Brigham Young University BYU ScholarsArchive
Theses and Dissertations
1994
The International Diffusion of the Mormon Church
Samuel Otterstrom Brigham Young University - Provo
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BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Otterstrom, Samuel, "The International Diffusion of the Mormon Church" (1994). Theses and Dissertations. 5004. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/etd/5004
This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. the international diffusion
of the mormon church
A thesis
presented to the
department of geography
brigham young university
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree
master of science
by
samuel M otterstrom
august 1994 this thesis by samuel M otterstrom is accepted in its present form by the department of geography ofbrighamofbrigham young university as satisfying the thesis requirement for the degree of master of science
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11 acknowledgements
it would not have been possible for me to complete this thesis in a timely manner without the consistent support given to me by my family and the faculty in the geography department professors jackson davis shumway and emmett have all given very valuable editing and content revision suggestions it is amazing to me that they even took the time to read the whole thing I1 especially appreciate dr davis help in regards to formatting and printing of the final project he has encouraged me all the way jeff bird also deserves thanks for assisting me a cartographic amateur in learning how to use the aldus computer program to make the maps used in the study
I1 would like to especially thank my wife lori who has motivated me and taken care of our rambunctious boys nils and ethan very unselfishly so I1 could have time to write and write and finally thanks are extended to my motherinlawmother in law jean thomas who has been very generous to us by letting us live in her home during most of my graduate experience at BYU without her help we would be impoverished instead ofjust plain poor
iiililliiiiilii111 TABLE OF CONTENTS
page
LIST OF TABLES v
LIST OF FIGURES vi
I1 THE PROBLEM AND ITS SETTING I11
II11 THE literature REVIEW AND conceptual FRAMEWORK 5
iliillIII111 DATA AND methodology 21
IV OVERVIEW OF international LDS GROWTH 29
V SOUTH AMERICA 35
VI MIDDLE AMERICA 68
vilVII EUROPE AND CANADA 85 villVIII ASIA 92
IX SOUTH PACIFIC 100
X AFRICA 104
XI SUMMARY conclusions AND recommendations 108
APPENDIX 115
bibliography 116
IV LIST OF TABLES table page
I11 countries with more than 10000 LDS in 1991 27
2 1989911989 91 LDS growth rates for nations in table I11 34
3 south america early mormon diffusion 37
4 south america 1994 mormon geography 39
5 brazil number of stakes by city and year 40
6 brazil number of stakes by state and capital 47
7 chile number of stakes by city and year 49
8 chile number of stakes by region 53
9 argentina number of stakes by city and year 57
10 peru number of stakes by city and year 60
11 middle america early mormon diffusion 69
12 middle america 1994 mormon geography 71
13 mexico number of stakes by city and year 73
14 europe early mormon diffusionmormons 1993 87
15 asia early mormon diffusionmormons 1993 94
16 south pacific early mormon diffusionmormons 1993 101
17 africa early mormon diffusion mormons 1993 106
v LIST OF FIGURES figure page
I11 preliminary conceptual model of international LDS diffusion 15
2 brazil stakes and missions 19691974 41
3 brazil stakes and missions 19791984 42
4 brazil stakes and missions 19891994 43
5 chileargentinauruguay stakes and missions 19691974 50
6 chileargentinauruguay stakes and missions 19791984 51
7 chileargentinauruguay stakes and missions 19891994 52
8 PeruperuecuadorEcuador stakes and missions 1979198419891994 61
9 mexico stakes and missions 19691974 74
10 mexico stakes and missions 19791984 75
11 mexico stakes and missions 19891994 76
12 philippines stakes and missions 19791984 97
13 philippines stakes and missions 19891994 98
14 conceptual model of international LDS diffusion 110
viVI I1 THE PROBLEM AND ITS SETTING
introduction
the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints also known as the mormon church has grown from its simple beginning in 1830 of six members in new york state to over 878.7 million followers around the globe in 1994 this amazing growth has not been evenly spread over time and place but today there are mormon congregations in at least 149 nations and territories
the mormon church feels it has been given the divine mandate to spread its beliefs
throughout every nation kindred tongue and people book ofmormonof normonmormon mosiah 320 additionally its doctrine states that the diffusion mormonismofofmormonism to all countries must occur before the end of the world
and again this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations and then shall the end come or the destruction of the wicked pearl of great price joseph smithmatthewsmith matthew 131311
the mormon church has made missionary work a high priority ever since the churchs
founding in 1830 throughout the rest of the 1800s the church had success in gaining
converts in some foreign countries particularly upper canada great britain denmark
switzerland and the society islands french polynesia most of these new members
except those in the society islands gathered to utah after their conversion leaving few
mormons in their native countries it was not until the twentieth century when church leaders began to encourage converts to stay and support mormon congregations in their own countries that the mormons began to have an international presence the most substantial worldwide diffusion of the church has been a recent phenomenon in 1930 approximately 90 percent of all church members lived in the united states this figure has dropped dramatically so that by 1980 only 70 percent of mormons lived in the USA by 1991 only eleven years later this proportion was less then 5555 percent otterstrom 19909 deseretdeseretnewsnews church almanac 1992
this research will analyze the patterns of international growth of the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints to show the principal models of spatial diffusion which have operated to create the present worldwide church membership distribution it will also illustrate the magnitude and extent of this increase ofmormonismofmormonism
the study will not attempt to show how religious diffusion operates on a microlevelmicro level neither is it intended to be a complete history of mormon international expansion furthermore it will not describe the effect of internal relocation of church members in a country on diffusion patterns not because migration is not a factor but because of the lack of obtainable data
it is assumed that the locations of stakes missions wards and branches see appendix for the definitions of these terms within countries or regions can be considered to be reliable indicators of the actual diffusion of LDS church populations this assumption will be explored further in the chapter concerning the data sources
2 the iml2ortanceimportance of the study
the purpose of this thesis is to show the nature and magnitude of the geographic spread
of the church worldwide it explores the international expansion of the mormon church
from a geographic perspective which has not been done in this way before it also seeks to
bring further understanding to a type of religious diffusion which deserves more
investigation as a spatial phenomenon by so doing it will be able to show where mormonisms spatial diffusion within international countries fits into current diffusion theory
the organization of the remainder of the studstudy
chapter two will review related studies on general and religious diffusion as well as specific works on the growth of the mormon church the conclusion of the chapter will outline the geographic conceptual framework which will govern the approach to the problem
chapter three describes the data their sources and the methodologies which will be
employed to test the stated hypotheses chapter four is an overview outlining the history of the growth of the mormon church since its inception chapters five through ten correspond to six different regions of the world south america middle america europe and canada asia the south pacific and africa the emergence of mormonism in these regions is
illustrated by outlining the original diffusion of the church into the countries within these
regions and showing the ongoing growth patterns which account for the current mormon
3 distributions this will be to determine the part which hierarchical and contagious diffusion processes play in the international spread of the mormon religion
the final chapter includes the summary of the findings of the thesis and the recommendations for further study in the realm of mormon international diffusion and growth now follows a look at previous studies related to this thesis
4 II11 TBETHE literature REVIEW AND conceptual FRAMEWORK overview of diffusion studies
the phenomenon of spatial diffusion has been the subject of much discussion and research in the world of geographic study the seminal theory of spatial diffusion was set forth by torsten hagerstrand in his 1953 dissertation innovation diffusion as a spatial process morrill et al 198823 hagerstrand produced a model which helped explain the spatial nature of the spread of a farm implement innovation in sweden hagerstrand argued that because most peoples contact network is localized the diffusion of an innovation would likewise be a local process where an innovation spread outward in a contagious manner morrill et al 19882319882341988 23423 4
the research of hagerstrand has had great influence on the many paths that diffusion research have followed see brown 1981151981152198115212211 many books and papers have been written on the diffusion of innovations and culture though space using the hagerstrand model or variants thereof these studies range from the spread of black ghettos to the diffusion of influenza in iceland to the growth ofamishof amish communities in the united states
brown 19812019812011 explains the three general patterns often associated with the diffusion process
over time a graph of the cumulative level of adoption is expected to approximate an S shape in an urban system the diffusion is expected to proceed from larger to smaller centers a regularity termed the hierarchy effect within the hinterland of a
5 single urban center diffusion is expected to proceed in a wavelikewave like fashion outward from the urban center first hitting nearby rather than fartherawayfarther away locations and a similar pattern is expected in diffusion among a rural population this third regularity is termed the neighborhood or contagion effect
later diffusion models have included the elements of relocation migration and the influence
of an innovation propagator in the conceptual models studied brown 19812852
relocation is an important element of the diffusion of the LDS church because much
of the geographic spread mormonismofofmormonism can be attributed to the relocation of its members
this type of spatial diffusion has included large migrations in the early history of the church
eg moving to utah and settling new colonies and movements of families from utah in
this century for job opportunities schooling and other reasons
the relocation process has been fundamental to the international diffusion of the LDS
church missionaries the main instruments of mormonisms spread are intentionally
relocated in new countries or regions of countries where the church has been allowed to proselytize other international relocations of american members who are in military government or business fields have provided the groundwork for the initial diffusion of the
church into a surprising number of countries
although brown 19819811 used business corporations as his examples ofpropagatorsofpropagators of
an innovation eg a satellite dish manufacturer a restaurant franchise corporation or a
department store chain some aspects of his conceptual model can help explain the way the mormon church operates as the propagator of the LDS religion brown argues that it is
important to look at a more complete picture of diffusion than one which just concentrates
on what influences the individual or household to adopt an innovation
6 more recent research indicates that this perspective alone does not provide sufficient explanation if as is the case for most contemporary innovations the innovation is propagated by an entity motivated to bring about rapid and complete diffusion in this setting the mechanisms through which innovations are made available to potential adopters are of equal if not greater importance that is it is necessary to consider supply as well as demand factors brown 198151981500
brown further describes the role of the propagator which is the LDS church in this study in the establishment of diffusion agencies in various locations these agencies which can be compared with church missions become the points from which the innovation eg mormonism spreads into surrounding areas thus the locations of the agencies and the temporal sequencing of their establishment determine where and when the innovation will be available and provide the general outline of the spatial pattern of diffusion brown
198251
chapters three and four of browns book discuss the first two stages of propagator supported diffusion which are diffusiondiffiusion agency establishment and agency operating procedures strategies used to promote the innovation the third aspect of the process is the actual adoption of the innovation by individuals most corporations seek to spread their innovation following these stages of diffusion for the purposes of increasing sales and profits the LDS church also follows a similar pattern but its goal is to increase the numbers and quality of converts or adopters of the mormon faith rather than multiplying profits
brown also describes some of the methods and patterns of diffusion which typify centralized decisionmakingdecision making structures where a single propagator determines the number of diffusion agencies to be established and their location size and other characteristics
7 198192 the LDS church is characterized by a centralized hierarchy of leadership which is responsible for deciding the locations of missions and the number of missionaries sent to these areas brown concluded that the patterns of diffusion associated with centralized decision making structures vary and are not necessarily hierarchical in nature 198163 geographic studies of religious diffusion
A number of spatial diffusion studies have been written on religions other than the
Morcormonsmormonsmons crowley 1978 shared an interesting historical geography overview of the diffusion of old order amish settlements he traced the movement amishofamishof people to the united states and the establishment of amish communities in various parts of north america he compared the number and location of both surviving and defunct settlements he also outlined the factors which influenced the amish to settle in particular regions the spatial diffusion ofofamishamish communities described is more related to the early colonization efforts of the mormons in the great basin than to the modem spread mormonismofofmormonism
hemmatihemmasi 1992 describes the diffusion of islam as an example of a phenomenon which can help teach students a variety of geographic principles the islam faith is an interesting religion to study because of its great growth and its virtual saturation of many countries in the middle east hemmatihemmasi describes how different types of diffusion affected the spread of islam through history
these diffusion categories include expansion diffusion colonization diffusion and relocation diffusion expansion diffusion contains the subtypessub types of voluntary forced and hierarchic voluntary diffusion occurs when one converts to islam on their own accord
8 while forced diffusion is characterized by coercion into the faith hierarchical diffusion
fl occurredfloccurred when islam was initially introduced to those who lived in highorderhigh order settlements of conquered or submitted nations hemmatihemmasiHemmasi 1992269
colonization diffusion of islam is similar to that which occurred in the intermountain west under the direction ofoflasofldsLDS church leaders settlers would begin new communities in dispersed areas in regions conquered by muslim kingdoms or in the case of mormonism away from salt lake city relocation diffusion is when muslims moved to new regions to live without proselyting this produced isolated pockets of muslims in europe the caribbean and elsewhere without resulting in many converts among the host population finally intellectual diffusion consists of missionaries merchants seamen etc who spread islam to other areas of the world during their travels
barriers to the diffusion of islam are also discussed by hemmatihemmasiHemmasi these include physical barriers such as mountains oceans and dense forests and cultural barriers like language economic political and religious differences barriers alter the diffusion of religions such as mormonism and islam so that different regions of the world experience different rates of adoption of the belief system in the LDS church political barriers particularly delay the establishment of missionary work in a country while additional impediments such as language culture and physical remoteness can hinder the rate of conversion to the faith after missionary efforts are initiated these along with other barriers help explain the spatial conversion rate variability of mormon proselyting efforts the barriers which the diffusion of mormonism face will be discussed in chapter five
9 in a study of the diffusion of the reorganized church of jesus christ of latter day saints RLDS peffers 1980 used a descriptive historical narrative combined with diffusion path maps within countries to show the relatively small international spread of that church various models of diffusion were not readily utilized perhaps because of the limited penetration that the RLDS have made around the world peffers does mention the LDS church at various junctures in her thesis at such places and times that RLDS missionary efforts have been affected by that of the Morcormonsmormonsmons for example RLDS missionaries struggled in europe in the late 1800s and some of the blame was placed on the mormons who ruined their efforts by proselyting in the various countries before the RLDS
no other relevant recent studies concerning the diffusion of other churches were found studies of LDS growth
johnson 1966 and louder 1972 both wrote their dissertations in geography about the diffusion of the LDS church throughout the united states both studies emphasized the american nature ofthe mormon church and the spatial diffusion models were tested using only the LDS membership distribution in the continental united states louder particularly emphasized the concentration of members in the western united states louder 1975 louder & bennion 1978
johnson used a diffusion model similar to that developed by hagerstrand he divided the continental united states into a large number of hexagons placed all USU S wards in a hexagon corresponding to its location and compared this pattern with one produced using
10 his contagious type diffusion model this effort produced mixed results and low correlation with actual membership patterns
louder improved upon johnsons efforts by using a time sequence model which emphasized the correlation of church growth in western counties including such factors as total county population percent of LDS in the county and the standardized number of irrigated acres in the county he also added the inverse relationship of airline distance to salt lake city to show the relationship between distance to salt lake and date when a ward was formed louder 1975128 louders model proved to be fairly successful in predicting the geographic spread ofmormonismofmormonism in the western united states
since the 1970s when louder modeled LDS diffusion in the united states the church has grown at an incredible rate outside of this country louders model although successful in predicting mormon diffusion in the west did not attempt to account for the growth of the church in other areas of the world for example it is doubtful that the number of irrigated acres in an area has any influence on the degree of LDS diffusion in the international setting
in 1984 rodney stark a nonnonmormonmormon sociologist at the university of washington posited that the LDS church can now be seen as a new world religion and that the mormons will soon achieve a worldwide following comparable to that of islam buddhism christianity hinduism and the other dominant world faiths stark 198418 stark emphasized the unique qualities of the LDS church and showed how growth rates pointed to a future of a continuously expanding world membership
