POPULATION, SPACE AND PLACE
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
Published online in Wiley InterScience
(www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/psp.486
Divergent Growth of the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints in the United
States, 1990–2004: Diaspora, Gathering,
and the East–West Divide
Samuel M. Otterstrom*
Department of Geography, 690 SWKT, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602, USA
ABSTRACT
This paper analyses the spatially divergent
growth of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-
day Saints from 1990 to 2004 in the US. The
Church has been based in Utah since 1847,
and its membership continues to be
concentrated in the West. However, recent
population trends show an ongoing diaspora
throughout the country marked by local and
regional clusters (or ‘gatherings’) where more
rapid growth and larger relative membership
sizes are evident. The Church is growing
fastest in the central and eastern portions of
the country, exceeding general population
growth rates there. Natural increase in these
areas has been greatly augmented by
conversions and in-migration. Comparisons
using the Hoover index of concentration and
the Duncan index of dissimilarity also show
that with the regional divergence of Church
growth rates, its membership distribution is
slowly becoming more similar to that of the
general population. Although future Church
membership growth in the eastern parts of the
country will probably be counterbalanced by
the sheer size of population increases in the
traditional Church population centres in the
West, recent data show that the West has
become increasingly less Mormon as
* Correspondence to: Samuel M. Otterstrom, Department of
Geography, 690 SWKT, Brigham Young University, Provo,
UT 84602, USA.
E-mail: otterstrom@byu.edu
conversions and natural increase have not
kept pace with the migration of non-Mormons
into the region. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley
& Sons, Ltd.
Received 14 June 2007; revised 21 January 2008; accepted 22
January 2008
Keywords: Mormons; population concentration;
religious diaspora; United States
INTRODUCTION
R
eligion is a cultural cornerstone throughout
much of the world (Jordan-Bychkov and
Domosh, 2003). In the US, the religious
landscape is diverse, but regional patterns are still
quite apparent. For example, concentrations are
evident of Catholics in the Mexican-American
borderland and the Northeast, Lutherans in
Minnesota and North Dakota, and Baptists in
many parts of the South. However, because of
mobility and changes in religious affiliation, most
larger churches can be found outside of their
historical cores (Gaustad and Barlow, 2001;
Crawford, 2005). This paper analyses the dynamic
growth of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints in the US from 1990 to 2004, to underscore
the growing distinction between the church’s
slower-growing but more populous heartland and
its rapid emergence in key urban and rural areas
far from its western core.
The US has a relatively mobile population. It
is religiously diverse, but even with a long history
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
232
of interstate migration, certain regional patterns
have endured on the American landscape. One
of the best examples of this is the membership
pattern of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-
day Saints. The Church, whose members are
known as LDS or Mormons (‘Church’, ‘LDS’ and
‘Mormons’ are terms I use throughout the paper),
has been based in Salt Lake City, Utah, since
1847, and has developed an area of dominance
in Utah and other areas of the Mountain West.
Up until about the 1890s, new converts to
Mormonism were encouraged to ‘gather’ to
Utah and neighbouring territories to strengthen
the church’s membership there and to occupy
greater extents of the region (Ludlow, 1992:
676). This Mormon-dominated area thereby
extended to many valleys outside of its core
in Salt Lake City, and thus engendered its
own distinct cultural region. It has since been
designated as the ‘Mormon Culture Region’
(Meinig, 1965).
Since the beginning of the twentieth century,
Mormons have been encouraged by their leaders
to stay in their local countries and lands to
strengthen the Church in those more distant
places (Ludlow, 1992: 676). This has resulted in
more persistent growth and local ‘gathering’ of
Mormon congregations in all parts of the US and
in many countries throughout the world. Indeed,
there are now more LDS living outside of the US
than in it (6.68 million international members, to
5.60 million in the US in 2004: Deseret Morning
News, 2005). The diffusion pattern of Mormons
internationally has been hierarchical in nature
within countries, while the greatest success has
come in Latin America (Otterstrom, 1994).
Even with this significant international growth,
the US continues as a prominent focus of the
Church’s proselytising efforts. Of the Church’s
338 missions in 2004, 106 were within the US
(Deseret Morning News, 2005), and recently 54,000
convert baptisms occurred in the US in a year
compared with 220,000 abroad (Jordan, 2007). A
Church mission is a defined geographical area
where about 120 to 250 missionaries serve full-
time in sharing their beliefs with the goal of
gaining converts (Ludlow, 1992: 916). Most of
these missionaries are young men and women
between 19 and 23 years old. Indicative of the
source of some of the conversions to the Church,
many of the missionaries are also taught a foreign
language, such as Spanish, so they can effectively
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
communicate with non-English speaking immi-
grants within the US.
From 1990 to 2004, LDS membership in the
country grew substantially faster than the growth
rate of the general population. This overall US
membership increase can be attributed to the dif-
fusion of the Church through its proselytising
efforts, as well as to natural increase and inter-
national immigration. Besides the conversions,
Mormons have significantly higher fertility rates
than the national average, which boosts the
Church’s natural growth (Heaton et al., 2005).
Finally, international immigration of LDS
members from other parts of the world, espe-
cially Latin America, has added to the Church’s
population base in the US.
As the numbers of Mormons grow, their geo-
graphical distribution has changed. This has
occurred through the baptism of new converts
around the nation and the relocation, or dias-
pora, of Church members away from traditional
Mormon areas in the Mountain West. Concern-
ing this diaspora and diffusion of Mormonism,
there are two key questions which are explored
in this paper. Firstly, as Mormons have spread to
most parts of the country, have their growth pat-
terns from 1990 to 2004 just mirrored national
trends, or do the LDS have their own national
growth paradigm? Secondly, the relative distribu-
tion of Mormons does not match that of the
overall US population, but has this distribution
become more similar to that of the general popu-
lation since 1990, and if so why?
The starting assumption for the first question
is that LDS growth patterns have followed those
of the national population, meaning that Mormon
growth is following basic population patterns
such as suburbanisation and Sunbelt growth. For
the second query, the belief is that the distribution
of Mormons is converging with the general pop-
ulation (but with the tendency for localised clus-
tering or gathering in many places), which would
indicate that the Church membership, by becom-
ing less centred on the Mountain West, is trans-
forming into a national institution, rather than
continuing as an isolated religious body. Addi-
tionally, growth up and down the urban/rural
hierarchy across the nation would indicate that
Mormonism is finding a place within a large
variety of cultural and economic environments,
while the uneven spatial manifestation of this
process would show a greater propensity for
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
Mormons to relocate with success in certain geo-
graphical locales.
Following is an outline of the remainder of the
paper. I first give an overview of the literature,
focusing on how researchers have studied the
geography of religious distributions in the US
generally and of the growth of the Church spe-
cifically. Then I outline my methods used to
analyse the changes in LDS population distribu-
tion and concentration. I next analyse the research
questions at different scales aggregated from
county-level data. These include the county,
state, city-system, Census division, and nation.
I also compare and contrast among metropolitan,
micropolitan (the recent US Census definition of
a county that falls between metropolitan and
rural status) and rural counties in those areas.
This methodological framework structures the
analysis and helps to clarify the conclusions. The
purpose of this research, then, is to analyse how
and why the Mormon population has changed in
distribution across the US, and to assess and
explain how the relative distribution of Mormons
has shifted in comparison with the general popu-
lation. By so doing it will also provide others
with a process with which they can geographi-
cally analyse changes amongst other subpopula-
tions around the world.
POPULATION CHANGE AND RELIGION IN
THE UNITED STATES
Diversity in religious practice around the world
has translated into a bustling field of research,
both in the US and elsewhere. To wit, Kong (2001;
see also Kong, 1990) classified recent geographi-
cal studies of religion into at least six categories,
including those that explore religion at different
scales and others that use historical approaches
for specific locales. Because of the strong ties of
religion to ethnic and national origins and the
historical settlement of the country, studies in
this area often integrate the importance of past
processes into understanding present configura-
tions. Reviewing studies on the geography of
religion in the US underscores three main areas
that are relevant to this paper. These are firstly,
studies of the general characteristics and changes
in religious affiliation in America as a whole or
in a smaller region; secondly, religious geogra-
phy as it pertains to specific religions or ethnic
religious effects; and thirdly, research that focuses
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
233
directly on the growth and change of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Religious geography in America continues to
evolve, which has prompted various studies
