We're unWORTHY!!
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Locked on 08/03/2007 6:34:01 AM PDT by Religion Moderator, reason:
Poor behavior |
Posted on 07/26/2007 5:03:33 PM PDT by tantiboh
Democratic political consultant Mark Mellman has a very good piece up today at The Hill on the baffling and illegitimate opposition among voters to Mitt Romney due to his religion. I liked his closing paragraphs:
In July of 1958, 24 percent of respondents told Gallup they would not vote for a Catholic for president, almost identical to Gallup’s reading on Mormons today. Two years later, John F. Kennedy became the first Catholic to assume the oath of office. Within eight months, the number refusing to vote for a Catholic was cut almost in half.
[snip]
Mellman also discusses an interesting poll he helped construct, in which the pollsters asked half of their respondents whether they would support a candidate with certain characteristics, and asked the other half about another candidate with the exact same characteristics, with one difference. The first candidate was Baptist, the second candidate was Mormon. The Baptist had a huge advantage over the Mormon candidate, by about 20 points.
[snip]
However, more recent polls have attempted to fix the anonymity problem. A recent Time Magazine poll (read the original report here), for example, got to the heart of the question by asking respondents if they are less likely to vote for Mitt Romney specifically because he is a Mormon. The result is not as bad as some reporting on the poll has suggested. For example, while 30% of Republicans say they are less likely to vote for Romney because of his religion, fully 15% of other Republicans say that characteristic makes them more likely to vote for him. And while many have reported the finding that 23% of Republicans are “worried” by Romney’s Mormonism, the more important (but less-reported) number is that 73% say they hold no such reservations...
(Excerpt) Read more at romneyexperience.com ...
Sorry, I left this information out of my previous post to you.
The American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS) showed a significantly smaller numbers of Americans self-identifying as mormons, about 2.8 million in 2001. That would seem to be an upper bound on activity.
Every time a temple is opened (or reopened after major renovations) there is an open house where non-members are welcome to come tour the building. These are very well attended and usually run for several days. As long as there was no damage done to the building all they would do would be to replace the carpets and give it a good cleaning after the open house, before it is dedicated to God. They would do this to present it to God in the best condidtion possible. The building has not been dedicated at the time of the open house, so at that time it isn’t really a temple so how could the presence of a non-Mormon defile it?
Good info, CC, though the statistics don’t sit right with me. I don’t accept the premise that the Church is inflating membership numbers. More on that later.
~”Mauss says the worldwide retention problem stems from missionaries attempting to baptize as many people as possible, some of whom are not prepared for the demands of an LDS life. New members are often not provided the support they need during their first year in the faith.”~
I can see that, given the anecdotal evidence I’ve seen. In South America, where the Church’s growth is explosive, about 90% of new converts go inactive within a year. Those are some pretty severe growing pains. What I don’t know is how many of them are eventually reactivated. It’s not an insignificant number, though.
In Italy, where I served my mission, a convert was a very rare thing. The average missionary in the Rome mission was baptizing one person a year. But we had a retention rate of almost 100%. Our running joke was that one Italian conversion is worth 20 South American conversions.
There has been a real emphasis, particularly by President Hinckley, to fellowship and support new converts, and I’ve seen significant improvement. Of the last ten or so new converts that I’ve seen, only about three have gone inactive. It’s all anecdotal, and the shift is too new for quantitative analysis to confirm that the emphasis is meeting with success; but it seems to me that the situation is improving (at least from my perspective - from yours, that may not be the best word :-) ).
I don’t agree with the alarmists who say that the Church is stagnant or even collapsing. When we are consistently bursting our buildings at the seams despite new chapels being built all the time, I just don’t see it. Our numbers are growing, even though the American population is roughly keeping pace.