the magnitude of this ongoing international growth prompted me to study its possible financial implications for the church otterstrom 1990 this study compared worldwide
11 church population projections with present gross national product GNP per capita figures of nations with large LDS populations countries with mormon populations greater than
10000 were used to make growth rate calculations these countries constitute the vast majority of the world membership the same method used to calculate growth rates in that study are used in this thesis
these exercises show the magnitude of the churchs ongoing shift to a population increasingly made up of members in developing countries this emphasizes the fact that the most successful recent diffusion mormonismofmormonismof has occurred in the lessdevelopedless developed realm
I1 further postulated that financing church missionary educational welfare and building programs in farflungfar flung areas of the world could prove to be more difficult in the future as budgets have to be stretched to accommodate the needs of church members in the rapidly growing third world mormon community
jackson rinschede and knapp 1990 discussed the pilgrimage phenomenon in the mormon church it included a descriptive background discussion on the growth of the church and used maps to show the distribution of members in the united states and throughout the world the bulk of the study concentrated on the importance of certain mormon sites as holy sites and the patterns of visitation to these places
arrington 1987 wrote a short but comprehensive overview of the historical events which have led to the international growth of the LDS church the paper described international missionary endeavors ranging from the first efforts with american indian nations in 1830 to the tremendous growth of the church in mexico during the 1970s
12 van orden 1993 is writing a complete history of the worldwide expansion of the
church for a brigham young university religion course on the subject he is about halfhalfwayway
through with the project the second half of the packet contains chapters from the
international church moss et al 1982 which was the previous class manual van orden
divides the world into regions and gives detailed accounts of missionary work and church
expansion in the areas through different time periods throughout the various chapters he
emphasizes the positive influence that the following factors among others have had on numbers of converts to the LDS faith high degree of religious freedom a large christian
sector and a substantial population of those in lower socioeconomic classes overall the student manual is comprehensive and current
the information supplied in van ordens more nations hanthanthan7 one A global history of the LDS church and moss et als the international church will complement the historical
capsules of the worldwide church section oftheofodthethe deseret nenewsws church almanac 1993-
1994 those two works will provide the necessary background data for the structure of the remainder of the thesis
conceptual framework of the studstudy
the growth of the LDS church in the international setting has great potential as a
subject for diffusion research the spatial patterns are guided by a number of factors which
affect both the rate of diffusion and the degree of penetration in a country to help organize
these factors in an understandable manner I1 have developed a framework which will guide
the remainder of the study
13 figure I11 outlines the conceptual model of international LDS diffusion this model stems in part from the comparison of functional and spatial perspectives of diffusion described by brown 198141981411 the functional perspective of this model is the supply demand and temporal portions while the spatial perspective is represented by the spatial box on the bottom of the figure
this study concentrates on the spatial perspective by showing the patterns of LDS spatial diffusion within countries so discussion of the functional portion of the model and how it relates to the international growth ofmormonismofmormonism is mostly limited to this chapter functional perspective
supply and demand are both important when looking at the functional manner in which the LDS church spreads over time the propagator of the innovation mormonismofofmormonism is the mormon church with headquarters in salt lake city utah the church programs including missionary efforts are administered by a central decisionmakingdecision making body known as the general authorities the general authorities direct the affairs of the missionary program and decide when and where new missions will be established
the factors which influence the international supply of the mormon religious innovation are many they include the number of members who relocate to foreign countries for military business or governmental purposes the supply of missionaries available for service periods ranging from one to two years the number of members in a country who actively participate in sharing the mormon religion the extent of the international transportation
14 functional perspective
THE innovation MORMONISM SUPPLY DEMAND
supplier of the innovation consumer of the innovation the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints population of country A factors affecting amount of supply in country A factors affecting amount of demand in country A political a number of mormons who relocate to country A a stability b number of missionaries available b religious freedom c financial resources of the church c religious makeup of population d number of new converts in country A d economic conditions per capita income e churchs strategies to proselytize in country A e education f number of converts who return to country A f culture g population growth rate h mobility
A few scenarios innovation DIFFUSION RATE
HIGH HIGH HIGH
MED MED MED
LOW LOW LOW supply demand rate supply demand rate supply demand rate
i j I1 functional spatialsloatSiDat iallallai interface I1 spatial perspective 18000Q 0 hierarchy of urban places
urban spatial diffusionstagesdiffusion stages hagerstrand 1952 brown 198121 country A urban setting
0 0 1 primary stage 2 diffusion stage 3 saturation stage 0 0 40 0 0 60.60 0 pattern 0 000 0oo0 hierarchy effect initiated hierarchy effect continues random spatial 0 around diffusion centers 0 0 00 0 primary diffusion centers contagious effect added 0 ie missions condensing and filling in 0 established in largest cities secondary diffusion centers as more of the population 0 4d0e established other adopts the mormon 0C 9 ie 0 rv missions religion ON0 000.0 spread into the hinterlands of both the primary and 006oooo06 09 secondary centers 0 0 figure I11 preliminary conceptual model of the international diffusion of the LDS church 15 network and the financial resources available for use by the church to support the missions and desired proselytization strategies eg the radio or television media
the greater the number of mormons who relocate to foreign countries especially those with small indigenous LDS memberships the greater the possibility that sustained church growth will occur in those countries the foundation of the more seasoned expatriate members can help support these membership increases those who join the church in foreign countries become part of the supply side themselves because all members are strongly encouraged to share their faith with those around them
it is obvious that a greater supply of missionaries means a larger number of places in which the church can place these full time diffusers mormonismofofmormonism although much of the missionaries living expenses are paid by themselves their families or their home wards the church still incurs great expenses in supporting missionary headquarters around the globe paying for missionary travel translating and printing church literature in foreign languages and supporting missionaries from less developed countries As the amount of money that the church devotes to its missionary programs increases the potential supply of mormonism to more remote locations also grows this is because increasing distance from salt lake city and the united states where the bulk of mormons are increases the cost of diffusing mormonism
the bulk of missionaries in foreign lands still come from the united states and conditions within this country can greatly affect the supply of missionaries the united states government can sometime limit the number of missionaries by military conscription
16 during wars like the korean and vietnam periods of economic troubles in this nation may also decrease the number of US mormons who can afford to serve a fulltimefull time mission
the demand for the mormon religion in a specific country is affected by such factors as the amount of religious freedom religious orientation ie percent christian income characteristics political stability cultural attitudes languages amount of migration or displacement of a countrys people and population growth rates one possible view is that more religious freedom less per capita income larger proportions of christians and greater political stability all exert a positive influence on the demand for mormonism higher population growth rates also tend to increase the demand for mormonism because there will be more second generation adopters of the LDS religion ie there will be more young children of new converts baptized into the church after turning eight
each country receives different levels of supply from the LDS church and exhibits varying degrees of demand for the religion an increase in demand usually encourages a growth in supply while a welladvertisedwell advertised supply can create a measurable amount of demand for optimal diffusion rates however high amounts of both supply and demand are required
the variable effects that both supply and demand can have on the diffusion rate in a country is entitled innovation diffusion rate A few possible scenarios are represented of how a specific rate of LDS diffusion in a country may result
when there is no supply and a large demand for mormonism substitute LDS type churches are sometimes formed as was the case in nigeria before 1978 missionaries were first sent there that year and found that a number of successful churches bearing the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints name had been previously organized without official
17 approval from the LDS headquarters in salt lake city deseret nesnews church almanac
199319941993 1994 19922519922511 moss et alal3313 3 121 2
on the other hand low demand can result in only a few converts even with an abundant supply as has occurred recently in the netherlands for example the netherlands amsterdam mission will be discontinued this july 1994 and consolidated with another mission this may mean a possible decrease in the supply of mormonism eg fewer missionaries in the country for the country even though there are more than 15 million people in the country who are not LDS church nenewsws march 26 1994 this change may be attributed to the low conversion rates that the country has experienced in the last two decades van orden 1993130
over time it is expected that the supply of the monmonnonmormonnon innovation in a country will tend to equalize the corresponding demand for the religion however the supply side of missionaries media programs etc is sometimes even increased in those regions where there is a low demand for the religion in an attempt to create more interest in the church this is an effort to allow as many people as possible to hear about the church and to fulfill the first LDS prophet joseph smiths prophecy concerning the church
the truth of god will go forth boldly nobly and independent till it has penetrated every continent visited every clime swept every country and sounded in every ear tillfillfili the purposes of god shall be accomplished and the great jehovah shall say the work is done history of the church 1957 4540 this goal to diffuse its beliefs to all nations has meant a greater dispersion of the mormon religion than if the church only sent missionaries to areas where conversion successes were the greatest where the demand was the highest
18 spatial perspective
this discussion on the effects of supply and demand on the diffusion ofmormonismofmormonism is related to the second part of the conceptual model the spatial perspective the interactions of both supply and demand sides of the mormon innovations create a specific rate of
diffusion within each country as shown in the innovation diffusion rate box this rate of growth interfaces shown as the functionalspatialFunctional Spatial interface with the spatial structure of the
countrys population the greater the rate the faster the religion will spread throughout a nation
the spatial patterns exhibited by LDS diffusion within a country are shown only as hypothetical stages in figure 1 these stages are after hagerstrand 1952 who placed the three regularities of diffusion the shapesshapeS curve for diffusion through time the hierarchy effect and the neighborhood effect into an interrelated framework brown 198121
hagerstrands stages of diffusion are used in this study as the background model which guides the development of mormonspecificmormon specific phases of diffusion his framework also parallels the main hypothesis of this thesis modem post WW II11 mormon diffusion within international countries involves a distinct pattern of initial introduction of the church by north american mormon expatriates by citizens converted to mormonism elsewhere or by mormon missionaries followed by conversions and the eventual establishment of missions in the largest cities which produce through organized proselytization strongly hierarchical patterns of church unit formation
each country is unique in population size area and shape and alurbanruralurbanrur makeup so the spatial manifestation of the phases of diffusion will vary among nations consequently
19 some countries may not even follow an outlined pattern however I1 hope to show that most of the countries with large mormon populations have exhibited similar spatial characteristics in their growth during the modemmodern period however before the exploration of these spatial patterns can occur a look at the data and the methodology which will be employed to guide this process is in order
20 III111 DATA AND methodology data requirements
the data required for this study are various they can be divided into two types LDS
church data and country data the church data include the locations and dates of
establishment of church stakes and missions throughout the world church histories of
countries and the rates ofmormon membership growth in various nations country data are the populations of the nations cities provinces districts andor states which contain LDS stakes and missions in some instances distance measurements from central cities to other cities where stakes and missions have been established will be required church data
the mormon church keeps very detailed statistics of the numbers of church members and their location around the globe the deseret nesnews church almanac 199319941993 1994
hereafter referred to as the almanac contains a brief overview of church growth in the different countries nations and territories as well as in the various states of the united
states within these accounts are also the location of all stakes and missions in that geographic area and the date each stake or mission was created
the latest edition of hethe almanac 1992 contains stake and mission data as of october
1 1992 fortunately the church nesnews a weekly supplement to the deseret news publishes
21 the creation of new missions and stakes as the information becomes publicly available the names of all stakes and missions formed since october 1992 have been obtained from the various church news editions so the data are current as of march 1994
the LDS church publishes a directory each year which contains the names of all of its wards and branches and the stakes or missions to which they belong A copy of the directory is available at the history and religion reference desk on the fourth floor of the harold B lee library however photocopies of pages of the directory are not allowed the directory has been used just to check the accuracy of the church almanac and as an aid in locating hardtofindhard to find stakes
the name of a ward or branch usually corresponds with the town or city where the congregation meets however in large metropolitan areas with numerous wards and branches unit names are often repeated with a number qualifier eg manaus 3rd ward or spokane 19th ward or are differentiated by a neighborhood name or physical feature eg
Independenindependenciacia ward atlixco mexico stake or valley ridge ward kearns utah west stake
this type of naming makes the exact location of some church units very difficult to find additionally the directory does not indicate the date when the individual wards or branches were formed which is a disadvantage as one attempts to track the diffusion of the church over time the church almanac does list the dates of stake and mission creation however the macroscalemacro scale of this project renders much of the specifics of ward and branch locations within large cities irrelevant correspondingly a diffusion study using the locations of the huge number of wards and branches over 21000 in the world as data points is out
22 of this projects scope finally the use of stakes for location data does not mean a dearth of data As of march 1994 the church had nearly 2000 stakes in the world approximately
1170 of these stakes were located within the united states
the names of stake and missions always have some geographic reference usually they indicate the location of the stake center building or mission headquarters licemiceoffofficeofmomm although stakes and missions are more regional in nature and include greater areas than their component parts of wards and branches they are easier to locate and their dates of creation are readily available additionally the wards and branches of the world are component parts of stakes and missions so one still gets an accurate feel for the overall mormon distribution by using the stakes and missions as diffusion locators
to help one further understand how stakes are an indicator of mormon international diffusion I1 will briefly describe the processes related to stake creation new stakes normally come into being by one of two processes both related to membership growth the first method is to divide an existing stake or stakes which have grown large enough to warrant splitting them into a more manageable size an example of this is the recent creation of the pago pago samoa central stake from the pago pago samoa and the pago pago samoa west stakes
often times the new stake is named after a city other than the one from which it was divided this new city acts as the stake center and it acts as a helpful locator of LDS diffusion an instance where newly created stakes have been headquartered in a city other than the original stake is the 1993 division of the florianopolisFlorianopolis brazil stake into the monte cristo brazil and sao jose brazil stakes
23 the second source of stake formation is from branches under church missions jurisdictions church branches that are not part of established stakes but which are dependent
on specific missions are directed by the missions which cover that area A number of these
dependent branches under mission control make up a mission district when the branches
in a mission district become large and numerous enough a new stake is formed and the old
mission branches become either wards or branches within the new stake organization
depending upon their size an example of this is the creation in 1991 of the chetumalChetumal mexico stake in southeastern mexico from the chetumalChetumal mexico district
there are numerous historical data sources available on the international spread of the
church As mentioned above the deseret news church almanac is a good general reference book on the subject additionally bruce van ordens 1993 student packet for the history of the international church class is an excellent source for information on how when and where the church diffused to the countries of the world it also contains substantial bibliographic references at the end of each chapter which constitute a fairly comprehensive reference list of where to obtain more detailed information on the history of the church is various world areas