seeking to explicate the salient features of this
ongoing process. When Wilbur Zelinsky (1961)
published his ambitious article on the distribu-
tion of various religions in the US in 1952, he
gave a detailed explanation of the patterns of
growth and change of the largest religious bodies
in the country. His analysis was followed by
Edwin Gaustad’s (1962; see also Gaustad and
Barlow, 2001) historical atlas of religion which
offered a long-term comprehensive cartographic
and descriptive portrayal of the country’s reli-
gions. Since that time, much work has followed
in an effort to portray accurately the religious
geography of the nation. Halvorson and Newman
(1994) in their atlas, and researchers such as
Carroll et al. (1979), Shortridge (1976), Newman
and Halvorson (1984), Robbins and Anthony
(1990) and Sherkat (1999), in their studies, have
all emphasised more recent changes in the reli-
gious make-up of the country.
The continuing growth of smaller religious
bodies on the one hand, and the geographical
stability of religious regions on the other, are
common themes in these works (see also Webster,
2000; Barcus and Brunn, 2004). Stump (1984),
Sherkat (2001) and Paul (2003) enlarged this
scope by demonstrating both how migrants
between regions tend to follow their destination
region in terms of church activity, and also that
there is a significant tendency for people to
change their religious affiliations during their life
course. Finally, Crawford (2005) analysed the
changing geographical distribution of a number
of large religious groups in the US from 1971 to
2000. He found the Mormon population geogra-
phy to be dynamic in its growth and change, and
that the weighted centre of Mormon distribution
between 1980 and 2000 moved from the Colo-
rado/Utah border to a location a short distance
eastwards.
Many religions have close associations with
certain ethnic groups or regions of the country.
Specific peoples such as immigrant Koreans
(Min, 1992) and Hispanic Protestants (Hunt,
1999), or ethnically associated Jews (Sheskin,
2000) and Amish (Crowley, 1978) have been
examined in the context of local and regional
geographical changes. Other religious bodies
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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234
have also received attention, such as Catholics
(Shortridge, 1978), Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists
(Smith, 2002a,b) and Protestants (Smith and
Seokho, 2005). Thus, each has been treated from
a more focused perspective than in the general
religious geographies. Taken together, these
studies most closely resemble the way that the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has
been studied in terms of geographical growth
and change.
Studies of the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints have emphasised issues of both
regional region-making and geographical growth.
Meinig (1965) defined the ‘Mormon Culture
Region’ as the area in the western US with a
dominant Mormon population base exhibiting
distinctive characteristics in its cultural land-
scape. Others such as Francaviglia (1978), Jackson
(1978), Louder and Bennion (1978) and Bennion
(1995a) followed and expanded upon this theme.
More recent explorations of the impacts of
Mormons on the geography of the Mountain
West have emphasised its continuing importance
in this US region (e.g. Norton, 1998; Jackson and
Jackson, 2003; Yorgason, 2003; Upton, 2005).
There are only a few studies that have focused
on the geographical growth and spread of
Mormonism throughout the US. The most exten-
sive were the diffusion analyses of Johnson (1966)
and Louder (1972, 1975). They applied their dif-
fusion models to Church growth up through the
1960s. They both centred on the US, but Louder
gave more attention to the West because of its
greater Church membership. Johnson’s model
showed mixed results, but Louder was success-
ful in modelling Church growth in the West over
time using such variables as distance to Salt Lake
City, irrigated acres in a county, and base Mormon
population in a county. He showed the hierarchi-
cal nature of the Church spread outside of the
‘Mormon Culture Region’. These studies did not
focus on the relationship of Church growth to
general population growth or other factors.
Stark (1984) brought attention to the strong
growth trends of Mormonism worldwide, while
three more recent studies have given more spe-
cific attention to the geographical processes sur-
rounding the growth of the Church, especially in
the US (Bennion, 1995b; Laing, 2002; Johnson and
Johnson, 2007). Bennion emphasised that the
Church was still basically a western US institu-
tion in 1992, with nearly 80% of its US members
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
in the 13 western states. On the other hand,
Johnson and Johnson analysed how the migra-
tion of key individuals from the ‘Mormon Culture
Area’ to large cities and education centres
across the country helped the Church grow in
these areas during the twentieth-century. Laing
updated Bennion’s appraisal by showing the
‘diaspora’ of Church members to the South, and
that the rural/urban distribution of LDS in the
region closely followed the general distribution
of population in 2000. Laing’s study briefly
touched upon other areas of the country, but an
overall ongoing picture of the geographical
growth and distribution of the Church in the
country was not a prime motive for the paper.
Nevertheless, Laing’s work comes closest to what
I develop in this research.
In summary, research about the geography of
religion in the US has resulted in a wide swath
of studies that take in both large-scale patterns
and more localised manifestations of religious
practice. With all that has been written about the
uneven geographical distribution of different
religious groups in the US, there is a need to
show that spatial change in religious affiliation is
related to underlying population patterns, so that
reasons for these shifts can be illuminated. This
study will add to the literature by more compre-
hensively outlining recent growth patterns of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the
US, and by putting these shifts into context within
the continuing growth of the general population
of the nation. Additionally, the differences
between rural and urban growth patterns
explored here can complement previous research
concerning other religions and uneven religious
association across regions.
DATA AND METHODS
Whether in the US or another country, diffusion
and growth have led to the establishment of
various-sized Mormon congregations. This local
church structure is distinct in that each Church
unit is geographically bounded. Mormons attend
the congregation in which they reside. Most of
the US is divided into ‘stakes’, which contain
approximately 5 to 14 individual congregations.1
The larger congregations are called ‘wards’
(approximately 250 to 700 members) and the
smaller ones are known as ‘branches’ (less than
about 250 members). Stakes, wards and branches
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
are all led by a lay clergy of stake presidents,
bishops of wards, and branch presidents (Ludlow,
1992).
The Church unit structure allows for changes
over time, while giving a specific accounting for
the actual membership in various areas of the
country. As branches grow in size they eventu-
ally are made into wards. As wards expand, at
some point they are divided into two smaller
Church Units. As the numbers of wards and
branches increase within a stake to a threshold
determined by the Church, the stake will be sub-
sequently divided. The geographically bounded
nature of Church congregations therefore makes
it possible to calculate the totals of Church mem-
bership for specific locations around the country.
The greater the numbers of branches, wards and
stakes in an area, the greater the precision in
locating the LDS members there, because the
congregation itself will have a smaller area.
Since the growth of LDS population comes
from natural increase, conversions and interna-
tional immigration, it would be helpful to have
population data divided by type. However, the
data I used did not delineate the quantity of
membership growth in each of these categories,
but only showed the total yearly population
(without any demographic characteristics) within
individual wards and branches across the
country. The data were provided by the Church’s
Management Information Center, which admin-
isters a centralised individual membership data-
base of all people within every ward and branch
worldwide. Whenever a person moves, dies or is
baptised, ward and branch Church units first
update their local records, and then they transmit
this information to Salt Lake City for processing.
Changes in the make-up of local units are then
sent back out by Salt Lake to the affected Church
units (e.g. record changes will be sent both to
the origination ward and destination ward of
someone who moves). To be on the Church rolls,
all members have had to either been blessed as a
child and baptised into the Church after turning
eight years old, or been baptised into the Church
(being at least eight) when converting from
another faith.
Members in the wards and branches range in
activity level from those who attend worship
services weekly to those who have not gone to
church in many years. In addition, the local unit
data do not include those members who are lost
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
235
(no current address on file with the Church) or
those who have been excommunicated or who
have formally requested that their names be
removed from Church rolls. The limits imposed
by not knowing the actual source of Church pop-
ulation growth (whether by migration, natural
increase, or religious conversion), nor the demo-
graphic characteristics of the members in each
unit themselves, helped focus my approach
towards both comparing rates of LDS growth
across different regions and county types in
the country, and assessing the similarities and
differences of LDS and general population
geographies.2
Because of the lack of growth type differentia-
tion, I used natural increase rates from two
predominantly LDS Utah counties as surrogate
measures for comparison. Utah County, home to
Church-owned Brigham Young University and a
relatively young and fertile population, repre-
sents a high point of natural increase (its average
household size was 3.59 persons in 2000 com-
pared with 2.59 nationally). It was about 87.7%
Mormon in 2004 and had an average annual
natural increase rate of 2.2% between 1990 and
