By Common Consent » Where Have All the Young Women Gone?

Where Have All the Young Women Gone?

By: David Knowlton - April 07, 2008

President Monson’s call for “the less-active, the offended, the critical, the transgressor” to come back to the fold gained strength in an interview of Sister Elaine Dalton, President of the Young Women. She was asked by the media, according to a report in the Salt Lake Tribune “how they [the new Young Women’s presidency] planned to cope with the fact that as many as 80 percent of the single Mormon women between 18 and 30 are no longer active in the LDS Church”. She reportedly responded that she did not know.

At first the number in the question surprised me. Is the inactivity rate for young women really that high? That number needs to be placed in a context. It is a number that refers to young women in the whole Church.

If, as in Mexico and some other countries, only some 20-25% of the people listed on the roles of the Church claim membership when asked by census agencies then the number does not sound so alarming. It is akin to what one would expect. But not all countries are showing such high discrepancies.

In the US, the Pew Trust Religious Landscape Survey shows that 30% of those born in the Church, in their sample, change their religious affiliation. 70% remain. The percentage that leaves is lower than that of other non-Orthodox Christians. Mormons born in the Church stand out for their religious loyalty.

But that percentage is only for those born in the Church. 26% of the Pew Surveys Mormon sample were converts to Mormonism from other traditions, about half Protestant, roughly a quarter Catholic, and about a fifth from the ranks of the disaffiliated. Those registered in the sample are the ones who chose to stay and claim Mormonism as their religious affiliation.

The Pew Survey does not tell us what percentage of the converts in the United States, to our highly missionary Church stay. It emphasizes changes from the tradition of birth to the religion one holds at the time of the survey. It does not pick up what anthropologist Henri Gooren calls ‘religious careers”, i.e. the multiple affiliations people may have over the course of their life.

The Pew data do show that Mormons do show a net decline from 1.8% of the total sample compiled for childhood religion to 1.7% of adult religion. While this decline is much less than that of many non-Orthodox Christian groups, it is also higher than many. We are not converting enough to replace our losses and, as a result, show a one-percentage point decline in our total standing. This suggests that most converts probably do not stay in the Church.

However the Pew Trust does show that the broader Mormon tradition which all these numbers refer to, although the LDS Church is by far the largest in their sample (about 94%). We do not know, as a result, how different the patterns of retention and disaffiliation are for the Utah-based Church as opposed to other Mormon Churches and what impact those differences might have on the trends cited above.

Nevertheless the Pew data are a wakeup call. That one point net loss over time suggests difficulties in the US. It also makes us ask about other countries, where converts make up a much higher percentage of the membership. What are our retention rates of converts and of those born in the Church?

We need more studies of what the sociologists are calling “disaffiliation” and of Gooren’s religious careers to understand how Mormonism is or is not fitting and staying in people’s lives.

While the context I find for the question posed to Sister Dalton suggests the issue is not that of young women alone, we can ask if women or men show higher rates of inactivity or religious switching. The Pew data do not give us numbers specifically for Mormonism. The Survey does say, “men are only slightly more likely to switch affiliation than women (45% vs. 42%)” (p.33 of Chapter 2). Nevertheless it is possible, given the social place of women and the emphasis given on women’s roles (e.g. Elder Ballard’s address) that young women may show higher rates of inactivity and abandonment than may young men. I do not know.

If so, the 80% figure quoted by the journalist is alarmist. It overstates the issue in relation to a general context of very high inactivity. Nonetheless, it is important to ask if Mormons buck the general trend that men show greater rates of disaffiliation than women.

I do not know and I wonder what people are seeing in their neck of the Mormon woods. Is it fair to ask where have all the young women gone?

231 Comments

I believe the statistics. I was in a singles ward in Utah in the late 80s that was 90 percent inactive. The bishop cited indifference, boredom, irrelevance of the Church in their lives, late marriage, mission shellshock, education, skepticism and agnosticism as reasons.

Comment by cindee — April 7, 2008 @ 7:01 am
Nevertheless it is possible, given the social place of women and the emphasis given on women’s roles (e.g. Elder Ballard’s address) that young women may show higher rates of inactivity and abandonment than may young men. I do not know.

I’ve never seen any data or had any experience that would indicate more women are inactive or leaving the church than men.

In our stake (Helsinki FI), YSA rates are 40% for men, almost 50% for women. Of course, our youth activity rate is a whopping 85%.

Comment by Norbert — April 7, 2008 @ 7:26 am
Why do you think, Norbert, there is the higher YSA rate for women than for men in your stake? I also wonder how you understand and explain the very high youth inactivity rate?

Are other wards facing similar rates?

What does everyone else think of the reasons listed by Cindee for high inactivity rates in her Utah singles ward?

They are really a complex bundle. I have to think more about them.

Comment by david knowlton — April 7, 2008 @ 8:10 am
I have never in all of my research seen any data that suggests that 80% of unmarried women from 18-30 are inactive esp in the US. When I saw that question I immediatly chalked it up to SLTRIB anti-LDS bias

Women are more likely to be active then men. The PEW study showed a 56-44 gender inbalance in favor of women. The real question is where are all the single Men?

I am sure that JNS and Kevin will weigh in here

Comment by bbell — April 7, 2008 @ 8:10 am
The baseball baptisms have all grown up.

Comment by Eric Russell — April 7, 2008 @ 8:31 am
My experience has been that in-active single women ages 18-30 are mostly in relationships with non-members. Either living together and not married or previously married to a non-member and now divorced. I would say those two groups account for 70% of the inactive women I’ve known for the last 30 years.

Comment by Tiny G — April 7, 2008 @ 8:44 am
I’m not sure whether the 80% figure is accurate, but assuming that it is, there are many possible explanations. Here are a few, off the top of my head:

- Serving a mission may be a good predictor of future activity. Since more men serve missions, they may be more likely to remain active.

- It is often asserted that, in practice, young men are treated as if they were “more important” than young women in the Church. This also may contribute to young men’s activity.

- Perhaps we focus too much on activation and retention of men rather than women, on the false assumption that women are more spiritual, less likely to sin, and less likely to fall into inactivity.

I’m just throwing these explanations out there. I realize that they rest on a number of problematic assumptions, and I think they paint a too simplistic picture (and may be totally erroneous). But my point is that, if the 80% figure is accurate, I think there are lots of potential explanations.

Perhaps implicit in this post is the idea that young women are naturally less likely to go inactive. That may have to do with notions that women are inherently more spiritual, less likely to question or rebel, etc. Were the statistic 80% inactivity for young men, I don’t think we would be as surprised. Rather than scratching our heads, we could easily point to a number of explanations: p0rn, inherent male un-spirituality, etc. I think we need to question our fundamental assumptions about male and female spirituality.

Comment by Steve M — April 7, 2008 @ 8:49 am
It is worth noting that the number is not being compared to the male number, it is just being offered up on its own. Speaking to someone who worked with many stakes in the Utah Valley, singles wards have more women than men. This is, I think, pretty commmon. If so, it strongly suggests (though does not prove) that activity rates are higher among single women than men.

Comment by Frank McIntyre — April 7, 2008 @ 8:57 am
I heard the question, and was surprised by the 80% number and wonder where it came from. But I can’t disprove it through any statistics in stakes where I have lived. Many, many young single adult membership records end up in the “address unknown” file. I recently dealt with an example: a woman who grew up in my ward, went away to college and quit attending church, then last summer moved to a large city where a recently calling gave me Church contacts. I determined that her membership record had not followed her - the stake where she lives had never heard of her. (They have now!) Had I not taken the initiative to get the information to her new ward, I wonder how many more years it would have taken for her records to catch up with her. I have wondered how many others among those who grew up in my ward are now “lost,” not just in terms of Church participation but even the church knowing where they are.

Comment by JrL — April 7, 2008 @ 8:57 am
Oh, and I have no idea if the 80% is right or not.

Comment by Frank McIntyre — April 7, 2008 @ 8:58 am
The number that regional Church Authorities have floated in our area is activity rates between 8% and 14% for the YSA in US, depending on the stake. I have talked to several Stake Presidents who have verified that.

Comment by J. Stapley — April 7, 2008 @ 9:09 am
Perhaps they go inactive because of the same type of insensitivity that was displayed toward children in one of yesterday’s conference talks. Someone has posted a “What Children Know” rebuttal in response:

http://mormonmatters.org/2008/04/07/what-children-know-a-childrens-rebuttal-to-elder-ballards-conference-talk/

Comment by Daryl — April 7, 2008 @ 9:10 am
The reporter did not indicate that the 80% statistic only includes American or North American Mormons. If accurate, it presumably reflects a church-wide rate of inactivity (although, the difficulty of determining a church-wide statistic would cast doubt on the accuracy of the figure).

But assuming that the statistic reflects church-wide inactivity rates and is reasonably accurate, then it might make more sense. On my mission, teenage girls were a major demographic among the mission’s convert baptisms. A very substantial portion of them went inactive within a year of their conversion. If this trend is consistent across other missions, then the 80% figure may be reasonable, even if it doesn’t reflect the average composition of American singles wards.

Comment by Steve M — April 7, 2008 @ 9:13 am
David, while I agree wholeheartedly that retention is a huge issue that must be addressed in each and every unit in the Church, there are some major disclaimers that need to be mentioned in the context of the question if we are to address this issue in any meaningful way. Just from the stakes in my current area:

1) 80% inactivity might be accurate for YSA (18-30 year-old unmarried members), but it is not accurate for those younger, those married to another member at that age and those older - and the latter is intriguing. Iow, many of those who are inactive from 18-30 return to activity after 30.

