The Church has released year-end 2018 membership and congregation totals for most nations with a reported Church presence. These statistics can be accessed on Church's official website at
http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/facts-and-statistics.
Countries with the highest annual membership growth rates in 2018 (10%
or greater) are listed below. Lists for nations with the most rapid
membership
growth rates are also available for
2006,
2007,
2008,
2009,
2010,
2011,
2012,
2013,
2014,
2015,
2016, and
2017. The percentage next to the country name is the annual growth rate
percentage, which is followed by the country's membership at year-end 2018. Countries in
bold experienced an annual membership increase greater than 200 during 2018.
- Rwanda - 25.7% - 749
- Montenegro - 21.1% - 23
- Angola - 19.3% - 2,933
- Bosnia and Herzegovina - 15.9% - 80
- Israel - 15.3% - 332
- Togo - 14.6% - 4,736
- Mozambique - 13.3% - 12,274
- Solomon Islands - 12.8% - 1,240
- Benin - 11.5% - 3,463
- Cote d'Ivoire - 11.1% - 48,776
- Sint Maarten - 10.4% - 277
Below is a list of the top ten countries by numerical
membership increase for the year 2018. Each country is provided with the
numerical national
increase in membership. Additionally, the percentage of total church
membership increase is provided for each country. Lists are also
available for
2007,
2008,
2009,
2010,
2011,
2012,
2013,
2014,
2015,
2016, and
2017. 73.7% of the 2018 net increase in Church membership can be attributed to
the following 10 nations.
- United States - 39,943 - 20.4%
- Mexico - 20,391 - 10.4%
- Philippines - 19,771 - 10.1%
- Peru - 14,771 - 7.6%
- Nigeria - 13,535 - 6.9%
- Brazil - 10,817 - 5.5%
- Argentina - 8,455 - 4.3%
- Ghana - 5,586 - 2.8%
- Guatemala - 5,306 - 2.7%
- Ecuador - 4,921 - 2.1%
With the country-by-country breakdown for membership in 2018, it can be determined what countries appear primarily responsible for the significant slowdown in membership growth in 2018 compared to 2017. These countries include:
- Brazil (18,855 members less than 2017 increase)
- United States (9,748 members less than 2017 increase)
- Venezuela (2,199 members less than 2017 increase)
Additionally, it appears that the Church has stopped reporting membership for some sensitive countries with a Church presence in its overall membership totals reported in General Conference. In recent years, this number has generally ranged from 10,000 to 20,000. The bulk of this membership consists of members who live in mainland China (estimated at more than 10,000 members, Pakistan (estimated at approximately 4,400 members), and Saudi Arabia (estimated at approximately 1,500 members). Furthermore, the
Church has not published membership and congregational data for year-end 2018 for Russia for the first time even though information about the Church in Russia in regards to the locations of its congregations remains public. At most recent report in year-end 2017, the Church in Russia had 23,252 members. Therefore, the sum of Church membership for Russia and sensitive countries should equal approximately 40,000, yet the Church's year-end 2018 membership totals for countries listed on the Newsroom site (16,251,031) is only 25,339 short of the worldwide total reported for year-end 2018 per the annual statistical report figure (16,313,735). Thus, there appears to have been an error in reporting the worldwide total for Church membership for year-end 2018, or the Church has stopped reporting its membership for sensitive countries in world totals, which would result in a decrease of approximately 15,000-20,000 members from what would ordinary be reported.
I will provide additional analysis of year-end 2018 membership by country in the coming days.
15 comments:
So if they are under-reporting year-end membership numbers by leaving out some countries, does that account for the large drop in membership growth this year?
This appears to account for half of the unexpected decrease. The other half of it is primarily from Brazil. It appears this sudden decrease in membership growth in Brazil is probably due to membership record auditing and clean-up, most likely due to children of record who are not baptized at age 8.
Well that is good news. Even if it means lower growth numbers, cleaning up records and reporting more accurate data will be better for the church going forward. And sensitive countries accounting for much of the decrease in growth is great news also.
If we look only at the change in membership numbers for countries reported in 2017 & 2018, then we will find that:
North America grew by 81,955 members in 2018
South America grew by 55,307 members in 2018
*Asia grew by 24,030 members in 2018
*Europe grw by 4,003 members in 2018
Africa grew by 42,321 members in 2018
Oceania grew by 9,516 members in 2018
Total growth in membership for countries reported in 2017 & 2018: 217,132
The reported change from 2017 to 2018 for total church membership is 195,566 a difference of 21,566 (217,132-[16,313,735-16,118,169]).
If we look at Europe, it currently shows a big drop in membership numbers even though that is not the case (and as Matt pointed out, it appears that Russia's membership numbers are no longer being reported in the totals).
*I counted Armenia, Georgia & Turkey as part of Asia instead of Europe for my numbers. On the Church Newsroom, those three countries are currently counted as part of Europe.
As a UCLA professor commented on my Chile and Brazil papers about Church growth, it would be interesting to compare to other groups like Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses, or Assemblies of God and Baptists.
The temple growth is amazing. Despite slow growth in California" for example, an 8th temple is being built there!
Punta Arenas could use a temple as well as Temuco or Valdivia or Puerto Montt, or Osorno in Chile.
In favor of Venezuela, I can say many of the Venezuelan in exile are being baptized. In Chile we have a lot of Venezuelan converts.
Eduardo. We hope more temples in Chile, but some of cities you mention their stakes are not strong enough for carry a temple, as Valdivia and Osorno. Maybe an small temple in Punta Arenas -for its long distance to the closer temple-, and Puento Montt. Viña del Mar, would be a good candidate with its 7 stakes in metro area (Valparaiso, Quilpué, Villa Alemana, and other communes), but some of them are very weak as Achupallas Stake which in consolidating wards.
Percentages seem high. 20% growth rate in the US would be like a million people.
A temple in Punta Arenas could serve a few districts in southern Argentina that have even lower prospects for getting a temple of their own.
The 20% in the US is that 20% of all the net growth in membership is net growth in number of members in the US. It says nothing about the percentage growth in the US.
It is very interesting how Yamil reflects the way many Chileans think about themselves. It is very common of stake presidents and bishops to think that the church in Chile is weak, that members are not strong enough or faithful enough. Unfortunately, those kinds of thoughts lead to inaction. It can be very frustrating to struggle against that kind of mentality. The reality is that people in Chile are wonderful, ingenious and loving, and many church members are very faithful, especially outside of Santiago. Osorno, Arica and Villa Alemana (which is part of the Valparaíso metro area) are some of those great places.
I've heard that the reason that we might no longer have access to the number of members in Russia could be in relation to a Russian law on collecting and storing info on Russian citizens. But I have yet to locate the actual law that may be related to this change.
I saw in CDOL that all russian stakes, districts, wards & branches have only a responsible pristhood holder listed (Leadership positions). Mostly the Area president for stakes and wards. Mission presidents for districts and branches.
This statement in unintelligible. Try again?
So I try the make my statement more understandable. IN CDOL (Church Directory of Organizations and Leaders) you can checkout leadership positions in stakes, districts, wards and branches. (Stake president, counselors & clerks, Bishops). But for the Russsian stakes and wards only the Area President is listed as "Responsible Priesthood holder". For branches outside of stakes the mission president is listed as "Responsible Priesthood holder" and sometimes a missionary as clerk.
This fits the description of the law "Deivisas" mentioned considering collection and storing of info of Russian citizens.
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