Ahab Posted April 11, 2017 Posted April 11, 2017 2 minutes ago, clarkgoble said: That's interesting. Stake missionaries were a great thing. Both to prepare people for a mission but also to significantly increase labor in a way splits can't do. I was on a full time Stake mission for a month about six months before my mission. I was living as a full time companion to a missionary. As a convert from another church, I've always thought it a bit odd that members seem to think it takes going away from their own home ward on a mission to share the gospel as a full-time missionary when they could simply stay at home and stop working for the same length of time and share the gospel with others.
Hamba Tuhan Posted April 12, 2017 Posted April 12, 2017 On 07/04/2017 at 9:26 PM, rockpond said: I just finished a 4-yr stint serving as a bishop's counselor. I did a good number of visits to inactive during that time. I didn't keep the stats but I would guess it's probably about 50/50. Our ward is lucky to have about an 80% activity rate so we don't have a lot of inactive families. Of those who are, I can think of several just off the top of my head who no longer identify as LDS, including one family who lives on my street. I would estimate a similar number for our ward: about 10 per cent of those on our membership list no longer identify as Latter-day Saints. Of course, even that figure is complicated. The mum in one of the families that I home teach would be amongst this 10 per cent (she now claims to be an atheist), but she faithfully pays fast offerings each month and encourages our visits. Another woman that I home teach (I like challenging home teaching assignments!) talks about 'your church' and has been away for more than 20 years, but she's now sending her grandchildren (who are in her care) to Faith in God each fortnight. In addition, the Elders and I have recently been working with a man who also calls the Church 'your church', plays in the band at another church, and talks about 'my pastor'. He's also been coming to church with us each Sunday for about two months now after more than 20 years away. I don't even know how to begin categorising him. 1
Hamba Tuhan Posted April 12, 2017 Posted April 12, 2017 On 08/04/2017 at 0:06 AM, Gray said: That fits what I've seen among inactive people in the areas I've lived. A small minority of inactive members still have a strong Mormon identity, but we've lost track of most of the others, or if we can find them, they want nothing to do with us. On 08/04/2017 at 0:09 AM, Gray said: I think our definitions of actively engaged are similar, but I've met many people who were actively engaged and lost their faith right in the middle of it. It sounds like our experiences in the Church have been vastly divergent in both of these areas.
stemelbow Posted April 12, 2017 Posted April 12, 2017 23 hours ago, clarkgoble said: Honestly I don't know. It completely depends upon where Holland was getting his information. Was it demographic statistics or just an unwise and ignorant extrapolation from the numbers then out? Not sure it matters. If there was a we who projected out, as Elder Holland suggested, it was obviously something someone and likely more than a someone worked on. I believe even at the time he said it, some of us were questioning where he was getting his idea. Back then I was astounded people weren't seeing the steep impending decline. Here's what I said on this forum at the time we all talked about this prediction: Quote So from December to January the number of missionaries dropped 5,000 and it was holding steady at 85,000 in January? I don't get what she's saying there. Apostles and prophets don't make predictions like this any more--must know something. It was already noted that we lost 5,000 missionaries in a month. That's a huge deline. it was obvious the numbers were going to continue downward. How they didn't know that is beyond me. Here's the thread from 2 years ago:
stemelbow Posted April 12, 2017 Posted April 12, 2017 3 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said: It sounds like our experiences in the Church have been vastly divergent in both of these areas. I've noticed when it comes to this type of stuff, most people see what they want to see. If they want to see the Church as the bestest thing ever, doing good constantly and making huge waves int eh world, they see it. If they don't, they don't. My experience is more in line with what Gray had said. The ward I currently live in is huge, or it feels huge. But by and large most members on the records don't come to Church. I think we're just below 40% activity rate. There's a significant sum that comes once a month to keep our numbers up, but I'd guess somewhere around 20% are those that are really engaged. It used to be people would complain on this board about those in their ward who won't do anything. That there are only about 10% of the ward who you can rely on to fill certain callings or some such stuff. I heard them but felt the problem was less with those int heir ward and more with the program. It's hard to be engaged with busywork fo the sake of busywork when you have tons of other stuff happening in your life.
