Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Convert and Member of Record Baptisms, and Deaths

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reports convert baptism for the world (April Conference Statistical Reports), but does not break down the numbers by smaller geographic units like countries, states, missions or stakes.  The researcher in me recoils at this lack of data but the member in me rejoices at the frugality in the expenditure of tithes.  Building on prior work, I use demographic data by country to break down the increase in membership by country into convert baptisms, member of record baptisms and deaths. 
The Church also reports membership by country on an annual basis at the Church Newsroom.  I used that data to calculate the change in membership from 2011 to 2013.  This is the second piece of the puzzle.  The change in membership is equal to child of record baptisms plus convert baptisms less deaths and excommunications.  I used demographic data from the CountryData function of Wolfram’s Mathematica program to estimate proxies for child or record baptisms and deaths.  Excommunications are reported to be a small percentage of the change in membership and, because I could not devise a proxy, I assumed them to be zero.  This will create a slight downward bias in my estimate of child or record births and convert baptisms.
I estimated child baptisms by multiplying the birth rate by the church membership for each country.  Not all children born into the Church will be baptized.  I multiplied the Seminary enrollment rates reported in “Seminary Activity Rates by Country,” to reduce the births to Church members to an estimate of the number of births that were baptized as members.  This number is likely to be a lower bound as death and inactivity grow as members age; initial estimates of child or record baptisms will be too low and convert baptisms, too high.  To summarize, child of record baptisms are estimated multiplying membership by both the birth rate and the Seminary enrollment rate.  Deaths were easier to estimate.  I multiplied church membership by the death rate. 
With the change in membership, child of record baptisms and deaths in hand, I estimated convert baptisms by country.  I then summed my estimate of convert baptisms and found that they exceeded actual convert baptisms.  I then multiplied convert baptisms for each country by a factor of .79114 to produce an estimate of convert baptisms by country that summed to the correct number.  This implies that the number of child of record baptisms or deaths by country was too low.  Using my estimates of convert baptisms, I made a second estimate of child of record baptism by country by multiplying the original estimate until the new estimate plus the estimate of convert baptisms less deaths summed to the correct worldwide total.  The estimates are presented in the table in the second portion of the post.   


CountryChange in MembershipEstimated Change in MembershipChild of Record BaptismsConvert BaptismsDeaths
Africa
Cape Verde
1,297
1,067
92
1,023
48
Cote d’Ivoire
2,354
2,086
470
1,795
179
DR Congo
4,112
3,773
1,072
3,066
365
Ghana
3,809
3,576
1,176
2,838
437
Kenya
947
901
314
696
109
Liberia
846
750
191
682
123
Madagascar
1,173
1,049
242
871
64
Nigeria
6,100
5,389
1,677
5,479
1,766
R of Congo
1,776
1,486
164
1,370
48
Sierra Leone
1,580
1,413
376
1,259
222
South Africa
2,261
1,958
672
2,265
978
Uganda
1,074
864
72
916
124
Zimbabwe
2,209
1,883
370
1,848
335
Asia

Hong Kong
196
179
106
241
168
India
994
857
149
768
60
Indonesia
92
99
62
78
41
Japan
663
560
536
1,281
1,257
Mongolia
374
367
151
277
61
Philippines
13,568
14,261
7585
9,985
3,308
South Korea
587
530
310
730
510
Taiwan
1,276
1,059
232
1,209
382
Thailand
553
462
89
492
118
Europe

Armenia
59
55
24
55
24
Austria
51
51
36
59
43
Belgium
86
77
38
99
61
Denmark
-12
3
39
8
44
Finland
30
56
76
27
47
France
565
491
202
617
328
Germany
71
123
280
269
425
Hungary
96
73
18
118
63
Ireland
98
89
30
83
23
Italy
527
457
172
553
269
Netherlands
83
75
48
109
82
Norway
118
109
43
106
40
Portugal
1,181
906
113
1,230
437
Russia
291
240
146
437
343
Spain
1,374
1,179
348
1,318
487
Sweden
60
73
81
86
93
Switzerland
114
123
87
111
75
Ukraine
163
159
121
215
176
UK
433
392
795
1,477
1,880
N. America
Canada
2,493
2,644
1,765
2,363
1,484
Costa Rica
1,492
1,347
360
1,147
159
Dom. Rep.
2,411
2357
1,037
1,930
610
El Salvador
2,705
2665
1,154
2,071
560
Guatemala
7,958
7658
2,885
5,932
1,159
Haiti
758
628
110
675
157
Honduras
6,249
5837
1,884
4,693
740
Jamaica
131
124
50
109
35
Mexico
44,501
40,302
11,554
35,115
6,366
Nicaragua
4,604
3,987
735
3,557
304
Panama
1,242
1,206
490
953
237
Puerto Rico
234
194
79
283
168
USA
92,183
110,397
86,086
74,145
49,834
Oceania
A. Samoa
218
345
334
73
62
Australia
4,225
3,843
1,248
3,522
927
Fiji
680
669
272
495
98
French Polynesia
775
813
401
522
109
Kiribati
915
721
41
803
123
Marshall Islands
180
172
62
133
23
New Zealand
1,384
1,487
984
1,246
743
Papua New Guinea
1,071
886
122
905
141
Samoa
1,507
1,734
1,136
1,031
434
Tonga
1,190
1.353
851
799
297
South America
Argentina
12,655
10,960
2,756
11,001
2,796
Bolivia
5,489
5,399
2,366
4,275
1,242
Brazil
36,441
32,621
9,462
30,201
7,041
Chile
6,883
6,270
2,769
6,926
3,425
Colombia
4,398
4,187
1,670
3,574
1,057
Ecuador
8,230
7,239
1,690
6,564
1,015
Paraguay
2,264
2,193
847
1,676
330
Peru
18,947
18,355
7,197
14,210
3,053
Uruguay
2,139
1,712
365
2,225
879
Venezuela
4,094
4,299
2,194
2,873
769

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