[Perseveranze]

CHICAGO (RNS) Mitt Romney may or may not become the first Mormon to move into the White House next year, but a new study shows that Mormonism is moving into more parts of the country than any other religious group, making it the fastest-growing faith in more than half of U.S. states.

The 2012 Religious Congregations and Membership Study, released here Tuesday (May 1), shows that the mainline Protestants and Catholics who dominated the 20th century are literally losing ground to the rapid rise of Mormons and, increasingly, Muslims.

The study is conducted once every 10 years and can track Americans' religious affiliation down to the county level, from the largest (Los Angeles County, where Mormons grew 55 percent while Catholics shrank by 7 percent) to the smallest (Loving County, Texas, which is home to 80 people and one nondenominational evangelical church).

Romney's Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reported 2 million new adherents and new congregations in 295 counties where they didn't exist a decade ago, making them the fastest-growing group in the U.S.

Mormons were the fastest-growing group in 26 states, expanding beyond their historic home in Utah to the heart of the Bible Belt and as far away as Maine.

Muslims came in second, with growth of 1 million adherents in 197 new counties, to a total of about 2.6 million. Overall, non-Christian groups grew by 32 percent over the past decade.

"Mosques have multiplied at a growth rate of about 50 percent," said Dale Jones, a researcher with the Church of the Nazarene who worked on the study as part of the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies. "They have more religious centers, and simply moving into the suburbs puts you closer to where a lot of your folks are living."

While other studies tally total membership, beliefs or worship attendance, the RCMS study counts the actual number of people who are affiliated with U.S. congregations -- or, as Jones put it, the people who are "involved enough to the point where they know to count you."

The study found that while upwards of 80 percent of Americans claim to be Christians, only about 49 percent are affiliated with a local congregation. And that, Jones said, should concern church leaders.

"In some ways, our chickens have come home to roost," Jones said. "Churches have talked about needing to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ -- what you hear is,'I need a relationship, I need to be born again,' but not,'I need to be involved in a congregation.' Guess what? That's where we are."

Overall, the survey identified nearly 350,000 religious congregations in the United States, from Albanian Orthodox to Zoroastrian. Those churches, temples and mosques are the spiritual home for 150.6 million Americans, and researchers say they were able to capture 90 percent of all U.S. congregations.

Like most surveys, the RCMS study relies mainly on self-reported data from churches and denominations. Some, including several historically black churches, failed to submit information on new numbers. Researchers were able to reach only one-third of U.S. mosques and had to estimate the rest.

The survey did not track growing numbers of secular or religiously unaffiliated Americans -- estimated at about 16 percent of the country, according to other studies -- because they do not belong to a local congregation.

Jan Shipps, a respected non-Mormon scholar of Mormonism who's now retired from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, said Mormons' "astonishing" spread into new counties is likely due to church leaders' decision to split large wards (congregations) into separate smaller wards on opposite sides of a county line.

"The way they organize themselves makes for more congregations," she said. "They don't have big huge congregations like the independent churches."

The study also tracked the growth of nondenominational and independent evangelical churches, which combined represent the nation's third-largest Christian group, at about 12.2 million adherents across 35,000 congregations.

Catholics, while losing about 5 percent of adherents in the past years, nonetheless remain the nation's largest religious group, at about 59 million. The Southern Baptist Convention came in second, at 19.8 million, but its 50,816 congregations made it the group with the most churches.

The rapid growth among American Muslims likely has several explanations, researchers said: growth in the suburbs, an increased willingness by U.S. Muslims to stand and be counted, and more mosques being built to serve more worshippers.

Imam Muhammad Musri, president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, saw growth explode by a whopping 473 percent in and around Orlando's Orange County, according to the RCMS study, and he thinks the growth is actually double the 10,000 new Muslims reported by the study.

He said Muslim growth has been fueled by a wave of post-9/11 converts, American-born children of immigrants having kids of their own, and jobs in the booming medical industry. In central Florida, he said, Muslims are just following everyone else in search of "better weather, cheaper prices, cheaper homes."

"I doubt in the next decade we will grow as much," he said. "It's like a new product when it's first introduced, there's lots of interest. But now we're more of a known quantity and we're not going to be opening as many new mosques as we were in the last decade."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...n_1469566.html

Islam, pretty much expected.

Mormonism though, quite a surprise. What's your opinions on this?

[f1mad]

Mor-what?

[I Kant Spall]

Mormons have lots of babies. States with the highest birth rates like Utah and Idaho are also predominantly Mormon.

It's not that the religion is growing and people are rapidly forming a consensus that Mormonism and Islam are true; it's that their followers breed like rabbits.

[Darth Stewie]

(Original post by I Kant Spall)
Mormons have lots of babies. States with the highest birth rates like Utah and Idaho are also predominantly Mormon.

It's not that the religion is growing and people are rapidly forming a consensus that Mormonism and Islam are true; it's that their followers breed like rabbits.

Pretty much this, also the study only counts people who regularly attend a congregation which Mormons and Muslims may tend to feel the need to more than people who follow other denominations or religions that do not require a congregation or only have it very infrequently.

the whole study seems a bit dodgy tbh, how can an estimate for Muslims be reliable if they only had the data for 1/3 of the mosques?