2) This age group corresponds perfectly to the time when a student leaves home and gains a far greater degree of independence. It is the age range dominated by political liberalness, for example, as college students fight to establish their own identity outside of “the system”.

3) Ironically, the YSA group in our smaller campus branch has a MUCH higher activity and conversion rate than the large singles branch that includes multiple campuses **and those who are not students on any campus**. I think this speaks to the issue of belonging, since it seems to indicate that those who are more narrowly associated with a dominant organization (the college in a more isolated town) are much more likely to remain active than those scattered throughout a city with no ties to a dominant organization - and mixed in with a MUCH larger population, overall.

4) The inactivity rate among our YSA women is not higher than our YSA men. That, imo, is true elsewhere. Just as our activity rate is higher among our YW than among our YM, it is higher among our YSAW than among our YSAM.

5) The largest number of those who are inactive as YSA were inactive as YW/YM. The critical years for most of these members is 12-18, not 18-30. Also, the vast majority of those who are active YSA come from active families, and the percent who drop into total inactivity as YSA from **fully-active** families is relatively small.

6) Finally, women simply are waiting longer to get married than they used to do. This means that there are MANY more YSAW than ever before who are not married but not old enough to serve a mission - who are, in many ways, “in limbo” in the traditional structure of the Church. They are not YW, but they don’t feel like the married women in RS. Singles units were established to fill that void, but if transportation is an issue (for any number of reasons) there is little choice where a YSAW can feel comfortable “among others like her”. (Similar to African-American members in areas where I have lived, these YSAW sometimes slip into inactivity just prior to another YSAW appearing on the scene. It’s a vicious cycle, since there would be an abundance of similar members if all remained active for 5 years, but they tend to leave shortly before the desired “one like me” arrives.) This points to Elder Worthlin’s description of those who don’t have huge doctrinal issues, but rather simply feel like they don’t fit in because they are different.

Sorry for the length, but that’s what I see in the stakes around here.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 9:14 am
I think we need to question our fundamental assumptions about male and female spirituality.

I don’t think it has anything to do with it. More likely, the church provides a social bonding based on shared values, which I think women are more likely to find attractive.

david: that’s 85% active, not inactive. I don’t know why, except that Finns are family-oriented and committed. And they tend to get their names off the records rather than languishing in inactivity.

Comment by Norbert — April 7, 2008 @ 9:16 am
How are we defining activity? I think the church technically defines activity as attending Sacrament once a month (a friend in the bishopric told me that, but I was unable to verify).

I can say that being a single woman in the church can be pretty brutal. I think it is easier to walk away than to deal with it. As someone who is trying to decide if I want to continue to be a member or not, I can say my path is much easier as a single person to leave vs. someone who has an active spouse. I don’t have a spouse or kids to worry about. Some people want to leave but cannot because of spouse, and that may help them stay and work through their issues instead of walk away.

It is really hard to be single in a married church. Women are told their divine purpose is having children,but when they are not doing that it leaves them wondering if they have a place in the church, and what their divine purpose then becomes.

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 9:21 am
I have never commented before, but this thread struck home with me. I went inactive for several years in my twenties. Mostly because as I grew into my late twenties, I knew I wouldn’t be getting married and I became depressed and upset that I was considered a “failure” by so many members. (When asked who my husband was one day by a sister, I said, “I’m not married” and the woman grabbed my arm, gave it a squeeze and said “Oh my dear, I am SO SORRY”. She never spoke to me again - she just didn’t feel I was worth the time, I guess). I still feel a failure sometimes at church (and I’m much older), and I’ve walked out of talks on marriage and children especially when they say stupid things like someone a few weeks ago - “I really pity those people who are not married and don’t have children”. So I understand why single sisters go inactive and I can sympathize with their reasoning. When I was in my child bearing years and all I wanted to do was get married and have children, being a member was not easy, and I left for a number of years because of it.

Comment by Single Sister — April 7, 2008 @ 9:22 am
In my last paragraph, I meant to add at the end: This would explain why some come back when they get married. Now, even if they are married to a non-member, they “fit in” within RS.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 9:22 am
Norbert,

My point that we should evaluate our assumptions about female and male activity didn’t have to do with explaining the statistic (as you point out), but with explaining our apparent surprise in response to it. As I mentioned, I don’t think this post would elicit the same interest if it cited a statistic that 80% of young men are inactive in the Church.

Comment by Steve M — April 7, 2008 @ 9:29 am
* My first sentence in comment #18 should read “. . . our assumptions about male and female spirituality . . .”

Sorry.

Comment by Steve M — April 7, 2008 @ 9:40 am
“I don’t think it has anything to do with it. More likely, the church provides a social bonding based on shared values, which I think women are more likely to find attractive.”

I would think that social bonding based on shared gospel values would lead to greater spirituality.

Comment by Frank McIntyre — April 7, 2008 @ 9:51 am
David,

My mind went to the same questions this morning. Let me share some stats I pulled together yesterday and today. We were told yesterday that there are 554,600 Young Women in the church today. That number represents all of the 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, and half of the 18 year olds (the other half of whom are presumably graduated from high school and entering Relief Society). This means about 85,000 YW in the Church turn 18 each year.

Now consider the “Increase in Children of Record” reported yesterday. We were told that 99,638 eighty-year-olds were baptized in 2007. Of this number, about 50,000 eight-year-old girls are baptized in the Church annually. I checked and this number has not been this high since at least 2000. So we see that about only 58 percent (50,000 out of 85,000) of the young women born into the church are getting baptized when they are eight years old.

Now compare the numbers of YW to the number of missionaries reported yesterday. We had 52,686 missionaries in the field as of 31 Dec 2007. At most, this means, on an annual basis, 26,343 young men are turning 19 and entering the mission field. What is more likely, given the increasing numbers of single women and couples who are serving, there may only be 20,000 young men in the church who are entering the mission field each year. Now let’s assume the number of young men and young women in the church are about equal. This means only a quarter (20,000 out of 85,000) of the young men who are born in the church are serving missions. (This percentage of young men serving missions could be lower if the proportion of missionaries who are female has been increasing since we raised the bar in 2002.)

I am assuming, also, that very few of the young men who choose not to serve missions remain active in the church.

So if the retention rate of our youth is only 58 percent at age eight, 25 percent at age 19, is it that hard to believe that only 20 percent of the men and women ages 18-30 in the church are staying active?

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 9:54 am
Except for a very few months immediately after my mission, I was completely inactive for the whole decade of my 20s, and well into my 30s. I was always a believer, and always considered myself a Mormon, but there was no place for me at church. There still isn’t, really, except that now I’m more self reliant than I could be in my 20s.

It would be very, very interesting to be part of a candid study of young adult inactivity.

Comment by Ardis Parshall — April 7, 2008 @ 10:03 am
In the twentieth century, between 25-35% of young men in the Church eventually served missions. Between 15-20% of all missionaries were single sisters.

Again, the Church’s own data is that between 8-14% of all YSA are active, depending on the stake. I’m fairly certain my stake is on the low end of this. This of course doesn’t include missionaries and those who are married.

Comment by J. Stapley — April 7, 2008 @ 10:03 am
Just a quick post to say I am here and reading. This topic exploded while I was at class. I have work I have to accomplish right now and so will not be able to comment for a while. This is a topic which engages lots of interesting issues. There is actually a lot I want to comment on. yikes.

Comment by david knowlton — April 7, 2008 @ 10:17 am
I think part of the problem is that singles in the Church often perceive that the Church–its programs, lessons, culture, practices–infantilizes adults of any age who have never married, and to a degree the doctrine also casts aspersions on those whose marriages have failed, and have not remarried.

For divorced singles, the doctrine of eternal families and the practice of keeping sealings intact can pour salt in open wounds, and they would rather not bother going to church. For singles who never marry, constantly being given “chastity talks” or invasive interviews, or harangued about needed to date are definite downers.

I was in a singles ward once where the bishop and his wife said they considered us their children. This was very, very creepy, especially since this was an older singles ward (25-40). The bishop’s wife was a notorious matchmaker, and they both would do anything (including betray confidences) to try to marry off the ward members. A lot of damage was done.

Another example of this infantilization is that many singles events are administered by married people, including chaperones of dances, etc. A newlywed couple in their late teens or early twenties is often considered more mature and authoritative than a single counterpart twice their age. It is extremely humiliating for an older single to realize that they are assumed to be inept or irresponsible just because they don’t have a spouse.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 10:20 am
continued

When single LDS are navigating their regular world (work, socializing outside LDS wards, etc.) and weighing it against the singles environment, it’s not hard to see that the singles culture in the Church leaves a lot to be desired. Some leave and return when they feel they are stronger and can handle it, some leave and return when they are married, and some never return at all.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 10:23 am
Sterling,

I think increase in number of children of record indicates children born and placed on the rolls. That is how I have always understood it.

Comment by bbell — April 7, 2008 @ 10:24 am
J. Stapley: Wikipedia says about 30 percent of young men in the Church served missions, which seems to agree with your numbers. I don’t think it said anything about the percentage of missionaries who are women. The figures I am talking about are 21st century. Have you seen the missionary service rates for the last decade? I am also including all men and women ages 18-30 (single, married, divorced, separated, widowed, etc.) in my numbers. Do you think your low-activity YSA percentages (8-14 percent) average with the higher-activity married percentages (maybe 30 percent) to equal the overall activity rate I came up with (about 20 percent)?

bbell: “Increase in Children of Record,” as I understand it, means children who are baptized between the ages of 8 and 9. The moment these children turn 9, from what I remember as a missionary, their baptisms count as “converts” and not as “children of record.” Can others verify this?