2004 (as per the US Census Bureau). Davis
County, a commuter county north of Salt Lake
and south of Ogden, represents a more moderate
level of natural increase at about 1.6% per year
over the study period. It had an average house-
hold size of 3.31 and was 72% Mormon in 2000.
Therefore, counties across the US where LDS
growth exceeded the estimated growth rates of
either Utah County (extrapolated to 36% in 14
years) or Davis County (extrapolated to about
25% growth over the period), would most likely
have had either high in-migration and/or con-
version levels augmenting their natural popula-
tion increase. I will use the more conservative
comparison with Utah County for this paper,
while Davis County can also be used as a point
of reference.
I aggregated the data by county according to
where the ward or branch chapel was located. In
some cases (especially in the central and eastern
parts of the country) there are most likely
members of a ward who live outside of the county
where the chapel is located. However, in this
study all of the congregation’s members are still
counted as residing in that county. This is because
there is no way to gauge accurately the numbers
who live across county boundaries. The problem
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236
is apparent at the county level in areas in the
central and eastern parts of the country that have
low numbers of Church members, but is less of
an issue when analysing the larger regional and
national scales. This means that some of the con-
centration measures of the LDS will register
higher than they are in actuality in parts of
the central and eastern states. However, over
time those measures will improve in accuracy
as new Church units are organised in more
new counties. The number of counties without
organised wards or branches was 1961 in
2004, which was a decrease from 1402 in 1990.
Most of the counties without organised LDS
wards or branches were in thinly populated areas
in the central and eastern portions of the
country.
My approach consists of multiple statistical
avenues to test the two hypotheses at different
scales. The scales include single cities (urban
counties), city-systems (large groups of urban
counties and their hinterland counties that are
economically tied to the core cities), states,
regions, and the nation.3 Each of the scales affords
a distinct view of the interactions and relation-
ships between the general population and that of
the LDS. City-system and state analyses will
emphasise urban–rural connections in their larger
social and political system. At the regional scale,
more expansive geographical distinctions become
apparent in terms of religious and other cultural
considerations. The national scale is most useful
to highlight the overall trends in geographical
distributions of the two study populations. Thus,
while analysing the recent changes in the Mormon
population in the US, it also provides a template
for comparing growth and change between two
different populations within the same area.
Firstly, to answer the question of whether the
national trend of Church growth matches the
overall growth pattern of the US population, I
calculated Church and general population growth
rates for various scales: counties, states, regions,
and rural/urban classifications for the study
period. I also further separated the counties in
each region into rural, micropolitan and metro-
politan groups to illustrate where the growth
is occurring. These absolute growth rates and
values in Church population highlight the areas
where the Church is growing strongly in relative
terms. Mapping and graphing of the differentials
(differences between general population and
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
Church population growth levels) in these rates
point out those areas that most closely resemble
each other in growth trends and those places
where there is a strong divergence in growth pat-
terns. Comparisons with the Utah County natural
increase growth rate also provided an estimate of
the counties where Church membership proba-
bly grew faster than by natural increase alone.
The conclusion for this section summarises how
different areas have mirrored or departed from
national population growth trends.
The second hypothesis of whether the distribu-
tion of LDS people is becoming more similar to
the general population is an outgrowth of the
first. To test this hypothesis I calculated Hoover
indices of LDS population concentration for
states, city-systems, regions and the nation. All
of the scales are aggregations of counties that are
within that unit (e.g. all of the counties in the Los
Angeles city-system were used to calculate the
Hoover index for that region). The Hoover index
compares the relative distribution of a popula-
tion in a grouping of areas. This index has been
employed in many studies (e.g. see Bencloski and
Tepper, 1992; Schaeffer, 1992; Long and Nucci,
1997) of population concentration and it gives an
easily comparable and understandable value.
Below is a short description of the Hoover index
of concentration and how it is used in this paper.
It is calculated in the following manner:
Let Pit be the fraction of a nation’s [or city-
system’s] population in sub-area I in year t,
and ai be this area’s fraction of the nation’s [or
city-system’s] land area, and let there be k sub-
areas. Then, the Hoover index (Vining and
Strauss, 1976: 2), Ht is given by:
 k 
H t =  ∑ Pit − ai  * 50 (1)
 I =1
The index has potential values from 0 to 100.
Higher values equal high concentration, or a very
uneven distribution of population. Low values
mean low concentration, or a landscape of more
equally distributed settlement. In essence, the
index indicates the percentage of people in the
study area that would have to be relocated to
make an exactly even distribution of population.
An increase in the Hoover index between years
means that the overall population growth became
concentrated in fewer counties of the study area,
these counties usually being the central core
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
counties. On the other hand, a decreasing Hoover
index value between decades points to people
moving to areas of the city-system that were less
densely populated than the central county
or counties. This occurrence could mean
either spillover suburban growth to counties
bordering metropolitan areas, or rural increase
in lands more distant from the centre of the
city-system.4
Related to the two main hypotheses is the over-
riding concept of system-wide similarities. When
comparing the Hoover indices of the general
population with those of the LDS, it is not appar-
ent how the relative distributions of each group
actually differ in a region. For example, the
Hoover index as one number cannot show
whether differences in population concentration
are more a function of just a few counties in the
system having a much higher concentration, or if
the dissimilarities are driven more by many
counties that have higher relative concentrations.
It is therefore helpful to measure the relative dif-
ferences in the non-LDS general population
versus LDS distributions in regions and track
their changes over time. Differential analysis
addresses this issue. Here I use a slightly modi-
fied Duncan index (see Funkhouser, 2000;
Sakoda, 1981). In the paper it will be given as the
differential geographical index (DG) at year y,
calculated as follows:
k
Lc Gc
DG y = ∑ − * 50 (2)
I =1 Lt Gt
where I is the region (or city-system) having k
counties, L is the LDS population, and G is the
non-LDS population in the county (c) or region
(t) respectively at year y.
Like the Hoover index, this index reports a
value between 0 and 100. Zero means that there
are exactly the same proportions of LDS and the
general population in each county compared
with the total populations of the region. A value
of 100 is not likely because it would indicate a
complete separation of the LDS from the non-
LDS (i.e. all the LDS are in one set of counties,
and all of the non-LDS are in a completely differ-
ent set of counties), but relatively high values
indicate that the proportions of LDS and the
non-LDS general population are distributed quite
differently among the counties of the city-system
(or region).
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
237
A follow-up to the differential geographical
(DG) analysis is a ratio between the number of
counties within the region that have relatively
more LDS versus those that have relatively fewer
LDS. A value over 1.0 means that relatively more
counties have greater shares of LDS, while a value
of less than 1.0 means that there are more counties
that have relatively fewer members. In essence,
regions over 1.0 have a more spread-out LDS
population compared with those under 1.0, which
have a more concentrated LDS distribution.
The full range of methods results in in-depth
comparisons of the evolving local and regional
geographies of the LDS population in the US
from 1990 to 2004. Taken together they will show
the location and degree of Church growth, and
whether there is a move towards convergence in
the distribution of LDS around the country com-
pared with the general population. A converging
trend could equate to greater levels of diffusion
or spread of the religious group.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Varying Growth Levels
From 1990 to 2004, Church membership (27.4%
increase) grew at a faster rate than the national
population (18.1% increase). This overall growth
was more than Davis County’s estimated
natural increase growth of 25%, but less than
Utah County’s rate of 36%. The LDS growth
was uneven around the country. At the regional
level some surprising patterns are evident
(see Figs 1 and 2 and Table 1). Firstly, in the
Mountain West and the Pacific regions, where
the bulk of the LDS population resides, Church
membership grew at slower rates than the general
population, but the Pacific region had extra-
sluggish LDS growth compared with other
regions of the country (only 9.8% while the
next slowest region was the Mountain West
at 29.3%). However, the Mountain West, even
with its 29% growth in Church membership,
trailed nearly 16% behind overall regional
population growth.
On the other hand, the rest of the country’s
regions not only showed rapid growth in LDS
population, but those areas also grew more
rapidly than the general population. These large
differences can be attributable to the small base
of LDS population in the central and eastern
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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238 S. M. Otterstrom

