Hi Grig, long time no see !
It is not "unloving" to remove people that have removed themselves from the congregation by purging the rolls . People often move between denominations. They have not become "unbelievers "necessarily , but some have found another church body or they have had a doctrinal change . I suspect that if such a person returned to the church they could again become members
Keeping non attenders on church rolls artificially inflates church numbers and is dishonest .
Baptism can not be revoked.
Do not Mormons purge the list of "temple worthy" based on their own criteria?
“Hi Grig, long time no see ! “
You missed me?!? :)
I’ve been here, we just haven’t been on the same thread in a while.
“Baptism can not be revoked.”
That makes taking someone off the membership roles a very different thing between us then. For us, excommunication does revoke their baptism, as I’m sure you know. So we see it as a far more serious matter.
”Keeping non attenders on church rolls artificially inflates church numbers and is dishonest . “
Only if you portray it as a list of people who meet a certain attendance requirement. We don’t portray the membership list as anything other than what it is, a list of those who are currently recognized as having been baptized into the church.
I know you don’t like the idea of our church growing at any rate, but spreading unsubstantiated rumors (as in post #5) to try and dismiss it seems a little petty if you ask me. Children cannot be baptized without their parent’s permission, and if some guy had his baptism recorded more than once it was a rare mistake. My mission baptized about 150 people per month. I spent 10 months assisting in the mission office an in all that time only ONE baptism didn’t follow proper procedures (the missionaries baptized the person before they attended a Sunday service). Man, did those missionaries catch it for that!
The growing membership does reflect that the church is growing. If you want a measure of the growth of active church members, then look at the number of new wards, branches, stakes and meetinghouses although these indicators lag behind the growth by at least a year.