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 10:34 am
Sterling:

Children of record can be any of the following:
1. Children who are blessed in the LDS church
2. Children of converts who aren’t blessed but are younger than 8 years old
3. Children whose parents consent to their being on the rolls of the LDS church as long as a)at least one parent is LDS and b) both parents concur.

Children of record are counted in the membership statistics of the church–if they’re not baptized by their ninth birthday, however, they are dropped from the rolls.

The church stopped counting baptisms of 8 year olds some years ago; instead they report the children of record.

My source for this is the CHI that can be found online.

Comment by Kendall Smith — April 7, 2008 @ 10:49 am
Married activity rates are definitely much higher then for singles. In the US, I would suspect that they are well above the 50% mark, though I haven’t seen the numbers.

Comment by J. Stapley — April 7, 2008 @ 10:55 am
As J. Stapley said above, 80% would be an improvement to the situation in the Seattle area.

Additional reasons I have heard from inactive young women: the boredom Cindee cited above cannot be overstated, women appear to them to be devalued in the organization and parlance of the church, many of their talents (especially executive) will never or seldom be put to use in the Church (wouldn’t God want their talents?), the Word of Wisdom seems untrue in light of recent scientific studies of tea, coffee and red wine (so how can they trust other revelations?), they marry nonmembers with no interest in the church (love and children seem much more important than religion as the biological clock matures), they have had an affair and fear or don’t have faith in the repentence process and they have felt betrayed by new information regarding subjects like the Book of Abraham, feel betrayed and distrustful and leave. Though no one has voiced this to me, I think many never learned the gospel or our history well enough as children, wake up to adulthood in a culture apathetic or antagonistic to religion and simply haven’t the knowledge, including spiritual knowledge, to confront issues like those above or to sustain interest in religion.

Comment by Molly Bennion — April 7, 2008 @ 10:58 am
Kendall Smith: Thanks for the clarification. That must mean that only a fraction of the “Increase in Children of Record” numbers reported annually in general conference represent baptisms of 8 year olds. If so, that must mean less than half of the people who are born in the church end up getting baptized in the church. I think this is significant, because, by my estimation, only a quarter of the YW in the church are converts.

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 11:13 am
I meant to say only a quarter or less of the YW getting baptized in the church are converts.

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 11:16 am
There’s a difference between YW (Young Women, which the Church defines as 12-18) and YA (Young Adults). Some in the Church–even in our written communications, as seen above!) lump any unmarried members as teenager/other/”youth”. It’s very telling.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 11:25 am
If these figures are accurate (I can’t grant that since I don’t know where they’re from) I think it might be time for church leadership to reconsider the Relief Society as the default for female adult (18+) activity.

Yes, the Relief Society is inspired. No, that doesn’t mean that it always forever has to be the only option.

Comment by Researcher — April 7, 2008 @ 11:41 am
80% seems high. Here’s one thought. In a Utah-valley singles ward that I was in, lots of people seemed to feel free to go visit other wards–often for months. It seemed more common for women–lots of girst would come to our ward right out of high school, stick around for a few weeks, go somewhere else for a few months, and sometimes come back. They weren’t inactive during these months–they were just at other wards. But they wouldn’t show up as attending a ward.

Maybe a good number of the “inactive” people are just going to other wards and not moving their records around with them.

Comment by Ryan Millecam — April 7, 2008 @ 11:43 am
Single Ward Veteran: Great point. I was trying to distinguish between YW (ages 12-18) and what I was calling “women ages 18-30.” YSA, I gather, does not include the married women ages 18-30 in the church.

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 11:48 am
This is an important and vexing question that I’ve spent some time wrangling with. My own experience (admittedly anecdotal) confirms the languishing activity rate for YSAs in the Church, with no obvious difference based upon sex or a person’s having served a mission. The overwhelming majority of YSA LDS I know personally — RMs and non-RMs alike, male and female — are not active, for any number of reasons and by any number of definitions. And, off the top of my head, not a single one of them has “lost faith” in the sense of rejecting the truth claims of Mormonism. All of them are sexually active (mostly in committed monogamous relationships), some gay, most straight, and all of them routinely engage in some form or another of WoW infraction (usually social drinking).

This is a phenomenon I have not come close to wrapping my head around, but SWVs comments in # 26 and 35 seem very insightful.

Comment by Brad — April 7, 2008 @ 11:53 am
Single Ward Veteran, I spoke insensitively in using “young women” referring to younger adult women, 18-30. Sorry. I actually don’t think of those we call young women as women at all, but that’s the term and I should have been more exact. You make an excellent point about infantilizing language and activity.

Comment by Molly Bennion — April 7, 2008 @ 11:56 am
Just a clarification: in my comment in #37, I do not want to downplay any of the excellent reasons listed in #32 or other posts (I am particularly aware of the importance of boredom). I just think that some of the 80% are plenty active.

Comment by Ryan Millecam — April 7, 2008 @ 11:58 am
I think trying to have this discussion in the Church also runs the risk of letting it devolve into an exercise in self-fulfilling prophecy. We say that the world is uniquely evil and horrible and that there’s so much pressure on our youth, and then when confronted with stats like these, we can simply point to the mess and say “we told you so.” That absolves us of the responsibility of pointing the finger in our own direction, enabling us to point the take-no-offense finger of shame at the other 80% and shake our heads in frustrated sadness at the wickedness of the world.

I admit this is an extreme characterization of only one possible reaction and something of a strawman. I’m just highlighting the kind of thinking that I think a productive discussion of these problems must avoid.

Comment by Brad — April 7, 2008 @ 12:01 pm
Dude, Ryan, did you miss the comment where I said the Church hierarchy itself uses the 8-14% number? They have spent a lot of time on this problem and though I haven’t seen their methodology, I do suspect that numbers so dismal were fairly vetted, your speculation notwithstanding.

Comment by J. Stapley — April 7, 2008 @ 12:01 pm
#30- Children of Record are not taken off the roll if they aren’t baptized by the age of 8. They remain on the rolls until they turn 18, and there is a star by their name on the rolls denoting their member status as Unbaptized Children of Record.

I’m not saying what you found online is incorrect, but I’m looking at a YW class roster right now, that is current as of this month, and it lists the Unbaptized Children of Record. We are instructed to count them in our attendance records.

Comment by Jennifer in GA — April 7, 2008 @ 12:05 pm
J. Stapley: Maybe some of the disconnect comes from regional differences in experiences of members of the church. Is the activity rate for YSA about the same in Mexico, Brazil, the Phillipines, Europe, Utah, urban American West, east coast, etc.?

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 12:07 pm
J. Stapely- I shamefully admit that I just skimmed your post, then jumped right in. Had I been more diligent, I could have saved valuable seconds for many people. I like to think, however, that I provided fun-filled anecdotal evidence that explains what those 8-14% are up to.

Comment by Ryan Millecam — April 7, 2008 @ 12:10 pm
Sterling, those are the numbers the Church has used for the US, I don’t know about outside the US.

Comment by J. Stapley — April 7, 2008 @ 12:13 pm
I will probably repeating some of what my mother wrote above, but although a man, I was raised in the church and with three daughters consider myself to have skin in the game. Oh, and for what it is worth, my wife converted after our 5th month of marriage.

First, the church youth programs amply demonstrate the “amature” nature of our organization. At school, in athletics, pursuing music or art I was consistently encouraged to work hard and challenge myself to do my best. When I attended church functions I saw events where lack of effort, and acceptance of mediocrity (if not lower standards) were the norm. This was not the case in friends’ churches or my high school (which was Episcopalian). These standards were, and are, no more clearly demonstrated than in the manual’s and my former (and alas current) teachers’ complete unwillingness to intellectually challenge the members.

Although the above critisism is by no means reserved for young women, if you combine that with what I perceived as a young man to be a pervasive notion that women were first-and-foremost baby-makers rather than individuals…backed up by the whole “the priesthood is only for men” and “the man is the head of the household”…schtick and I can understand young women electing to chose the world to explore their individuality and define themselves rather than a singles ward.

I can’t say I attended services on the first Sunday of my freshman year because of an affinity for the church as an organization, because the church as an organization made me more complete, or because it played a vital role in my daily life. Instead, for me it was purely faith in certain aspects of the gospel instilled in me by my parents that overcame what was at that time distain for the organization. Had I been a woman, I think it would have been significantly harder to make that choice. To be fair, now that I am older I have more appreciation for the difficulties inherent in an all-volunteer church. I have been (partially) assimilated.

Finally, I found it extremely creepy when moving into a new singles ward, the stake president put his arm around my shoulder, walked me through the halls to the chapel, and started talking to me about all the attractive women in the ward. I remember thinking, “Is he going to show me their teeth…how can I tell how old they are without looking at their teeth?” Who wants to go somewhere and put of with that attitude?

Comment by TyB — April 7, 2008 @ 12:19 pm
No offense taken, Molly Bennion and Sterling. I just wanted to point out that the problem with single adult inactivity starts with how we define and treat them.

There are married people among us who shake their heads and tut-tut about the wayward single youth. No matter how old we are–even if the single adults are our peers or older than us–, sometimes the tendency is to think of singles as troubled young post-teenagers who just need to get their acts together and come back to Church.

No matter what the reason for this dire statistic, it is no small feat for someone who doesn’t believe the Church is fulfilling his/her needs to maintain interest in going or even belonging. There are many who still find value in the Church nonetheless, but many other’s can’t and don’t, particularly while they are single.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 12:20 pm
Ty, it took you five months? Impressive skills.

Comment by Steve Evans — April 7, 2008 @ 12:22 pm
I see a huge difference between inactivity and abandonment. Inactivity sounds temporary in nature — for instance “just taking a break”. I was inactive until my children were born. This may sound bad but I really didn’t see much point in going just for myself.