Figure 1. United States regions (from US Census divisions).

70

60

50

40

30
Total
Metropolitan
20
Micropolitan
Rural
10

0
USA Pacific Mountain W North W South E South South New Middle E North
Central Central Central Atlantic England Atlantic Central
-10

-20

-30

Figure 2. Differentials between LDS and overall population growth, 1990 to 2004, by US region and county type.

parts of the country (Table 2) (i.e. small numeri-
cal growth equates to large percentage growth
rates), but the large spread is noteworthy. For
example, LDS growth in both the Middle Atlantic
and the West North Central regions was about
38% greater than that of the total population from
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
1990 to 2004. Mormon numbers in the other five
regions (West South Central, East South Central,
South Atlantic, East North Central and New
England) outpaced their general counterparts in
increase by between 11% and nearly 30%. In
essence, the Church’s greatest percentage growth
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US 239

Table 1. US national and regional membership growth comparisons for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints from 1990–2004.

Total LDS growth % by county type LDS growth% – total pop. growth% 1990–2000 overall

LDS
Region growth Metropolitan Micropolitan Rural All Metropolitan Micro Rural Total Difference

USA 27.4 28.9 22.3 19.8 9.3 10.9 4.2 1.7 22.1 9.0
Pacific 9.8 8.6 21.8 16.4 −11.9 −13.1 0.1 −5.3 8.5 −6.6
Mountain 29.3 33.7 15.7 12.5 −15.3 −11.0 −28.9 −32.2 23.5 −9.6
W North 49.2 46.6 51.6 59.6 37.8 35.2 40.1 48.2 40.6 31.7
Central
W South 48.5 50.6 29.7 58.9 23.8 25.9 5.1 34.2 38.1 20.4
Central
E South 42.1 43.5 49.5 22.9 27.0 28.3 34.3 7.7 36.1 23.9
Central
South 38.1 39.2 34.8 35.4 11.3 12.3 7.9 8.5 28.3 9.5
Atlantic
New 37.5 39.9 26.8 34.8 29.7 32.1 19.0 26.9 31.6 26.2
England
Middle 45.6 48.6 29.9 36.8 38.4 41.4 22.7 29.6 41.1 35.6
Atlantic
E North 34.1 33.2 34.2 48.4 24.5 23.6 24.6 38.8 27.9 20.4
Central

Source: Total population data for 2000 and 2004 are from the US Census.