needed statistics on church growth have primarily come from my honors thesis
otterstrom 1990 and LDS church statistics the church membership growth rates in the thesis were computed for countries which had at least 10000 LDS in 1989 about 37 nations the rates were an average of growth from 1980 until the end of 1989 the church
almanac 199319941993 1994 contains membership figures for each country as of december 3311
24 199iggi19911 I1 have revised the 198019891980 1989 membership growth rates using the newer 1991 statistics country dataata
populations of specific cities states and provinces have been obtained from the 1992 edition ofiheaaaof the AAA worldworldatlasatlasatias the atlas contains the most recent and extensive population estimates available in one volume the distance measurement from central cities to other cities nave been obtained from country road maps found in the harold B lee librarys map collection research methodology
to effectively explore both the functional and spatial aspects of the international diffusion ofmormonismofmormonism a variety of methodologies will be employed chapter four begins with an overview of the international diffusion of the LDS church from 1830 to the present
1994 approximate 1994 LDS membership figures for countries with over 10000 mormons are given these figures are calculated by projecting the average mormon growth rates from the recent period of 198919911989 1991 through to 1994 the number of stakes in these countries will also be shown
after this general overview the world is divided into regions these regions are south america middle america europe and canada asia south pacific africa within each regional chapter is a short overview of the LDS church geography in those countries the chronology ofmormonismsofmormonisms diffusion to the countries is illustrated using a chart showing dates of the establishment of the first branch and mission in the country along with the size
25 of the present mormon population A brief description of the methods of initial entry ie
expatriates from north america or elsewhere citizens converted in other nations or
missionaries from neighboring nations is also included on the south and middle america
tables
the first two regions of south and middle america also contain detailed accounts of
the diffusion patterns using stakes and missions for location indicators of mormonism
within most of the regions countries during the postworldpost world war II11 period these two
regions have provided the bulk of the new converts to the LDS church during the modern
era and so the most attention is being given to them in this thesis mormons in south and
middle america comprised less than one percent of the total mormon population in 1930 by 1989 these two regions had over 26 percent of the worlds Morcormonsmormonsmons second only to north america in numbers of LDS members otterstrom 199091019909 10
the discussion on the remaining regions illustrate some interesting anomalies and patterns in the process of LDS diffusion which do not fit the patterns shown in south and middle america to give specific examples of mormon diffusion patterns in the other regions canada the philippines the united kingdom germany australia and new zealand will be discussed in some detail each of these three countries has an interesting and unique mormon spatial diffusion history
the importance ofmiddle and south america in LDS church geography is emphasized in table 1 although the united states has the greatest number of mormons of any nation
itsils LDS diffusion patterns will not be discussed because the focus of this thesis is on
international areas
26 NATION REGION MORMONSM drmons1991iggi1991 STAKESstalSTAIces1994CES 1994 MISSIOMISSIONSNS 1994 united states north america 43364336000000ooo10001 1173 89 mexico middle america 659000 126 17 brazil south america 400000 105 22 chilehiI1 e south america 3150003153000 67 6 philippines asia 266000266 000ooo000.000 48 13 peru south america 195000 52 7 rgentinargargentinaentina south america 1820001823000 35 10 united kingdom europe 156000 41 7 canada north america 130000 37 7 guatemala middle america 129000 23 4 japan asia 99000 26 10 ecuador south america 92000 17 3 colombia south america 87000 13 4 australia south pacific 78000 18 6 new zealand south pacific 77000775000773000 17 2 bolivia south america 7100071 00 12 2 south korea asia 62000625000 16 4 uruguay south america 580058000 11 1 venezuela south america 57000573000 12 4 western samoa south pacific 49000491000 9 1 honduras middle america 46346000463000000ooo 9 2 el salvador middle america 41000 10 2 germanyCjermany euroeuropepe 3900039 16 6 dominican republic middle america 380038000 7 3 tonga south pacific 36000 10 1 portugal europe 31000315000 5 3 france europe 24000 7 3 spainS europe 23000 3 5 panama middle america 212100030001000 4 1 south africa africa 2000020 000ooo 5 3 costa rica middle america 19000 4 1 taiwan asia 19000195000 3 2 hongflongelong kong asia 18000 5 1 nigeria africa 180001814000 3 4 puerto rico middle america 17117317000171000000ooo 0 1 italy europe 16000 2 4 paraguay south america 13000 3 1 french polynesia south pacific 12000123000 4 1 american samoa south pacific 11000 3 0 nicaragua middle america 11000113000 0 1 TOTAL for nations with 10000105000 LDS 7971000 1961 264
TOTAL world 808954081089540 1979 303 As of december 31 1991 As of about march 1994 adofAsasofof july 119941 1994 table 1 countries with more than 10000 mormons in 1991 along with regional descriptive narratives I1 use five year increment mapping of a number of countries in the world from 1969 or 1979 through 1994 to illustrate the concurrent diffusion of stakes and missions over time the countries have been selected because they all contain multiple stakes and they are located except for the philippines in the middle and south american regions where the more detailed analysis will be concentrated these map sets are brazil chile argentinauruguayArgentina Uruguay PeruperuecuadorEcuador mexico and the philippines
the maps will help illustrate the spatial patterns of growth exhibited within the context of each countrys unique geography and will visually complement the discussion on this diffusion in the body of the thesis to aid in the analysis I1 have created tables showing the spread of stakes by city population over the same five year increments and in the same countries which were used in the mapping exercise
in the concluding chapter the results of this exploration of the patterns of international
LDS diffusion are incorporated into the conceptual model discussed in the previous chapter in the chapter hagerstrands 1952 stages of spatial diffusion shown in the figure I11 model are transformed into phases specific to the mormon church
28 IV OVERVIEW OF international LDS GROWTH
the international expansion of the church is not a new development missionary work has been emphasized since the very beginning in 1830 when the church was organized in the state of new york the early period of proselytizing helped the church garner many converts these new members were instrumental to the growth of the church as everyone was a new adopter of the faith these people often left their homes to be closer to the growing groups of members in america which growth allowed the church to eventually establish communities and church centers in kirtland ohio independence missouri nauvoo illinois and finally salt lake city utah
it did not take long for joseph smith the first LDS prophet to send some of the new converts to preach the merits of the new church to citizens in surrounding areas in june
1830 about two months after the church was organized samuel H smith joseph smiths brother began a missionary journey which signalsignalledled the beginning of the diffusion of the church almanac 1992151 in october 1830 the first diffusion of the church to other
11 nations11nations was attempted by oliver cowdery parley P pratt peter whitmer and ziba peterson who preached to the indian nations of the Cattercatteraugusaugus in western new york the shawnees and delawaresdelawarekDelawares in eastern kansas and the wyandotsWyandots in western ohio arrington
198710
29 more successful international missionary endeavors occurred in upper canada now ontario starting in 1832 and in england beginning in 1837 work in canada spread to what is now quebec new brunswick and nova scotia in england the missionaries spread their labors from their initial efforts near preston to other areas in the country as well as in wales scotland and ireland arrington 1987101987- 10
in the early 1840s joseph smith sent missionaries to palestine australia india germanyC-Termany jamaica and the society islands with mixed results by the end of 1847 LDS church membership in foreign countries approximated 10000 in england 1900 in wales
20004000.4000I1 in scotland 40 in ireland 2000 in the society islands and an additional 4160 scattered worldwide arrington 198711 by 1850 there were over 30000 members in great britain compared with 27000 in all of the united states and canada van orden
199314
the diffusion efforts were the most successful in england many of the converts from the british isles and elsewhere emigrated to americas mormon settlements during the next sloveralseveral decades this pattern continued throughout the century giving much strength to the church the abundance ofbritish converts resulted in the majority of the LDS in the church being either from britain or descending from members who had joined the church in the british isles van orden 199314
the beginning of the british mission in 1837 marked the start of organized missions with presidents to direct proselytizing efforts in a specific geographic area other international missions organized during the nineteenth century include the following
30 society islands 1844 welsh 1845 scandinavian 1850 french 1850 italian 1850 swiss 1850 sandwich islands 1850 australian 1851 east indian 1851 malta 1852 german 1852 gibraltar 1853 south african 1853 siam 1854 european administrative 1854 indian territory 1855 netherlands 1864 mexican 1879 turkish 1884 samoan 1888 new zealand 1898 source almanac 1992286199228699
some of these missions were discontinued after only a few years of existence A number of the missions found only limited success but one can see the global effort to preach mormonism was during the last century by the end of 1899 there were 271681 Morcormonsmormonsmons
40 stakes 20 missions including those in the united states and over 1000 missionaries serving around the world almanac 19923974001992397 400 virtually all of these missionaries were mature men who left their wives and children at home where they had to support themselves and raise funds to support the missionary as well arrington 198715
the only stakes which existed outside of the united states by 1900 were the juarez mexico and alberta canada stakes which consisted mainly of mormon colonizers who relocated there from the intermountain west
31 the first half of the twentieth century marked a shift of the historical inward gathering of converts to utah and other mormon centers to an emphasis on members staying in their respective states and countries to strengthen the church there moss et al 1982270198227011 church membership climbed steadily but world war I1 the great depression and world war II11 interrupted missionary activity in many areas for long periods of time by the end of world war II11 the bulk of mormons continued to live in the united states with all but one stake being in north america the only stake created away from the continent was the oahu stake in hawaii which was formed in 1935193 5
As the clouds ofwar dispersed in the late 1940s the church was poised to make major steps to enlarge and expand its international presence the church reached its first million members in 1947 president david 0 mckay the LDS prophet beginning in 19519511 reemphasized the importance ofmissionary activities he traveled around the world to visit the members in many lands and to encourage them to further build up the church so that independent stakes could be established in their nations van orden 199318
the first stake to be created outside of north america and hawaii was the auckland stake in new zealand in 1958 this development marked the beginning of a rapid increase of foreign stakes and missions worldwide by march of 1994 there were some 806 stakes outside of the united states almanac 19923901992390519923 90590 5 & church news 199319941993 1994 all issues
at the end of 1993 there were approximately 49000 missionaries serving in some 295 missions these missionaries baptized an average of 25400 converts into the church every month during 1993 church news april 9 1994 if past trends were followed during 1993
32 the majority of the new converts were citizens of countries other than the united states and more particularly of nations in the developing world otterstrom 199091019909- 10
table 2 shows the 198919911989 1991 LDS growth rate for nations with more than 10000 members in 1991 along with a projection of 1994 membership for these countries it is interesting that eight of the ten fastest growing countries for mormonism are in the developing world the projections are just projections and fast growing countries such as nicaragua and the dominican republic probably are not keeping pace with their tremendous growth of 1989199198919911989 199iggi19911
the following regional sections will detail the amazing international diffusion of the church since world war 11 and will also point to some future mormon growth possibilities in areas which are just beginning to be touched by the worldwide LDS missionary effort
33 GROWTH MORMONS NATION REGION RT 899189 91 1989 1991 est 1994 nicaragua middle america 50650.6 400040000 11000111000 30000 dominican republic middle america 34734.7 19000 3800038 ooopoogoo 7600076 ooo000 honduras middle america 23123.1 29000291000 46000 7300073 1000 1 costa rica middle america 23023.0 12000 19000 30000300000 nigeria africa 20320.3 12000121000 18000 27000 panama middle america 16816.8 15000155000 2100021 NO 29000 spain europe 15115.1 17000 23000235000 310003 1 NO portugal europe 14914.9 23000 3100031 1000 42000 2300 1 guatemala middle america 13713.7 9800098 50000000oooo 1290001291000 17000017050000000oooo ecuador south america 13713.7 70000701000 92000 121000 bolivia south america 12812.8 55000555000553000 71000711000 92000925000 ooo ooo brazil south america 12612.6 311000 400000400 000 514000514 5.5 000 el salvador middle america 12412.4 32000320000 4100041 000poogoo 5300053 10000000oooo american samoa south pacific 11711.7 870083700 1100011 i0003000oooo 140014000 philippines asia lii11111.1 2130002135000 266000 33200033250003323000 south korea asia 10810.8 50000 62000625000 77000771000773000 peru south america 10210.2 1590001591000oooo 195000195 1000 2390002390000 western samoa south pacific 898.9 4100041 50003000 490049000 59000591000 argentina south america 878.7 153000 182000182 1000 tig216000216iwoimo venezuela south america 868.6 48000483000 57000571000 6800068 50007000 chile south america 858.5 2660002661000 315000315 50000000oooo 37300037310003733000 uruguay south america 848.4 49000 58000 6900069 1000 paraguay south america 848.4 1100011 ip000 13000 15000 south africa africa 818.1 17000171000 20000200000 24000241000 tonga south pacific 757.5 1000310003 360003650000000oooo 42000420000 mexico middle america 737.3 5690005695000 6590006595000 763000 colombia south america 686.8 76000765000 87000871000873000 loo10000010010004000 france europe 676.7 21000 24000241000243000 27000271000 italy europe 676.7 14000141000 16000161000 bambvm18000BMW taiwan asia 565.6 17000175000 M19000wooo000ooo 21000211000211 000ooo french polynesia south pacific 444.4 11000115000 12000 13000 japan asia 424.2 9100091 vooMOO 99000 1080001083000 germany europe 393.9 36100 3900039100 42000425000 australia south pacific 333.3 73000730000 78000 83000831000833000 puerto rico middle america 303.0 16000 17000 18000 hong kong asia 292.9 170017000 1800018 5000oooo 19000 canada north america 202.0to 1250001255000 130000 135000 united states north america 191.9lgig 4175000 4336000 4503000455 03 MOOpoo united kingdom europe 131.3 1520001521000 156000 160000MONOmomo new zealand south pacific 070.7 76000765000 77000 78000781000 nicaraguas 1989 membership estimated from church almanac 1992 p250 includes both germanys in 1989
table 2 19819891991919 LDS growth rates for countries with more than 10000 members in 1991 1994 LDS membership estimates V SOUTH AMERICA overview
the south american continent is the site of some of the greatest mormon diffusion successes of this century parley P pratt an early mormon leader along with his wife and another missionary made an early attempt to proselytize in chile during the end of 1851 and the beginning of 1852 however their attempt ended without one single convert moss et al 1982170198217033 it was not until over seventy years later that the LDS church started to build an actual foundation in south america
mormonism was first introduced into south america during the 1920s by german LDS immigrants who settled in argentina and southern brazil the south american mission was organized in 1925 in buenos aires argentina at first the majority of converts were german immigrants in 1928 missionary work spread from buenos aires to the city of joinville in the southern brazilian state of santa catarina joinville was home to many german immigrants 90 percent of the population were german in 1930193 0 missionaries were sent to rosario argentina and in 1933 to porto alegre brazil another dominantly german city moss et al 1982177
in 1935 the brazilian and argentine missions were created from the south american mission missionary work continued steadily and by 1950 there were 1135 and 724 mormons in argentina and brazil respectively moss et al 1982177198217788
35 the next south american country to receive the mormon religion was uruguay in 1944 the montevideo branch was organized for frederick W williams former president of the argentine mission and other north american LDS who were in the country on USU S government service the uruguayan mission was organized in 1947 with frederick W williams as president almanac 1992279
argentina brazil and uruguay were the only countries in south america to have church branches before 1950 between those three nations there were only just over 2300 mormon members in 1950 while forty three years later there were an estimated total of
730000 members in those same three countries in the whole of south america there were approximately 161.6lgig million mormons in 1993 moss et al 1982 178 van orden 1993263 although this growth has been impressive the ratio of nonnonmormonsmormons to mormons in south america is still about 190 to 1
table 3 outlines the basic ways in which the mormon church has been introduced to the countries of south america if LDS north americans played the lead role in introducing the church first in a country it is noted as north americans if missionaries or relocated immigrants from germany were instrumental in first establishing the church that is also indicated some of those most involved in the early church stage in the various countries are also listed by name additionally the dates of the first branches and the first missions headquartered in the various countries are indicated
As one can see from the figure the majority of the countries in south america were first introduced to the church by north american mormons who were living in those countries for business or governmental purposes LDS missionaries from other missions were usually
36 SOUTH AMERICA
1stIST 1stIST NATION BRANCH introducers MISSION argentina 1925 LDS german immigrants 1925 wilhelm friedrichs emil hoppe brazil 1928 LDS german immigrants 1935 roberto lippelt family uruguay 1944 north americans 1947 frederick S williams paraguay 1948 north americans 1977 samuel J skousen peru 1956 north americans 1959 frederick S williams chile 1956 north americans 1961 william fotheringham bolivia 1963 north americansduaneamericans duane wilcox 1966 dube thomas norval jesperson ecuador 1965 missionaries from andes 1970 mission in peru colombia 1966est1966 est north americans 1968 venezuela 1966 north americans 1971 durlDurisuriname1I name 1988 missionaries none guyana 1989 abdulla family converted none in canada & missionaries french guiana 1989 missionaries none
source almanac 1992 table 3 south america early mormon diffusion
37 sent into the countries soon after the first branches of mostly north americans were established LDS german immigrants helped initiate missionary work in argentina and brazil diffusion efforts were first started in ecuador guyana french guiana and suriname by missionaries without the benefit of an existing membership base there was one mormon family in guyana when the missionaries arrived