Comment by StillConfused — April 7, 2008 @ 12:57 pm
Julie in GA:

The CHI says that records are maintained on children of record not baptized by age 9; even though the records are kept, those people shouldn’t be counted as members.

Comment by Kendall Smith — April 7, 2008 @ 1:14 pm
Sterling:

In the current scheme of things, the baptism of a previously blessed 8 year-old doesn’t change anything. He or she was counted as a member the day they were blessed or otherwise entered into the system.

If they aren’t baptized by their 9th birthday, they aren’t supposed to be counted as members anymore, but they are on the rolls, as Julie in GA says.

Comment by Kendall Smith — April 7, 2008 @ 1:18 pm
Kendall Smith: Could you please point me to where it says that on the church website, because I can’t seem to find it.

Comment by Jennifer in GA — April 7, 2008 @ 1:38 pm
As a Young Woman, there’s a lot of pressure from the members of the Church to be something I’m not, nor do I have any desire to be. That, combined with the fact that my parents are non-members, is a tough line to walk for a 16 year old convert.

But I love the Church, and I love my leaders. They have helped me learn to be my best self in a world where people would have me be THEIR best selves. And I think this past General Conference, more than any other, has made the effort to get the Saints to make that distinction.

But I’m still wary. I’m now 18, and I have to decide whether or not to move up to Relief Society before I go to college. None of my girl friends have successfully made the transition in my branch so far, and I’m thinking it’ll serve me better not to try.

This is the kind of stuff that causes inactivity: when attitudes within the membership make being a member seem like more trouble than it’s worth.

Comment by Paradox — April 7, 2008 @ 1:45 pm
The CHI isn’t on the church’s website, but a copy of the 1998 version can be found at the following link:

Quoting from the CHI:
A person age nine or older who has a membership record but has not been baptized and confirmed is not considered a member of record. However, tile bishop keeps the membership record until the person is 18. At that time if the person chooses not to be baptized despite being given every opportunity, the bishop, with written permission from the stake president, cancels the membership record. However, records of unbaptized members who are considered not accountable because of mental disabilities are not canceled.

Comment by Kendall Smith — April 7, 2008 @ 1:48 pm
I spoke with my 20 year old daughter about this as well. She said that many of her friends feel that they are pressured at Church to marry and be moms. They drop out of Church while they are pursuing their education and careers and come back into the fold once they are married or ready to get married.

Comment by StillConfused — April 7, 2008 @ 2:10 pm
Steve,

We dated 3.5 years before marriage. Which reminds me of Fletch:

Fletch: “Oh, it was. Yeah, it was really a shame. To go so suddenly like that.”
Dr. Joseph Dolan: “He was dying for years.”
Fletch: “Sure, but… the end was very… very sudden.”
Dr. Joseph Dolan: “He was in intensive care for eight weeks.”
Fletch: “Yeah, but I mean the very end, when he actually died. That was extremely sudden.”

I’m a natural missionary. It must be my gentle good nature and deep and abiding spirituality. Who else could convert their sole-mate in just under four years?

Ty

Comment by TyB — April 7, 2008 @ 2:22 pm
LOL, Ty. Dr. Rosen Rosen. I’ve also heard that the legendary seductive powers of the Bennion Eyebrows played a role.

Comment by Steve Evans — April 7, 2008 @ 2:23 pm
I have noticed that the Church sometimes has a I have noticed that the Church sometimes has a one size fits all way of organizing it’s membership.

Example #1. Young men at nineteen go on Missions. Women are not allowed to go on a mission until they are twenty one just in case a young man needs a wife when he returns form his mission. Young man and young women marry, he goes to school, they start to have children and the life goal has been reached. They live happily ever after.

Oops! Young man or young women now thirty not married what happened? How can we fix this unsettling state of being? We live in a more complex society. Time to deal with it.

This second example I have heard fabout four different times by various locale leaders in talks and in private. I don’t know where it originated.

Example #2 “Convert the investigator, baptist them, confirm them and give them a calling. After one year get them to the Temple and then they are ready and on their own.”

Oops! They where told they are now part of a larger family, feel abandoned and found the back door leading to their old life and friends. Many converts here in Santa Fe tell the story of moving to Utah to be around more Mormons and that it was one of the loneliness times of their life. Sorry Utahans, I’m just relating what I have been told a number of times. maybe they weren’t converted in the first place or there are other reasons we are unaware of but we still need to deal with it.

As for me I left the Church in 1967. I couldn’t deal with it and it couldn’t deal with me but like I said it was 1967 and you can maybe figure out from that what happened. I returned to activity in February 2001.

Comment by Ogan — April 7, 2008 @ 2:37 pm
I can’t help but think that women are under a lot more pressure nowadays then men are.

While men historically have high inactivity rates then women, recently their has become a division among US women that does not exist among men.

In the larger US society, women seem divided into two camps. One camp holds to old traditions that view motherhood as an indivisible element of womanhood. The other camp rejects motherhood as a source of feminine identity, instead arguing that fulfillment as a women is found in intellectual or business pursuits in the workforce.

While most reasonable people would recognize that they should not be mutually exclusive positions, the current climate is such that women are often shoved into one camp or the other. For example, my mother was regularly patronized and treated with condescension by working women because she was a full time homemaker- despite the fact that my mother was highly educated and worked as a computer programmer before having children.

The fact that she understood the workforce, and came from a family with a long line of feminist women meant nothing. Simply by choosing children, she had chosen sides.

I am sure other women in the other camp who work have felt similarly ostracized and forced into a position of conflict.

What happens to a Mormon woman who professes allegiance to more traditional views of womanhood but can’t find a husband? Where does she fit in?

Women used to support each other much more than they do nowadays. Many women (such as my mother) look to their husbands to provide validation of the worth of their activities, as traditional sources of validation from other women are no longer reliable.

Comment by Cicero — April 7, 2008 @ 2:47 pm
Another thing that has changed are the large number of women who are consciously deciding to put off marriage until after graduation. (As opposed to those who are willing but can’t find an acceptable mate).

Since this is clearly at odds with the counsel given by the Priesthood and the Church, it is not surprising that some women decide not to regularly attend church.

Comment by Cicero — April 7, 2008 @ 2:51 pm
I’m sorry, Kendall, but I think that website is wrong. I just put in a call to our stake clerk who told me that children who

- have been blessed (therefore creating a membership record)
- are between the ages of 9-18
- and have never been baptized

are absolutely counted as “children or members of record”, and are *included* monthly attendance records that are turned in to the stake (until they turn 18), and I would imagine contribute to the statistics presented in the opening post.

Believe me, I wish these COR weren’t included in the numbers, as the average attendance of the Primary I’m in charge of would leap from 25% attending at least once a month to 80% attending at least once a month.

Comment by Jennifer in GA — April 7, 2008 @ 2:55 pm
One thing the church could be doing a better job of is helping people move out of the “me-serving” mentality and on to the “other-serving” mentality. One with an “other-serving” outlook will stay in church while those who fail to get beyond the “me-serving” perspective will begin to drop as soon as it rains.

Comment by Eric Russell — April 7, 2008 @ 2:56 pm
Also, how can any discussion of this topic in the blogernacle avoid the temptation of touching the third rail of Mormon culture.

Looking at this logically from a perspective of simple incentives, I can not help but realize that there is a policy that would radically change current incentives towards encouraging marriage and greater activity by young single women:

Polygamy

At least, that’s what all the period Relief Society writings defending the doctrine seems to suggest.

Let the true firestorm of controversy begin!

Comment by Cicero — April 7, 2008 @ 2:57 pm
Cicero, what you’re talking about is not a new suggestion. Suffice it to say that it would not entirely solve all problems.

Comment by Steve Evans — April 7, 2008 @ 3:03 pm
Women used to support each other much more than they do nowadays.

Women who fit the mold find an exceptional support system in RS today. Women who don’t, mostly don’t.

Comment by Brad — April 7, 2008 @ 3:10 pm
Single Ward Veteran,

In what ward is there a singles ward of ages 25-40? I am highly skeptical that such a ward exists in the US.

On another note, it is true that a young married man could be called into the bishopric of a singles ward and be younger than some of those in the ward. It is also possible that he, joined by his spouse, could attend a singles dance in his leadership capacity. But I don’t think that makes him a “chaperon” per se, at least not in the traditional sense. The statement “A newlywed couple in their late teens or early twenties is often considered more mature and authoritative than a single counterpart twice their age.” is downright false.

Comment by Eric Russell — April 7, 2008 @ 3:11 pm
So Elder Wirthlin was right; some people feel like they don’t fit in. Let’s take his counsel a step further and create an atmosphere in which they do fit it.

1) I would love to see singles units dissolved. I don’t like the natural meat market mentality that is so hard to eliminate. There is so much that YSA can add to a ward - and even more so to a branch.

2) Hold separate YSA Gospel Doctrine classes - at the very least - and establish YSA Relief Society and Elders’ Quorums groups, if supported by the numbers. Call 3rd Counselors, again if supported by the numbers. We’re separating them currently, so it’s hard to argue that we shouldn’t separate them in a ward. The YSA SS class was done in our ward before the encouragement was solidified to attend the singles branch, and it was very successful.

3) Actively call YSA women into RS Presidencies and YSA men into Branch Presidencies and Bishoprics - at least as Ward Clerks and Executive Secretaries. Married status has no bearing on real spirituality and overall worthiness, as evidenced by the callings extended in singles wards and branches.

4) Retain an absolute minimum of callings as “married-only” - perhaps only Bishop and Relief Society President.

There are more things that can be done, but treating YSA as normal, individual, non-special people would be a nice start, imho.

