Church membership numbers not good.

[drumdude]

I'm confident that M.G. 2.0 would not be welcome to speak most of his nuanced beliefs at fast and testimony meeting.


The Mormons in the pews must remain shielded from uncomfortable truths and critical thinking. I applaud MG for having those nuanced beliefs, but he needs to recognize they're not in any way orthodox and the church does not want you speaking them to other members. That's how you end up with Dan Peterson writing a hit piece on you and getting yourself excommunicated by the orthodox members in your ward.

[MG 2.0]

I'm confident that M.G. 2.0 would not be welcome to speak most of his nuanced beliefs at fast and testimony meeting.


The Mormons in the pews must remain shielded from uncomfortable truths and critical thinking. I applaud MG for having those nuanced beliefs, but he needs to recognize they're not in any way orthodox and the church does not want you speaking them to other members. That's how you end up with Dan Peterson writing a hit piece on you and getting yourself excommunicated by the orthodox members in your ward.

Hi drumdude. For clarification would you make a short list of these nuanced views you’re referring to? Especially those that the church explicitly would not approve of or condone.

Thanks.

Regards,
MG

[IHAQ]

As I said earlier, the country by country break down would be enlightening…

For 2021, the church has resumed its helpful practice of releasing country-by-country statistics, so it is easy to see which regions of the world are experiencing the most and least growth. (The church did not provide country-by-country information for 2020, the first year of COVID-19 disruptions, so it’s terrific to see this information become available once more.)
As researcher Matt Martinich has pointed out on his LDS Church Growth website, eight of the top 10 nations in terms of growth were in Africa, with Congo leading the list with a 29.4% growth rate over the two years since 2019. The locations of countries that are losing members are more variable, with some in Europe (Bosnia and Herzegovina; France), the Caribbean (St. Kitts and Nevis; Granada) and Central Asia (Kazakhstan).
In the United States, growth has essentially been cut in half. We’re seeing a .6% growth rate spread over the two years, whereas in each of the two years before the pandemic (2018 and 2019), we saw that same rate over the course of a single year. And even that was a significant drop from the U.S. growth of a decade ago.

https://religionnews.com/2022/04/07/is- ... d-decline/

This is the link to the blog mentioned by Jana Riess https://ldschurchgrowth.blogspot.com/

[IHAQ]

One potential area of concern is the lower than expected number of “children of record” reported for 2021. This refers to children whose parents have had them “blessed” as babies but who will not be counted as full members until they are baptized after turning age 8.
No one was surprised that in 2020, the church saw a serious drop in the number of children of record. After all, LDS chapels around the world were entirely shut down for much of the year, so many parents could not have their children formally blessed in sacrament meeting. Some parents chose to bless their children at home during the pandemic, but even then, there was the question of when such a ritual would be formally recorded in the church’s rolls; many aspects of record keeping were disrupted by the virus.
But the 2021 numbers still haven’t caught up. In fact, as Martinich points out, instead of the 2021 numbers representing a “double cohort,” with the expected backlog of babies from 2020 added to the usual annual number, the 2021 numbers were actually lower than for 2019.

https://religionnews.com/2022/04/07/is- ... d-decline/

It’s no wonder then why Oaks spent time at Conference saying he believed remaining single or not having children was the devils work.

[dastardly stem]

https://ibb.co/pbBMgWs

Thanks, Res Ipsa. Hopefully this works.

[Marcus]

I was going to put the rest of my updated charts here that I've shared before, but the board says my quota is reached. I'll see if I can figure it out later, for any interested parties.

Hi d stem, what’s the deal with a quota like that? I hope someone can figure that out, I’m sure it’s just a random setting from the switchover.

Anyway, I like seeing your charts so I hope you don’t mind I experimented with posting your ibb link to see if it would bring them over as images:

[MG 2.0]

I'm confident that M.G. 2.0 would not be welcome to speak most of his nuanced beliefs at fast and testimony meeting.


The Mormons in the pews must remain shielded from uncomfortable truths and critical thinking. I applaud MG for having those nuanced beliefs, but he needs to recognize they're not in any way orthodox and the church does not want you speaking them to other members. That's how you end up with Dan Peterson writing a hit piece on you and getting yourself excommunicated by the orthodox members in your ward.

Hi drumdude. For clarification would you make a short list of these nuanced views you’re referring to? Especially those that the church explicitly would not approve of or condone.

Thanks.

Regards,
MG

*bump

[drumdude]

Hi drumdude. For clarification would you make a short list of these nuanced views you’re referring to? Especially those that the church explicitly would not approve of or condone.

Thanks.

Regards,
MG

*bump

I don't follow you that closely, MG. But I'm fairly confident we've discussed your unorthodox beliefs before. If you consider yourself completely orthodox then you have my apologies for misunderstanding.

