NOM

Just listened to John Dehlins latest podcast where a family was just excommunicated . Is the church getting desperate ? Terrified? Free falling in membership ? Will it fall in my lifetime (Im 59) . Tell me what all of you think please.

The churchs interest is in itself not the members. Reading handbook 1 will make that very clear.

The church sees this as amputation to save the body. The human destruction is irrelevant.

The church has enough money to last forever and I don't think there's any chance of it 'falling apart' anytime.

I also think the idea of the church in free-fall is overblown, but it certainly appears that it's leveled of and is headed towards a shrinking membership. This is clearly fueled by the information about the church being so easily accessible, so I think they're doing what they can to cut any perceived threats off before they can find credibility within Mormon circles.

Think of the people offended at the church excommunicating the Youngs... but then realize that most TBMs will never hear about it, and that those who might hear about them from here on out will ignore them as apostates.

The church thinks by exing the Youngs, Bill Reel, etc that they are stopping the bleeding by forcing members to view them as apostates/enemies of the church. It's a calculated risk but clearly they have access to the data that shows it's one that they need to take to keep more members from taking that first step out of the box and looking at church problems.

If my family is any indication, then no. Actually, the church is at best just not seeing the more aggressive growth rates of the past.

I see it becoming more irrelevant, but not going extinct.

I don’t think it is free falling, but it is in the edge. For example. what is Quitmormon.com started advertising in Mexico, Chile, Philippines, etc. These are countries where the number of members the church claims is significantly more than the people themselves claim on the census.
If the ad ran telling people if you were ever baptized Mormon, then you are still Mormon, but you can quit Mormonism for free...
There could be as many people leaving the church as those being baptized.
The recent data on church activity rates puts the world church activity at 23%. That means 77% of people don’t attend. Can you imagine a million people leaving each year. That could happen with the right world media campaign and it would be a free fall.

In Holland the latest figures show something like a slowfall.
It’s melting away.
Attendance since the reorganisation is down 40%
Youth-attendance is down 70%

About the only thing that could possibly be considered in a free fall for the church in general, is the Church's public reputation.

Beyond that as far as actual membership, while there are hot spots here and there, overall, the church is in a slow decline. Waning activity mixed with dropping converts.

The church shares so little information it is difficult to tell. Even the information it shares is subject to manipulation. For example, there are lots of reports that stakes and wards are smaller, on average, today then they were 10 years ago. So even looking at the number of stakes or wards doesn't give the whole picture.

The financial resources of the church combined with a strong base make a free fall anytime soon unlikely. I could see it in 40 or 50 years, when millenial attitude towards religion has been passed on to their children.

Nope.

We're just witnessing the continuation of the 2/3's of the church that has always remained inactive. We're just watching people transition from active to inactive in real time play out on FB and Reddit.

When I was in ward leadership we often discussed the inactives, and in most cases we didn't know most of the people or why they went inactive. Today many know the inactives and why they went inactive because they walked away leaving a trail of sin!

I live in a rather strong ward in a strong area near a temple. It looks growing and thriving from the point of view of my family and ward friends. It is true that just about everyone knows a friend or family member who has left, but those that remain constantly reassure each other that they are doing the right things. My ward still sends out missionaries and has many young people get married in the temple. Some youth still eageraly attend BYU. It feels like my ward has retained much of what made many LDS wards great places to live back in the 1980s.

And yet, my ward members are glumly resigned to the change in attitude towards LGBT people. I saw the looks on the faces of ward members when they heard that my Lesbian daughter was marrying the girlfriend she met in seminary. My ward YW just had a lesson on belief and asking questions faithfully. It was a lesson that I never received as a teenager in the 1980s. My bishop is a kind man, but I don't think he wants to confront faith transitions directly. He had his counselors give a pretty thin lesson on testimonies during the 5th Sunday in March.

The older generation I think is suffering under the inability to call out sin quite as caustically as apostles could do so up through the era of Ezra Taft Benson. It feels like the strident talks on Word of Wisdom and tithing are relegated to talks and lessons at the local level where the old guard can still talk about it without having to worry about how this looks to non-members. It was quite amusing to see so many believers eagerly anticipate getting the Word of Wisdom relaxed in the last conference. We are urged to be worthy for the temple for increasingly platonic, and less specific reasons.

The financials are not available to us. I suspect that cash flow is declining, but assets are high enough to cover them for now. I think the shortfall in the next generation of leadership is going to hit much harder than any shortfall in tithing.

Not the extent many disaffected Mormons on the interwebs think it is. There are plenty of members who will never leave no matter what. Many of them scare me. However, the Brethren have obviously noticed more people are leaving than have in the past, and for different reasons than they did thirty years ago, and are reacting to it, they must be somewhat concerned about it given all the “stay in the boat” and “doubt your doubts” and “give Joseph a break” crap they foist on believers to keep them from questioning.

My goal is to get to a point where I don’t care what the Church does - it’s not my dumpster fire anymore. Free fall or not, it won’t have any impact on me. Not there yet though.

I live in the midwest/south. I am seeing it here- an area nearby that had to split to 3 wards 10 years ago now does not have enough active members to fill all callings. Whispers of going back down to 2 wards are happening.

I have noticed more and more married women attending church alone. I have honestly been surprised by the number of women I know whose husbands are now inactive.

I don't see it as free falling- but just a slow fade.

T. S. Eliot's famous poem, "The Hollow Men" was written about the problems in Europe post-WW1 under the Treaty of Versailles. It ends with one of the most famous and quoted couplets in poetry:

T. S. Eliot wrote:This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

This really feels how the LDS church will decline.

The church may not be free fallin', but Tom Petty sure is.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lWJXDG2i0A

Sorry, it had to be done...

I would offer this idea, the problem is bigger than contraction the problem is becoming irrelevant, not being important, not having pull, or influence or whatever you want to call it. The church is just becoming another special interest group that can be ignored, take medical pot for example in Utah. Church said no, people said yes. That is what the church fears.

Brent wrote: ↑Tue Apr 23, 2019 11:02 amI would offer this idea, the problem is bigger than contraction the problem is becoming irrelevant, not being important, not having pull, or influence or whatever you want to call it. The church is just becoming another special interest group that can be ignored, take medical pot for example in Utah. Church said no, people said yes. That is what the church fears.

Medical pot: Church said no, people said yes, church completely gutted the proposition and basically took away anything the people said yes to...

LD$-Inc. might be on their way to irrelevancy, but nowhere near them actually being irrelevant yet as far as the theocracy in UT is concerned. Luckily there are signs that the irrelevancy is coming. (NOT soon enough. )

Corsair wrote: ↑Mon Apr 22, 2019 11:45 am The financials are not available to us. I suspect that cash flow is declining, but assets are high enough to cover them for now. I think the shortfall in the next generation of leadership is going to hit much harder than any shortfall in tithing.

I live on the east bench of Salt Lake City. I agree that leadership is going to be a big challenge. The only thing I could see change this, is the old people die off and the housing market turns over. Even then, the houses are too expensive when compared to Utah County for young families.

My ward feels anemic, when it comes to leadership. My ward/s in Southern AZ felt much stronger and stable.

I teach at the school that the kids in the stake go to. They tell me the Dynamics at school are changing, many are afraid to say they are Mormon. Those that are, feign to not be interested, or just put up with some teasing. It feels very different than 20 years ago when I lived in the same area.

My brother's ward in Utah county has had to split two times in three years. They actually had two elders quorums, because they maxed out at 96 elders. You never know...

I am in the Boise area and work at a high school and agree that LDS students are keeping their heads low. 20 years ago they were proud to be LDS, not at all now...