We can’t water down the doctrine that makes us unique, but we certainly can teach it in a more conducive *structure*. If YSA are valued more within the visible organization, it might rub off on the general membership and lessen the condescension too many express.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 3:12 pm
Yeah, it’d make single young men even more alienated. Not to mention those ‘over 25′ guys.

Comment by Clark Goble — April 7, 2008 @ 3:13 pm
Julie:

Next Sunday, ask to see the CHI and you can verify for yourself. As it says, those young people should have membership records but shouldn’t be counted among the 13.1 million members of the church.

Comment by Kendall Smith — April 7, 2008 @ 3:15 pm
Disagree, Eric. It happened to me when I was assigned by a high councilor to chaperone a SA dance. I was younger than most of those in attendance, but because I was married, it was assumed that I had a better handle on chastity and morality and was therefore qualified to oversee people twenty years older than I and make sure there was no hanky-panky. It was really weird, and I don’t think my experience is uncommon.

Comment by Mark IV — April 7, 2008 @ 3:16 pm
Eric,

In my stake they have the mid-singles group. All people between 30-40 (I cannot remember the exact upper number) are put in the same family ward together. At this point most of the members are the singles.

Not the one he was referring to, but close. It is super bizarre though. They have a seperate temple night, etc. They did finally stop seperating the married/singles for Sunday School. The married members of the the ward referred to the singles as youth.

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 3:19 pm
Ray,
In my last three wards, the RS president has been unmarried, so that calling doesn’t fit the married-only requirement (not to mention that it’s always an unmarried woman in singles’ wards).

Eric,
Until say three years ago, Manhattan had a singles ward for ages 27 (or 28; I don’t entirely remember) and up. According to my sister, Palo Alto had roughly the same thing (although maybe the dividing age was different). Manhattan’s is gone–everyone over 30 is in the traditional wards–and I’ve never lived in Palo Alto, so I can’t speak to them, but it’s not an unreasonable proposition that there existed a (or multiple) singles ward(s) that appeared to be for people roughly 25 to roughly 40.

Comment by Sam B. — April 7, 2008 @ 3:19 pm
Eric Russell,

In Boston there are two singles wards for people ages 25 and up. People 31 and older are not required to attend family wards, and in fact I know of a few people older than 40 who still attend the singles wards. However, your intuition is largely correct: in most areas singles wards are now limited to people ages 18-30.

Comment by Anna — April 7, 2008 @ 3:21 pm
#68 - Eric, perception is 9/10’s of reality - to twist a familiar statement. Don’t discount the frustration felt by a 30-year-old single adult at seeing a 23-year-old and his 19-year-old wife attending a YSA dance. In many cases they are there on assignment as “leaders” - and it really is comically painful in too many cases.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 3:21 pm
In what ward is there a singles ward of ages 25-40? I am highly skeptical that such a ward exists in the US.

The 8th ward in Provo is basically that. Not exactly. There are some under 25s. But not many.

Comment by Clark Goble — April 7, 2008 @ 3:21 pm
Ray, #1 couldn’t be more wrong. That’s the absolute worst thing the church could do. Aside from a very slim, but sometimes vocal minority, single people prefer to go to church where they can be with other singles. What the church needs to do is increase singles wards. As the single population gets older, there ought to be shifts to take that into account. In highly populated areas there ought to be 27-37 year old singles wards, instead of forcing singles out into family wards the day they hit 31.

Comment by Eric Russell — April 7, 2008 @ 3:23 pm
Sam, that’s my point - that YSA men and women serve in leadership callings in singles units; why can’t they do the same in non-singles units? (and, btw, I do not object to having single women serve as RS Pres.)

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 3:25 pm
I would love to see singles units dissolved. I don’t like the natural meat market mentality that is so hard to eliminate. There is so much that YSA can add to a ward - and even more so to a branch.

The anti-”meat market” bit gets to be a bit silly (IMO). Look. For most under 25 they are dating a lot or at least interested in dating. It might only be a fraction of everyone but they like to date a lot. And lots of people are interesting in “finding the one.” There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s far less of a meat market than say an LDS dating site.

Yeah it can interfere and frankly some of the shenanigans of the 19 year old girls and recent RMs can be annoying - especially around BYU. But I’m not exactly sure how you think one could eliminate that, keep folks dating and so forth.

In my experience most single adults in regular wards get ignored because (a) there are only a handful in a ward of 300+ people and (b) most families with young kids barely have time to socialize with their spouse let alone lonely young singles. Give the young adult a calling in primary and they’ll disappear off from the radar of the ward. Don’t give them a calling and they feel left out and go inactive.

I remember doing both the regular ward and single ward things back when single. As bad as the single wards sometimes were the regular wards were far worse.

Comment by Clark Goble — April 7, 2008 @ 3:27 pm
I have no idea whatsoever how typical this situation is, but I have a daughter who is about to graduate from college (not BYU or other church school). She goes to church somewhat regularly, because she believes the church is true. But she hasn’t been impressed with any of the YSA wards she has attended.

Let me rephrase that. She hasn’t been impressed with the guys at YSA wards. Her impression is that the typical YSA male is not interested in getting to know his female counterpart as a friend, only as a future wife. If she goes out on a traditional date with a guy (as opposed to hanging out with a group), the guy won’t leave her alone afterward because all he thinks about is wanting to get married like his mission president told him he needed to do right away.

She basically feels that the singles wards are designed to get people married off rather than helping them grow spiritually.

As a result, she says that if she comes to live with us after graduation while she looks for employment before going to live on her own, she says she’ll attend our ward, not the singles ward in town. She does want to marry sometime, but when she’s ready, not because she’s expected to fill some RM’s one-woman quota.

Like I said, I don’t know how typical my daughter’s experience is. But if it’s true that single women are treated only like future wives and mothers, and not being appreciated for who they are, I can see why inactivity rates could be so high.

Comment by E — April 7, 2008 @ 3:27 pm
Ray,
I’m sure you don’t object, and I totally agree with you—I guess my point is, why should Relief Society president be on the list of must-be-marrieds (given that my last three non-singles wards have had unmarried women as RS presidents)? So I wasn’t actually disagreeing with you.

Comment by Sam B. — April 7, 2008 @ 3:28 pm
Eric (#78), I disagree (as a single person), I would love nothing more than to be able to attend a family ward and be welcomed and utitlized. My current choices is the mid-singles group and the family ward (where the former bishop told me they were not equipped to deal with singles).

I agree with treating the singles as any other member of the church. Sure, have lots of activities for them to meet people. But the point of church is to worship, feel the spirit, etc. not meet people in order to get asked out and date. I find it bizarre to be in a church where the clergy says from the pulpit “guys ask girls out, girls, say yes” or the bishop witholds temple reccomends from men not dating enough.

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 3:28 pm
Ray, they can in regular units. I’ve been in quite a few wards with singles in the Bishoric and singles as RS Presidents.

However typically there are (a) far more married people than singles making such things improbable and (b) a concern of whether singles would understand the needs of married people. (A valid concern - I consider myself thoughtful and so forth, but being married is eye opening and having kids amazingly eye opening)

Comment by Clark Goble — April 7, 2008 @ 3:29 pm
Eric, we simply disagree on this one. If our activity rate is 8-14% when we are using singles units for those 18-30, but those rates increase *significantly* after age 30, I have a hard time thinking the numbers will drop without those units - especially if YSA are treated as adults and integrated into wards and branches as normal members - with the opportunity to meet as a separate group in SS, RS and PH where the numbers merit it.

Your response mis-characterizes my proposal, since my proposal explicitly allows for YSA to meet and worship with other YSA.

I might be wrong, but continuing to do the same thing and expecting different results . . . I don’t like quarantining people away from those who are different - for way too many reasons to list here, not least of which is the chance to observe and learn (both good and bad) from those who are different - including, in this case, those with children.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 3:33 pm
E-From talking to lots of other singles, it really depends on the area and the leadership.

The last singles ward I was in had a bishop that felt people’s problems would go away if they would just get married. In my current area women being sex objects is first and foremost, wife and mother second. Lots of plastic surgery (implants) and eating disorders-including the common knowledge that the bishop paid for his daughters.

I attened a different singles ward a few cities away and felt the spirit the strongest I ever have. The focus was truly on developing a relationship with your Savior and you God. It was beautiful. Another ward near me was all about the education a woman had. So really, each wards “flavor” is different.

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 3:33 pm
Re: singles wards for 25 and older–

There are MANY singles wards across the US that serve older singles. The leadership has tried to disband them, but there have been official and unofficial ones for decades.

I have been a member of/attended “older singles wards” or “…branches” in the following cities:

San Fransisco, Boston, Chicago, Manhattan, Salt Lake City, Park City, Midvale, Arizona.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 3:34 pm
Oh, and of course, there’s a gigantic, thriving “mid-singles” program in Southern California, which typically sees a large turnout for its annual conference/retreat (numbering in the hundreds, sometimes thousands).

Then there are even older wards and branches (we used to call them “forty ’til death”.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 3:35 pm
I recently was involved in a over 31 singles conference and dance. The married members of our stake who helped put on the dance and conference were not chaperones. I would call us workers. We set up, fed, DJ’d, took pictures and cleaned up afterwards. Nobody told us we were chaperones and nobody acted like it.

Comment by bbell — April 7, 2008 @ 3:39 pm
I am fascinated with the changes people talk about over the course of a life; being active, inactive, and then active again over a life. I know people who have been in the Church, had their names removed, joined another Church, then rejoined Mormonism, become inactive again and participated in another Church and so on. I wonder how many people actually stay active in the Church over their lifetimes. It is probably a small minority.

