According to the latest statistics published by the NCC in its Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches, the Jehovah's Witnesess had the highest growth rate, in 2010 growing 4.37%. This is, I believe, is the 4th year in a row, that the Witnesses had the highest growth rate. Roman Catholics grew by less than 1%, as did most of the other churches listed. Others continued to lose members, including the Southern Baptist Convention, with a 3-year losing streak. See the article entitled "2011 Church Membership: Southern Baptist Decline, Jehovah's Witnesses Increase" at:
Jehovah's Witnesses - Once Again the Fastest Growing Faith in the U.S.
by davidl7 99 Replies latest jw friends
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villabolo
They also have the highest turnover rate of any religion.
That means that eventually everyone in the US will have become an ex Jehovah's Witness. That would make for fantastic Memorial attendance.
Villabolo
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Incognito
1) Where does the NCC obtain their information? The link states: Ranked 20th in size, the Jehovah’s Witnesses denomination reported a 4.37 percent gain in membership, with 1,162,686 members total. So the WT reports the growth rate which is not verified by the NCC?
2) Is the same growth calculation criteria used throughout all reporting denominations?
3) What does the WT use as an indicator of growth? Baptisms, Field Service reports (15 minutes reported once every three months), number of seats filled on average, number of seats filled at the memorial?
4) Are walk-aways, DF'd, DA'd, deaths subtracted from the growth figures?
5) Are the figures accurate or are they doctored to bring prominence to the report?
It's interesting that JWs were included within the groups named following this statement: But a few church bodies, regarded as cults by some Christians, continue to increase in size.
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jookbeard
think they've not included Islam which is experiencing high growth in the USA as well, definitely right about the drop out from the WTS as well which is unmatched world wide
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DagothUr
Their main quarters is in US, but their increase is not! They are increasing in numbers in less developed countries. In the western countries they have been declining for the last decade or so. "The fastest growing faith in the US" is a uninspired construct. They are not growing in the US, but their leadership is in the US.
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alanv
I am a little confused here. The Watchtower has recently published it's worldwide report, and the figure they gave for USA was 2%
In fact the actual figure was 1.7% but they rounded the figure up.
David could you explain how they get to the 4.37% figure.
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slimboyfat
Maybe they are comparing peak publisher numbers rather than the average figures. I can't find my recent yearbooks at the moment to check that out.
Whether JW growth is as high as this or not I think it is fair to say JWs are doing better than most other churches of a comparable size in modern secularizing societies.
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DagothUr
They are increasing in numbers, that is true and I can put my hand into the fire for that. But even their US increase - if it's real - is based on the high number of immigrants, not on the American population. The same situation exists in Europe. A large number of German, Spanish, French, Italian brothers and sisters are learning Russian, Romanian, Bulgarian in order to be able to preach to the immigrants. The native population is totally apathetic to the JW message in countries like Germany or Spain, for example. In these countries, any increase can only be justified by the increase in the birth rate (born-ins) and by the conversion of the immigrants.
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DagothUr
A close friend of mine was in Spain in 2010 and he only gave 4 magazines in 2 weeks. The Spanish just don't give a s..t on the JW doctrine. But when he went to our fellow Romanians, he initiated 4 studies in one day. The person I'm speaking of is the youngest MS in our excongo. HE was 20 years old and 1 year in the troof when he got the appointment.
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nugget
Percentages can be misleading since you are not comparing like with like. !% of 100 is a lower figure(1) than 1% of 1000000 (10,000) and so on. I am assuing that in comparison with other faiths JWs rank quite low.