Anyone know how Mormonism is doing in Africa given the LDS history of racism against blacks?
Do black people there know of LDS racist past?
Do they care? OR...
are they leaving Mormonism in "droves"...as predicted by some?

Africa is one of the last places on Earth where it’s still possible for missionaries to convert people. Last I heard there was growth there. Since the converts were born after 1976, the history would bother them less.

Most people who join the church generally are not that skilled in researching its history. Most people joining today are interested in Jesus. How it makes them feel good to talk about Jesus. So converts in Africa would be more interested in stuff about Jesus and the warm fuzzies it. They would not have been exposed to critical thinking about doctrinal problems etc. About Christianity.Remember ignorance is bliss when it comes to Mormons That is why the come follow me program is interesting. Its focus is Christ. Not the stuff that created the Mormon Church. The problem is most people who have studied religion and are interested in Christian religion start to see the flaws and it turns them to other stuff like new age religion

New Age is popular because it teaches you are in charge of your own destiny. I have found new age to be just as strange as anything Mormonism teaches and it’s full of opportunists and charlatans as well. New Age has it’s cult leaders as well.

I took a meditation and yoga class and found my instructor believed they were being visited by lion looking creatures that fly in a UFO. Ha! Ha! I though I wonder if they are flying in from Kolob?

"In the spaceship, the silver spaceship, the lion waves goodbye." This is an actual lyric from the song "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," as performed by They Might Be Giants. It's an old song now, and I just thought it was weird how it lined up.

There’s a Mormon born every minute.

Secular Priest Wrote:
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> Most people who join the church generally are not
> that skilled in researching its history. Most
> people joining today are interested in Jesus. How
> it makes them feel good to talk about Jesus. So
> converts in Africa would be more interested in
> stuff about Jesus and the warm fuzzies it. They
> would not have been exposed to critical thinking
> about doctrinal problems etc. About
> Christianity.Remember ignorance is bliss when it
> comes to Mormons That is why the come follow me
> program is interesting. Its focus is Christ. Not
> the stuff that created the Mormon Church. The
> problem is most people who have studied religion
> and are interested in Christian religion start to
> see the flaws and it turns them to other stuff
> like new age religion

And community and social conversions. I'd say most converts these day "convert" because they enjoy the community or because of friend, family member or love interest.

the FACT that ChurchCo moves $ (wealth) from developing countries <ANY COUNTRIES> to SLC ought to be a CRIME!

Instead, Russ chides them to send their tithing with the suggestion that they'll become more prosperous if they do...


Russ is the snake-oil salesman of our times.

I suspect in the rare occasion that it's ever brought up, and if the mishies are prepared at all*, they talk about how great JS was with Jane Manning and Elijah Abel, and make it sound like TSCC was always the leader in equal rights--IOW, answering the question the investigator *should* have asked...

Because, you know, that's how the Church™ works.


*Any RM's here on RfM that served in Africa? My niece did, but there's no way in hell I'm going to ask her: "So, how did you deal with the fact that the church is partly built on racism on your mission?"

It *might* be interesting to learn/know how many missionaries are currently serving in Africa / have been sent there, compared to the rest of the world, that is ...;

do the MPs still abide the financial rules/guidelines that apply to other MPs regarding church funds & their 'stipend'?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/26/2019 01:44PM by GNPE.

My cousin is "special" meaning a total ass. I thought it was a good place for him to go. I wouldn't dare ask him about how their mission was. Maybe his wife.

I would rather hear of Africans in mormonism.

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
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> I would rather hear of Africans in mormonism.

Or Mormonism in an African.

Excuse me.

Are you related to Jame Retief?


I’m asking for a friend.


Oops! Wikipedia has instructed me to check with Jame Retief, to ask HIM if he is related to you!!

I lived in Congo just before I resigned my membership, and my wife and I hung out a lot with the several American senior missionaries there. We got a close look at "The Lord's Work." Yeah, a lot of Africans join, because most most of sub-Saharan Africans are constantly looking for religion. Sit down and talk to them about your religion, and they want to join. But retention is poor, just like the rest of the world. Plus missionaries don't tell them about the former priesthood ban. It's ironic how Mormons discriminated against Africans, and now depend on them for growth and bragging rights.