How do you know when someone has “abandoned” the Church or even just disaffiliated? People have complex levels of involvement and engagement. I know one person who hasn’t been to Church in a decade or more and yet, although non-compliant with the Word of Wisdom, believes strongly in the Church and has a testimony. I know another person who is active and yet does not believe as firmly as the first person. We presume we know what these categories, active and inactive mean and the kinds of persons they apply to. But other than in a quantitative sense of participation we do not.

The levels of inactivity y’all describe for young men and young women fascinate me. I see two issues here, coming from the sociology of religion. One talks about how a demanding Church builds more inner commitment by removing the complexity of the free rider problem—i.e. those who participate but do not pay tithing, or do not follow the commandments. As a result they are arguably more marketable.

But that also comes at a cost. It may be the cost is the loss of a certain number of youth. If convert growth is greater than the loss then the Church continues to grow. But if not, then it declines.

So there is another variable here, at least: the demand for the religious good (sorry for the jargon) in the broader society. Another way to say this is the fit between the social situation of enough people and the Church such that the Church is attractive and meaningful.

Another variable is the barrier between the members of the Church and the broader society. If that is broad, and enforced from both sides, then it is hard for people to leave and go anywhere, even if there is not a good fit, once they are inside.

However one can look at this religiously, where the entire field of humanity is God’s kingdom and the problem is one of ministering to all His children and bringing them to the Lord. It may be tempting to close up into a smallish group of the saved. But if the goal is finding ways to bring a message that is intelligible and meaningful to the “sheep not of the fold “ then one has to scrutinize the structure and offering to make it meaningful to as many people as possible.

The Church seems caught in these issues and seems looking for the latter without compromising the commitment and sectarianism of the active.

Comment by David Knowlton — April 7, 2008 @ 3:41 pm
Julie:

Next Sunday, ask to see the CHI and you can verify for yourself. As it says, those young people should have membership records but shouldn’t be counted among the 13.1 million members of the church.

With all due respect, Kendall, isn’t it possible that you might be misinterpreting the CHI, given the fact that you have addressed incorrectly as “Julie” three different times? At this point, I’ve got the word of my stake clerk that COR are indeed counted, as compared to your unknown source on the internet. Please understand that I mean no disrespect. Surely there is a ward or stake clerk here who coud weigh in with a third opinion? ;D

It’s is entirely possible that my stake clerk is completely wrong, and I’ll gladly eat crow if you are right. Right now, it’s easier for me to believe him and take your info with a grain of salt.

As to the question at hand, I think church leaders are well aware of the loss of young women as they make the transition from that organization to Relief Society. Up until last October, I was a leader in the YW organization for the past seven years, both on the ward and stake level. In 2002, we received a letter from the General YW and RS presidencies reminding us how valuable AND vulnerable these YW are, and giving ideas to make the transition smoother.

I can tell you first hand that both the RS president and the YW president have a lot to do with how a young women responds to the transition. In the wards where the girls were encouraged to move on to RS, and welcomed, made to feel important, and given an opportunity to serve in some capacity, they usually stayed active. If the girl was encouraged to stay in YW as long as possible, and/or basically ignored once they went into RS, then they found other places to be.

Comment by Jennifer in GA — April 7, 2008 @ 3:43 pm
Btw, attending wards with everyone else doesn’t mean disbanding stake or multi-stake or regional committees and activities.

Does anyone have access to the activity numbers of YSA prior to the establishment of singles units? I know the world was different then, but that would help see things historically.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 3:45 pm
Tanya Sue said:

I attened a different singles ward a few cities away and felt the spirit the strongest I ever have. The focus was truly on developing a relationship with your Savior and you God. It was beautiful.

That’s good to hear. I hope that’s more typical and that my daughter has run into the exception.

Cicero said:

Another thing that has changed are the large number of women who are consciously deciding to put off marriage until after graduation. … Since this is clearly at odds with the counsel given by the Priesthood and the Church, it is not surprising that some women decide not to regularly attend church.

Where has that counsel been given?

Comment by E — April 7, 2008 @ 3:46 pm
The gender issue is a different one. Y’all are talking about the differential loss of relevance of the gospel to young people because of a poor fit between their social needs and the Church or because the Church’s organization is off-putting.

This intrigues me. Traditionally the language used to describe people who stray from the fold is one of sin. Y’all are mobilizing a different language. Maybe y’all are just more sociological or something.

I think the pressures faced by young women are different than those faced by young men. They fit differently into social discourses. They also carry a different ideological weight and pressure, because of reproduction, than do men. Today, women are more likely to attend college and may soon be earning more than most men. Will this/ does this make a difference in terms of LDS thinking and practice?

Comment by David Knowlton — April 7, 2008 @ 3:48 pm
Along with all the other reasons they go inactive, I have to say it’s just so freaking easy to stop going. In cities with large singles wards, there is a huge turnover all the time. people in and out for school, jobs, internships whatever. As noted above, there are a lot more women than men. I’m talking a huge number of women. So, you’re bored, you hate being talked to like a child, you don’t think you’ll find a Mormon man (your chances aren’t good), you stop believing, you’re tired, lazy, feel undervalued, you don’t have any friends, the doctrine doesn’t seem to apply to you anymore, anything, you can just not go one Sunday and unless you’re in a visible calling (chances are you’re not bc there are so many people) NO ONE really notices if you don’t go. Then one week can turn into two or a month or whatever.

And because of the huge turnover, it’s hard for anyone to keep tabs on who’s really around and who’s not.

It’s easy to lose people this way.

Comment by amri — April 7, 2008 @ 4:05 pm
David - on your question about activity rates over a lifetime, Albrecht et al’s study on inactivity found that about 78% of Mormons are inactive at some point in their life. I discussed the study a bit more here at Mormon Mentality about a year ago.

Comment by matt b — April 7, 2008 @ 4:09 pm
David, this is going to be a difficult analogy to make properly, but I’m going to try. I apologize in advance if I butcher it:

In Ohio, the legislature decided to raise significantly the level of reading proficiency necessary to leave 4th grade. After the first year of the new standard, the percentage of students who failed the test jumped from less than 20% from the previous year to over 60%. The irony is that during the exact same year, nearly 95% of the students who took the reading portion of the Ohio Graduation Test passed it. Iow, less than 40% of the 4th Graders were considered successful readers, even though only 5% of them would be considered failures 8 years later when they took the graduation test.

The proposed solution for these “at-risk kids” (who weren’t “at-risk” under the previous standard) generally was to remove them for 30-90 minutes each day from the classroom with the “successful kids” and give them small group intervention. That’s fine in theory, but almost nobody stopped to think that “slowing down the instruction” meant not only that these kids would be missing the regular instruction (putting them behind the others by default), but that slower instruction actually *accelerates* the learning acquisition gap. The “solution” to isolate literally solidified the original gap and made it almost impossible to re-integrate the kids back into full classroom instruction. **It also separated them from their peer role models**, and labeled them all as problem children (those who needed special attention and treatment “normal kids” didn’t need - meaning there was an increase in socialization difficulties. The solution, imo, should have been to fix the core classroom instruction that was causing the problem in the first place, not create an intellectually and emotionally gratifying system that actually contributed to accelerated failure - when failure would not have been the result under the original measurement system.

My point? There was a disproportionate expectation put on those 4th graders that singled them out as failures, even though, treated as perfectly normal, they would be considered just fine a few years later.

I understand the pain we feel over inactivity, and I support *fully* efforts to reach out to those who are disproportionately more inactive than others, but sometimes I think we focus so much on the “YSA problem” that we end up creating complex situations to handle it - when proper implementation of the core organization would work just as well, if not better. Many of those who struggle in that age range will struggle no matter what we do, but holding them to an unrealistic standard, isolating them, condescending to them and sending them the message that they can’t succeed in the “normal” church . . . I just have a problem with that.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 4:12 pm
One thing the church could be doing a better job of is helping people move out of the “me-serving” mentality and on to the “other-serving” mentality. One with an “other-serving” outlook will stay in church while those who fail to get beyond the “me-serving” perspective will begin to drop as soon as it rains.

I agree 101% that the gaining of a other-serving mentality is critical. But to say that the Church has to do a better job of it then negates the whole point (the Church should serve me up a new other-focus mentality on a silver platter).

When I was in college, and single, I served as Elder’s Quorum president along with a Single RS president (local professional woman) and a Single YW’s president (newly converted college student), all in a family ward. That period was one of very fond memories of gospel service and friends.

Comment by MAC — April 7, 2008 @ 4:13 pm
#95 - Amri, that is another reason I don’t like singles wards. The turn-over rate almost guarantees nobody notices when someone stops attending.

Thank you for mentioning that. I can’t believe I forgot to do so.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 4:14 pm
bbell, when you presided over/chaperoned/managed/coordinated a singles activity as a married man with other married people, it’s possible that the impression was given that you were in charge BECAUSE you were married. After all, most (99.9%) of the bishops in the Church are married. Stake presidents are married. Mission presidents are married. GAs are married. These are the people (I’m putting on my cynical hat; I don’t really believe this) who can be trusted to organize, run, oversee, etc. Babies, children, teens, and..oh yes, the single people..just show up.

Comment by Single Ward Veteran — April 7, 2008 @ 4:15 pm
Amri-and let’s be honest, the leadership and members don’t have time to outreach to those who are not going. Even if they were to notice someone isn’t there, they don’t have time to call and check in, etc. I flat out told my bishop I was questioning my membership and whether I would continue to even be a member. He talked me into a blessing and no showed-completely forgot I brought it up and now haven’t heard from him in over a year. He isn’t a bad guy, he just has to pick and choose his battles.

