-800 Units in Europe

[Meilingkie]

Well

Just had a chat online with a former SP; who used to be the BP in Nijmegen, the unit getting closed in a few weeks,He told me Church is planning to close 800 (yes: eight-hundred!!) units in Europe.

[Giant Sloth]

Holy Fetch!

What's the time frame on that? 800 this year? Over the next few years?

[Meilingkie]

There are 800 units which need to close, or consolidate at the very least.
800 under-strength units which need shoring up.

[Just This Guy]

Do you know how many units there are in Europe in total? That way we can put the number of units being closed in perspective.

Edit: What may be more interesting is a time line of unit counts. That way we can see the trend data. Any idea how hard that would be to compile?

[Meilingkie]

I was wonderibg the Same thing. I Will try to get some Numbers together later today

[oliblish]

There are several sites with this type of data.

Cumorah.com has historical counts of units by country, but I don't know if you can get counts for Europe in general.

www.cumorah.com

Unfortunately their tables are in graphical format so it is difficult to pull the figures from the site. Here is the historical unit info for France:



They also have some nice graphs:



To find this country information on the site go to www.cumorah.com and hit the 'Countries' tab and select:

Resource: Statistical Profile
Country: France (or whatever country you would like to see)

Here is what comes up for France:

http://www.cumorah.com/index.php?target ... ind=Search

To find the latest wards and branches that have been created or closed look here:

http://ldsunitgrowth.blogspot.com/
http://ldschurchgrowth-us-canada.blogspot.com/

The ldschurchtemples.com site has some good country data as well:

http://www.ldschurchtemples.com/statistics/units/world/

[Meilingkie]

Just a small update

British Isles, Scandinavia, Benelux and France account for 621 units.
FHE now with Inlaws now. Reporting back later.

[Meilingkie]

Well

Western Europe, you know, what used to be Nato has 1163 units
Iceland 4
Finland 29
Sweden 41
Norway 22
Denmark 21
Ireland 24
United Kingdom 322
Netherlands 33
Belgium 16
France 109
Spain 146
Portugal 72
Italy 107
Switzerland 37
Austria 17
Germany 163

Made some calls, There are 800 which should be strengthened, as such they should merge.
Meaning at least 400 are on the chopping block. Still that´s a lot on a total of 1163.

[Korihor]

Made some calls, There are 800 which should be strengthened, as such they should merge.
Meaning at least 400 are on the chopping block. Still that´s a lot on a total of 1163.

"being strengthened" is not a 1:1 closure rate. A stake in Utah was recently strengthened, it had 6 wards and they closed one to strengthen the other 5.
While this thread gives me hope that they are coming to their senses, I highly doubt it would be 400 units out of 1163. Losing 1/3 of their unit count would make waves and look bad. The church hates looking bad (who doesn't?). My guess is 800 units will be affected and I would estimate they close 50-100 units during this year. That would be less than 10% total and only a few each month.

[redjay]

If your contact is right this news is astounding, there is no other way to look at this but crisis.

Actually there is another way, that is that the brethren have realised that stretched wards over-burden the members causing burnout and disillusionment as such wards/branches should be combined - however, I think it is more likely to be a response to crisis, which I welcome, hopefully we can see the church become more progressive and have a genuine acceptance for NOM's - though I think I am far too optimistic.

It's more likely to double down and become more isolated and fundamental.

Anyway OP thanks for posting.

[Meilingkie]

Made some calls, There are 800 which should be strengthened, as such they should merge.
Meaning at least 400 are on the chopping block. Still that´s a lot on a total of 1163.

"being strengthened" is not a 1:1 closure rate. A stake in Utah was recently strengthened, it had 6 wards and they closed one to strengthen the other 5.
While this thread gives me hope that they are coming to their senses, I highly doubt it would be 400 units out of 1163. Losing 1/3 of their unit count would make waves and look bad. The church hates looking bad (who doesn't?). My guess is 800 units will be affected and I would estimate they close 50-100 units during this year. That would be less than 10% total and only a few each month.

The problem in Europe is, there aren´t many people to disperse over multiple units. And the distances are quite big.
My previous ward had 6 families total, 20 people in all, not much left to split.
2 families were related (mine), and put in 1 ward near their house. The other 4 went to another ward.

[Korihor]

Made some calls, There are 800 which should be strengthened, as such they should merge.
Meaning at least 400 are on the chopping block. Still that´s a lot on a total of 1163.

"being strengthened" is not a 1:1 closure rate. A stake in Utah was recently strengthened, it had 6 wards and they closed one to strengthen the other 5.
While this thread gives me hope that they are coming to their senses, I highly doubt it would be 400 units out of 1163. Losing 1/3 of their unit count would make waves and look bad. The church hates looking bad (who doesn't?). My guess is 800 units will be affected and I would estimate they close 50-100 units during this year. That would be less than 10% total and only a few each month.

The problem in Europe is, there aren´t many people to disperse over multiple units. And the distances are quite big.
My previous ward had 6 families total, 20 people in all, not much left to split.
2 families were related (mine), and put in 1 ward near their house. The other 4 went to another ward.

I totally agree and understand the logistics and geographic situations would be a large obstacle. I doubt a remote unit would be split 4 ways to surrounding units. I'm just saying I think it highly unlikely to disband 400+ units. I hope to be proven wrong.

[Emower]

This is interesting to me. I served my mission in Norway. About 12 of those units could be closed. But they are all the units in remote places and this would basically remove the church as a weekly opportunity from them. I assume this is the case throughout Europe. The units that most need closing are the units that are least capable of being split up.

[Meilingkie]

Well, sent this, and some other tidbits to John Dehlin.
He contacted me, and asked me to do a podcast with him.

SP won+t like it, but let´s just say I can´t be bothered by what the authoritah thinks.

[Enoch Witty]

Well, sent this, and some other tidbits to John Dehlin.
He contacted me, and asked me to do a podcast with him.

SP won+t like it, but let´s just say I can´t be bothered by what the authoritah thinks.

Looking forward to hearing it!

[FiveFingerMnemonic]

Well, sent this, and some other tidbits to John Dehlin.
He contacted me, and asked me to do a podcast with him.

SP won+t like it, but let´s just say I can´t be bothered by what the authoritah thinks.

Brave step my friend, really looking forward to it. Just keep that Dutch brevity so it doesn't go 3 hours.

[John G.]

Well, sent this, and some other tidbits to John Dehlin.
He contacted me, and asked me to do a podcast with him.

SP won+t like it, but let´s just say I can´t be bothered by what the authoritah thinks.

That would be great if you did a podcast! Love to hear the European perspective!

[John G.]

Interesting to hear about the consolidation in Europe. Last year there were two big consolidations that I heard about in SLC. One in the Sugar House area and the other one just up the street involving the stakes around This is the Place Monument. The latter lost 4 wards I think. Which is surprising because it is in the heart of morridor!

I wonder if this is a worldwide thing??

[Meilingkie]

Wondering if I should prepare John

https://stuffdutchpeoplelike.com/2011/0 ... irectness/

[FiveFingerMnemonic]

Wondering if I should prepare John

https://stuffdutchpeoplelike.com/2011/0 ... irectness/

I'm sure he will be "super excited" to interview you.