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I recall prophesying in 1992 that by 2020 Mormonism could become the dominant religion of the western United States. But we are not going to see that large a transformation. I went wrong because the last two decades have witnessed the deliberate dwindling of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints into just one more Protestant sect. Without the changes, Mitt Romney and Jon M. Huntsman Jr., a fellow Mormon, would not seem plausible candidates.
This is from an op ed piece in today’s New York Times titled “Will This Election Be The Mormon Breakthrough” by Harold Bloom, the Yale University english prof that wrote about JS back in the 90s in a book called, “The American Religion”. I’ve heard him quoted quite often but the tone of this piece seems very different. Anyway, just curious what people think.
Sometimes I wonder if the Church has been brought out of obscurity too much. When Gordon B. Hinckley was the prophet he conducted a widespread media campaign. The Church Logo was changed to place emphasis on the Savior. Smaller temples were planned to dot the earth, as almost to suggest that the Latter-day Saints are everywhere. I know as I served as a missionary I was always trying to use the Church’s official name, refer to myself as a Christian who believes in the Bible, who attends church on Sunday to worship Jesus. Always when I spoke about the Book of Mormon, I always drew parallels to the Bible (like hey, it’s no big deal it resembles the Bible) we just have more scripture to read now, than just the Bible. I don’t really know how effective I was as a missionary? I should have dared to be different, not shied away from the Polygamy issues, Joseph Smith Issues, and what makes Mormonism different. I think by trying to share on common ground so much, I think I watered down the faith. Sometimes I like to be “Mormon” and not worry about the “Am I Christian Crisis” that often plagues us by the outside. Hey, I believe in the priesthood after the order of the son of God, and 12 living apostles, who are called by JC, does that make me Christian? I believe in ongoing revelation, does that make me Christian? I pray, that makes me religious. I fast, that makes me religious. I read scripture, that makes me religious. Muslims do the last three things I have written, but that doesn’t make me Muslim [one who submits their self to God (Allah)], and that doesn’t make a Muslim a Mormon. But am I submitting myself to God by doing those last three things, or am I doing them because I actually like them and don’t really think of it as a submission to God? In a pluralistic society, religiosity is religiosity and spirituality is spirituality. Everything else is just semantics. No, I wouldn’t call us just another Protestant religion. Unlike other Mormon spin-offs, we’ve kept those things that make us unique — and strange — to the world. Our temple ordinances, the BoM, our temple garments, our food-hoarding etcetera. Those things are in full-force. So, I wouldn’t say we were just like any other protestant religion.
I think the thing that saves us is that it’s nearly unanimous that however strange our religion is to other people, it produces “nice people”. And we seem pretty down to earth when you separate us from our weird beliefs. THAT makes a Mormon US President plausible.
I think Bloom got caught up in number projection – and that focus warped his and our own view of the future. What I mean by that is quite simple: When an organization is small, doubling in size is not that difficult – but as it grows, doubling in size becomes much harder.
Just for the sake of easy calculations:
If you have 1,000,000 members, for example, adding 300,000 members in one year is an increase of 30%. If you then take that “growth rate” an d project it out over multiple decades, you end up with what Bloom got. However, if there really are “only” about 300,000 people we can reach each year who will end up joining the Church, the growth rate slows each and every year – even though the actual baptism rate stays exactly the same. Iow, the Church is just as “successful” statistically each year even though the growth rate slows each year.
Yes, the actual baptism rate has slowed a bit over the last decade or so, but I know personally that some of that is because the LDS Church intentionally has slowed its numerical progress to eliminate “questionable” conversions and avoid mass baptisms that would be likely to end up with splinter groups in other countries. We could have baptized entire villages in Africa, for example, but they would have been baptized due solely to the tribal / familial leader being baptized – resulting probably in the type of radical swings the Book of Mormon describes. Hence, the Church made a conscious decision not to pursue / allow that type of “instant growth” – and I agree with that approach. It has slowed the baptism rate, but I think everyone here would prefer a slower growth rate over the baseball baptisms and congregational splintering of the past.
We have enough issues without adding those to the mix again.
GBSmith wrote:Quote:I recall prophesying in 1992 that
by 2020 Mormonism could become the dominant religion of the western United States.But we are not going to see that large a transformation. I went wrong because the last two decades have witnessed the deliberate dwindling of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints into just one more Protestant sect.Without the changes, Mitt Romney and Jon M. Huntsman Jr., a fellow Mormon, would not seem plausible candidates. This is from an op ed piece in today’s New York Times titled “Will This Election Be The Mormon Breakthrough” by Harold Bloom, the Yale University english prof that wrote about JS back in the 90s in a book called, “The American Religion”. I’ve heard him quoted quite often but the tone of this piece seems very different. Anyway,
just curious what people think.I don’t believe the LDS Church is just another Protestant sect at all and I don’t believe the limited growth has had much of anything to do with any intentional changes. Sure Gordon B. Hinckley made some PR moves to try to make the Church sound more mainstream and now we have this “I’m a Mormon” advertising campaign apparently to intended to give the impression that Mormons aren’t really that different from everyone else but in terms of the actual doctrines and culture not much has really changed in a long time from my perspective.
Where this professor went wrong with his prediction in my opinion was simply trying to project long-term growth based on short-term changes in the total number of members without taking into account that the majority of these members have typically been inactive and will not necessarily contribute to continued growth of the Church the same way active members often will by doing missionary work and raising their children to follow the same traditions. Some other factors that have limited growth even more recently are active members having fewer children on average now and the internet exposing potential problems with the Church’s story to more members and investigators now than before.
Personally I don’t buy the idea that the Church should try to emphasize its differences from mainstream Christian churches as a way to distinguish itself as if this is a strong selling point. You could argue that the Assembly of God and 7th Day Adventist churches are both “just another Protestant sect” more than the LDS Church but they have grown even more worldwide within the last 100 years. Also even if members end up leaving I think it would still be better for the Church to try to promote goodwill and positive feelings about Mormonism as much as possible rather than being content to leave so many people with a negative overall impression about it such as that their parents tried to force them, they were tricked into making unreasonable sacrifices, etc.
Interesting. My wife and I had just been discussing this, but from the opposite perspective. Her comment was that these guys only have a decent chance because of the perception that “mormons aren’t Christian”. I think there’s something to it. I am reminded of Barry Goldwater’s complaint about the republican party being overrun by Christian religionists who were unwilling and unable to engage in the process of compromise (an essential skill in politics) because they saw themselves as doing the Will of God. So perhaps mormons are less scary to the general population in that regard because they’re not seen as fitting that mold. If they only knew.
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