ALL churches grow in Africa. It's easy pickin's, because Africans, in general, love religion, love God, love magical thinking, and hope to somehow profit from belief, and look for prosperity in belief. I hired an LDS guy to do work around my house after he continued to beg for work. It was non-sh*t stuff that I could easily have done, like washing our car and scrubbing our floor. So I paid him $60 a month for it, better than the average salary. He became bishop of the Kasa Vubu ward in Kinshasa. In our normal talks, he went on and on about sorcery and witchcraft, and really believed in it. The RS president once told me how she is so afraid of sorcery, and had hired a local shaman to give her a "fetish" (I don't understand the use of the word there, but Congolese were always buying "fetishes" for protection). So they are eager to find religion, but flit around between churches, and conflate Christianity and Mormonism with folk belief. That will never change. Talk to them about your church, and they are sure to join.

A fetish is an inanimate object with magic powers like a rabbit's foot or a voodoo doll or something that is supposed to protect you from danger.




ETA: A seer stone would probably count as a fetish.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/01/2019 03:47PM by Lot's Wife.

Hasn't there been a corny musical on this subject?

I suspect that if Russ' words of advice regarding paying tithing *& sending it to SL, never to be seen again* > is the way for Africans to get out of poverty (preposterous on it's face), ChurchCo would be shown the door...

But they won't tell that to the masses, or at least most
Africans won't understand the totality of the significance....


This, IMHO, is THE WORST THING OUT OF SL IN DECADES

I had to post this, although it is not really germane to the argument. But as I was saying above, even Mormon Africans still buy into sorcery and witchcraft. In 2005, when we arrived in Kinshasa for my tour there, the city was in the grips of violence caused by people believing that shamans and witches were selling so-called "fetishes" to shrink or destroy the penises of their enemies. No one I knew had had it done to them, of course, but they all swore that they had friends or relatives that it had happened to. Some people reported getting on public transportation with a penis, and discovering their penis had disappeared by the time they arrived at their destination. Weird stuff. Here's the Reuters article on the subject. Oddly enough, the article was from 2008, about 3 years or so from the time I first remembered it happening.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-congo-democratic-witchcraft/lynchings-in-congo-as-penis-theft-panic-hits-capital-idUSL2290323220080422

In the context of religion and Mormonism, this is what the churches still deal with there. Even your average Congolese bishop or stake president will still believe in this.

Being called to serve a two-year mission is the best job many Africans will ever have, their entire lives! 24 months of dependable pay, along with playing dress-up six days a week.

How does that work? Do all native African missionaries get paid rather than paying for the privlege?

It's all the worthy 3rd world young people, male & female. Of course, the church doesn't just forward them their monthly stipend, out of the goodness of its heart, it gets rich member/donors to foot the bill.

While there may be a few sincere young elders and sisters who don't look at it as a job, they are probably in the minority.

I a mishie blog in which the elder wrote home to American and explained that his native companion would simply disappear and it turned out the companion was meeting with his young, femail 'camp follower', who was also living off that stipend.

Another mishie, in Cambodia, tracted out an inactive member who'd served a mission and who lamented that those 18 months were quite likely to constitute the best job she was ever to likely have.

It's on the basis of these two stories, and my experiences with human nature that I base my sentiments.

I don't think LDS, Inc. cares about retention all that much in Africa. On their books, once you join you are in the database forever. Appearances are everything. The bigger the numbers the more they can crow that Mormonism is growing. I have a cousin who keeps hearing that Mormonism is still the fastest growing religion. He is a never Mo. It seems to be human nature to believe anything in print.

I just looked up Nigeria. LDS Inc reports 180,000 members, 54 stakes and about a dozen districts. Some converts are staying active. Stakes don't run themselves.

I'm kind of curious about how the Africa wing will work out in the long run.

If the LDS church were to offer public school scholarships (school fees, plus required uniforms--even if they were used hand-downs, and required books or whatever) to the offspring of LDS members, the church would very quickly begin breaking Africa "new member" records among all Christian denominations.

The one thing everyone in Africa wants above all else is public school education (through high school at least....plus, hopefully, through university level for those who achieve pre-university qualifications), but the pre-university requirements for required uniforms, etc. is unreachable for most hardworking families.

If their kids could go to public school, and graduate with the equivalent of at least a high school diploma, African families would do just about anything for the church--and they would pass this on to the succeeding generations.