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 4:15 pm
MAC, I agree with your comment 102%. I just phrased it that way to try to avoid being accused of blaming the victims who choose to go inactive.

Comment by Eric Russell — April 7, 2008 @ 4:19 pm
Matt b. Yes…but the Albrecht et al. study is already old. We need more material and more work. I think that is clear just from the conversation here. For example, the 78% over a lifetime is precariously close to the 80% cited by the journalist above. Yet the one is contemporaneous and the other is over a life time. I do not think the numbers could be simultaneously accurate.

It may be that the issues around inactivity have changed, since their study, meaning we now face a different situation.

Ray. I hear your point loud and clear. I was just arguing there is another concern. If the current situation leads to a net loss in members and a decline in overall membership in the US as the Pew numbers seem to bode, then other approaches than stay the course might be merited. However I am advocating neither approach.

I have no mantle under which to advocate.

Your example is good, but is religion really like teaching literacy? Only if you absolutely know, in advance, the code that the people must obtain. Otherwise the metaphor is perhaps stretched. The absolutely know is more the sectarian model I sketched above. It works but also has some strong limits.

Comment by David Knowlton — April 7, 2008 @ 4:28 pm
#101 Tanya Sue-

I don’t feel any blame on the leadership for that. They are monstrosities (these large singles’ wards in metropolitan centers or Utah) there’s no way to keep tabs on everyone and keep up with callings, interviews, etc.

I’m just saying it’s easy to go inactive. Some people that are inactive are there bc it was so easy to get there.

Comment by amri — April 7, 2008 @ 4:29 pm
also Tanya Sue, my condolences. It sucks to be told to turn to your bishops in crises of faith but not have them available because they’re so swamped they forget your crisis. That really sucks.

Comment by amri — April 7, 2008 @ 4:33 pm
David, just a minor point, but one that is important: If I understand correctly, the study doesn’t show a net loss in members or a decline in overall membership, but rather a decline in *relative* membership - a lower percent of the total population. Is this incorrect?

Everything I’ve seen indicates that general activity rates are fairly steady - that real attendance is increasing, even as relative membership is flat or slightly decreasing. If anyone has numbers that would help see that more clearly, it would be helpful to answer what you just mentioned.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 4:34 pm
#105 - Amen. That just hurts to hear.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 4:35 pm
Amri-It’s cool. I took it as a sign that it was ok for me to take a breather while I figure things out and what I actually believe. Him and I were actually really tight at one point-I just think he couldn’t deal with this because he never saw this coming from me. Everyone else did, but he didn’t.

I agree it is easier to go inactive in a singles ward. I am not sure what the solution is there. I am not sure if it is better in a family ward or not (as a single that is).

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 4:38 pm
Jennifer:

Sorry for the error, I’m posting in fits while trying to supervise a work crew doing something else.

As I said before, the info comes from a copy of the CHI; if you don’t think it’s correct, you can always ask to see a physical copy the next time you’re at church and see a ward clerk or a member of the bishopric.

They are probably still tracking those blessed but not baptized young people, but they shouldn’t be counted as members.

Comment by Kendall Smith — April 7, 2008 @ 4:38 pm
I was trying to restrain myself from trotting out my pet theory, but Amri and Tanya Sue have raised some of the same points, so here goes:

Dissolve singles wards. Form singles branches.

1. Easier to form close friendships. It’s just too daunting to try to get to know ~300 people well, especially if your ward/branch has a high turnover rate. Many people give up and socialize with a few friends, not bothering to reach out beyond their circle. Other people fade away entirely. It’s a lot easier to know everyone in a branch of 100-150, and a lot harder to disappear.

2. More meaningful opportunities for service. In a branch where there are fewer people to fill callings, it’s more likely that people will feel that their contributions are valued and needed, rather than feeling that they were given a made-up calling.

3. Possible lessening of the “meat market effect.” Because it is hard to get to know people in a group of ~300, there is a temptation for people to make decisions about whom to date based on first impressions and superficial characteristics. In a smaller group, as people get to know each other more deeply over a longer period of time, friendships and relationships develop more naturally. (I know some will object that people are less likely to date and marry in a smaller “pool,” but in my experience the quality of one’s interactions with members of the opposite sex matters more than the quantity.)

4. More manageable workload for the leadership. In a family ward with 300 people, the number of family units is actually far less than 300. But in a singles ward with 300 people, each individual is in a sense a family unit. Think what that means for a bishop of a 300-person singles ward doing tithing settlement, or how hard it is to have a good handle on how all the members of his ward are doing spiritually.

Comment by Anna — April 7, 2008 @ 4:48 pm
David - True. As I note in the link, we need something that takes into account 1)Converts; 2)Non-American Mormons; 3)The impact of the Internet. But for the time being, I suppose, it’s the best we’ve got.

Comment by matt b — April 7, 2008 @ 4:49 pm
Anna-I don’t know about the calling…I always felt that Assistant Nursery Coordinator for HFPE was really needed in the mid-singles/family ward I was in(not!).

Comment by Tanya Sue — April 7, 2008 @ 4:51 pm
The problem is that singles have more time than married folks. There’s simply a massively different dynamic. Yet simultaneously the older you get the fewer social opportunities are there. The problem is that if we want to socialize with Mormons there are huge problems. You can have your ward as a social nexus or you can go elsewhere. Even in Utah if you are over 26 chances are your out of the ward socializing will have far more to do with non-Mormons and inactives than actives. Which can lead to other problems.

But let’s be honest. If the issue is having a social life there is ultimately only so much the Church could ever do.

Comment by Clark Goble — April 7, 2008 @ 5:01 pm
I like Anna’s thoughts. We used to say — haven’t heard it in years — that “we divide to multiply.” That is, it was better to divide most wards before they were really large enough to form two wards, because the newer, smaller wards somehow rapidly filled to capacity when, among other reasons, people who had been overlooked in the big ward were suddenly sincerely needed in the new small one.

Comment by Ardis Parshall — April 7, 2008 @ 5:04 pm
Ardis is right — Anna has some very interesting ideas. Thanks, Anna.

Comment by Steve Evans — April 7, 2008 @ 5:12 pm
Kendall and Jennifer in GA: Wikipedia says “Church Handbook of Instructions, Book 1″ was issued in 1998 and 2006. So maybe is quoting from the outdated version and Jennifer’s clerk is following a new policy contained in the 2006 version. Can anyone else verify this hypothesis?

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 5:13 pm
I meant to say “maybe Kendall is quoting from the outdated version”

Comment by Sterling — April 7, 2008 @ 5:14 pm
Ray. You are, of course, right. I was pushing the issue further to make a point at the extreme.

Comment by david knowlton — April 7, 2008 @ 5:17 pm
I concur with the idea of making singles units smaller. It think the BYU singles units are smaller now than when I attended BYU.

I question whether dissolving singles units would solve the problem.

I don’t think the attendance percentages for unmarried members over 30 is any higher than for those under 30. I know that each time the singles ward in our stake has “kicked out” those over 30 or 31, most of the “refugees” quit attending.

I also know that the Church has historically been ambivolent about singles units and language units. About 30 years ago, the Church disbanded the ASU stake and wards, so that students could go to their “family” wards or their stake’s singles unit if it had one (most did not, at the time). Over time, more singles units were formed in the stakes, and the university stake reconstituted about 5-10 years ago.

An area presidency in California strongly encouraged the dissolution of singles and language units 8-10 years ago. Many were dissolved, and many (some would say most) of the former singles ward and language ward units stopped attending. A new area presidency changed the policy, and many of the dissolved units were reconstituted.

My guess is that the social science research division of the Church has done or is doing studies on the effects on Church participation of singles units versus singles programs in “family” units. I suspect that, if there are results of any such studies, they are inconclusive, or the Brethren would likely have taken a more firm stand on the issue.

Comment by DavidH — April 7, 2008 @ 5:18 pm
Since the point came up in the discussion, I’ll mention the following.

1 Tim. 3:2. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach;

Single RS Pres, yes. Single EQ Pres, yes. Single bishop, no.

Comment by Researcher — April 7, 2008 @ 5:21 pm
No worries, Kendall. I will definitely check the hard copy (so to speak) next Sunday.

Comment by Jennifer in GA — April 7, 2008 @ 5:26 pm
My wife sat next to our brilliant, lovely, and single RS President in a meeting where the leaders were stating the umpteen reasons why single members aren’t active (connections, feeling like they don’t belong, exclusion from callingsm and so forth). This RS President leaned over to my wife and said, “Look, it’s sex. Can we just stop beating around the bush and admit it’s sex?”

Comment by Dave — April 7, 2008 @ 5:28 pm
As a single woman in my late twenties I definitely feel like I’m being treated more infantile than other women my age with children. At least in my area, Institute is taught more like seminary. The CES teacher is probably only a couple of years older than me, but yet I feel like I’m being taught down to, so I don’t go. The activities for the YSA are the same activities that I went to as a 14 year old (dances - with the same music too!, firesides, etc…). There are Enrichment activites in my ward, but most of them occur during the daytime which accommodates stay-at-home mothers but not graduate students such as myself. Maybe if there were more interest based groups within wards (sports, book clubs, etc…) where both men and women could participate, it could break down the barrier between married and single and I would feel more valued to the ward. I think the same principle could work for activities for the YSA. I think a lot of young singles are lost because of the “boredom” factor of feeling like you are perpetually going to Mutual.