One way to judge the “real growth” of the LDS Church is to take a look at the number of stakes and wards. A stake or ward is formed in response to a specific number of -active- members (particularly worthy priesthood holders able to fill the leadership positions). It takes active members to fill the positions necessary to maintain a well-functioning stake or ward, no matter how many inactive members may be on the roles - and sometimes the number of inactives on the roles is several times the number of actives.
Here’s an interesting video that visualizes the growth in the number of stakes since the Church settled in Utah. The soundtrack is a bit melodramatic, but the visualization is effective:
http://www.allaboutmormons.com/ENG_Video29.php
Take a look here:
http://mormonstories.org/?p=252
Note the graph of stakes. I noticed that the increase the number of stakes flattened about 1997, while the increase in membership stayed linear. This denotes a lessening rate of convert retention, and lasted about 5-7 years. The chart is starting to pick back up; we’ll have to wait and see if that’s a blip or the beginning of a new trend.
What I’d really like to know is what happened in 1989. I don’t think anybody’s been able to isolate any specific factors, though.
The following figures are derived from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States
According to the U.S. Census, there were 281 million Americans in 2000. Of that, 1.4% claimed to be LDS. That totals to 3,934,000 members in 2000. Assuming the same percentage applies today, the Census Bureau estimates the U.S. population at about 302,500,000 today. That comes out to 4,235,000 self-identified Mormons in the U.S. today. This does not count the number that are officially on the LDS roles, such as yourself, but do not self-identify as such. How many? Impossible to know for sure. Perhaps we could estimate that at an even 4.5 million total. If you are correct, of course, that 1.7 million live in Utah, then 2.8 million live in the rest of the country. I think I spotted somewhere that California has 700,000.
So, it appears my number of 6,000,000 was too high, and your number of 2,500,000 was too low.
My logical flaw was that I assumed that the distribution of new converts was about 50/50 between inside the U.S. and outside. This, of course, is ridiculous in the face of the numbers. In fact, Church growth outside has been significantly greater outside the United States for several decades, and a decided majority of Mormons are now non-Americans. Is roughtly 8.5 million non-American Mormons an outlandish claim? Given the explosive growth of the Church worldwide, particularly in South America, non-communist Asia, and more recently in Africa, I don’t find the number to be incredible.
As a percentage of population in the U.S., the Church’s growth does appear to be flat in recent years. I wonder if our detractors’ biggest fear is that a Romney presidency would change that? Get us up to a whole 2%? I don’t think that will be the case; but I must admit, there’s a small part of me that chuckles when I see this fear expressed.
Mitt Romney on the Christian Broadcasting Network’s 700 Club
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTBqnZ7SLn4&NR=1
What an AMAZING statement!
You say AMusing;
I say AMazing!
Resty; you SELECTIVELY left something out here!!
Why does the LDS organization complain that other churchs say they are not 'christian', and then can turn right around and say those 'others after the split' are not MORMON!
Can we say "Double Standard"?
Indeed!
She has no AUTHORITY to have that attitude!
When, I guess it COULD be; but since you, as a source of info, are QUESTIONABLE, we can NOT say that reason is correct.
(see #189)
I see...
KJV Luke 18:10-15
10. Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican.
11. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican.
12. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.
13. And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.
14. I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.
(see #189)
What ever you are selling don't fit in with my talk!
How do you KNOW you don't want what I'm selling, if you don't know what I'm talking about??
Like THESE???
Oh... wait!!
I think those are MOUNTIE forces!
Sadly; you are right!
Then, as a Baptist, you need to find out MORE about the groups that call themselves "a minority christian sect"!
And you haven't learned to just let it be.
You may be 'sick of it', but I doubt that you can do anything to change the facts of how your religion came into being.
Ah...
But WHICH 30%??
Are YOU an 'accurate' source' for info?
How can we believe what YOU say on the matter?
You are not a prophet or a son of a prophet; are you?
OH??
You mean the ceremony has CHANGED???
A 'command' from GOD??
It's folks like you that has caused Juan Valdez to moonlight by harvesting cocaine!
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