[Morley]

I'm confident that M.G. 2.0 would not be welcome to speak most of his nuanced beliefs at fast and testimony meeting.


The Mormons in the pews must remain shielded from uncomfortable truths and critical thinking. I applaud MG for having those nuanced beliefs, but he needs to recognize they're not in any way orthodox and the church does not want you speaking them to other members. That's how you end up with Dan Peterson writing a hit piece on you and getting yourself excommunicated by the orthodox members in your ward.

Hi drumdude. For clarification would you make a short list of these nuanced views you’re referring to? Especially those that the church explicitly would not approve of or condone.

Thanks.

Regards,
MG

Please correct me if I'm mistaken, MG. I thought that you had expressed the belief that the Book of Abraham should be removed from the canon.

Many decades ago, I was a tithe-paying, church-attending unbeliever. I was teaching the Gospel Doctrine class, but when the subject matter switched from the Old Testament to the Book of Mormon, I told the bishop that I needed to be released from the calling. I privately explained I didn't believe in the historical authenticity of the Book of Mormon, so to continue teaching would be dishonest.

That admission was the beginning of the end for me. If I had come out in Fast and Testimony meeting, I'm sure that it would have even been worse.

But things may be different these days. And different for you.

[MG 2.0]

I thought that you had expressed the belief that the Book of Abraham should be removed from the canon.

Yes/no…but not really. In other words I took the position that the Book of Abraham was a translation from papyri but it was somewhat of a mishmash in the sense that some of the papyri may have been missing and we of course have issues with the facsimilies. We have a scripture that was printed in serial form and then later canonized after years had gone by. The provenance chain (the place where it begins, where it springs into being…all of the moving parts) from mummies to canonization in SL is a long and somewhat convoluted one.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there are some individual issues that came packed in with an overall scriptural tome which was produced as a midrashic composition. The Book of Abraham as a whole is canonized scripture with scriptural authority and importance to LDS doctrine but there could be midrashic elements that slipped through the canonization processes which are problematical but to the average Latter Day Saint don’t make any difference. But at the same time those elements may be inspired/revelatory as they teach truths in regards to Abraham’s experiences and doctrinal teachings.

A mixed bag.

Now if I was to find out that the facsimilies aren’t a problem at all, that would be awesome. But I recognize the controversial nature of the Book of Abraham project and am willing to shelve those things that I haven’t seen scholars resolve for a fact. The reason is that I see revelation and the ancient world through the doctrines taught in the Book of Abraham. They ring true to me. Yes, some of those doctrines/ideas were being tossed around at the time of Joseph Smith BUT they had not been disseminated to mankind in scriptural form. The Book of Abraham and the voice of the ancients put those doctrines front and center for our age/time.

Another template of sorts to get ‘true doctrine’ out there. I like templates/scaffolding to project ideas and truths. Those templates/scaffoldings exist in the real world without having to come up with them whole cloth. That’s another thing that is a testimony of the restoration to me. Much of what Joseph taught was already here but it was scattered all over the place and needed to be organized and put into scriptural form with divine authority and stamp of approval.

I don’t expect that the Book of Abraham would be decanonized. Why? Because of the overall bearing it has as revealed scripture. Which I’m not at odds with at all.

As far as it is translated correctly.

Many decades ago, I was a tithe-paying, church-attending unbeliever. I was teaching the Gospel Doctrine class, but when the subject matter switched from the Old Testament to the Book of Mormon, I told the bishop that I needed to be released from the calling. I privately explained I didn't believe in the historical authenticity of the Book of Mormon, so to continue teaching would be dishonest.

That admission was the beginning of the end for me. If I had come out in Fast and Testimony meeting, I'm sure that it would have even been worse.

But things may be different these days. And different for you.

I do think that there is more openness to ‘variations on the theme’ as long as one sees the composer as being proficient in their creation of the magnum opus as a whole.

After all, it is apparent, at least to me, that God DOES work in mysterious ways his works and wonders to perform. In regards to the Book of Abraham I don’t think the whole story of its creation from start to finish (and it wasn’t actually finished if I remember correctly) is known and/or is a done deal.

The Book of Abraham is the little brother to the Book of Mormon, in a sense. If the Book of Mormon is ‘true’, which I believe enough evidence supports, then it is wise to cut the Book of Abraham some slack and be patient and willing to stick with what is known and be willing to wait for further light and knowledge to come forth in regards to issues related to some of the facsimilies, etc.

I am fully supportive of the work John Gee, Kerry Mulestein and others have done with the Book of Abraham. They are men of faith and testimony in the restoration. I am prone to go generally in their direction rather than in the direction of those that have apostatized from the church and left EVERYTHING behind.

Given away their birthright, so to speak.

I’ll leave it at that.

Regards,
MG