that.

By: Geoff B

Geoff B — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 01:30:46 +0000

Raymond, I grew up in Marin (Bolinas and Mill Valley) and some family members still live there. They are inactive (and very unlikely to read this blog).

The Marin County phenomenon is extremely common in my experience in the Church — wealthy suburbs decrease in membership while inner-city areas and middle class areas continue to grow. I have noticed this trend in New Jersey, Florida and even in Rio de Janeiro, where I lived for several years.