Table 2. Regional percentage shares of LDS wards and branches that have been established
membership. for non-English speakers. Spanish language units
Region 1989 2004
are the most common, increasing in number from
200 to 493 between 1990 and 2004. Membership
Pacific 25.9 22.1 in them grew very rapidly from 54,534 to 124,718
Mountain 51.8 51.7 (2.8% of the US Mormons). Emphasising their
W North Central 2.4 3.1 spreading geography, the relative portion of
W South Central 5.0 5.9 Spanish unit members outside of the Pacific and
E South Central 1.8 2.1 Mountain West regions increased from approxi-
South Atlantic 6.8 7.6 mately 37% to 41% between 1990 and 2004.
New England 1.0 1.1 Growth in Spanish-speaking units appears to
Middle Atlantic 2.0 2.5 mimic the diaspora of Hispanics across the US
E North Central 3.3 3.7
in the past few decades.
In the Pacific Region, Spanish Mormon mem-
Source: Deseret News (1990) and Deseret Morning News (2005). bership increased from 3.1% to 4.9% of total
members in the region, while the Spanish mem-
bership share in the Mountain Region (including
Utah) more than doubled from 0.5% to 1.1%.
actually occurred in regions where overall popu- Even though their total numbers are fewer than
lation grew quite slowly, indicating both LDS in the Pacific and Mountain regions, Spanish
conversions and in-migration of Mormons. Church unit members comprised 11.6% of Middle
Therefore, at the regional level, the Church did Atlantic Mormons and 8% of West South Central
not closely mirror the general population (includes Texas) LDS in 2004, showing their
growth. larger relative importance in these eastern regions
A noteworthy component of the growth in in comparison with the West. Spanish growth
Mormon adherents has been the increase in was probably augmented by both conversions of
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
DOI: 10.1002/psp
240
immigrants as well as immigrants who were
already Mormon before coming to the US (there
are over one million Mormons in Mexico and
more than 500,000 in Central America; Deseret
Morning News, 2005: 649).5
Other non-English units include those where,
among other languages, Tongan, Samoan,
Korean, Chinese, Tagalog and Vietnamese are
spoken. Growth in these units was more tenta-
tive, with all the non-Spanish language units
increasing from 22,421 to only 29,961 members
over the 14 years. Most of these LDS lived in
California and Utah and other parts of the West,
rather than in the areas of the country where the
Church is growing more rapidly. For the Tongan
and Samoan-speaking units, which represent the
bulk of these non-Spanish language units, growth
was probably highly connected with Pacific
Islanders who were already Mormon who then
migrated to the US. Tonga and Samoa had the
highest proportion of LDS of any country (46%
and 36% respectively in 2004; Deseret Morning
News, 2005).
Growth patterns also varied according to urban
and rural components. I examined these patterns
from the two perspectives of overall and com-
parative growth. Church membership in rural
counties in the West North Central, West South
Central and East North Central grew the fastest
within their respective regions (Table 1 and
Figure 2). The situation in the central portion of
the country probably stems from the small initial
numbers of rural LDS there and from the creation
of new wards and branches in rural counties,
where before the LDS members in these counties
had to attend church in neighbouring metropoli-
tan counties. Micropolitan counties had the great-
est percentage increase of LDS within the Pacific
and East South Central regions, while in the
remaining four regions, metropolitan counties
had the greatest regional growth in LDS. Indeed,
overall in the US the Church grew most rapidly
in metropolitan counties (28.9%) over the 14-year
period. Additionally, because the bulk of the LDS
population usually lives in metropolitan coun-
ties, the resulting regional figures show the great-
est similarity between the general LDS increase
and the LDS growth in metropolitan counties
(compare ‘Total’ and ‘Metropolitan’ columns in
Table 1).
Comparison of the general population with the
LDS population reveals that in the Pacific region
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
the LDS in micropolitan and rural counties actu-
ally mirrored overall growth in those two classes
of counties, while the metropolitan counties grew
more slowly than the overall region (Figure 2).
This finding possibly indicates that there has
been a significant movement of LDS from core
urban areas in the Pacific to outlying smaller
urban and rural communities. Additionally, the
very slow growth of the Pacific region overall
suggests that many Mormons left the region alto-
gether, moving to Mormon centres such as Utah,
Mesa, Arizona, and Las Vegas, Nevada. In the
Mountain region relative growth patterns were
negative. All types of counties were being out-
paced in growth by the general population, with
the metropolitan counties registering the most
negative differential (a 17.7% slower rate of
growth in Church membership than that of the
total population), indicating that in many Moun-
tain West areas the Mormon population is being
eclipsed by non-Mormon newcomers.
In the rest of the country’s regions, Church
growth outpaced the overall population in all
types of counties. Significantly, all regions grew
faster than the natural increase rate of Utah
County (except the East North Central Region,
which was close at 34%), suggesting the impor-
tance of Mormon immigration and conversions.
In the West North Central region, for example,
the rural growth of the Church approached 60%
even as general rural growth was negative there
between 1990 and 2004. Other portions of the
northern and central US experienced rapid
growth in rural counties as well, which is most
likely a function of the establishment of Church
branches and wards in rural counties during the
study period. On the other hand, metropolitan
counties in the Middle Atlantic and New England
saw the most significant growth within their
respective regions.
In summary, Church membership growth has
not followed that of the US as a whole. Between
1990 and 2004 rates of increase were slower than
the general population in the Pacific and Moun-
tain states, while being very much higher across
the rest of the country, except for the South
Atlantic region where total Church growth was
just over 10% greater. The statistics also indicate
that migration, conversion, and growth in
Spanish-speaking congregations have been par-
ticularly important in bolstering the central and
eastern US Church membership base. Conversely,
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US 241

Percentage Difference in Growth

(A positive value indicates that the Mormon -47.47 - -20.1
population had a greater percentage increase than -20 - 0
the total population for the time period. A negative 0 - 18.12
value indicates the opposite occurred)
18.12 - 36.65
36.65 - 63.1

Figure 3. Differences in total growth percentages between the LDS and

overall populations at the state level, 1990–2004.

the Church’s size relative to the overall popula-
tion has slipped in the Pacific and Mountain
regions, suggesting both out-migration and lower
conversion rates (see Fig. 3).
Regional Convergence and Clustering
Mormons have a distribution in the US that is
nearly opposite of that of the country’s general
population. The bulk of the total national popula-
tion lives within a few hundred miles of the
coastal areas of the northeast, Gulf Coast, Florida
peninsula, West Coast, and around the Great
Lakes. In contrast, the Mountain West as a whole,
with the obvious focus on the state of Utah, is
home to the greatest number of Mormons of any
region (see Table 2 and Fig. 4). The second largest
region in terms of Mormon population is the
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Pacific, and as such it is one place that could
show a more similar match in the distribution of
LDS to the total population. This section will
address the question of how the LDS population
is in one respect converging with the general
population’s geographical distribution within
city-systems and the nation, while at more
local scales Mormons show distinct clustering
tendencies.
National Concentration
To better understand the Church population
redistribution occurring across the country, I
completed a set of national and city-system
Hoover index calculations (Table 3). At the
national level the index is quite high, pointing to
the great concentration of LDS in the West. The
national values have been between 71 and 72 for
the whole period between 1990 and 2004, but
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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242
Figure 4. Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as
a percentage of the total population, 2004.
there was a slight slide (or deconcentration) from
about 71.9 in 1990 to a low below 71.2 in 1998 and
a shift back up to about 71.4 in 2004. This sup-
ports Newman and Halvorson’s (1984) previous
work showing that spatial concentration of dif-
ferent churches can remain stable even with large
numerical increases in membership. These are
small movements on the Hoover scale, but they
are noteworthy because the sheer number of US
counties and the persistence of populations do
not lend themselves to dramatic moves in the
index. The Hoover shifts from 1990 to 2004 are
important in that they highlight how Mormons
continue to be concentrated in the Mountain
West, and that the diaspora to areas outside of
dominant Mormon areas between 1990 and 1998
was tempered by growth in Utah and other tra-
ditional Mormon strongholds between 1998 and
2004. Thus, even though the global Hoover Index
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
used here at the national level cannot identify
local population shifts, it is still useful for popu-
lation geographers and other interested parties
alike to better comprehend the overriding trajec-
tory and relative distribution of a certain popula-
tion (in this case the Mormons in the US).
Comparisons with the General Population
Another way to look at this changing geography
is to subtract the LDS population concentration
indices from the overall non-Church population
concentration indices. I calculated these figures
for 1990 and 2000 using the decennial US Census
data, and for 2004 using Census estimates. At the
national level, there is a clear trend towards con-
vergence in population concentration levels, as
the differences between the LDS and general
indices were 6.2, 5.7 and 5.5 for 1990, 2000 and
2004 respectively.
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US 243