the next part of this regional overview deals more specifically with the spatial patterns exhibited by the diffusion of the LDS religion I1 illustrate this phenomenon using the historical spread of stakes and missions throughout the various countries for reference table 4 shows the present mormon population and number of stakes in the region brazil
brazil is larger than the contiguous united states and has more than 150 million people the population is most dense along the coasts especially near the huge metropolises of sao paulo and rio de janeiro table 5 shows the number of stakes headquartered in various cities of brazil over five year periods beginning at the end of 1969 the cities are ranked according to current population size there are four cities without population data figures
2 through 4 are maps illustrating the locations of the stakes and missions in the country over the same time periods
sao paulo was the site for the creation of the first stake in south america in 1966 it is the largest city in south america it is interesting to note that although missionary work first started among the germans in the southern states of brazil sao paulo was still the site of
38 SOUTH AMERICA
NATION MORMONS STAKES MISSIONS 1994 est 1994 1994 brazil 51400514000 105 22 chile 373000 67 6 peru 239000239p00 52 7 argentina 2160002161000 35 10 ecuador 121000 17 3 colombia 1000001005000 13 4 bolivia 92000920000 12 2 uruguay 69000691000 11 1 venezuela 68000681000 12 4 paraguay 15000151000 3 1 guyana 300 french guiana 200 suriname 200
from van orden 1993263 as of abt march 1994 as of july 119941 1994 table 4 south america 1994 mormon geography
39 CITY P epulation3pulationpopulation 1969 1974 1979 1984 19899 1994 sao paulo metro 12588439 2 3 5 8 c9 16 rio de janeiro metro 9018637 1 3 4 4 4 beloHorizon honzontehorizonteHonzontete metro 2541788 1 1 2 recife metro 2348362 1 1 3 porto alegre metro 2232370 1 1 2 2 4 salvador metro 1772018 2 fortaleza metro 1581588 2 3 5 Curcuntibacuritibaitiba metro 1441743 1 3 6 5 6 belem metro 1000349 1 goiania 703263 1 1 manaus 613068 1 2 campinascarnpinasCamCarncampanaspinas 566517 1 1 1 2 3 santo andre 549278 1 1 1 brasilia 411305 2 2 2 santos 411023 1 1 1 1 1 sao bernardo 381261 1 1 1 1 1 0sascoosascoorasco 376689 1 natal 376552 1 maceio 376479 1 1 2 teresina 339264 1 Ribeirao preto 300704 1 4 joao pessoa 290424 1 1 2 aracaju 288106 1 campo grande 282844 1 sao jose dos campos 2680732681073.1073 1 1 olinda 266392 1 1 1 londrinalondrmalondemaLondrina 258054 1 1 1 1 sorocabaSorocaba 254718 1 1 1 2 campina grande 222229 1 1 1 joinville 217074 1 1 1 candascanoas 214115 1 jundiai 210015 1 caxiascabias do sul 198824 1 sao vincente 197770 1 1 1 pelotaspalotas 197092 1 1 barrubauru 178861 1 sao jose do rio preto 171982 1 ponta grossa 171111 1 1 1 fionaFlonaflonanopolisflorianopolisFlorianopolis 153547 1 1 santa mariamarlamana 151202 1 petropolis 149427 1 1 1 vitoriavitorla 144143 1 1 franca 143630 1 novo hamburgohamburghHamburgo 132066 1 1 1 1 aracatubaArac atuba 113486 1 sao carlos 109231 1 manilamanliamarilia 103904 1 1 1 rio claro 103174 1 1 1 passo fundo 103121 1 1 sao leopoldo 94864 1 uruguaianaUruguaiana 79059 1 Ararararaquaraaquara 77202 1 1 1 1 bage 66743 1 tuburaotuburan 64585 1 livramento 58165 1 alegrete 54786 1 1 1 sao jose 37562 1 boa vilgemviagem 1 1 Contacontagemgem monte cristo 1 Ribeirao pires 1 TOTAL 2 9 19 46 56 105 no population data table 5 brazil number of stakes by city and year r s
braz
1969
braabra2
1974
scale in kilometers
0 50 100 mo
stake el mission with date of establishment and 1994 headquarters city figure 2 brazil stakes and missions 19691974
41 braabra2
1979
s
braz
N 1984
scale in kilometers
0 50 1 200 300 LC stake el mission with date of establishment and 1994 headquartersheadquafters city figure 3 brazil stakes and missions 19791984
42 fortaleza 1987
1979
RecirecifeelkellkeelfeEl BRAZIL
brasilia q 1985
belobeio Horizonhorizontete 1988
1986 1968 campinasCamcampanaspinas GE 1972 t 1989 01935ed01935 ED rio de janeiro sao paulo curitinaritiba 0 1980e
arburk 19el9 porioporto alegre
r
19 7bele elabelebelemm el manaus 1994 faf6fortaleza 0 1987 0
1979
reciferecine BRAZIL 1993
199019 Sa1vadorr E 9 1994lffirroff brasilia 1985
N belobeio Horizonhorizontete 1994 beiraoribeiraoRi 1988 1994 1993 E SOP preto 0 0 W 1986 19931968 scale in kilometers canasca nas 0 1972 0 0 el 0 50 loo100 200 MO 0 1935 11 iggi1991 rio de janeiro 991 el sao paulo 0 stake lcuritiba 0 1980 E mission with date of establishment 0 and 1994 headquarters city 13 fioriaFloriaflorianopolisnopolis 0 iggi1991 a el porto alegre figure 4 brazil stakes and missions 1959 19891994
43 the first stake in the country manifesting its size advantage which increases the probability of it having sufficient numbers of mormons within a relatively small area to warrant a stake
by the end of 1974 there were nine stakes in brazil three of the new cities with stakes including the countrys second largest city of rio de janeiro have over one million inhabitants curitibaCuritiba and porto alegre are the largest cities in southern brazil in the regions where the earliest missionary labors in brazil were concentrated so their role as headquarters for stakes early on is not surprising the other three stakes were centered in cities with overoverpopulationspopulations over 350000 additionally all three of these cities campinasCamcampanaspinas santos and sao bernardoBemardo are within 100 kilometers of sao paulo which may help explain the relatively early formation of stakes there notwithstanding their smaller size
brazil is an ethnically diverse country with many of mixed african european and indian race eg mulatto or mestizo prior to 1978 no mormons with any african ancestry were allowed to hold the priesthood in the church this posed a problem in brazil because there are so many citizens of mixed race that it was difficult to tell exactly who was considered to be of african ancestry when the church made public the revelation on the priesthood on june 9 1978 which stated that worthy men of all races could now receive the priesthood the ancestry issue in brazil melted away
the church has grown very quickly in brazil since the priesthood revelation of 1978 it is especially interesting to note the formation of the recife mission in 1979 and the subsequent creation of numerous stakes in the dominantly black northeast the tremendous growth exhibited during the past fifteen years across the entire country is also attributed to
44 the dedication of a temple in sao paulo at the end of 1978 church news feb 19 1994
3 10 is 31010 A temple the most sacred edifice for worship in the mormon church
at the end of 1979 there were 19 stakes in the country twelve of these were in cities of more than one million people the rest of the stakes were centered in cities of more than
200000 inhabitants except for novo hamburgohamburghHamburgo which is very near to porto alegre and
Ararararaquaraaquara which is in the state of sao paulo
since 1979 the number of stakes in brazil has increased over fivefoldfive fold in 1994 there are
105 stakes and approximately 500000 members in the nation church news feb 19 1994
3131010 by july of 1994 there will be 22 missions in the country sixteen of the stakes are centered in sao paulo while a total of 43 stakes are located in cities including sao paulo with over one million people many of the rest of the stakes are concentrated around sao paulo recife rio de janeiro porto alegre and curitibaCuritiba manifesting a certain degree of contagious infilling which occurs as the church grows and spreads in and around a metropolitan area
only twelve of the stakes were headquartered in cities of less than loo100100000000ooo people the relatively late organization of stakes in large cities such as belem manaus and teresina may be partially explained by the fact that they are all a great distance from the population centers of the south and are also isolated from the coastal metropolises of fortaleza and recife in the northeast
it is not surprising that the headquarters of missions are all located in the larger cities with beiraoribeiraoRi preto being the smallest with 300704 people it also follows that the missions are concentrated in areas where LDS diffusion efforts have been successful
45 although it appears that some cities have not increased in number of stakes in many vearsyears in actuality many stakes have been divided so that the new headquarters are in other nearby cities an example of this is the division of the novo hamburgohamburghHamburgo stake which was created in 1978 into three additional stakes centered in candascanoas sao leopoldo and caxiascabias do10 sul
the states of rio grande do sul sao paulo and the federal district have the lowest ratio of population per stake meaning a relatively high concentration of Morcormonsmormonsmons on the other hand the states bahia minas gerals goias and para contain more than 3 million people per stake which is far above the national average of 141.4 million people per stake table 6
most surprising is the low concentration of mormons in the state of minas gerals which is adjacent to the state of sao paulo the reason why there are so few LDS in the populous state of rio de janeiro remains unexplained
brazil has shown strong hierarchical diffusion patterns mormonismofofmormonism in the future the stakes in brazil will most probably continue to be concentrated in and around the largest cities however the trend of an increasing number of stakes being located in more remote andzandkand smaller cities will most likely continue chilehiiehile
chile is a narrow sliver of land bounded by the pacific ocean and the crest of the andes mountains it stretches from the southern tip of south america to peru a distance of over
25005 00 miles chiles 13 million population is less than 10 percent of that of brazil however
46 STATE population s1sarakesFAKESSTAKES POPSTAKE CAPITAL STAKESSTAKES alagoas 1987581159875581139875581 2 993791993 47911791 maceio 2 amazonsamazonas 143206615432 066ogg 2 716033 manaus 2 bahia 94742639154741263 2 4737132 salvador 2 ceara 529487651294 876 6 882479 fortaleza 5 espirito santo 202382121023 821 1 20238212023 821 vitoria I11 federal district ij77117739343931393 2 5886975889997 brasilia 2 goias 3865482308655482 1 338654825865548238655482 goiania I11 mato grosso do sul 13703331370333 1 13703331 campo grande I11 minas gerals 13390805 3 4463602 belo Horizonhorizontete 2 paparara 3411868341 1586813868 1 3411868141118683 belem I11 paraiba 3 pessoa 277260027726005 924200 joao 2 parana 7630466716301a66 8 953808953 58080808 Curcuritibaitiba 6 fernambucopernambucopemambuco 61471026 147 lot102 4 153677611536776 recife 3 plaul 2140066211401066 1 214006625140066 teresina I11 rio grande do norte 1899720l8991899 3720 1 18997201 natal I11 rio grande do sul 777721271777 tit212 15 518481 porto alegre 4 rio de janeiro 112973271102971327 5 22594657259146502591465325914652 rio de janeiro 4 santa catarina 3628751356285751336285751 5 7257507255750 florianopolisFlorianopolis I11 sao paulo 25040698 41 610749610glogio57490749 sao paulo 16 sergipesergine 1141834 1 114111418345834 aracaju I11 150 105 brazil 1503680007 36800 1432076 not a state location ofnational capital table 6 brazil number of stakes by state and capital in 1994 the 370000 LDS membership in the country is more than 70 percent as large as brazils over 242.4 percent of chileans are Morcormonsmormonsmons this percentage of members is the highest in south america and is even larger than that of the united states
the diffusion of mormonism in chile has been very rapid the first mission headquartered in chile did not open until 1961 but by 1972 the first stake in chile was created in santiago now just over two decades later there are 67 stakes in chile table 7 shows the progress of stake creation in the country compared with city populations from the end of 1974 until 1994 figures 5 through 7 are maps illustrating the diffusion of both missions and stakes in the country over the same time period
the dominance of santiago in terms of population and numbers of stakes is quite striking santiago is a primate city which is the center of political and business life in chile no other city in the country comes close to it in population or economic importance over
27 percent of the nations people live in metropolitan santiago while 37 percent of the LDS stakes in chile are centered there at a slightly larger scale 37 of the 67 stakes are located in the central regions of santiago and valparaiso see table 8 these regions together contain about 42 percent of the countrys population
the rest of the cities in chile where stakes are headquartered are much smaller than those in brazil twentysixtwenty six of the stake centers are in cities of less than 100000 inhabitants compared to brazils twelve in the same category this pattern is understandable because of the high percentage of members in chile and the lack of large cities in the nation other than santiago
48 NUMBER OF STAKES CITY population 1974 1979 1984 19891989 1994 santiago 3672374399721374399727374 2 9 16 18 25 vina del mar 281361 1 1 1 1 2 valparaiso 271580 1 2 2 2 concepcion 20622620612262067226 1 1 1 1 tejucotemuco 197232 1 1 1 talcahuano 148300 1 1 1 1 Rancrancaguaagua 140589 1 1 2 talca 133160 1 1 1 1 chilian 128515 1 1 1 Antofantofagastaagasta 1251001251100 1 1 2 puerto montt 190591190591 1 1 1 valdivia 115536 1 1 la serena 99908 1 1 arica 87700871700877700 1 2 2 quimbocoquimboCo 73953 1 osorno 68800 1 1 1 iquiqueaquique 64500 1 1 punta arenas 6214062 140 1 1 1 los angeles 49500491500497500 1 1 san antonio 46700 1 1 calama 45900 1 1 copiapo 45200 1 curico 41300411300 1 1 1 quilpue 400040600 1 1 1 1 linares 37900 1 1 quillotaQuillota 365003650036.500 1 1 1 penco 33962331962330962 1 1 1 ovalle 31700 1 villa alemana 290029600 1 1 1 1 melipillaMelipilla 23900 1 san fernando 23600237600 1 1 los andes 23500 1 san pedro 8255 1 1 1 andalienAnmandaliendalien 1 1 1 1 hualpen 1 1 1 achupallasAchupallas 1 1 1 calichebaliche 1 1 1 el belloto 1 TOTAL 3 17 40 51 67 no population data table 7 chile number of stakes by city and year 0
CHILE CH E
CORDOBA CORDOBA 00 1962 12 1972 URUGUAY rosarloROSARIO M TTDTTP TTAV
1935 0 SANTIAGO 0 F 1 1947 iggi1961 BUENOS montevideo alresAIRES
ARGENTINA
C 1969
N
scale in kilometers F 4 F 4 0 loo100 200 400 800 stake elD mission with date of establishment and 1994 headquarters city figure 5 chileargentinauruguay stakes and missions 19691974
50 CHILE CHILE
CORDOBA CORDOBA
1962 1972 1962 vlnaVINA 1979 NIA 1972 DL rosarloROSARIO vil D 19799 MAR 1977 URUGUAY MAR Os p 0 0 1977197 D URUGUAYI1 0 00 1935 E 1947 0 1935 an77ago WAn77ago 19477
iggi1961 BUENOS montevideo iggi1961 BUENOS montevideo alresAIRES el AIRES 1974 alres 1974
1475 ARGENTINA 1975 ARGENTINA 0 I1 concepcion concepcion 1980 00 BAHIA BLANCA 19771 1977j el OSORNO OSORNO
1979 1984
N
scale in kilometers
i 0loo 100 200 400 800
stake
DE mission with date of establishment and 1994 headquarters city
figure 6 chileargentinauruguay stakes and missions 19791984
51 14
0
1988 1988 antofagasty antofagastak 0 h 1988 OE 1988 SAleaLTA SALTA
1990 do resistenciaRESIS TENCIA CHILE CHILE
0 CORDOBA CORDOBA jo 0 iban el 036esaega je 1962 00 11979 0 VINA delt 1972 1962 1979 ROSARI 0 VINA EL 1972 MAR 197797 URUGUAY MAR 1977 990 ROSARI 0 0 URUGUAY 00 0 0 ENDOZA o 0 1935 0 0 PA 1947 ild 1935 n77ago ANTIAGO 1947 0 fiz 0 meg BUENOS 00110 BUENOS montevideo 707 iggi1961 igiigl191 0 1 alresAIRES montevideo alresAIRES 0 1992 1974 0 0 1974 1475 ARGENTINA 1975 ARGENTINA 0 concepcion 1980 concepcion 1980 0 110lle 0 o BAHIA 0 BAHIA BLANCA BLANCA 019771 01977
CISORNO OSORNO
1990 TRELEW
C C 1989 0 1994
N
scale in kilometers
loo100 200 400 800
stake
Q mission with date of establishment and 1994 headquarters city
figure 7 chileargentinauruguaychileargentinatjruguay stakes and missions 19891994
52 IR fc REGIONw G10N population STAK POPSTAKE Antofantofagastaagasta 341203 4 85301851301850301 atacamaatacaman 183071 1 1830711831071 biobiobiogio 151655215161552 7 216650 quimbocoquimboCo 419178419 178 3 1397261391726 el Liberlibertadorlebertadortador 58498958419895847989 4 146247 la araucania 692924 1 692924 los lagos 84343084314308437430 3 281143 magallanes 132333 1 13233313213331327333 maule 723224 3 241075 santiago 4294938 26 1651901651190 tarabacaTaratarapacapaca 273427 3 91142911142 valparaiso 1204693204169320476931 11 1095181091518
CHILE 12961000 67 193448 table 8 chile number of stakes by region in 1994 after the initial organization of stakes by 1974 in the largest cities of santiago and vina del mar the spread of stakes continued in an hierarchic manner by the end of 1979 there were 17 stakes in the country nine of these were in santiago while five of the rest were in cities of more than 100000 people the smaller cities of villa alemana and quilpue are within twenty kilometers of vina del mar and andalienAnmandaliendalien is near concepcion
the more remote but relatively large cities of antofagastaAntofagasta arica tejucotemuco chilianChillanlilan puerto montt tejucotemuco osorno and punta arenas contained stakes by 1984 arica is 2000 kilometers north of santiago while punta arenas on the southern tip of south america can only be reached by plane by boat or by land through argentina
in 1994 twentyfivetwenty five stakes were concentrated in santiago in contrast no other city in the country has more than two stakes meaning that the stakes outside of santiago are spread among a wide host of cities and towns this difference can be attributed to the fact that no other cities are even 10 percent as large as santiago so having fewer than one tenth the 25 stakes of santiago ie less than 252.5 stakes is logical
there are six missions in the country which amounts to a ratio of about one mission per every 222.2 million people in the country santiago was the first city to be made headquarters for an LDSLD S mission in 19619611 it was followed by the large city of concepcion in 1975 and later osorno in 1977 both located south of santiago A second mission was created in santiago in 1977 and the nearby city of vina del mar became the home to the next mission in 1979 the only new mission organized since then was in the city of antofagastaAntofagasta in 1988 which is in the northern part ofthe country the placement of missions in chile reflect both
54 its population centers and the logic of being evenly distributed along the extensive length of the country
the ratio of stakes to population in the country as a whole is approximately one stake to 190000 people the central regions of santiago valparaiso and el Liberlibertadorlebertadortador general bernardo ohiggins have lower ratios of population per stakes however one interesting note is that the two regions with the lowest ratios of total population per stake are not in the center of the country these regions tarabacaTaratarapacapaca and antofagastaAntofagasta happen to be the two most northerly regions this may be due in part to their small total population see table 8
chile is an example of how one large primate city can be the dominant center for adoption of the LDS religion in a country the hierarchical pattern of diffusion is evident although the size of urban places in chile quickly drops to communities of relatively small populations the stakes have also spread out to more remote locations over time ie arica in the far north and punta arenas in the far south the tendency for single stakes to be located in numerous towns over time santiago excepting seems to mirrorminnor the rank order of cities in chile in the future more stakes will probably continue to be established in numerous cities which have no stakes today it is also anticipated that many more stakes will be created in santiago and the other larger cities of the country argentina
argentina has a population of about 32 million it is over one million square miles in size making it one of the largest countries in the world although it was the site of the first lasting LDS missionary efforts on the continent it has not kept up in terms of growth rates
55 with some other countries in south america brazil chile and peru all have more stakes and members than argentina however the LDS church has still grown from one stake in that country in 1966 to 35 stakes in 1994
table 9 shows the progressive creation of stakes since 1969 see previous maps argentina is another example of a country with a primate city like santiago in chile the metropolis of buenos aires dominates in size and importance in argentina it is about ten times the size of the next largest city cordoba