Comment by Carrie — April 7, 2008 @ 5:53 pm
I just want to thank everyone for your comments. We have been discussing this issue for the last few months in our stake, and I just shared some of these comments with a few of the key leaders.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 6:44 pm
Ray, as someone who is young, single, in college, and in a regular ward, I have to say I like all of your suggestions. And here’s why. My ward is amazing. The YSAs are a generally a pretty close group. We have responsibilities in our ward that tie us to other members. You start to see church as something special, and value the interaction with people who aren’t like you. Its not common life experience that ties us together, its the gospel. All of my YSA friends value and enjoy church on Sunday. I feel like an important part of my ward, and I’ve never felt marginalized because I was single (this may be because I’m 20… nobody really expects me to be married yet. I am open to realizing that experience might be different for people a few years older than me).

Last summer I lived in Provo for a couple of months. Church became just another thing that people did. It was nothing special and nobody really seemed to enjoy or treasure it. It was a lot more bland and a lot less spiritual, even if there were no screaming children in the pews.

I don’t like the typical singles ward dynamic. I like the idea of living in an area with a higher concentration of young, single LDS people, and I’m sure I will after I graduate next year. However, I know such a move will come at the expense of something I treasure. I feel wanted, needed, loved, and utilized in my current ward. I’m not sure even the most amazing singles ward in the world is capable of matching the experience I’ve had in my current ward.

And the saddest thing about singles wards is missing out on getting to know the really cool people around you that are already married. There isn’t currently an option for me to go to a singles ward (there aren’t any in the entire state where I live, and the closest ones are about an hour away), but even if there was one here, I’m not sure I’d go. My ward has so many really great people, especially the married grad students and their families, and since they live so close to me, I’d be missing out by not knowing who they were.

Comment by Megan — April 7, 2008 @ 6:48 pm
When I was single and in my early 30s, the stake singles decided to take an overnight trip to Sea World. The stake insisted that we had to have “adult chaperones”, despite the fact that many (perhaps most) of the participants were over 21 and adults by any reasonable standard.

One of the “adult chaperones” was (I kid you not) a recently-married 20-year-old sister–chaperoning grownups nearly old enough to be her parents.

There’s really no way to explain that, except to conclude that married people of any age are considered adults, while singles of any age are not.

Comment by Left Field — April 7, 2008 @ 6:59 pm
I’m jumping in here without having read each post carefully, but you may be interested in the experience of a 55-year-old Utah County resident with five daughters.

In my experience, ward and stake leaders, with a considerable push from their area presidencies are simply trying to locate YSA’s. They have a tendency to disappear. Some of you have suggested that YSA’s disappear because they are invisible. I think that is true to some degree. They also disappear because they do not wish to be seen. The reasons for that are as varied and numerous as the young people themselves. Most of us have limited anecdotal evidence for people we know, but our experiences do not translate into easily generalizable data.

The Church, quite obviously, has not found an institutional solution to the problem. One rationale for the Church trying to maintain YSA wards is to try to bring enough young people together under a single roof to increase the odds of meeting a marriage partner. Changing social mores in the United States challenge this rationale. More young people prefer to remain single well beyond their late teens or early twenties. Age differences in these wards are often magnified, making it difficult to keep and maintain friendships, especially when some friends marry and others are “left behind.”

I want, however, to suggest a different reason for the disappearances. One group we haven’t mentioned here is the significant number of returned missionaries (male) who disappear. This number has everyone very concerned indeed. No one seems to have an explanation.

Here is my interpretation. I believe that the youth programs of the church, including seminary, leave our kids spiritually barren. The programs tend to emphasize “activity,” “scripture reading,” “wholesome entertainment,” speaking pat testimonial phrases, but make little real effort to introduce kids to much more than sentimentality. They remind me of the phenomenon the English have called enthusiasm. In such a milieu, it’s very easy simply to fit in with the crowd or to be turned off by the absence of real depth.

I think the same thing continues for many missionaries who go through the motions but experience no real change of heart. It also happens to the people they teach who quickly fall away.

I guess I’m saying that there are some institutional practices that keep kids active while not fostering conversion. Adolescence and young adulthood should be a time when people are invigorated by spiritual communication, personal inspiration, respect for differences, and profound questions. Instead, it has become a time for rigid social conformity, a time when social pressure replaces attempts to guide young people toward experiences that strengthen true testimonies. No wonder our kids say they are bored. We offer them empty cisterns.

That is at least a partial explanation for what has gone wrong. Our own culture, paradoxically, leads kids away from the kinds of experiences that lead to true conversion.

Comment by Neal Kramer — April 7, 2008 @ 7:19 pm
Neal gets the prize for most perspicacious comment.

Comment by J. Stapley — April 7, 2008 @ 7:26 pm
#127 - I said that once to someone in my ward and got called in for an interview with the bishop the next week.

Comment by Ray — April 7, 2008 @ 7:54 pm
Amen, Anna #110, a thousand times amen.

Comment by sister blah 2 — April 7, 2008 @ 8:13 pm
I think the high inactivity rate of YSA’s (men and women) is incredibly scary for the Church - especially the women being so inactive - traditionally the church has relied a lot on the young women to keep the young men active. Although hopefully some of these people will return to activity after marriage and families start - still, with the high inactivity rate and falling family size - a significant decrease in children BIC could result - and with the admittedly less than stellar retention rate of new converts, this doesn’t bode well for growth. Perhaps I am biased, because all of my young adult children (5) went inactive during my divorce. The church/ward did nothing at all to reach out to them and try to help them maintain their membership. It was really sad for me to watch. Frequently children of divorce fall away, because of Elder Wirthlin’s idea they don’t fit in. I have struggled so to help them return, but so far no luck - they are just making lives for themselves outside the church. I see even very active families having 2, 3 or even more of their children falling away. It is a big problem all over the church. I don’t have a clue how to solve it.

Comment by chimera — April 7, 2008 @ 8:19 pm
I have no experience in a single ward but from some of the descriptions among the comment, they begin to sound like the ghettoization of unmarried members. Is that to harsh sounding?

Comment by Ogan — April 7, 2008 @ 9:23 pm
Clark #80:

The anti-”meat market” bit gets to be a bit silly (IMO). Look. For most under 25 they are dating a lot or at least interested in dating. It might only be a fraction of everyone but they like to date a lot. And lots of people are interesting in “finding the one.” There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s far less of a meat market than say an LDS dating site.

Hopefully I can manage to disagree without being disagreeable (sometimes I struggle with that ) here goes:

I vehemently disagree with this comment. To me (and I’m willing to admit that this reflects a strong bias towards my personality and experience) this is the exact mentality that leads to the de-spiritualization of single’s wards, the removal of real meaning and ultimately making people (me at that age, for one) not feel like it is valuable and something they want to participate in.

YES, people under 25 like dating. YES, want to “find the one.” But here’s thing thing, I don’t want to go to a 3-hour Sunday block to do those things! I go to church to take the sacrament, to feel the spirit, to serve in my calling, to be instructed in the gospel and unite with a community of saints.

There are plenty of other hours in the week to date and find the one. Why can’t church be church, and when I want to date I go to a dating website?

Explicitly meeting-other-singles weekday activities are one thing (note that these could happen for singles while they attend a family ward), but conflating the Sunday rituals with a single’s bar mentality seems very wrong-headed to me. As a single person, I felt like “the system” set up this way wasn’t valuing my spiritual growth as much as it was just pushing me to hook up.

The idea that I could be in a (singles) ward council meeting, and in addition to providing single-minded service to the Lord, I’d be noticing that the EQP is really hot, is a little jarring and almost creepy to me, like workplace sexual-harassment-y or something. Now this is where I’m willing to admit my strong emotional reaction could be an individual thing, maybe I’m just not good at multi-tasking? But I don’t think I’m entirely alone in this, and this kind of “those 25s always have dating on the brain!” notion is the vehicle though which I personally experienced that “infantilizing” vibe that many singles talk about.

Comment by sister blah 2 — April 7, 2008 @ 10:06 pm
I am currently a Bishop of a YSA ward, so I will chime in with a few general comments.

1. There is no one size fits all. Some YSA members would thrive in a family ward, others would not and vice versa.

2. I am quite confident that if our Stake dissolved our ward, we would lose a significant number of our members to inactivity. A few might benefit, but most would not.

3. Our activity rate is between 40% and 50%. That is about average for YSA wards in this area, and I am astonished by the low numbers I see quoted above. I am not sure I believe them, although I have no way of knowing. The large majority of those on our ward list who are inactive became inactive long ago, likely in their teenage years. I can’t think of any active members we have lost to inactivity, but I can think of a few inactive members who have come back into activity. It is doubtful that they would have become active in a family ward, although I obviously don’t know that.

4. We have about 90 active members. We know them all, we miss them when they are not there, and they are much less likely to get lost in our ward than they would be in a family ward. However, I don’t think I could say that if our ward was twice our size, as is the case in many YSA wards.

5. I don’t particularly like the “young single adult” title. My ward members are adults in every sense of the word, but they all have their stories of being patronized and condescended to. Our relief society president once thanked our Bishopric for treating them like adults. I was stunned that being treated like an adult would be worthy of mention, coming from a 26 year old professional.

Comment by Gary — April 7, 2008 @ 10:12 pm
Hm, re-reading my own comment (trying to diagnose if I was too disagreeable ), the term “family ward” really jumped out at me. Now that I think about it, that’s a pretty divisive term. I’ll have to remind myself not to use it anymore.

Comment by sister blah 2 — April 7, 2008 @ 10:14 pm
YES, people under 25 like dating. YES, want to “find the one.” But here’s thing thing, I don’t want to go to a 3-hour Sunday block to do those things! I go to church to take the sacrament, to feel the spirit, to serve in my calling, to be instructed in the gospel and unite with a community of saints.

The problem is that this is not only why people go. There have been a fair number of surveys on people leaving the Church and social connections is usually the root cause.

If yo