clarkgoble Posted April 12, 2017 Posted April 12, 2017 1 hour ago, stemelbow said: Not sure it matters. If there was a we who projected out, as Elder Holland suggested, it was obviously something someone and likely more than a someone worked on. I believe even at the time he said it, some of us were questioning where he was getting his idea. Back then I was astounded people weren't seeing the steep impending decline. Here's what I said on this forum at the time we all talked about this prediction: More or less all I'm saying is that if this is based upon demographic knowledge it may not be as far fetched as we assume.
stemelbow Posted April 12, 2017 Posted April 12, 2017 1 minute ago, clarkgoble said: More or less all I'm saying is that if this is based upon demographic knowledge it may not be as far fetched as we assume. Fair enough. I was feeling so sure that it was a wrong prediction, I wasn't considering that it might prove correct in two years. But man, that would be one amazing turn around.
Hamba Tuhan Posted April 13, 2017 Posted April 13, 2017 11 hours ago, stemelbow said: I've noticed when it comes to this type of stuff, most people see what they want to see. ... The ward I currently live in is huge, or it feels huge. But by and large most members on the records don't come to Church. I think we're just below 40% activity rate. There's a significant sum that comes once a month to keep our numbers up, but I'd guess somewhere around 20% are those that are really engaged. (emphases added) I appreciate your input, but I'm not actually just guessing when I discuss my ward. In one capacity or another, I've been a member of the ward council for nearly 13 of the almost 14 years that I've lived in this ward: ward mission leader, ward clerk, Young Men president, second counsellor in the bishopric, first counsellor in the bishopric. My current calling is ward mission leader again, and in this capacity I organise our weekly rescue visits. I have been in most homes of our ward members multiple times, and I know their stories, not just the numbers.
stemelbow Posted April 13, 2017 Posted April 13, 2017 10 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said: I appreciate your input, but I'm not actually just guessing when I discuss my ward. In one capacity or another, I've been a member of the ward council for nearly 13 of the almost 14 years that I've lived in this ward: ward mission leader, ward clerk, Young Men president, second counsellor in the bishopric, first counsellor in the bishopric. My current calling is ward mission leader again, and in this capacity I organise our weekly rescue visits. I have been in most homes of our ward members multiple times, and I know their stories, not just the numbers. Same here.
clarkgoble Posted April 13, 2017 Posted April 13, 2017 23 hours ago, stemelbow said: Fair enough. I was feeling so sure that it was a wrong prediction, I wasn't considering that it might prove correct in two years. But man, that would be one amazing turn around. Oh I'm skeptical. I bet some secretary or assistant just did a linear projection without thinking that dropping the age means extra missionaries for a while. However part of the large increase at that time wasn't just the age change but demographically a lot of of youth hitting the mission age at the same time. The missionary department actually does track those numbers in advance. So while I suspect it's just an error on Holland's part it's possible it's based upon those demographic numbers.
stemelbow Posted April 13, 2017 Posted April 13, 2017 Just now, clarkgoble said: Oh I'm skeptical. I bet some secretary or assistant just did a linear projection without thinking that dropping the age means extra missionaries for a while. However part of the large increase at that time wasn't just the age change but demographically a lot of of youth hitting the mission age at the same time. The missionary department actually does track those numbers in advance. So while I suspect it's just an error on Holland's part it's possible it's based upon those demographic numbers. Ok. This sounds worse than I thought now. If by projecting out they meant more kids will be getting to their missionary age then we may be losing kids before 18 at an unheard of rate. I've determined that far less young men, as a percentage, are going now since the age change because since the age change the percent of women who go has doubled. You figure that women doubling and the change in percent of kids going is about 5% since 2012, then it must mean more young men are opting out of missions, since the age change or there aren't near as many young men of missionary age as a percentage as there were 5 years ago. Or if in 2 years somehow the Church has that many more young women and young men at missionary age, well, that'd be nuts. How that type of anomaly would happen in a population of millions scattered around the world would be more than coincidental, I'd think.
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