Is Mormonism Dying?

[rongo]

20 hours ago, The Nehor said:

I suspect Salt Lake waits a month or two and then uses some kind of people locating search to find out where they are. If they stay off the radar or do not have a permanent address they will probably get the old address again and send it straight back.

I do not mean to imply malice. The process is probably automated. I just think the process is stupid. If you do not trust the local leaders to know that someone is gone then the system will not work anyways.

Salt Lake does contact available family. My wife got a call about her sister, and she gave them her address. She came back to the Church and is now sealed in the temple. So, I know that they do try.

I'm just upset with the system and policy of sending records to the last known unit when Salt Lake can't locate them. It's just to "get them out of Address Unknown," but they are also known not to be in the units they are sending them to. It gets to be a pretty staggering drag on attendance percentage, home/visiting teaching percentage, guilt/morale in the units when you put it all together. I estimate it at 2-3 million members. I think the Address Unknown file should remain in Salt Lake and not count against local units. Inactive members known to be in the local units, yes. That's fair game. 

Edited March 1, 2018 by rongo

[mrmarklin]

On 3/1/2018 at 4:48 AM, Glenn101 said:

The gentleman says at one point:

Then goes on to do just that:

Of course the last part can be said for all religions, i.e. the no (physical) evidence part.

I do not think Mormonism is dying, but I believe that the growth will be more outside the U.S. than inside. I believe that is already playing out. I also believe that it will be getting worse for all Christian based religions if I understand the prophecies about the last days correctly.

Glenn

The Catholic Church is not growing in its traditional base of Western Europe , but a lot in overseas areas.

I would expect our Church  follow this pattern. 

[cdowis]

Quote

 

Is Mormonism dying?

 

I certainly hope so.

 

I was going to post this, but I suspect that many of you would misunderstand.  So I didn't.

Edited March 19, 2018 by cdowis

[cdowis]

On 3/1/2018 at 9:25 AM, rongo said:

Salt Lake does contact available family. My wife got a call about her sister, and she gave them her address. She came back to the Church and is now sealed in the temple. So, I know that they do try.

I'm just upset with the system and policy of sending records to the last known unit when Salt Lake can't locate them. It's just to "get them out of Address Unknown," but they are also known not to be in the units they are sending them to. It gets to be a pretty staggering drag on attendance percentage, home/visiting teaching percentage, guilt/morale in the units when you put it all together. I estimate it at 2-3 million members. I think the Address Unknown file should remain in Salt Lake and not count against local units. Inactive members known to be in the local units, yes. That's fair game. 

It gets worse. 

I know the address of an inactive member, and told the ward clerk.  But we did not have her record and he had no way to report the new address to the church.  The only way is to transfer the ward's record to the new ward.

[rongo]

8 minutes ago, cdowis said:

It gets worse. 

I know the address of an inactive member, and told the ward clerk.  But we did not have her record and he had no way to report the new address to the church.  The only way is to transfer the ward's record to the new ward.

I've done that before. You order the records, and then transfer them to their actual ward. All it does is break the "chain of custody" showing the most recent ward. It will show your ward, when in fact the record was only there for a minute. It's like laundering money through offshore banks in the Cayman Islands . . .  

If you send the address and info to that ward's clerk, they will usually . . . not order the records. You have to do it yourself, as you indicated. 

[cdowis]

1 hour ago, rongo said:

I've done that before. You order the records, and then transfer them to their actual ward. All it does is break the "chain of custody" showing the most recent ward. It will show your ward, when in fact the record was only there for a minute. It's like laundering money through offshore banks in the Cayman Islands . . .  

If you send the address and info to that ward's clerk, they will usually . . . not order the records. You have to do it yourself, as you indicated. 

The ward clerk refused to order it since she was not in the ward.  I called the membership dept and suggested they look at the problem.

[The Nehor]

On 3/19/2018 at 7:18 PM, cdowis said:

The ward clerk refused to order it since she was not in the ward.  I called the membership dept and suggested they look at the problem.

I am tempted to ask you to PM it to me and I will do it but that is probably inappropriate.

[cdowis]

8 hours ago, The Nehor said:

I am tempted to ask you to PM it to me and I will do it but that is probably inappropriate.

I know now how to contact the church office directly, but obviously most members are unaware of how to do that. 

But thanks.

[Jeanne]

To the OP/Subject Title...define mormonism?  Ask yourself how much this religion has changed since Joseph Smith's said martyr?

[JLHPROF]

1 hour ago, Jeanne said:

To the OP/Subject Title...define mormonism?  Ask yourself how much this religion has changed since Joseph Smith's said martyr?

Much of Mormonism has changed over the years.  The founding principles have not.
Some of us attach more importance to the things that are changed than others.  But the fact that Mormonism continues to develop is a sign of life, not death.