Table 3. Hoover Indices of LDS population concentration, differential geographical indices (DG), ratios, and
Hoover differences.

Fig. 5 1990 2004 DG 1990 2004 ratio 1990 2004 Differ.

# 1990 2000 2004 DG (Fig. 6) Ratio (Fig. 7) differences (Fig. 5)
Miami 1 36.6 34.5 32.4 6.5 6.9 1.6 1.6 −6.3 −9.2
Tampa 2 36.6 35.1 35.4 16.6 15.9 1.0 0.8 −1.6 0.1
Jacksonville 3 31.0 30.9 30.8 24.0 21.8 0.8 0.7 −17.3 −17.5
New Orleans 4 36.9 36.7 38.2 30.2 28.5 0.6 0.6 −6.5 −4.9
Birmingham 5 50.4 46.4 46.8 20.7 19.7 0.5 0.6 12.5 8.6
Atlanta 6 65.7 60.4 60.8 33.1 27.0 0.3 0.4 15.6 8.5
Charlotte 7 47.8 45.8 45.6 24.1 22.5 0.5 0.5 14.0 10.1
Richmond 8 65.7 62.8 62.8 32.4 35.7 0.5 0.5 14.7 12.3
Washington, DC 9 55.3 53.3 52.1 30.9 26.0 0.9 0.9 −2.6 −2.5
Philadelphia 10 37.1 34.1 33.9 26.0 20.4 0.8 0.9 −4.9 −6.8
New York 11 49.2 54.8 53.3 30.1 20.5 1.5 1.7 −13.5 −9.8
Boston 12 53.2 53.3 53.0 26.9 22.7 1.5 1.5 −9.0 −9.3
Buffalo 13 43.7 43.1 44.0 25.4 23.0 1.4 2.2 −8.7 −7.9
Pittsburgh 14 43.4 43.8 44.8 31.8 29.4 0.8 0.8 0.7 2.7
Cleveland 15 38.5 37.6 39.3 19.6 15.9 1.8 1.8 −2.9 −0.8
Detroit 16 53.0 49.9 49.6 30.1 23.3 0.9 0.9 0.9 −1.3
Columbus 17 59.0 54.0 55.2 18.2 12.8 0.4 0.6 15.3 9.8
Cincinnati 18 59.8 59.0 59.5 34.4 31.7 0.6 0.7 13.2 12.5
Indianapolis 19 52.3 49.2 52.1 34.7 27.5 0.9 0.6 11.4 9.3
Louisville 20 64.7 58.6 56.9 43.8 34.7 0.4 0.5 26.7 18.6
Knoxville 21 52.4 48.0 49.7 28.4 25.7 0.6 0.5 21.3 17.8
Nashville 22 54.0 51.1 51.7 35.4 25.7 0.5 0.5 16.2 11.8
Memphis 23 65.4 68.0 68.0 36.9 37.7 0.4 0.4 28.7 29.5
Little Rock 24 56.4 53.4 55.5 28.6 25.5 0.6 0.6 20.2 15.7
St. Louis 25 62.8 57.0 57.6 32.7 29.6 0.5 0.6 11.7 7.5
Chicago 26 54.6 52.3 52.4 28.0 28.2 0.9 1.2 −4.3 −7.6
Milwaukee 27 61.6 60.1 59.6 32.7 22.2 0.5 0.6 10.7 8.3
Minneapolis 28 68.6 67.7 67.1 33.1 28.5 0.4 0.4 14.5 9.8
Des Moines 29 69.8 60.9 60.0 37.1 28.6 0.3 0.4 32.0 20.2
Omaha 30 78.7 73.4 73.4 29.9 22.6 0.2 0.3 24.0 15.4
Wichita 31 73.4 69.0 70.5 28.4 23.0 0.3 0.3 22.2 16.4
Kansas City 32 66.4 62.6 63.2 19.6 21.1 0.4 0.7 12.4 7.6
Tulsa 33 55.4 52.1 52.4 16.4 17.5 0.8 0.8 10.4 6.8
Oklahoma City 34 61.1 59.8 59.9 18.5 18.3 0.4 0.4 12.9 9.8
Dallas 35 72.1 72.5 73.0 17.9 17.7 0.3 0.4 10.5 7.7
Houston 36 64.5 65.1 66.0 13.5 10.6 0.5 0.7 3.9 3.8
San Antonio 37 66.5 63.5 64.0 9.1 8.6 0.5 0.5 3.8 1.4
El Paso- 38 54.0 53.3 53.6 45.2 41.9 0.5 0.6 −3.9 −7.0
Albuquerque
Denver 39 58.6 57.8 58.6 32.2 30.2 0.4 0.5 −7.2 −9.4
Spokane 40 56.4 58.2 58.9 19.7 16.3 0.5 0.4 2.3 2.0
Salt Lake City 41 71.2 71.9 72.2 40.0 36.9 1.0 1.0 2.6 2.6
Phoenix 42 51.4 54.9 56.2 16.2 14.3 0.9 0.9 −7.5 −3.5
Los Angeles 43 59.6 60.1 59.9 20.4 21.5 1.7 1.7 −6.9 −3.0
San Francisco 44 59.4 57.9 57.8 18.3 20.2 1.9 1.6 −5.6 −6.1
Portland 45 58.1 58.6 58.5 8.5 9.0 1.1 1.7 −0.1 −0.5
Seattle 46 57.0 56.4 55.9 6.2 8.0 0.5 0.9 −2.7 −3.1
Alaska 81.3 81.4 81.5 12.1 10.9 0.7 0.6 8.8 7.8
Hawaii 60.6 57.8 58.0 5.5 4.4 1.5 0.7 −5.3 −3.7
USA 71.9 71.3 71.4 60.3 57.3 0.2 0.2 6.2 5.5

Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
DOI: 10.1002/psp
244
The city-system results are striking (Table 3,
last two columns, and Fig. 5). In 2004 a majority
of city-systems showed higher concentrations of
LDS than concentrations of the general popula-
tion. Only Portland (OR) and Tampa had very
similar concentration levels to the general popu-
lation. On the other hand, parts of the West,
Chicago and Detroit, and the Northeast stand out
as regions where the LDS are more spread out
than the general population. Here LDS members
have congregated in larger relative numbers
within suburban counties. Several city-systems
in the Great Plains and parts of the upper South
had very strong imbalances in membership dis-
tributions (over 16 index points), which empha-
sises that in those regions the LDS are much more
localised in distribution, and the fact that the LDS
Hoover indices for these areas probably contain
an upward bias because of the lack of wards and
branches in many rural counties.
Figure 5. Differences between LDS and overall populations in
Hoover indices of concentration for city-systems, 2004.
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
The differential index (DG) shows a different
facet of the comparative geography of LDS and
non-LDS populations (Table 3, ‘DG’ columns,
and Fig. 6). It focuses on the relative share of LDS
members of each county within one region,
versus the relative share of the general popula-
tion that that county contains. I calculated it by
completely separating the two populations. Thus
the general population does not include any LDS
in the calculations of the figures. At the national
level there has been a clearly converging trend in
the DG as it has dropped from 60.3 in 1990 to 57.3
in 2004 (it was 57.8 in 2000). The value of 57.3 is
still very high as it means that over 57% of the
LDS would have to move to certain other coun-
ties to equalise their relative distribution within
the general population. There was also an overall
decrease in the average of all city-system DG
values from 25.2 to 22.3 from 1990 to 2004. This
means that the LDS and general populations
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
Figure 6. Differential index (DG) of LDS and non-LDS populations for city-systems, 2004.
have become more similar in their relative popu-
lation distributions across the nation and among
the counties of the city-systems.
The city-system mean DG of 22.3 indicates a
great deal of variation across the nation. In 2004,
three regions in the Mountain West (including
Salt Lake) and six city-systems from St Louis to
the East Coast had the greatest DG levels, or
internal differences in relative distributions of
LDS vs non-LDS. Salt Lake City’s DG value is
more understandable once it is pointed out that
it includes southwestern Idaho, which is much
less heavily LDS than the rest of the city-system.
The Albuquerque-El Paso region has large LDS
clusters in smaller urban centres around the Four
Corners areas in cities such as Farmington, NM,
so its unevenness is also understandable.
The high differentials (DG values) of the
regions in the eastern half of the country high-
light the propensity towards distinct spatial dis-
tributions of LDS within these areas. For example,
Louisville’s DG of 34.7 in 2004 is partly explained
by the fact that Mormons have higher relative
numbers living in micropolitan counties than
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
245
2004 - Differential Index of
LDS to Non-LDS Population
6.90 - 16.30
16.31 - 21.45
21.46 - 25.50
(Higher values mean greater internal
25.51 - 28.62 differences inthe distribution of LDS
28.63 - 41.88 compared with the rest of the population)
metropolitan counties, compared with the total
population (60.7% metro. and 28.6% micro. for
Mormons, compared with 64.4% metro. and
24.4% micro. for the total population). Still, in all
of these eastern high differentials city-systems
but Memphis, the DG values decreased from
1990 to 2004, showing the propensity for recent
LDS growth to have focused proportionately
more on general population areas rather than
local clusters of Mormons, pointing to migration
and conversion as key drivers of the increase
there.
Interestingly, in some city-systems that have
many counties without wards or branches, such
as San Antonio, Texas, their differential indices
are still not very high. This means that the LDS
population matches the general population there
fairly well; sparse general populations in many
rural counties of that region do not include
very many LDS either. Other city-systems such
as Seattle, Portland (OR), Spokane, Phoenix,
Houston, Miami, Tampa, Cleveland and Colum-
bus (OH) also registered very similar internal
relative geographies for the two populations.
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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246 S. M. Otterstrom

A final way to show spatial patterns of cluster-
ing and dispersion within city-systems is to
consider the differential ratio (Fig. 7 and Table 3
‘Ratio’ columns). Throughout the period from
1990 to 2004 a majority of city-systems had ratios
below 1. This means that more than half of the
counties had a larger relative share of general
(non-LDS) population within that city-system. In
other words, Mormons were clustered in only a
few counties. These numbers are partly explained
in regions such as Dallas, Minneapolis, Wichita
and Oklahoma City by the fact that many of their
rural counties did not even have one LDS ward
or branch.
Alternatively, city-systems in the northeast
and along the West Coast had ratios over 1, indi-
cating greater relative dispersion of the Mormon
population. For example, a preference against the
largest coastal cities can be seen in the Los Angeles
city-system where Los Angeles, Orange and San
Diego counties (all in California) had negative
relative ratios (fewer Mormons than expected
compared with the general population), while
Riverside and San Bernardino counties in
California, and Clark County (Las Vegas),
Nevada, had positive ratios (more Mormons than
expected). Higher costs of living on the coast
might explain this pattern, as Mormons with
their larger family sizes could prefer less
expensive housing areas (see Plane, 1999).
Additionally, the overall dispersed pattern
(differential ratio over 1) in the New York City
system was supported by the fact that many
upstate New York counties and most of Con-
necticut continued to have relatively more
Mormons throughout the period than areas
around the New York and New Jersey coasts, but
also that New York (Manhattan) County and
neighbouring Hudson County, New Jersey, in
the New York City system transitioned from
lower relative numbers of Mormons in 1990 to
more Mormons than expected by 2004. These
characteristics helped the city-system differential
ratio actually increase (showing more dispersion)
from 1.5 to 1.7 from 1990 to 2004. By contrast, all
of nearby Long Island and other surrounding
counties remained relatively less Mormon during
the 1990 to 2004 period. The explanation for the

2004 - Ratio of Counties with Relatively

More LDS to Those with Relatively Fewer
0.2676 - 0.4312
0.4313 - 0.5714
0.5715 - 0.7500
0.7501 - 1.1538
(Values over 1 mean that the LDS are relatively
1.1539 - 2.1667 more spread out then the rest of the population)

Figure 7. Ratio between the number of counties that have a higher relative distribution of LDS than the average
and those counties that have a lower relative distribution, 2004.

