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IMO they get new members because they are unfailingly polite, clean and respectful.

They show the love of Jesus but do it for false reasons and lead people away from salvation. If they used the same tactics on display here they would chase away any possible new members.

Exactly. The venom many christians show mormons and often jews, is evocative of islamic treatment of non-believers. Catholic discussion of protestants often sounds like moslems discussing apostates.

The things mormons belive simply amaze me. I cannot see how any thinking person can accept such stories. But they are polite, clean, and respectful. And it should be instructive to other religions to see the success that single trait has gained them.

If I were to pick a religion based purely on the demeanor of its adherents, I would probably pick Buddhism. No cause for fighting there. Everyone is right. Or perhaps better to say no one is wrong, or ever has been. Because everyone is deity, and deity is everything, and everything is nothing, and the closer you get to nothingness the more complete you are, and the fewer headaches you have. Etc. (To real Buddhists reading this, please forgive me my outsider translations of your "paradoxes").

And Buddhism did win me over for a short while. Until I got to the center of the nothingness and found it, well, empty. Realizing there were things worth fighting about, I started fighting again. Christian truth, for example:

Jud 1:3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.

Earnest contention for the Christian faith involves confronting people with their error:

James 5:19 Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him; [20] Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.

So contending for truth and turning people away from error is a good thing. Not hate, but love, the turning of hearts to the true God, which leads to blessing, and a greater experience of God’s love for the person you are confronting.

But the human messenger is not the ultimate persuader of the wayward heart. The pressure is not on us to change everyone who fails to see the truth. Only God can lead a lost soul to repentance, and this has consequences in how we present the message:

2Tim 2:24 And the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient, [25] In meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth;

But that does not let us off the hook. We must still present the message. If Mormonism is false (and it is, as is Islam, and many other man-made religious inventions), Christians are obligated to call out the falsehood for what it is, without shame or hesitation:

2Tim 4:2 Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.

But this speaking out against falsehood, even when it is earnest as can be, must be done with more than mere civility; it must be done in love, lest we fall short of the supreme objective:

Eph 4:14 That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; [15] But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:

Peace,

SR

mormonism does not show the Love of the Biblical Jesus, they talk about the lds jesus, who is not the same Jesus of the Bible.
They gain converts by dispensation and out right lies about what mormonism is.
As well, as numbers being inflated. Their membership is about 14mil worldwide, yet it is presented as the US membership.
And never forget, once a member always a member.