The pandemic plunge
All church statistics for 2020 should carry a COVID-19 asterisk. While everyone expected the pandemic to shrink growth, we now know the extent: Convert baptisms cut in half, for instance, and new children of record down by nearly a third.
Independent researcher Matt Martinich, who religiously tracks these demographics at ldschurchgrowth.blogspot.com, sheds more light with some eye-popping observations:
Total membership • 16,663,663, up 98,627 (0.6%) from 16,565,036 in 2019.
“The last time the church reported an annual membership growth rate that was slower than 2020 was in 1857, when negative membership growth occurred (this was during the time of the reformation movement when church leaders advocated rebaptism to recommit to their covenants and to church teachings),” Martinich writes. “.The last time there was an increase of less than 100,000 for total church membership was in 1973, when there was a net increase of 87,750 members.”
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The Daily Universe
The Provo Community Congregational United Church of Christ hopes to raise $2 million for a restoration project to update and repair its buildings to serve as community gathering places. (Sydnee Gonzalez)
Over 130 years of time and weather damage have made it necessary to restore and repair Provo’s Community Congregational United Church of Christ’s buildings
in order for the church to continue to serve the community.
The church began fundraising at the beginning of February for contributions to make the much-needed repairs possible. Their goal is to raise $2 million during a 12-month period.
The renovation process began with the church’s Reverend Keith Cupples. After years of retirement as a Methodist pastor, Cupples was asked to lead the United Church of Christ here in Provo. He took the position but requested not to receive any salary or pension for his work.
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Memories linger a decade after the huge Provo Tabernacle fire
(Rick Egan | Tribune file photo) Provo firefighters shoot water on the flames on the north side of the Provo Tabernacle, Friday, December 17, 2010.
By Genelle Pugmire | The Daily Herald via AP
| Dec. 21, 2020, 5:14 p.m.
Provo • The shadows of 2020 are about the only thing that remain of a rather unusual and chaotic year. But time passes quickly and it will soon be but a memory.
That is exactly what area residents were saying a decade ago when their year ended with a devastating fire the belched pillars of smoke and shooting flames, the Daily Herald reported.