buenos aires was the first city in the country to have a stake organized there in 1966 cordoba and mendoza followed in 1972 and two years later the rosario argentina stake was created by the end of 1979 the number of stakes multiplied to 13 the locations expanded to include the smaller cities of san nicolas quilmerquilmesQuilmes godoy cruz and mar del plata however the pattern of stake locations did not change substantially because quilmerquilmes is in the immediate realm of buenos aires while godoy cruz is adjacent to mendoza and san nicholas is within about 70 kilometers of rosario mar del plata is located on the coast in the province of buenos aires and is one of the largest cities in the country these additional stakes show the ongoing hierarchic diffusion pattern in the country with all but one of the 13 stakes in 1979 being located in or near the four largest cities in argentina
the number of stakes in argentina jumped to 25 by the end of 1984 all of the new stakes were located in cities of more than 140000 inhabitants buenos aires gained another three stakes which is in keeping with its dominant role five years later in 1989 there had been a net increase of only one stake two stakes were created and one dissolved during that
56 NUMBER OF STAKES CITY population 1969 1974 1979 1984 1989 1994 buenos aires 99274049927140499273404 1 2 5 8 8 11 cordoba 98201898210189827018 1 2 2 2 3 rosario 95460695416069547606 1 1 2 2 2 mendoza 596796 1 1 1 1 1 la plata 560341 1 1 1 tucuman 496914 1 1 1 mar del plata 407024 1 1 1 1 san juan 290479 1 1 santa fe 287240 1 1 1 salta 260323 1 1 1 bahia blanca 22076522017652203765 1 1 1 resistenciaResistencia 218432184388 1 1 1 parana 159581 1 1 santiago del estero 148357 1 godoy cruz 141553 1 1 1 1 posadas 139941 1 jujuy 124487 1 1 comodoracomodoroComodoro rivadaviaRivadavia 96865 1 san nicolas 96313961313960313 1 1 1 1 neuquen 90037 1 trelestrelewrrelew 52073 1 1 florencio varela 1 quilmerquilmes 1 1 1 1 TOTAL 1 5 13 25 26 35
population not known tabletabierablerabie 9 argentina number of stakes by city and year period stakes were created in the smaller and more remote cities of jujuy in the far northwest and trelestrelew in the south on the coast during that time
the san juan stake was dissolved in 1989 this sometimes happens when a stake is having difficulty functioning as a unit eg low activity rates lack of adequate leadership the stake usually is changed into a district and is then placed back under the leadership of the local mission by 1994 a stake had been reestablished in san juan
in 1994 there are 35 stakes in argentina all but six of these were located in cities of greater than 100000 people fourteen of the stakes are centered in the greater metropolitan area of buenos aires buenos aires quilmerquilmesQuilmes florencio varela and la plata only two other cities have more than one stake this pattern is very similar to that of chile which also has a primate city except that chiles cities are smaller than argentinasArgentinas
the ten missions which cover argentina mean an average population of 323.2 million people per mission this is higher than chile but about half that of brazil the locations of mission headquarters have also spread out from buenos aires over time to smaller cities farther from the capital cordoba became the site of the second mission in 1962 followed by rosario in 1972 the more remote cities ofofbahiabahia blanca 1980 salta 1988 mendoza
1990 resistenciaResistencia 1990 and trelestrelew 1990 have been made new mission headquarters over time until now they are spread throughout the country buenos aires is now the home to three missions
by all indications the LDS church will continue to grow and diffuse in argentina if the same patterns continue the creation of new stakes will follow in an expanding
58 contagious manner within the large cities as well as continuing to descend to smaller places in the urban hierarchy of that nation peru
peru is another large country it has more area than the states of texas and california combined more than 22 million people live in the country the rugged andes run the length of the western portion of the country while the less populated northeastern areas of the country are part of the amazon river lowlands
lima another primate city has a higher proportion 42 percent of its countrys 52 stakes than does santiago to the south see table 10 and figure 8 perus stakes are headquartered in only nineteen cities owing to the dominance of lima and the multiple stakes in eight other large communities
the pattern of stake creation in peru has basically followed that of the three other countries which have been discussed thus far lima was the first city in the country to be made a stake center in 1970 nine years later lima had seven stakes of its own while trujillo to the north was the only other city to have a stake the lima peru callao stake created in 1979 is probably headquartered in callao a city of 260000 adjacent to lima
by 1984 stakes had begun to spread up the pacific coast out to iquitos in the amazon and south to arequipa and tacna as well as increasing in the lima area all of these new stakes except for tacna developed in cities of over 100000 inhabitants by 1989 the other large cities ofcuzcoof cuzco and icaleaiea had stakes while the smaller huachoguacho and mantaro stakes made their appearance mantaro is near huancayoHuancayo and its population was not in the atlas the
59 NUMBERNUMBEROIOF STMSTAKESES CITY population 1974 1 9791979 1984 1989 1994 lima 396897239681972 2 7 10 18 22 arequipa 447431 1 2 3 trujillo 354557 1 2 2 3 chiclayoChiclayo 280244 1 2 3 chimbotechimboleChimbote 2164062161406 1 1 2 plura 1863541861354 1 1 2 iquitos 173629 1 2 3 cuzco 17104171604 1 2 huancayoHuancayo 165132165 132 1 1 1 icaleaiea 1110871111087 1 1 tacna 92862 1 1 2 pucallpa 91953911953 1 puno 66477661477663477 1 pisco 53414 1 huanuco 52628521628523628 1 huachoguacho 43402 1 1 chincha 37475 1 canto grande 1 mantaro 1 1 TOTAL 22332000 2 8 19 34 52 population not known table 10 peru number of stakes by city and year 7 quito F 1 U 1970 I1 qufr00ff0 1970 ECUADOR ecuadorf1 1978 GUAYA
ez PERU
N
1959
LIMA llma 1977
1979
1978 AREQ u1p4 0
quffo buffo C q1qa 1970 1970 I1 ECUADOR 0 ECUADOR 1978 1978
GUAYAQ GVAYA 1991
e1 PERU PERU 1993
YO
1985 TRUJILLO 1985 TRUJILLO
1989 19591939 1994 1959 1977 1994 llmaLIMA limallmaLIHA 1977 1988 N 1988 0
0 scale in kilometers
1 1978 0 0 loo100 200 400 800 AREQUIPA gure 8 P E d &0 fi eru cua or stake 7 stakes and missions 5 5 1979198419891994 elD mission with date of establishment11 ishment J and 1994 headquarters city 61 lesspopulatedless populated huachoguacho gained a stake at the end of the five year interval in 1989 which makes it somewhat less anomalous from a hierarchical standpoint
by 1994 the lusiondlfdifdiffusion mormonismofofmormonism in peru began to include more cities of fewer than
100000 people additionally the largest urban areas lima arequipa trujillo chiclayoChiclayo chimbotechimboleChimbote plura iquitos and cuzco all added at least one stake between 1989 and 1994 this seems to show the result of contagious diffusion process at work within the realms of the larger cities
the spread of missions has followed a hierarchical pattern in peru too lima was the site of the countrys first mission in 1959 the four missions in lima are indicative of its large size and its success as a site for mormon missionary work the second most populous city of arequipa became a mission headquarters in 1978 and the next largest urban places trujillo and chiclayoChiclayo received missions in 1985 and 1993 respectively the ratio of 323.2 million people per mission in the country is similar to that of argentina
peru certainly has once again shown a pattern of hierarchic diffusion similar to the countries of argentina and chile which also have primate cities the dominant role that lima has played a center for diffusion and adoption of the LDS faith is very clear the diffusion of mormonism in peru will probably continue to exhibit hierarchical patterns at a quick pace for years to come
A less detailed look at the diffusion of mormonism in the other countries of south america follows none of these countries have more than 20 stakes so an extended analysis of the patterns of stake creation would not be useful
62 paraparaguay
it took 29 years from the time missionaries first came to paraguay in 1950 for a stake to be established in the country all three of the stakes currently in the country are headquartered in and near ascuncion the capital and dominate city A mission was established with headquarters in ascuncion in 1977 there are about 15000 members in the nation and there has been some success among the indians in the remote reaches of the gran chaco in the north of the country almanac 1992255 paraguays population is more than fifty percent ruralprb 1993 which may make the spread ofmormonismofmormonism more difficult because people are dispersed more throughout the nation this may partially account for the slower growth there jjrujeruuruguay
uruguay has a relatively high percentage of mormons nearly 2 percent which is only exceeded in south america by chile the diffusion mormonismofofmormonism began early in uruguay with the formation of the uruguay mission in 1947 see figures 575 7 the first stake in the country was created in montevideo in 1967 being the third country after brazil and argentina to have a stake the growth in uruguay has followed a hierarchic pattern with most of the stakes being created in the 1970s to 1980 montevideo the primate capital with onethirdone third of the countrys population has played the dominant role five of the nations eleven stakes are headquartered there the rest of the cities in the country are fairly small daringnaringduring the rest of the 1980s no stake were formed there and three stakes were actually dissolved in 1989 one new stake was added in 1993
63 bolivia
bolivia is a landlocked nation of some 7 million people the three largest cities in the country la paz santa cruz and cochabambaCochabamba all received their first stakes in 1979 this was only fifteen years after the first missionaries started preaching in the country today there are twelve stakes in the country eleven of which are in the same three big cities mentioned above el alto is adjacent to la paz odurooruro a city of 124000 is the only other city to have its own stake the limitation of bolivias stakes to only a handful of cities is probably related to the fact that there are few other large communities in the country ecuador
it comes as no surprise that the first stake to be created in ecuador was at ayaquilguayaquilGu the largest city quito the capital and second city received its first stake in 1979 sixteen years later in 1994 there are 17 stakes and over 100000 mormons in the country see figure 8 this growth of stakes emphasizes the great success that the LDS church has had diffusing its beliefs in ecuador an interesting break from the hierarchical pattern of stake creation came with the creation of the stavalootavalo stake in 1981 in a town of only 13000 this occurred because some of the first proselyting by LDS missionaries was among the indians there this missionary work proved to be very successful almanac 1992215 the majority nine of the countrys stakes are now in the vicinity of ayaquilguayaquilGu with the countrys capital quito a distant second at three stakes
64 colombia
colombia is a populous country of over 30 million people with only twelve stakes one would theorize that all of them would be located in large cities owing to a population base the size of argentinasArgentinas this seems to be the case in this instance all the cities with stakes have at least 200000 inhabitants the first cities to have branches and later missions headquartered there bogota and callcalicail were the first to have stakes located in their cities in
1977 and 1978 respectively bogota is the countrys largest city followed by medellin and callcalicail
it is interesting to note that a stake was not organized in medellin until ten years after callcalicail even though it is slightly larger than callcalicail stakes were also established in the smaller cities of Barrbarranquillaanquilla and bucaramangaBucaramanga before one was in medellin the absence of a mission headquartered in medellin as well as the negative influence of the medellin drug cartel may be part of the answer for the discrepancy venezuela
adjacent to columbia is the nation of venezuela this country has a population of about
20 million concentrated mostly along the caribbean coast and the orinoco river missionary work did not begin in venezuela until the beginning of 1967 almanac
1992280 but less than twenty years later there are some 68000 LDS in the country see table 2
caracas the capital and largest city was the first mission headquarters in 1971 and received the first stake in 1977 maracaibo the second largest city near the western border
65 with columbia received missionaries in july 1967 as well as the second mission and the third stake located in the nation in 1979 and 1980 respectively almanac 1992280 the second stake came to valencia a large city near caracas in 1979
by 1994 there were twelve stakes in venezuela three were centered in caracas while another three were in maracaibo the rest of the six stakes are headquartered in single cities the smallest cities have become stake centers after caracas valencia and maracaibo which shows the pattern of hierarchic diffusion at work in the country even though barcelona and adjacent puerto la cruz are smaller in population under 100000 they have both developed stakes in the past five years success in that region may have prompted the planned creation of the barcelona mission this summer 1994 A stake was organized in ciudad ojojedaeda in 199iggi19911 it also has fewer than loo100100000000ooo people but is near the larger city of cabimascabigas which probably is home to a few of the stakes wards the large industrial city of guaianaguayana ciudad guaianaGuguayanaayana is the location of the only stake in the interior of the country it was created in 1986 the guianasguianan
guyana surinameSuriname and french guiana are all relatively small countries in south america both in area and population french guiana is an overseas department of france while guyana and suriname are independent nations mormon diffusion into these countries has begun very recently within the last six years and only a few branches exist in each nation the capitals and largest cities of each nation georgetown Paraparamaribomaribo and cayenne have been the sites of the first mormon proselytization there
66 sumsummary
the mormon church has experienced substantial growth in south america since world war II11 the dominant pattern ofoflasofldsLDS diffusion within the continents nations has been hierarchical focusing on each countrys major cities stakes continue to multiply within the largest metropolises along with their simultaneous spread to the smaller urban areas roundabout in a way similar to hagerstrands stages shown in figure 1 from all indications this manner of spatial diffusion will continue in the future the focus now shifts to another very successful region for mormonism middle america
67 VI MIDDLE AMERICA overview
the middle america region includes mexico central america and the caribbean this region as a whole has experienced much mormon growth since world war II11 however the large country of cuba has not had a mormon presence owing to the present political situation
mexico has the most members and stakes of any country in the world after the united states it has the largest population of any country in the region mexico received the earliest lasting mormon missionary efforts in middle america beginning in 1876 in the northern areas of the country elder moses thatcher of the LDS council of the twelve apostles was called to be the first mission president in mexico city in 1879 the first stake was created in colonia juarez in northern mexico in 1895 but it was comprised of mormon colonists from the united states it was not until 1961 that another stake was created in the nation inin mexico city
the diffusion of the LDS church into the other countries of middle america came much later than it did to mexico table I111 I1 outlines the methods by which mormonism first made its way into the more populous nations in the region as well as the dates the first branches and missions were organized in the country some of the small island countries in the
68 MIDDLE AMERICA
1stIST IST NATION BRANCH introducers MISSION mexico 1879 missionaries from the US 1879 panama 1941 US servicemen 1989 puerto rico 1947 US servicemen 1979 guatemala 1948 john F ofonnalodonnalOFonnal from 1952 mormon colonies in mex costa rica 1950 missionaries from mexican 1965 mission & H darkoarkclark fails el salvador 1951 missionaries from mexican 1976 mission honduras 1953 missionaries from central 1980 america mission nicaragua 1954 missionaries from central 1989 america mission jamaica 1970 north american families 1985 dominican rep 1978 the amparo and rappleye 1981 families from the US barbados 1979 john & norman namie families 1983 belize 1980 missionaries fromerom honduras tegucigalpa mission haiti 1980 alexandre mourra haitian 1984 converted by LDS literalliterat trinidad & tobago 1980 missionaries from venezuela iggi1991 caracas mission source almanac 1992 table 11 middle america early mormon diffusion
69 caribbean are not included in the table as the LDS church is quite small in these nations see table 12 which contains the number of stakes and LDS members in middle america
the diffusion of mormonism into middle america occurred in a variety of ways not unlike that experienced in south america it does appear that more of the countries in middle america were first introduced to the LDS church by missionaries than in south america where expatriates from the united states and germany played a greater role however the importance of the likes ofofreyrey L pratt in mexico john F odonnal in guatemala and others from the mormon colonies in northern mexico in establishing mormonism in mexico and central america cannot be overstated rey L pratt was the mexican mission president from 1907 until 19319311 and john F odonnal was the first district president as well as a mission president and temple president in guatemala moss et al
1982163198216366 & almanac 1992226
following is an overview of the diffusion of the mormon church into the nations of middle america I1 describe this growth in more detail for mexico because of its large mormon population mexico
mexico has the greatest number of mormons and stakes of any country in the world excepting the united states its proximity to the united states and the early establishment of the mormon colonies in the northern mexico state of chihuahua helped start the first lasting diffusion of mormonism into a latin american country middle and south america this initial advantage coupled with many willing adopters in mexico has resulted in an
70 MIDDLE AMERICA
NATION MORMONS STAKES MISSIONS 1994 est 1994 1994 mexico 763000 126 17 guatemala 170000 23 4 dominican rep 76000765000 7 3 honduras 73000735000 9 2 el salvador 530053000 10 2 costa rica 30000 4 1 nicaragua 30000 I11 panama 29000291000 4 1 puerto rico 18000 I11 haiti 47004170044700 I11 jamaica 230020300 1 belize 130015300 trinidad & tobago 400 barbados 400 1 curacao 300 bahamas 300 st vincent & Grenagrenadinesdines 200
US virgin islands 200
from van orden 1993263 as of abt march 1994 as of july 119941 1994 1991 figure fiomalmanacfrom almanac 19923921992392319923 92m33 table 12 middle america mormon geography 1994
71 estimated 760000 mexican mormons by 1994 barring the united states no other country
in the world has more than 600000 members at this time
the diffusion of mormonism within mexico has followed a hierarchical pattern with
some interesting abnormalities in the modem period since world war IIIL11 before the modemmodern period the colonia juarez stake mexicos first was created in 1895 in the state of
chihuahua it was comprised of mormon colonists who had moved there from the united
states the juarez stake is an anomaly within normal hierarchical diffusion patterns the
diffusion in this case consisted of the wholesale relocation of a mormon population into mexico therefore a large population base to increase potential converts was not required
the colonies in chihuahua have remained as small mormon communities to this day
the modemmodern diffusion of mormonism in mexico has been dominated by the primate urban center ofmexico city it was the second city in the country to receive stake status in
19619611 table 13 and figures 9119 11 outline the progressive increase in stakes in the country with the cities ranked according to size the nine million figure for mexico city does not include outlying districts which increase its population by many millions its sheer size helps account for the 25 stakes which are headquartered there now