Edit: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/faith/5...rcent.html.csp study is a farce, the Mormons lied.

If you can't trust people who believe their god gave them a holy book on gold plates that had to be read out of a hat who can you trust?

[S-man10]

These studies never show the full picture which really irks me. There will be quite a few muslims in America who identifies themselves as 'muslim', but are not. Mainly so that they don't get ostracised in the community they live in, given the stigma of "OMFG you left islam"

[Perseveranze]

(Original post by S-man10)
These studies never show the full picture which really irks me. There will be quite a few muslims in America who identifies themselves as 'muslim', but are not. Mainly so that they don't get ostracised in the community they live in, given the stigma of "OMFG you left islam"

And Atheists don't get ostracised? Take a look at the thread "your reaction if your son converted to Islam", that's pressure for you.

[Perseveranze]

(Original post by Darth Stewie)
the whole study seems a bit dodgy tbh, how can an estimate for Muslims be reliable if they only had the data for 1/3 of the mosques?

Probably based on the number of mosques growing by around 75%? Or maybe we just randomly became more religious

[Darth Stewie]

(Original post by Perseveranze)
Probably based on the number of mosques growing by around 75%? Or maybe we just randomly became more religious

According to their estimates (and the other link) there should be just over 1200 Muslims attending each mosque in America and that might be right but mosques can function with a lot fewer members and a lot more members, the data can't be considered reliable by making a estimate based of only 1/3 of the total data

Although with the Mormons gone looks like Islam might be in the lead based off their criteria! just gota watch out for those pesky pagans. But seriously have a feeling Islam and a number of other religions would beat the Mormons if the data wasn't fabricated and the study was done accepting the fact not every religious person attends a congregation.

[S-man10]

(Original post by Perseveranze)
And Atheists don't get ostracised? Take a look at the thread "your reaction if your son converted to Islam", that's pressure for you.

Actually no, they don't, half of the responses in that thread are taking the piss. People will play to emotions and more readily embrace islam publicly saying "hey look at me, I'm a muslim" whilst the rest of the islamic community praises them.

(Original post by Perseveranze)
Probably based on the number of mosques growing by around 75%? Or maybe we just randomly became more religious

It's not like atheists have their own church so there may be a can fairly comparison?

see this: http://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/show...6#post29186026

[electriic_ink]

I think it's a shame when any religion reports a growth in members. It's a sad reflection of the quality of education that these people are getting.

[mc1000]

"Mormons are the fastest growing religion - dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb."

Spoiler:

Show

It's a South Park reference, for those who think I'm just being weird.

[concubine]

Gotta get into Romney's good books BEFORE THE CULL.

[justmyopinions]

(Original post by Perseveranze)
Islam, pretty much expected.

Mormonism though, quite a surprise. What's your opinions on this?

Mormonism not a surprise at all. One of the highest birth rates in the US, and they're growing in Canada too. And I guess Islam has the assimilation factor which is very high (when compared to other countries), as it is for many minority groups in the US. After all, the USA is a country based on assimilation.
Surprised, however, that Orthodox and Hasidic Judaism aren't mentioned. For example, New York state is 9% Jewish, with Manhattan at 20%, with the Orthodox having THE highest birth rates (in some areas as high as 8). Mormonism though has many more followers. Maybe in 100 years it might hold a near majority? Wouldn't surprise me, although I wouldn't say it's a bad thing at all I'm actually kinda glad

[navarre]

Moronism is bound to become the fastest growing religion- after all, Mormons have have the most amount of babies, they have very large families.

Still, both Mormonism and Islam are still pretty darm small in a population of 315 million.











Also important to note that atheism has grown significantly, and Catholicism is very fast growing due to Hispanic immigration.

In fact, Protestantism is also growing if I recall, although it doesn't have much room for growth as it's the largest religion.

[TheHansa]

(Original post by justmyopinions)
Mormonism not a surprise at all. One of the highest birth rates in the US, and they're growing in Canada too. And I guess Islam has the assimilation factor which is very high (when compared to other countries), as it is for many minority groups in the US. After all, the USA is a country based on assimilation.
Surprised, however, that Orthodox and Hasidic Judaism aren't mentioned. For example, New York state is 9% Jewish, with Manhattan at 20%, with the Orthodox having THE highest birth rates (in some areas as high as 8). Mormonism though has many more followers. Maybe in 100 years it might hold a near majority? Wouldn't surprise me, although I wouldn't say it's a bad thing at all I'm actually kinda glad

Do you know what their beliefs about black people are?

[justmyopinions]

(Original post by TheHansa)
Do you know what their beliefs about black people are?

There's black mormons...?

[gateshipone]

(Original post by TheHansa)
Do you know what their beliefs about black people are?

I believe that in 1978 God changed his mind about black people...

For reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHEqCXY2B-w

[.eXe]

Lets just say the second "m" is silent.

[TheHansa]

(Original post by justmyopinions)
There's black mormons...?

Black people can be masochistic too you know




There are though, but many of the more fundamental "Churches" bar them from cetain orders.

[Alpharius]

American's really are dumb.

Anyone who has the slightest bit of knowledge of Joseph Smith (its founder) would know he was a convicted fraud.

Say's it all really.