Wednesday, July 8, 2015

Updated List of the Countries with the Most Latter-day Saints without a Stake or District

The Church in 2015 has thus far organized districts in several nations where no districts or stakes previously operated such as Aruba, Lebanon, Macau, Namibia, and Slovakia. Consequently, it is time to update the list of the countries with the most Latter-day Saints without a stake or district. Previous lists for this measure can be found here. For those who may be unfamiliar with what a district is, please refer to our Missiology Encyclopedia entry for "district" that can be found here.

Each country or territory with at least 200 members without a stake or district is provided below with the number of members (as of year-end 2014), number of branches (at present), and current, if any, affiliation with another stake or district.  Countries in green appear likely to have their first districts/stakes created in the near future. Countries in yellow generally have a large number of recent converts and few active priesthood holders to hold leadership positions, but have a high likelihood for districts to be organized in the coming years. Countries in red have problems with member inactivity or too few members to create a district in the foreseeable future. Countries in blue pertain to other stakes or districts and do not appear likely to become their own districts due to reasonably close proximity to their current stake or district headquarters. Countries in dark blue have a poor likelihood for the organization of a district due to few members spread over large geographic areas.

  1. Bulgaria - 2,392 members - 9 branches
  2. Bahamas - 998 members - 3 branches (includes Turks and Caicos Islands)
  3. Lesotho - 867 members - 3 branches - part of the Bloemfontein South Africa Stake
  4. Northern Mariana Islands - 789 members - 1 ward - part of the Barrigada Guam Stake
  5. Greece - 742 members - 4 branches
  6. Saint Vincent and the Grenadines - 600 members - 2 branches, 1 group
  7. US Virgin Islands - 590 members - 2 branches
  8. Curacao - 552 members - 1 branch - part of the ABC District based in Aruba
  9. Burundi - 526 members - 3 branches
  10. Mauritius - 458 members - 2 branches - part of the St. Denis Reunion-Mauritius District
  11. Palau - 457 members - 1 branch
  12. Luxembourg - 405 members - 1 ward - part of the Nancy France Stake
  13. Turkey - 397 members - 4 branches
  14. Grenada - 376 members - 1 branch
  15. French Guiana - 373 members - 1 branch
  16. Jersey - 312 members - 1 ward - part of the Poole England Stake
  17. Isle of Man - 310 members - 1 ward - part of the Liverpool England Stake
  18. Saint Lucia - 303 members - 2 branches, 1 group?
  19. Niue - 288 members - 2 branches
  20. Kazakhstan - 281 members - 2 branches
  21. Rwanda - 281 members - 3 branches 
  22. Iceland - 275 members - 2 branches
  23. Republic of Georgia - 274 members - 1 branch, 1 group
  24. Laos - 270 members? - 1 branch
  25. Saint Maarten/Saint Martin - 260 members - 1 branch
  26. Tuvalu - 227 members, 1 branch
  27. Central African Republic - 216 members, 1 branch 
  28. Martinique - 215 members, 1 branch, 1 group
  29. Cayman Islands - 201 members, 1 branch
Of these 32 countries and dependencies, 10 previously had a district including Bulgaria (2), the Bahamas, Greece, Curacao, Palau, Mauritius, French Guiana, Turkey, Niue, and Iceland.

15 comments:

  1. What is happening with the Portugal Porto Mission and Central Eurasian Missions? Did they not happen as planned? Or is it taking a while to show up? Same for the Beirut Lebanon District, it still isn't showing up as a district on LDS Maps.

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  2. Greece! Hellas! And what is up with those Bulgars?

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  3. Here is an interesting article on two early converts to the Church in Haiti, one who is a temple worker in Boston now and the other who is serving as a senior missionary in Haiti with his wife. http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865631793/A-beautiful-day-in-Haiti-Early-converts-reflect-on-church-growth-temple-announcement.html?pg=3

    At least with the Central Eurasian Mission starting the mission may have been delayed past July 1st due to the late announcement. Has a mission president for it even been announced? On the other hand, it might just be delays in the system, or even a decision to not make its existence too public.

    Nationals of Bulgaria are referred to as Bulgarians, Bulgars is only used for certain historic groups. The Church has faced issues in Bulgarai including large scale opposition in the country. There may have also been a decision at some point to only have districts where non-missionary leadership can staff them.

