"Fastest Growing Church in America" was briefly true during the 1960's.. I guess MorgCorp. doesn't want to admit publically the mass exodus since the internet exploded. Also, members names are kept on the books for a hundred years, whether or not they are inactive or have resigned.
.....Mormons love the argumentum ad populum fallacy when overall they are just a rather insignificant cult in other than the Morridor. Longing for acceptance and feelings of inferiority? Aren't they supposed to delight in being a "peculiar people"? Even if we accept their deceptive accounting of their members, they are still less than two percent of the US, the highest percentage of any country on the planet.
The article this was based on is erroneous, and will likely be retracted tomorrow. The Morg has already done their damage, though, feeding phony numbers to the papers. Doubtful either the Des News or USA today will do a retraction on it, SLtrib probably will I think.
link: mormonthink.com (What's new section on front page)
I did a Google search and all I find are references to the article. Who does the survey and do they use reliable methods? I suspect something is rotten in Denmark. It probably came straight from the LDS, Inc.'s Ministry of Propaganda. If so, they seem like they are getting more desperate. It feels like something pulled from someone's arse and not a very veiled lie at that.
The more interesting story is not the bogus numbers - it's the fact that the morg is desperate to convince the world (and themselves) that they're still viable. They're baling as much water as possible, but the ship continues to sink. I hope they all know how to swim.
There is a very simple reason why USA Today (and all those other news outlets) quote the church's spin without any questioning: they reckon that the only people interested in reading an article about the growth of a cult are the members of that cult.
Think about it: how many of you would read an article with a title like "Ahmadiyya fastest growing branch of islam" or "Hare Krishna movement to open new temple in (name of town fifty miles away)"?
So the same goes for all those articles about new mormon temples, of course.
At the end of the day, USA Today just wants to publish one article about every little denomination once in a while, so all those people keep feeling good about the paper and keep reading it. By the same reasoning, most newspapers will write something nice about PFLAG once in a blue moon.