by 1974 there were five stakes in mexico city and two in monterrey the largest city in the north of mexico besides the colonia juarez stake there were also stakes in tampico monclova and valle hermosa the early creation of stakes in the smaller cities monclovaofofmonclova
and valle hermosa is probably related to the fact that they are close to the mormon colonies
and to the united states this proximity and the early establishment of missions in the nearby cities of torreon and monterrey have helped multiply stakes in the whole region in
72 CITY population 1969 1974 1979 1984 1989 1994 mexico city 9377300 2 5 14 18 21 25 guadalajara 1478383 1 2 2 3 monterrey 1006221 2 5 7 8 9 puebla 465985 3 4 4 5 ciudad juarez 424135 1 2 3 3 tijuana 363154 1 1 2 2 chihuahua 327313 1 1 3 3 mexicaliMexicali 317228 1 1 2 2 acapulcoAcapulcopuleo 309254 1 1 san luis potosi 271123 1 1 1 veracruz 255646 2 2 2 3 torreon 244309 1 1 3 3 Cuemacuemavacacuernavacavaca 239813 1 1 1 merida 233912 2 2 3 4 hermosillo 232691 1 1 2 2 culiacanCuliacan 228001 1 1 3 3 tampico 212188 1 1 1 1 1 saltillodaltilloSaltillo 200712 1 1 2 durango 182633 1 1 1 reynosa 181646 1 1 1 aguascalientes 181277 1 1 matamoros 165124 1 1 1 jalapa 161352 1 1 poza rica 152276 2 2 2 2 mazatlanMazatlan 147010 1 1 ciudad obregon 144795 1 2 3 3 tolucatoluba 136092 1 irapuato 135596 1 1 1 villahermosa 133181 1 1 2 madero 115302 1 1 1 1 oaxaca 114948 1 2 2 orizaba 105150 1 1 1 1 ciudad victoria 83897 1 1 1 1 pachuca 83892 1 1 1 celaya 79977 1 1 1 1 gomez palacio 79650 1 1 1 2 monclova 78134 1 1 1 1 1 senadaensenadaEn 77687 1 coatzacoalcos 69753 1 1 2 2 campichecampecheCampeche 69506 1 1 1 minatitlan 68397 1 1 1 1 los bochismochis 67953 1 2 2 tuxtiatuxtla gutierrez 66851 1 1 1 tapachula 60620 1 1 1 2 guaymas 57492 1 deliciasDelicias 52446 1 1 ciudad mante 51247 1 1 1 lalapazpaz 46011 1 1 atlixco 41967 1 piedras degrasnegras 41033 1 1 1 1 Juchjuchitanitan 30218 1 pantiaPapantpapantiapapantlaPa la 26773 1 1 chetumalChetumal 23685 1 valle hermosa 19278 1 1 1 1 1 tuxtepec 17701 1 cuautla 13946 1 1 1 1 chaicochalcochalaco 12172 1 1 1 1 tula 10720 1 1 1 1 valle del mezquital 1 1 tecalcotecaicomecalco 1 1 colonia juarez 1 1 1 1 1 1 colonia dublan 1 TOTAL 86154000 3 11 53 77T 105sr 126t6ta population not known table 13 mexico number of stakes by city and year hermosillo I1 9waw
torreon 1956
0 loo100 200 400 800
0 el mission with date of establishment and 1994 headquarters city figure 9 mexico stakes and missions 19691974 74 ij
hermosillo 1960
0
torreon 1956 0 el 0 M 1968 monterrey
scale in kilometeskilometersKilometes
0 loo100 200 400 800
1978 mexico AWAZI 0 stake cirt el ve S FIF I mission with date of establishment 18791901 and 1994 headquarters city figure 10 mexico stakes and missions 19791984
75 hermosillo 1960 1988 114 chihuahua
1956 torreon 0 ave 0 wriwelVEI 1988 1968 monterrey
leon 1975 1989 11 0 1978 guadalajara 11 000 1987 mexico 19880 cityciry st 0 1 18791901 puebla
1988 lleeleelw tuxtla gutierrez
tijuana E 1990
hermosillo 1960 1988 e34 chihuahua
1956 torreon 0 M 1988 io1968 monterrey
1987 atlanallanafian MEUCO 1994
scale in kilometers lonton 1975 1989 1975 0 loo100 200 400 800 JE 0 1978 0 meridamerlda guadalajara 0000 1987 0 stake mexico el cityciry 19880 veracruz 1879190 I1 EIWSIE F mission with date of establishment puebla 13 and 1994 headquarters city 0 00 1990 oaxaca 1988 do tuxtla gutierrez figure I1 I1 mexico stakes and missions 19891994 76 comparison guadalajaraguadalajarathe the second largest city but more removed from the united states did not receive its first stake and mission until 1975
during the five years between the end of 1974 and 1979 the number of stakes in mexico increased rapidly to 53 the number of cities with stakes grew to 313 1 which began to show the continuing pattern of stakes being distributed all over the country forty 75575575.5 percent of the stakes were located in cities with over 1001100000000ooo people mexico city monterrey and puebla southeast of mexico city together accounted for 22 of the 53 stakes the large cities merida poza rica and veracruz had two stakes each all the rest of the communities had just one stake apiece
in 1984 there were 77 stakes spread around the country the mormon growth in mexico city monterrey and puebla continued while guadalajara finally received its second fifty nine 76676676.6 percent of the stakes were in cities of over 100000 by 1989 there were some
105 stakes in the country with 80 76276276.2 percent of them located in cities with more than
100000 people in 1994 the ratio of stakes in large cities over 100000 to the total number of stakes is 92 of the 126 stakes 73 percent in the country
it is interesting that although the total number of cities with stakes continues to rise the share of stakes in communities with over loo100100000000ooo has remained relatively constant at about
75 percent it is also noteworthy that although monterrey is smaller than guadalajara it has nine stakes to guadalajaras three this shows the greater success that the diffusion of mormonism has had in monterrey over time as well as its advantage of having a mission located there earlier the late 1989 creation of a stake in the tourist mecca of acapulcoAcapuico may also be related to the factors which have led to less growth in guadalajara
77 the three stakes and five missions in existence in mexico in 1969 were only a precursor to the rapid diffusion of mormon stakes and missions throughout the country over the past
25 years although there are 124 stakes and an estimated 800000 mormons in mexico in
1994 still less than one percent of mexicans are LDS this leaves a great deal of potential for the diffusion of mormonism in that country only a few stakes have been created in mexico over the past three years even though the LDS membership has apparently continued to grow there if the growth of mormonism in mexico continues this lull in new stakes will be replaced in the future with another round of stake creations to keep pace with the increasing number of members in the country so the stakes will not be too large guatemala
guatemala has the highest percentage about 141.4 of LDS church members of any nation in middle america almanac 1992226 all of the countrys 23 stakes are located in its more populous southern half the capital guatemala city is by far the largest city in the country with over one million people in its metropolitan area about 12 percent of the countrys total population it was the site for the first stake in the nation in 1967 now there are twelve stakes in the guatemala city area this amounts to over 50 percent of guatemalas stakes being located among only 12 percent of Guatemalaguatemalansns showing the heavy dominance of guatemala city as a center for the mormon population in that country
the remainder of the countrys population is largely rural in nature some 67 percent of the population lives in rural areas PRB 1993 which means that there are few large cities in the country besides guatemala city it also indicates that there is actually a greater
78 potential in theory for mormonisms diffusion outside of the cities quetzaltenango the
second largest city and second to have a stake organized there in 1975 has a population
of only about 60000 this city now only has two stakes all the other communities with
stakes are even smaller than quetzaltenango and none of them became stake centers until
at least 1980
the late emergence of stakes in these smaller communities of guatemala reflects the
great gap in the urban hierarchy between the capital and the rest of the cities in the country
it is possible but not altogether probable that in the future more of the rural communities
may have stakes organized in them so that the dominance of guatemala city would thereby
be lessened because people are more dispersed in a rural setting the pattern for LDS
diffusion in guatemala outside of guatemala city will probably be more contagious than hierarchical because of the dearth of urban places in the country el salvador
the diffusion ofmormonismofmormonism in the nation of el salvador has centered around its capital
and primate city san salvador metropolitan population of 920000 like guatemala el
salvadors population is rural in nature and the spread of its ten stakes has been limited to the largest cities san salvador received the first stake in 1979 and now has five half of the
countrys stakes
santa ana population 96000 and san miguel population 59000 followed san
salvador with stakes of their own later in 1979 and in 1980 it was not until 1991 that the
smaller cities of Sonssonsonateconsonateonate and ahuachapan became stake centers the diffusion of the LDS
79 church in el salvador will probably parallel that of guatemala in the future As the mormon innovation begins to reach more of the countrys population the creation of stakes in other cities across the nation will probably begin to emerge honduras
honduras is different than the rest of the countries in central america in that the first stake there was not created in the capital and largest city of the country the first stake in honduras was created in the second largest city of san pedro sula in 1978 while a stake was riotnot organized in the capital of tegucigalpa until 1979 this different order may probably be connected to a higher rate of adoption in the vicinity of san pedro sula in the past and the fact that tegucigalpa is not much larger than san pedro sula honduras is also very rural which might help explain why the small communities of la lima valle de sula and el merendon in the vicinity of san pedro sula and comayaguela and toncontinToncontin near tegucigalpa are stake centers these towns are not to be found in most lasesatatlases these small towns with stakes may reflect the lack of big cities in the country as well as the contagious type diffusion influences which have emanated from the two large cities of tegucigalpa and san pedro sula which are also the countrys headquarters for its two missions belize
the small population of belize about 230000 and the recent arrival ofmormonismofmormonism into the country help explain why it currently has no stakes mormon missionary work in belize is covered by the honduras san pedro sula mission with only 1300 Morcormonsmormonsmons belize has the smallest LDS population of any country of central america however the
80 percentage of mormons in belize is approaching that ofoflasofldsLDS in el salvador this illustrates
that the diffusion ofmormonismofmormonism in belize has been fairly successful although on a smaller
scale nicarnicaragua
there are no stakes in nicaragua either even though there are some 13000 members in
the country there was a stake centered in managua beginning in 19819811 but it was
Ccontinueddiscontinuedlisils in 1989 the nicaragua managua mission began in 1989 after the
normalization of the countrys govgovernmentemment since that time the LDS population has grown
ataitatt a tremendous rate the highest of any country in the church with over 1000010 000ooo mormons
from 3453 to some 11000 in 1991 almanac 1992250 when the situation in nicaragua becomes more stable the recurrence of a stake in managua is most logical and probable
this occurrence will be followed soon by stakes being created in a number of other cities
in the country because of the large LDS base which already exists in nicaragua
costa rica
currently there are four stakes in costa rica all of the stakes are centered in the capital
of san jose san jose is located in the central valley of costa rica where the about 33
percent of the countrys inhabitants live this helps explain san joses dominance many of
the smaller communities surrounding san jose such as alajuelaAlajuela heredia and cartago have
church wards and branches which are included in the san jose stakes jan otterstrom my
father who lives in costa rica believes that stakes will soon be created in the port cities of
81 limon on the caribbean coast and Puntpuntarenasarenas on the pacific coast this action would be
consistent with the hierarchical pattern ofoflasofldsLDS diffusion seen elsewhere
panama
the pattern of stakes in panama is similar to that of costa rica the countrys first stake
was created in the capital of panama city in 1979 now there are three stakes in the panama
Ccity1ity area panama city bella vista and san miguelito and one in the western portion of
the country centered in david david is the second most populous city in the country
dominican republic
it was eight years from the time mormon missionary work began in the dominican
republic until the first stake was established in the capital city of santo domingo in 1986
that mormon achievement underscores the rapid diffusion of the LDS church in this nation which shares the island hispaniolaofofhispaniolaHispaniola with haiti it is estimated that over 70000 mormons
are now in the country this translates into seven stakes five of which are in the santo domingo area this includes the san geronimo stake the other two stakes are in the main
northern cities of santiago and san francisco de macorismacarisMacoris they were both created in 1991
because of the success that the LDS church has had in the dominican republic the
establishment of new stakes in the country will likely accelerate additionally as the
diffusion of mormonism continues cities outside of santo domingo will be better
represented by these new stakes
82 puerto rico
puerto rico is a unique example of an area where all the LDS stakes have been dissolved beginning in 1980 with the san juan stake four stakes were created in four large cities the stakes were all discontinued on december 5 1993 which was possibly caused by low activity rates of the mormons or by difficulties in maintaining adequate leadership the wards became branches and were all placed under the direct leadership of the puerto rico san juan mission emainderremainderemaingeremainder of the caribbean
no other countries in the caribbean have stakes established within their borders haiti and jamaica have the most members in the caribbean after the dominican republic and puerto rico the west indies mission covers most of the lesser antilles the growth of mormonism on these islands has been slow the mission president struggles to preside over such a widely disparate lingual geographical political economic and cultural mission van orden 1993312
LUMsummaryQ Maly
the diffusion of mormonism in middle america has been quite similar to that of south america primate cities such as mexico city Guaguatemelaguatemalatemela city and santo domingo have formed the nucleus of LDS growth in their respective countries the growth of mormonism in secondary centers has been most evident in mexico and guatemala while the church in costa rica panama and the dominican republic is still mainly centered around the capital cities
83 the discussion now turns to europe and canada where the earliest international mormon missionary work occurred the long church histories associated with the europecanadaEurope Canada region have somewhat altered the patterns ofoflasofldsLDS stake diffusion in a number of nations there from that shown in latin america
84 VII EUROPE AND CANADA overview
europe and canada were the sites of some of the earliest mormon missionary efforts the missionary force was relatively small in the 1800s and success varied among the different countries most converts emigrated to mormon centers in america and so the church membership in europe and canada remained small and LDS branches often struggled for years at a time without much direct guidance from the church in salt lake city not until this century when converts were encouraged to stay in their own countries did the mormon church in europe and canada begin to grow consistently
world wars and the cold war disrupted missionary work throughout europe at times and severely limited LDS activity in eastern europe for many decades therefore the most consistent and ongoing proselyting activity in the region has been in western europe and canada the recent break up of the soviet union has allowed the mormons to enter or reenter in many cases most of the eastern european countries including those newly created the unfolding of events which have allowed the mormon church into new nations in europe emphasizes a point which is true all over the world the LDS church diffuses into new countries serendipitously only when it is allowed in
over the past few decades the mormon church has grown quite slowly in most of europe with the notable exceptions of portugal and spain however in recent years
85 newcomers in a number of western european nations have helped keep LDS growth rates there from being even lower A sizable portion of the new converts in austria germany france sweden norway and the united kingdom have been immigrants and refugees from eastern europe africa and elsewhere van orden 199313813513212781261231993138135132127 8126123
As table 14 indicates many missions have been established recently in such countries as greece romania bulgaria poland russia ukraine hungary the czech republic and latvia russia and ukraine already have multiple missions the russian missions are headquartered in the large cities of moscow st petersburg samara sagatovSasaratovratov and by this summer 1994 rostov na donubonu and novosibirsk the first mission in siberia the two ukrainian missions are in kiev and donetskDonetsk it remains to be seen ifmormonismifmormonism will attract great numbers of new converts in the newly opened areas of eastern europe
in almost all of the european nations the original diffusion of the church came by way of missionaries mormon US servicemen played some part in establishing the church in portugal and spain additionally finnish mormons living in talliantallinnTallinn estonia and st petersburg russia helped start missionary work in those two nations almanac 1992 the table underscores the magnitude of the LDS churchs recent push into eastern europe and emphasizes how the church is seeking to preach in all nations emphasis added
even after many years of proselyting in numerous european countries there are still only about 350000 mormons in all of this region which has a total population of about 513 million this translates into only 88 stakes 41 of which are in the united kingdom germany has sixteen stakes france has seven and portugal is up to five stakes while no other country has more than three stakes even though holland was the site of the worlds
86 EUROPE
NATION 1stIST 1stIST 1stIST MORMONS BRANCH MISSION STAKE 1993 est great britain 1837 1837 1960 155000155i000 ireland 1840 1960 3000 germany 1843 1850 1961 40000401000 denmark 1850 1850 1974 450043500 france 1850 1850 1975 25000 italy 1850 1850 1981 16000161000 switzerland 185 lest 1850 1961 670061700 norway 1852 1920 1977 440001000 sweden 1853 1905 1975 8008000 iceland 1853 300 malta 1853 est 1852 100 netherlands 1862 1864 1961 7000 belgium 1889 est 1963 1977 5500 romania 1899 1993 200 hungary 1900 1990 15001500 austria 190igo190lest1901estigol1901lestiestest 1960 1980 330031300 poland 1928 1990 500 czechoslovakia 1929 est 1929 na czech republic 800 slovakia 100 finland 1930 est 1947 1977 45004 500 greece 1965 1990 400 luxembourg 1965 est 100 spain 1966 est 1970 1982 240024000 portugal 1974 1974 1981 31000310000 frrti5croatia 1975 200 serbiaugroidfraiaFrfrkiakiahtahin 19881qooidoo1700 200 russia 1989 1992 15001500 estonia 1990 est 400 ukraine 1991 1992 15001500 latvia 1993 est 1993 100 sloveniaolovcilldslisll iamitm 51 500 lithuania dedicated 1993 by mormon apostle 100 albania dedicated 1993 by mormon apostle 100
originally in germany czechoslovakia is now the czech republic and slovakia formerly part of yugoslavia table 14 europe early mormon diffusion mormons 1993
87 first nonenglishnon english speaking stake in 19619611 mormonism has grown so slowly there that there are only three stakes in the netherlands today I1 will now discuss the diffusion of stakes in the united kingdom and germany because the patterns of stake diffusion have been more influenced by early mormon missionary endeavors there than in other regions united kingdom
the first mormon proselyting in europe occurred north of liverpool near preston england in 1837 most of the early mormon diffusion occurred in the vicinity of preston liverpool and manchester almanac 1992276 van orden 19933748199337 48 and not in the country largest city of london this may be due to liverpools role as a major port city also joseph fielding one of the first missionaries had a brother who was a reverend in nearby preston the missionaries first preaching in england was before reverend james fieldings congregation van orden 199339