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  4. Unit update
    June 14
    Akure 2nd Branch, Nigeria Benin City Mission (8 Branch, 4 District, 6 Stakes)

    June 28
    Iyalu Ibere Branch, Umuahia Nigeria Stake (2 Branch, 7 Ward)
    Ughelli 2nd Ward, Warri Nigeria Stake (2 Branch, 8 Wards)

    July 5
    New Bell Branch,
    Village Branch, Republic of Congo Brazzaville Mission (11 Branches, 1 District, 2 Stakes)

    YTD 322(11.93/week 27)
    Africa 110, 34.2%
    Asia 9, 2.8%
    Europe 12, 3.7%
    North America 88, 27.3%
    Pacific 22, 6.8%
    South and Central America 26, 8.1%
    Utah & Idaho 56, 17.4%

    Totals no-sensitive
    Areas Temples Miss Stakes Dist Wards Branch Totals
    Global 25 147 416 3,138 548 22,388 7,340 34,002
    Us/Can 11 80 131 1,587 11 12,499 2,071 16,390
    US n/a 72 124 1,540 8 12,163 1,919 15,826
    Utah n/a 15 11 576 1 4,661 327 5,590
    Canada n/a 8 7 47 3 336 152 553
    Out 14 67 285 1,551 537 9,889 5,269 17,612

    With Sensitive
    Areas Temples Miss Stakes Dist Wards Branch Totals
    Global 25 147 416 3,138 559 22,392 7,429 34,106


    This blog post over at the Maxwell institute has some very interesting resources on the study of the international Church.
    http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/updates-international-mormon-studies/

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  5. This post and the one on Sao Tome/Principe got me thinking...it looks like the only island nations with no LDS presence whatsoever now include the Seychelles and Timor-Leste (both Christian) and the Comoros and Maldives (both Muslim). I was surprised to see Greece on the list above, I didn't know they currently had no districts. I was also surprised by the previous posting about the exploratory visit to Senegal, I sincerely hope something comes of that. I also had the article on extreme ethnolinguistic diversity on my mind recently because I home teach someone from Sudan; his native language was only spoken by 22,000 people (they all fled to Ethiopia during the wars of the 1990's) and he has to use a mix of Arabic and English to communicate with other Sudanese.

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  7. Also, just wanted to express how much I've enjoyed this blog over the years, ever since President Monson's words in Oct 2008 I've often used the information here to focus my own prayers: "There remain, however, areas of the world where our influence is limited and where we are not allowed to share the gospel freely. As did President Spencer W. Kimball over 32 years ago, I urge you to pray for the opening of those areas, that we might share with them the joy of the gospel. As we prayed then in response to President Kimball’s pleadings, we saw miracles unfold as country after country, formerly closed to the Church, was opened. Such will transpire again as we pray with faith." I'd like to think we have seem some miracles unfold here and are yet to see many more....

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  8. If there are members in Crete it would be sensitive, most likely. Montserrat in the Carribean is a funny place: how many are there since evacuation in the 90s?
    Many archipelagoes have hundreds of no LDS islands. Plus isolated ones in all the oceans. We could use another 100 k elders. Send 'em to the Bulgaros.

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  10. Sorry, I meant to specify that the only sovereign, independent island nations (non-dependencies) with no LDS presence whatsoever appear to be the Seychelles, Timor-Leste, Comoros and the Maldives. No doubt other dependencies have no LDS presence.

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  11. Sorry, I meant Cyprus, not Crete. Although I am sure that all the Greek islands are sparse when it comes to membership. How about Brunei? But right, independent sovereign island nations seems to be down to those four. Very cool. Can we get some couples missionaries to go there?

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  12. CDOL is showing the creation of a mission region in Timor in the last week. Not sure what a mission region is but it may indicate future developments are not too far away.

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  13. To my knowledge, a Mission region is a region within a Mission that is separate from the country with the Mission home, but included in proselytism efforts. That separation is usually a language barrier and/or a significant land or water body. Missionaries are usually not transferred between regions and the region is specifically stated in the call letter.

    Examples include the West Indies Mission and the two Adriatic Missions.

    I ran a series of facebook advertisements for the Book of Mormon in Timor-Leste. I like to think that these campaigns have some effect. It is definitely a great step!

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  14. Members in Brunei, to my knowledge, are part of a Malaysia based unit.

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  15. Very cool, Pascal. Way to further the effort on Facebook!

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