By the Numbers

Who are the Mormons?

If you are an American living in a metropolis of significant size or anywhere in the western half of the country, you probably know some Mormons, more accurately called Latter-day Saints. Stereotypical Latter-day Saints are white, suburban, middle-class, and part of a large family. They often stand out for being clean-shaven, wearing modest clothes, and abstaining from alcohol and tobacco.

My husband and I fall into this stereotype. He is from the Salt Lake area, and I from the Seattle area. We both descend from the Latter-day Saint pioneers who in the mid-1800s trekked across the American continent to settle the Utah wilderness. Our family history and religion are unusual, but everything else about us is pretty ordinary. We attended suburban public schools, went to college, got married and are now raising a family.

There are at least a million Latter-day Saints like us scattered across the United States with a large concentration in Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Nevada and Arizona. A common misperception, though, is that most Latter-day Saints fit this description. In fact, our Church has almost 14 million members, and more than half of them live outside the United States. Additionally, more than half of all members were not born into the religion, but converted as a teenager or adult. More surprising still is that Spanish, not English, is the most common first language of Latter-day Saints.

The Church of Jesus Christ is strong throughout North, Central and South America, in Australia, Europe, the Pacific Islands, the Philipppines, Japan and parts of Africa. There are also members in Mongolia, Russia and India, to name a few places. In short, there are members all over the world except in the areas where governments do not allow our missionaries, such as China and the Middle East.


How does the Church measure membership?

When someone receives the ordinance of baptism from an authorized priesthood holder, he or she is considered a member of the Church. Many people are baptized and then fall away from the faith. Therefore, while the number of names on the Church's records is always growing, some ask whether the Church is growing in terms of active members. Determining the number of active and inactive members is difficult because many people do not clearly fall into either category--there is a wide spectrum of faithfulness. Furthermore, commitment levels of individuals are always in flux Perhaps for these reasons, the Church does not release activity rates. The consensus among those who analyze the Church is that approximately one third of all members regularly attend meetings.

A better measure of the Church's growth than counting members is counting the number of new congregations--wards--that are created. Forming a ward requires certain numbers of attendance (when there are not enough active members in an area to form a ward, a smaller congregation called a branch can be formed). Every year, the number of wards within the Church increases. So while in most areas the majority of converts fall into inactivity, enough converts become strong in the faith for the Church to continually form new congregations and build new meetinghouses throughout the world. I live on the west coast of the United States and many of the strongest members in my ward joined the Church as adults. I was surprised when I realized that not one of my last four bishops (the leader of the ward) was raised in the Church.

Our Church has grown and changed tremendously since its formation in 1830. It started with six members. It is now one of the largest denominations in the U.S. and one of the fastest growing religions on earth. While the white, suburban, American family may be the face of Mormonism today, in the next few decades this stereotype will surely fade. Already, many of our Church's leaders have brown skin and speak English with an accent. I hope to live long enough to see our first Hispanic prophet.

Mormon Worldview Inaugural Post

A while back, I was at church when someone mentioned that Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe in an afterlife. I was incredulous. How could any Bible-believing Christian deny the existence of an afterlife? When some Jehovah’s Witnesses came to my door, I decided to ask them about this.

As I had suspected, the tidbit I had learned from a friend at church was not the whole story. In fact, Jehovah’s Witnesses do believe in an afterlife, but they do not believe that our spirits exist between death and the resurrection. In other words, while mainstream Christians believe the body and spirit are separated at death, Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that when we die the body ceases to function and the spirit ceases to exist. Thus, their view of the resurrection is not the reuniting of body and spirit, but the re-creation of body and spirit.

I suspect that others with similar questions are reluctant to ask the Jehovah’s Witnesses for information, probably because they are afraid if they show interest in the religion, the missionaries will pressure them to convert. When I showed interest, I was indeed pressured to learn more and more. However, the pressure was mild, kind and instantly removed once I stated that my curiosity was satisfied and I was no longer interested in meeting with them. My interaction with the Jehovah’s Witnesses was positive: I gained a basic understanding of their religion and an admiration for them as a people with strong faith and high moral standards. When I asked them not to come again, we hugged goodbye and wished each other well.

One of the reasons I wanted to learn about the Jehovah’s Witnesses was more personal than mere curiosity. As a member of a minority religion, I know firsthand how ignorant most people are on religious matters. New acquaintances have told me they thought Mormon was the same as Amish or the same as Seventh-day Adventist. I’ve been asked whether Mormons celebrate Christmas or wear magic underwear. Others have been anxious to tell me “the truth” about Mormonism, which consisted of half-truths learned from pastors and anti-Mormon Web sites. The most troubling misinformation I've seen is a list of "Mormon beliefs" taught to one of my friends by her college professor. Though the friend detected no malice in the professor, more than half of the beliefs in the list were simply wrong. That a college professor was passing along such blatantly bad information is simply inexcusable.

So my discussions with the Jehovah’s Witnesses were not only to satisfy my curiosity, but also to elevate myself above the ignorance, lies and rumors that constitute most people’s understanding of religions that are not their own. I hope you will join me in elevating yourself above the misunderstanding between people of different belief systems. I am not here to preach or persuade, and I am uninterested in debating the truthfulness of my religion. I do, however, welcome discussion through your comments, so long as they are respectful. I will only post comments that I deem appropriate. We Latter-day Saints are strong believers in freedom of worship and respect for other faiths. I hope we have this in common.

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This comical exchange between Sam and Rebecca, the leading characters on the hit show Cheers, illustrates all too well the misinformation that circulates about Latter-day Saints (commonly referred to as Mormons).