it is therefore not surprising that the countrys first stake organized in 1960 was centered in manchester and not london london did receive stake status in 1961 and now has about eight stakes two missions and a mormon temple in its metropolitan area but notwithstanding five of the first six stakes in england were in cities from birmingham northward showing that the diffusion of mormonism in england has been less tied to hierarchy and more related to the location of the first mormon proselyting efforts
glasgow scotland became a stake center in 1962 wales and northern ireland did not obtain their first stake until 1975 and 1974 respectively there are now five stakes in scotland two in wales and one in northern ireland
88 the average size of the cities with stakes in england is about 4600000 including
london and 230000 not including london although the average city size with stakes is
fairly large there are many stake cities which have less than 100000 inhabitants
most of the stakes in england were created in the seventies and only six stakes were
made in the eighties only one stake has been organized in england in the past ten years
the stakes are now fairly evenly dispersed throughout all of the country indicating that
mormons have become established in most areas of the country london is still not as
dominant a mormon center as is lima peru or santiago chile while the small city of preston 166000 people where mormonism began in great britain will be the site of the
next mormon temple in the country
germanygerm
the sixteen stakes in germany were all created between 1961 and 1987 the first three
stakes in germany were created in 1961 in the large cities of berlin hamburg and stuttgart
showing that by that time mormons were distributed around the country this is understandable because as with the united kingdom the mormon church had been
established in germany long before the first stake was made which allowed for groups of
mormons to be located in more cities than in a country like the dominican republic which
obtained its first stake less than ten years after missionaries originally arrived
two other interesting points about germanys stakes need to be mentioned because of
the strong presence of the united states military in the country four of the stakes were
created as servicemen units to serve the american mormons in the country now there are
89 only three servicemen stakes as the nuremberg servicemen stake was changed to just
nuremberg in 1994 which probably reflects the general decline of US military personnel
in the country
another anomaly in germany is that two of its stakes were in a different country four
years ago before the reunification there were two stakes in east germany which were
created during the eighties in leipzig and freiberg in the south these two stakes were the
only stakes which ever existed in the former communist eastern europe
canada
canada has some 140000 mormons and 37 stakes as of 1994 although canada was the first nation outside of the united states to have missionaries preach there in upper canada in the early 1830s and to have a stake created within its territory in 1895 in cardstonbardstonCardston alberta it has been surpassed in membership and stakes by mexico brazil chile the philippines the united kingdom and peru the church has simply not grown as fast in canada as it has elsewhere in the world
the diffusion of the church in southern alberta began with the establishment of mormon fanningfarming settlements in the vicinity of cardstonbardstonCardston in the late 1800s it is therefore not surprising that canadas first three stakes were established in the cardstonbardstonCardston area cardstonbardstonCardston raymond and lethbridge this shows a contagious pattern of mormon diffusion not unlike that experienced in utah where farm settlements and hence mormons spread throughout utah southern idaho arizona and elsewhere
it also follows that the first stake created in a major city was in calgary alberta in
90 1953 because of its proximity to the mormon center in cardstonbardstonCardston it was not until 1960 that stakes were finally organized in the large metropolises of vancouver and toronto fifteen years later at the beginning of 1975 nine of the twelve stake in canada were in alberta
since 1975 stakes have been established in ottawa montreal saskatoon winnipeg nova scotia dartmouth nova scotia and saint john showing that mormons are in most parts of the country the only provinces which do not have at least one stake are newfoundland and prince edward island nonetheless the mormons in canada are still most heavily concentrated in alberta where there are 17 stakes ontario and british columbia follow alberta with eight and six stakes respectively and the rest of the provinces have only six stakes between them
the early settlements of mormons in alberta has created a pattern of stake creation in canada which contains initial and continuing contagious elements associated with mormons in alberta as well the normal hierarchical progression of stakes seen elsewhere in the world
Qsummary
the diffusion ofmormon stakes in europe and canada have mostly centered around the large cities however the influence of early missionary work and colonization outside of the largest cities in canada and england have resulted in the first stakes in these nations being created in smaller localities in the modemmodern era missionary work has struggled in much of western europe even so the mormons continues to vigorously proselytize there the LDS church is just beginning to send or resend missionaries to most eastern european countries so the patterns of diffusion there are in the earliest stages
91 VIII ASIA overview
the continent of asia is the most populous in the world it includes such giants in population as china and india with about two billion people between them as well as indonesia japan bangladesh and pakistan each with over 100 million people japan is the only one of these large countries that has more than a few thousand Morcormonsmormonsmons even in japan mormonism has not been overly successful as there only just over 100000 LDS members in that nation of 125 million people
religious cultural political ethnic and language barriers have impeded the spread of mormonism in the asian region the muslim countries in the region excepting indonesia as well as china north korea and burma are all but closed to proselyting within their borders however the church has recently begun to make some progress in diffusing mormonism into many asian countries such as mongolia vietnam cambodia and pakistan among the christians only
religious freedom as well as high proportions of christians have seemed to help mormonism grow in an impressive manner over the past few decades in the philippines and south korea the philippines accounts for over half of the 500000 plus mormons in asia while the philippines together with japan south korea hong kong and taiwan account
1for0.0r about 96 percent of the total LDS population in the region
92 table 15 shows the movement mormonismofofmormonism into asian countries by date when the first
branch and mission were organized in each nation including the modemmodern opening of
missions in india and thailand and the 1993 estimated number of mormons in these
countries the initial thrust of the LDS church into india burma siam thailand and
china in the 1850s was not very successful the missionaries sent to these countries worked
almost exclusively with the british residents moss et al 1982193198219388
the mission in india had the most converts but many of these new mormons emigrated tdsaltto saltsait lake city and vicinity A branch did last in india until 1903 almanac 19922319922311
the missionaries to china were limited to hong kong and they spent just 56 days there before leaving for home after baptizing maybe one convert almanac 1992229 & moss et
al 1982197 the siam mission lasted about four months elam luddington the missions only missionary only baptized a man named james trail and his wife almanac 1992272 missionary work in what is now burma was equally unsuccessful moss et al 1982196
the japan mission plodded along with only a handful of converts until 1924 when it vaswas closed in 1937 the japan mission was openedreopenedre with headquarters in hawaii it finally returned to japan in 1948 after world war II11 almanac 1992235 the openingreopeningre of missionary work in japan signalledsignalled the beginning of a more permanent and growing mormon presence in asia
in the terms of stakes there are 98 in asia in 1994 they are located in the philippines
48 japan 26 south korea 16 hong kong 5 and taiwan 3 hong kong is one big urban center and the three stakes in taiwan are in the two very large cities ofoftaipeitaipei and kaohsiungKaoblaohsiunghsiung seoul south korea with eight stakes dominates the mormon geography of that
93 ASIA
NATION 1stIST 1stIST 1stIST MORMONS BRANCH MISSION STAKE 1993 est india 1851851 lestiestest 18511992 120011200 siam thailand 1968 est 18541973 50005000 hong kong 1951951 lestiestest 1955 1976 180018000 turkey 1885 est 1884 200 armenia 1885 est m 100 japan 1902 est 1901 1970 1000001 philippines 1945 est 1967 1973 3200003201000 korea south 1952 est 1962 1973 63000 taiwan 1956 est 1971 1976 20300201300 vietnam 1962 est singapore 1968 1969 180011800 indonesia 1970 1975 450045500 malaysia 1972 est 500 macau 1977 700 pakistan 1990 est 200 burma MM M 500 sri lanka M 100 china M m 400 mongoliamongoliasixsix missionarymissionary couples working in ulaanbaatar iniii 1993 cambodia recently 0 benedpenedopened for missionarymissionarymissionary work 1994 table 15 asia early mormon diffusion mormons 1993
94 country indicating a strong hierarchic influence as well as underscoring the size and importance of the city there are eight stakes in the megalopolis of tokyo yokohama japan and eight in the osakakobekyotoosaka kobe kyoto metropolitan region these two urban areas account for over half of japans stakes the first two stakes in japan were organized in tokyo and osaka
the philippines provides an interesting example of the way that LDS stakes have diffused in nations made up of multiple islands to help one understand this growth I1 will now discuss this pattern of stake creation in some detail for the philippines the country in asia with the greatest number of stakes philippines
the church was introduced to the philippines after world war II11 by americans peter and maxine grimm in manila peter was a colonel in the US army and maxine served in the american red cross the first filipino convert came in 1945 partly through their influence however it was not until 1961 that missionaries were sent to the country the grimms were still in the country and they continued to help in the missionary effort moss etalet al 1982221 & almanac 1992257
the philippines mission was created in 1967 being headquartered in manila two years later the church had spread to eight major islands of the country and the mission had the highest number of baptisms in the church almanac 1982257 the spread of stakes in the country has also been rapid although they are located on only five islands at this time
95 the first stake in the country was organized in manila in 1973 figure 12 it is the
largest city in the country six years later in 1979 there were only three stakes in the
country all three of them manilamakahi makati and quezon city the second largest city in the philippines were in the vicinity of manila missions had been created during that period on two additional islands cebu on the island of cebu and dabaodavao on the southern island of mindanao dabaodavao and cebu city are the largest cities in the country after manila and
quezon city A mission in baguio located in the northern part of the island of luzon the
same island that manila is on was also established in 1979
by the end of 1984 the number of stakes in the country had increased to sixteen six of these stakes were in the area of manila and quezon city five more were dispersed in large
cities in the lowlands north of manila and the remaining five were divided between cebu city dabaodavao and bacolod on the island ofofnegrosnegros
by 1994 all but one of the 48 stakes in the philippines were on the same four islands that had stakes in 1984 possibly showing hierarchical diffusion within the realm of each island rather than through the country as a whole figure 13 there has been a spread to the far north and south ofluzon island two stakes in each area and the north coast of mindanao island six stakes including one in zamboanga on the eastern peninsula only three cities dabaodavao bacolod and cagayan de oro had more than one stake two apiece the eight stakes around manila are located in eight different communities manila quezon city caloocanCaloocan Paranparaniaqueparanaqueaque marikina las pinas makatimakahi and pasigbasig this shows that the stakes in the philippines are distributed among many different communities
96 E T Y E L
1974 bebuemue
E
0O e G
city
0 1984 R 0 headquarters D 200neeaee N I1 M
10 1994
philippines
inuometers
100 andmcmmcq
scale
shmentashment
estabaestabl
of
dateemleemlo
with
mission stake
E T Y E L
1974 lauebu
U a E C
0 R 0 1979 D N I1 M 0 missions philippines
andmck
philippines 19791984
stakes
12
figure
97 E
R T Y A
loban E dabaodavao M 0 0O taclubantacloban L A A 0 Tac 3 cagayancagqyan zazoro N
A 1977 1990e 1 D chne N L 00 1988 1974 0 I1 M ebu 0 0 & U 19 a E aquaequanaga acolonacolod C
01987 1 3 Y ragan I 0 0 C 1967 A R lwotwomgo N N G ablo A C 0 19 E I 11 manila P Z city elaculanenanP N cityomza cabanatuan U 1992 iquezon 0 L nbaguio sangurqun 19t80fernando
1979 0 0 j headquarters 0 200 it 1994 1994 0 D ters N andmcq I1 kilowters Kilow M 100 in 1cac philippines establishment Sohoobo
of
date
with
mission stake
0 n
E T Y E L
ag N
C 1967 9a6N 1 cily manila 1 quezon
198ljferntindo
0 R 0 1989 D N I1 missions M 0 philippines
andacmamm
19891994 philippines
stakes
13
figure
98t10 still the greatest number of stakes continue to be located on the island of luzon particularly within a few hundred kilometers of manila this is logical when one considers the fact that manila is the most populous filipino city and that a large number of people live in the regions round about manila notwithstanding this concentration of stakes the manila metropolitan area has only increased by two stakes since 1984 while the country as a whole has tripled in number of stakes during the same time period this seems to indicate that the growth of the church outside of manila has outpaced that of the capital city sumsummary
the diffusion of mormon stakes in the islands of the philippines has been initially hierarchical from manila outward to other areas of luzon island as well as the islands of cebu negros and mindanao it appears that after this early diffusion the insulation of the various islands lessens the influence of manila in the hierarchic order except on luzon island
it will be interesting to see where additional stakes are created in the philippines and elsewhere in asia in the future this will help one learn if the strongly hierarchical patterns of LDS diffusion shown will continue in the five asian nations with stakes and if these same spatial characteristics will appear in the other countries of the region which currently have no stakes
99 IX SOUTH PACIFIC
overview
the region of the south pacific consists of australia new zealand tonga samoa
papua new guinea and the other islands scattered throughout the pacific ocean south of hawaii As in europe the LDS church has a long history in the south pacific the first
missionary work in the region began in 1840 in australia while the first mission was in the
societySI1 islands now french polynesia beginning in 1844 table 16
now some 150 years later there are over 280000 mormons in the region in at least 18 nations and territories with 62 stakes located in six countries and the US territory of american samoa tongas population is 33 percent LDS which proportion is the highest of
any country in the world western samoa is second with 29 percent mormon almanac
1992273282 in fact american samoa french polynesia new zealand kiribatiKiribati beleau the cook islands the marshall islands and niue all have a greater percentage of mormons than does the united states although most of these nations have small populations it still underscores that the mormon church has done quite well in diffusing its beliefs throughout thehe widely scattered region
in 1974 western samoa became the first country in the world to be entirely covered by stakes almanac 1992283 showing that the spread of mormonism in that small
country has been both successful and widespread papua new guinea and kiribati are
100 SOUTH PACIFIC
NATION 1stIST 1stIST 1stIST MORMONS TERRITORY BRANCH MISSION STAKE 1993 est australia 1844 1851 1960 80000805000 frF r polynesia 1844 1844 1972 13000131000 new zealand 1855 1878 1958 810008 western samoa 1888est1888 est 1888 1962 49000491000 american samoa 1893 1969 1100011 ip000 tonga 1897est1897 est 1916 1968 370037000 cook islands 1947est1947 est NO1000I1 niue 1952 210025100 guam 1952 est 1980 15001500 fiji 1954 1971 1983 9000ooo000 new caledonia 1961 100011000 vanuatu 1973 200 kiribati 1975 est 410071004 micronesia 1977 est 2000215000 marshall islands 1978 17001 700 papua new guinea 1979 1992 300010003 tuvalu 1992 est 100 nauru 1992 est 100 solomon islands 1992 est 100 palau belau 300 table 16 south pacific early mormon diffusion mormons 1993
101 examples of south pacific countries which have exhibited a rapid growth of mormonism very recently the diffusion in kiribati is especially impressive now having over 4000 mormons in a country ofjust 65000 and the church is only been in the nation for about 20
1Yyearsears kiribatiKiribati did not become a separate country until 1979
I1new zealand
the first stake in the south pacific region was organized in auckland new zealand in
1958 it was the first stake created outside of the united states not including the mormon settlements in juarez mexico and cardstonbardstonCardston canada today all but one of the countrys 17 stakes are located on north island and seven 7 of these stakes are located in the nations largest city of auckland new zealand is interesting in that the majority who joined the church in the country during the 1800s were rural native maori people although the first branch was formed among europeans in karorikafori near the capital of wellington almanac
1992249 australia
australia is a highly urbanized country 85 percent urban with the bulk of its population clustered around the large coastal metropolitan cities of sydney melbourne brisbane adelaide and perth all but one of the 18 stakes in australia are located in the vicinity of these cities one stake is headquartered on tasmania island at hobart
it follows that the first stake was established in sydney the most populous australian country in 1960 new stakes were also organized in brisbane and melbourne later in that same year A stake was created in adelaide in 1966 and in the remote city of perth in 1967
102 since 1967 stakes have just increased in the area of these five cities with the only outside addition of the hobart stake in 1977 additionally all are now headquarters for missions including two missions presently in sydney sumsummary
the LDS church has had great success in penetrating into the populations of many of the islands in the south pacific insomuch that nine of the ten international nations with the highest percentages of mormons are located in the region the spread of stakes in the highly urban australia and new zealand has been mostly hierarchical tempered by the rural influence of the maori mormons in new zealand the focus now moves from a region which has had relatively high rates of mormon adoption to africa which has the fewest mormons of any region and which has historically received the least amount of the mormon
innovation
103 X AFRICA
the diffusion of the mormon church into the african realm has been the most recent of any region in the world africa seems to have great potential for mormon growth as there are only some 69000 LDS members in 1993 on the continent which has a population of over 650 million van orden 1993376 mormon missionary activities there have been limited to subsaharansub saharan or nonmuslimnon muslim africa
the only countries in africa to receive mormon missionaries before 1978 were south africa and rhodesia now zimbabwe beginning in 1853 the first mormon branch in africa was established on august 16 1853 in mowbray south africa moss et al
1982325 missionaries began proselyting in rhodesia during the 1930s but were not successful until the early 1950s almanac 1992284 proselyting was mostly limited to members of the european community in those two countries this limitation on missionary contacts was related to the fact that as discussed in the section on brazil mormon church doctrine did not allow blacks to hold the priesthood until 1978
in 1978 the revelation which allowed all worthy members of the church regardless of race to hold the priesthood was received by church president spencer W kimball church leaders had decided not to send missionaries to black african countries before 1978 even though they had been requested by people in west africa because of the problems which
104 might have arisen there because the blacks could not hold the priesthood moss et al
1982331
even without missionaries a number of black mormon congregations sprung up before
1978 in nigeria and ghana led without church authority by men who had learned about the church through reading mormon literature moss et al 1982330198233022 although these mormon groups in nigeria and ghana were not officially connected with the church they later became the source of many of the initial mormon conversions when LDS missionaries did arrive in 1978
the LDS church has started to proselyte in many african countries over the past several years table 17 shows the number of mormons in various african countries the year in which the first church branch was established there and the number of missions in each country most of the countries have been introduced to the church by missionaries or by people who returned to their home countries after being converted while living in europe however there are unique cases such as nigeria and ghana where mormon literature and written correspondence with salt lake played the original diffusiondiffusionaryary role moss et al
198232919823293232
the only african countries which have LDS stakes are south africa 5 nigeria 3 and ghana 2 the first stake in africa was organized in 1970 in johannesburg south africa it is the largest city in that country the second stake was established in the nearby capital city of pretoria in 1978 the other three stakes are in the large coastal cities of durban and cape town as well as benoni near johannesburg
105 AFRICA
1stIST 1stIST MORMONS NATION BRANCH MISSION 1993 est south africa 1853 1853 22p022000 zimbabwe 1951951 lestiestest 1987 3003000 egypt LDS expatriates 1971 M 100 nigeria 1978 1980 210002 1 NO ghana 1978 1985 1111000000vooMOO reunion 1979 300 mauritius 1982 1988 300 swaziland 1985 MMMM 600 zaire 1986 1987 4000 kenya 1986est1986 est 1991 800 ivory coast 1986est1986 est 1992 est 2002000 sierra leone 1988 120015200 liberia 1988 est 1988 1NO1000 lesotho 19891989estest 300 namibia 1990 200 botswana 1990 300 uganda 1990 200 congo 1992 est 300 cameroon 1992 est 1992 200 gabon 1992 est 100 tanzania 1992 est 100 zambia 1992 est 100 centrcantr aftaff rep 1992 100 burundi 1993 est 100 table 17 africa early mormon diffusion mormons 1993
106 the first stake in nigeria was created in 1988 in the city of aba in southeast nigeria and the second was made near aba in port harcourt in 1990 the third stake was created in 1993 in benin city all of these cities are substantial in size but they do not approach the population which is in the capital and largest nigerian city of lagos this shows that the diffusion ofmormonismofmormonism in nigeria is not strictly hierarchical in nature
the two stakes in ghana were created on the same day in 1991 in the coastal cities of accra and cape coast accra is the capital and largest city and the headquarters of the ghana accra mission
it will be interesting to see what spatial patterns result as the diffusion of the mormon hurchchurch progresses in africa over the next few decades especially as the church becomes more established on the continent from all indications this process will proceed in a hierarchic manner similar to other areas of the world
107 XI SUMMARY conclusions AND recommendations sumsummary
the church of jesus christ oflatterlatterdayday saints has enthusiastically sought to diffuse its beliefs internationally from almost the moment of its founding in 1830 although the degree of adoption acceptance of the mormon religion has varied over time and place attempts have been made to introduce mormonism into virtually every country where missionary work is allowed this year 1994 will probably mark the transition of the church into a clearly international organization with as many members outside of the united states as within about 454.5 million mormons in each
the mormon churchs missionary successes in the modem era since world war II11 have been most striking in middle and south america as well as in the philippines south korea portugal and some african countries on the other hand the western europeans have been very slow to enter the mormon fold the virtual absence of LDS congregations in the worlds most populous countries of china and india and the closed religious and political atmosphere of most muslim nations drive home the fact that the mormon church is still just beginning its diffusion into all nations
in the countries where the mormon church has been successful the patterns of stake and mission creation have provided a basis for understanding how the mormon population has diffused through a country over time this method of tracking mormonisms diffusion
108 has shown that the creation of a countrys first mission followed later by a stake almost always occurs in the largest city from there the spread of missions and stakes has generally proceeded outward down the hierarchy of urban places as well as increasing contagiously within the realm ofthe central city this brings the discussion back to the conceptual model oflasofldsof LDS international diffusion proposed in chapter 2 conclusions
the conceptual model illustrated in figure 14 is the same as that of figure I11 for the functional perspective portion but the spatial perspective part now includes four mormon specific diffusion phases rather than the three stages ofhagerstrandofhagerstrand however the four mormon phases are very similar to hagerstrands which emphasizes that the diffusion mormonismofofmormonism within nations has followed a natural pattern often recognized in studies of the spread of other innovations
how the workings of supply and demand in the functional perspective affect the specific rate of growth within a country have not been studied in this thesis however the fact that growth rates vary throughout the world has been shown it follows that the greater the growth rate the faster the mormon religion will spread throughout a nation and the more quickly it will progress through the four general phases of spatial diffusion outlined in the model see van orden 19932119932122 for a related concept concerning international church growth
the unique population size area and shape and alurbanruralurbanrur makeup have caused the spatial manifestation of the phases of diffusion to vary somewhat among nations however
109 functional perspective
THE innovation MORMONISM SUPPLY DEMAND
supplier of the innovation consumer of the innovation the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints population of country A factors affecting amount of supply in country A factors affecting amount of demand in country A political a number of mormons who relocate to country A a stability b number of missionaries available b religious freedom c financial resources of the church c religious makeup of population d number of new converts in country A d economic conditions per capita income e churchs strategies to proselytize in country A e education f number of converts who return to country A f culture g population growth rate h mobility
A few scenarios innovation DIFFUSION RATE
HIGH HIGH HIGH
MED MED MED
LOW LOW LOW
supply demand rate supply demand rate supply demand rate
Ffunctionalu n c t 1 0 n a spatialatialabial interiinterfinterfaceace spatial perspective 0 0 0 0 hierarchy of urban places PHASES OF DIFFUSION mission diffusion rate time distance traveled IN COUNTRY A stake through phases
1 INITIAL introduction 2 CENTRAL STAGING 3 metropolitan 4 contagious MOVEMENT concentration 0 0 0 0 00 0 00 0 0 0 0 0 0 11 0 0 0 0 0 0 cr 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 00 00 100 0 00 00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 46 0 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 aa 0 0 0 0 0 0a 0 0 0 00 0 00 00 0 0 0 0 000eowwoe 0 0 0 0 000 00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 040 WF0 0 0 0 40 0
figure 14 conceptual model of the international diffusion of the LDS church
110 most countries studied in this thesis have followed this pattern during the modern era which this paper has concentrated on
phase one is the initial introduction period this diffusion of the church into a new country is begun in at least one of three ways by expatriate Morcormonsmormonsmons usually from north america or europe who move into a country by citizens of the country who join the church elsewhere and return to their own land or by LDS missionaries who are assigned to the country from a mission in a neighboring nation
missionaries must be allowed into the country by the government while expatriates or returning citizens can often begin meeting together before the church is officially recognized in a country in either case under favorable political conditions the church eventually obtains recognition missionaries begin to proselyte and branches are organized for the local church members in most instances these branches are located in the largest city or cities of the country As the country nears the end of phase one a mission is formed in or near the country to increase the supply of missionaries the mission is headquartered in or near one of the major cities where branches already are established by this time most of the members are not expatriate north americans
diffusion phase two is the central staging period proselyting activity is concentrated around the large city which houses the mission headquarters the headquarters acts as central point of diffusion in the region the mission president uses all available information to determine the best locations to place the missionaries over time missionaries are sent to open other cities which are often the larger metropolitan areas which are nearest to the mission headquarters diffusion success finally results in the establishment of a stake illiliiiilillii111 centered in the largest or close to the largest city in the country these developments mark the end of phase two
phase three entitled metropolitan movement is marked by the creation of additional stakes in the central or primate city where the first stake was created and the manifestation of a hierarchical pattern of stake creation in other large cities around the country these new stakes encourage the establishment of new missions headquartered in other large urban places spread around the country as well as the division of the existing mission in the central city the ability to create more missions however depends on an growing supply of missionaries from the united states and elsewhere
the additional stakes and missions act as new dispersion sources for the diffusion of the mormon religious innovation more people in lower order urban areas will be exposed to the religion by the mormon missionaries because of the more accessible proximity to the religious innovation this occurrence brings a country to the last phase of the diffusion model
the final phase is termed contagious concentration As the missions and stakes spread out across a country missionary activities become more localized small towns and rural areas can be more easily reached by missionaries and new church units are organized in these places the diffusion of the church becomes more contagious in its pattern emanating from the centers of stakes and missions
this contagious pattern occurs because the ongoing creation of new church units results in the missions and stakes covering ever decreasing areas with a constantly increasing membership therefore there are more members and missionaries to spread the mormon
112 religion within smaller regions which encourages a larger measure of filling in this phase continues indefinitely with increasing numbers of stakes and missions being created in more locations throughout the country until the population is completely saturated by mormonism this complete diffusion has not yet occurred in any country recommendations for future research
this thesis has concentrated more on the spatial perspective oflasofldsof LDS diffusion than on the functional perspective concerning the effects of supply and demand on the actual rate of diffusion it seems clear that supply and demand are both important when looking at the difference of acceptance of mormonism among nations but the degree to which the different variables of supply and demand influence mormonisms growth is not known an additional study testing how demand factors such as religious affiliation mobility or economic condition and supply factors such as number of missionaries or proselytizing strategies influence the growth of the church in a country seems in order
it would be interesting to be able to better show the pattern of church diffusion in countries in the world which have few stakes it is possible that this could be accomplished if ward and branch location and creation date data could be obtained from LDS church sources so that the degree of resolution of a study could be increased such as louder 1972 and johnson 1966 were able to do with the united states
another helpful activity would be to study the diffusion of other churches which actively proselyte in foreign areas to determine if their patterns of spread are similar or different than
113 thatifiatiffat of the mormon church there could be significant differences because the LDS church is more centralized and organized in its missionary efforts than many other christian faiths
on the whole this thesis fits nicely into the realm of diffusion research attempting to show spatial regularities related to the spread of innovations the church of jesus christ of iatterlatterlatterdayday saints has diffused throughout international nations in a strongly hierarchical progression of stake creations the rate ofwhich being quite high in many nations the future
mormon growth5 and diffusion of the church will undoubtedly help add to and clarify the findings1 of this study
114 APPENDIX definitions spatial diffusion is the process whereby behavior or characteristics of the landscape change as a result of what happens elsewhere earlier and it is the spread of the phenomenon such as a religion over space and time from limited origins morrill et al 1988 hierarchical diffusion is a type of spatial diffusion where innovations or ideas spread from the larger places to the smaller ones down the hierarchy of central places gould 1975 morrillmorrilletaletetalal 1988 contagious diffusion is a type of spatial diffusion where innovations or ideas spread from one person to another close by gould 1975 this is also known as the neighborhood eeffectffeafect propagatorsupportedpropagatorpro 12 abatoragator supported phenomenon is an innovation or idea which is spread by an organization that seeks its rapid and complete diffusion brown 19819811 mormons and LDS are members of the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints
A ward is a congregation of mormons on the average of 300500300 500 members which is the basic unit in and through which the programs of the church are administered mcconkie 97982719798271 each ward has distinct geographical boundaries
A branch is a congregation of mormons which is not large and stable enough to form a ward mcconkie 1979102
A stake is an organization of usually five to twelve wards and branches in a welldefinedwell defined geographic area it is the level of church organization directly above wards and branches the stake is led by a stake presidency comprised of three lay member from among the wards or branches of the stake
A mission is a geographic area of the church in which approximately 100200100 200 mormon missionaries are assigned to proselyte each mission is led full time by a mission president usually from another part of the country or the world
115 bibliography
AAA worldworldatlasatiasatlas 1992 Mapmaplewoodlewood NJ hammond inc almanac see deseret news church almanac 199319941993 1994 arrington LJ 1987 historical development of international mormonism religious studies and theology 192219 22 bookj3ook of mormon 1983 salt lake city ut the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints brown L A 19819811 innovation diffusion A new perspective new york methuen & co central intelligence agency CIA 1993 the world factbookFactbook washington DC church news published on saturdays as a supplement to the deseret news newspaper salt lake city ut
CIA see central intelligence agency crowley WK 1978 old order amish settlement diffusion and growth annals of the association ofamericanof american geographers 2249642249 64 deseret news church almanac 199119921991 1992 1990 salt lake city ut deseret news press deseret news church almanac 199319941993 1994 1992 salt lake city ut deseret news press gould P 1975 spatial diffusion the spread of ideas and innovations in geographic space new york learning resources in international studies hagerstrand T 1952 the propagation ofinnovationof innovation waves lund gleerup lund studies in geography hemmatihemmasiHemmasi M 1992 spatial dlfDiflusiondiffusion of islam A teaching strategy journal of geography 912637291263 72
116 1history of the church ofjesusof jesus christ of latterdaylatter day saints 1957 7 vols salt lake city UT deseret book company jackson R H G rinschede and J knapp 1990 pilgrimage in the mormon church in pilgrimage in the united states eds G rinschede and S M bhardwaj 275727 57 berlin dietrich reimer verlag johnson PT 1966 an analysis of the spread of the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints from salt lake city utah utilizing a diffusion model unpublished phd dissertation state university of iowa louder DR 1972 A distributional and diffusionaryDiffusionary analysis of the mormon church 185019701850 1970 unpublished phd dissertation university of washington
1975 A simulation approach to the diffusion of the mormon church proceedings of the association ofamericanof american geographers 126312630126 3300 louder DR and L bennion 1978 mapping mormons across the modem west in the7hethe7 he Allormonallormonmormon role in the settlement of the west ed richard H jackson 1356713513 5 67 provo UT brigham young university press mcconkie BR 1979 mormon doctrine salt lake city UT bookcraft morrill R GL gaile and GI thrall 1988 spatial diffusion newbury park CA SAGE publications inc mossmossy jr1JRjre R L britsch J R christianson and R cowan 1982 the international church provo UT brigham young university publications otterstrom SM 1990 the LDS church international growth brings GNP per capita decline unpublished honors thesis brigham young university pearl of great price 1983 salt lake city ut the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints peffers DD 1980 the diffusion and dispersion of the reorganized church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints an overview unpublished masters thesis brigham young university population reference bureau 1993 1993 world population data sheet washington DC
PRB see population reference bureau
117 stark R 1984 the rise of a new world faith review Religiousofofreligious research 2618272618 27 van orden BA 1993 more nations than one A global history of the LDS church student packet for religion 344 C provo UT brigham young university
118 the international diffusion
of the mormon church
samuel M otterstrom
department of geography
MS degree august 1994
ABSTRACT
this thesis outlines the international diffusion and growth of the church of jesus christ of latterlatterdayday saints or mormon church A model of mormon spatial diffusion in foreign countries is developed incorporating both a functional and spatial perspective the functional perspective includes supply and demand variables which influence the rate of growth of the mormon church in a country the functional perspective is not fully explored in the thesis the spatial perspective which the study concentrates on seeks to show a general spatial pattern related to the spread of the church within countries
the original diffusion of the church to other countries and the patterns of stake and mission formations in these nations since world war II11 are outlined stakes are used as mormon population location indicators special emphasis is given to latin america because of the success that the mormon church has had there the study finds that the mormon church has generally spread in a hierarchical manner within foreign countries
COMMITTEE APPROVAL r t aoa reo richardri H jackson rr4rrbcommittee chair
4 0 janasjan6sjariresdoA davis committee member
A alan H grey graduate coordinatorcoordinaw