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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
relative Mormon increase in New York (Manhat-
tan) and Hudson County, New Jersey, points to
in-migration as well as conversions among the
resident population (both English-speaking and
non-English speaking). In New York County, the
LDS population grew nearly 95% faster than the
overall county population between 1990 and 2004
(growing from approximately 2000 to 4100),
while in Hudson County, New Jersey, the
numbers of Mormons increased from less than
200 to nearly 1900 over the 14 years (nearly 890%
faster than the overall population).
Suburban Clustering Effects
More can be said about changing Mormon distri-
butions when smaller county groupings are used.
Many of the individual city-system Hoover
indices for the LDS show greater movement than
the national index. In some eastern city-regions
the deconcentration during the period meant
slower relative growth in the central cities, and
rapid growth in the suburbs. For two examples I
consider the Atlanta, Georgia, and the Spokane,
Washington, city-systems. In the Atlanta region
the Hoover concentration level decreased from
65.7 in 1990 to 60.4 in 2000, and then moved to
60.8 by 2004, while Spokane increased from 56.4
to 58.9 over the entire period. By analysing these
two regions using both the 36% natural increase
threshold as well as relative concentrations, the
emerging Mormon population pattern in these
regions can be explained.
Suburbanisation of LDS populations in the
Atlanta city-system appeared to largely affect its
deconcentration over the study period. The centre
county of the Atlanta region is Fulton County,
Georgia. In terms of Mormons, growth in that
county was very slow between 1990 and 2004,
increasing from 2692 to 2711 with numerous ups
and downs in the intervening years. Douglas and
Cobb counties, near Fulton, grew faster than
Fulton, but their LDS increase was less than 36%
and much less than the general population
growth in the counties. Neighbouring Clayton
County lost LDS adherents, but this was pro-
bably partly due to the creation of an LDS
congregation in bordering Douglas County in
1991. On the other hand, Mormon growth in
suburban De Kalb, Carroll, Paulding, Bartow,
Forsyth, Cherokee, Gwinnett, Jackson, Barrow,
Hall, Fayette, Coweta and Spalding counties
all exceeded 36%, indicating substantial in-
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
247
migration and/or conversions. What was even
more interesting was the concentration of LDS
in certain counties. Particularly, in Fayette and
Coweta counties, south of Atlanta, growth was
very rapid (100% over the 14 years), and the pro-
portion of the population counted as Mormon
was relatively high by 2004 (about 1% in both
counties). This compares with only 0.3% LDS in
Fulton County in 2004. It thus appears that in this
region there are certain local areas that have been
more attractive to Mormon adherents than
others.
On a different scale, the tendency for preferen-
tial clustering or gathering of Mormon popula-
tions in metropolitan areas can be illustrated
at the sub-county level in Maricopa County,
Arizona. Maricopa County is home to Phoenix,
among the largest cities in the US at 1.46 million
people in 2004. However, neighbouring Mesa,
with some 437,000 people (2004 US Census esti-
mates), was home to about 68,000 Mormons com-
pared with only 24,000 in Phoenix. Mesa has a
long LDS history, and it is the site of a Mormon
temple, a special place of worship for Mormons
that is distinct and different from regular LDS
meeting-houses (there are only about 126 Mormon
temples throughout the world; Deseret Morning
News, 2005: 515). These characteristics help
to explain Mesa’s longstanding attraction for
Church members.
In the northwestern part of the country,
the Spokane city-system experienced increasing
levels of LDS concentration throughout the 14-
year period. It appears that the concentration
trend in that city region was related to substantial
growth in and around the metropolitan areas,
combined with negative growth in many rural
areas (especially parts of eastern Montana). Met-
ropolitan LDS increase was greater than 36% in
Benton County, Washington (Tri-Cities area) and
Gallatin (Bozeman) and Yellowstone (Billings)
Montana. The largest county in the region,
Spokane, grew less rapidly but still fairly quickly
(30.6%), while six counties adjoining Spokane
grew at a rate exceeding 36%. For example, Koo-
tenai County, Idaho, home of the resort city of
Coeur d’Alene, grew by over 68% between 1990
and 2004. The Mormon increase in that county
was probably related to LDS in-migration, as its
overall populous grew significantly (general pop-
ulation growth there actually exceeded Mormon
growth by over 6.6%).
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
DOI: 10.1002/psp
248
Another method I used to identify centres of
Mormon growth was first selecting the counties
that exceeded the 36% natural increase threshold,
and then adding a further qualification that these
fast-growing counties must also have had a size-
able LDS presence (over 1000 LDS by 2004) (Fig.
8). This categorisation shows clusters where in-
migration and conversions are most likely hap-
pening in large numbers. In the eastern half of
the country, Houston, Austin and Dallas, Texas,
the Twin Cities of Minnesota, central and south-
ern Florida, counties surrounding Washington
DC and the New York metropolitan area emerged
as Mormon growth centres. In the West, Califor-
nia’s counties are almost completely excluded
from this high-growth category, while rapidly
expanding cities such as Las Vegas, Phoenix and
Boise were the beneficiaries of rapid LDS growth
which mirrored, but did not always keep up
with, total population increase. There are Mormon
temples in all of these fast-growth areas above
Figure 8. Rapidly growing substantial LDS populations, 1990–2004.
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
(except Austin, Texas, and southern Florida),
many being built recently, which have enhanced
the attractiveness of these areas to LDS in-
migrants and raised the visibility of the Church
there (Deseret Morning News, 2005).
A peculiar pattern has unfolded in the Ameri-
can Mormon heartland of the west. The ‘Mormon
Culture Region’ of the Mountain West with the
addition of California turned into the laggards in
relative LDS growth from 1990 to 2004. In most
counties of Utah, Arizona, Nevada, southeastern
Idaho and California, Mormon membership did
not have a natural increase base level growth of
at least 36% plus relative LDS growth rates that
exceeded that of the total population (see Fig. 9).
A notable exception to the pattern was Utah
County, Utah, the natural increase standard
and the most Mormon urban county in the US
in 2004. This lagging characteristic in the
West means two things. Firstly, in slow-growth
places such as coastal California, the Mormon
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
Figure 9. Ebbing LDS growth in the West, 1990–2004.
population has been prone to out-migration,
ageing (thus lower natural increase), and lower
relative rates of conversions. Secondly, even
where Mormons have multiplied quickly (such
as Las Vegas, Nevada, and Maricopa County,
Arizona), the non-Mormon population has often
grown even faster, presumably because of high
in-migration rates. In these areas, then, general
growth outpaced the combined effects of Mormon
in-migration, conversions, and potentially higher
rates of natural increase. In essence, the ‘Mormon
Culture Area’ (compare Figs 4 and 9) experienced
a widespread influx of people of other faiths over
the study period.
CONCLUSIONS
The methods used here can be applied to other
religious bodies and cultural groups that keep
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
249
detailed membership data, to evaluate how their
populations have shifted over time in reference
to other groups of people. The Duncan or
differential geographical index (DG) provides
simple-to-interpret numbers that underscore
geographical characteristics of two different
populations. Coupling these indicators with the
Hoover index and direct statistical comparisons
provided a multifaceted picture of the evolving
Mormon population geography in the US. Other
researchers can extract all or some of these
approaches in their quests to understand how the
geographies of certain segments of a population
are transformed over time.
What does this research tell us about the chang-
ing population growth and distribution of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the
US? Firstly, we can conclude strongly that as a
whole, the growth of the Mormon population has
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
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250
not mirrored that of the national population.
Non-Mormons have multiplied in the Mountain
West even faster than the LDS in terms of abso-
lute numbers (in all states except Utah) and rela-
tive rates (all Mountain West states). This is also
the case for California and the remainder of the
Pacific region. On the other hand, the central and
eastern parts of the country have seen their incip-
ient LDS bases grow substantially over the study
period. Additionally, the appearance of new
wards and branches in counties where none
existed before 1990 shows the increasing spatial
coverage of the Church across the nation. Even
though they remain a small group compared
with the overall US population, LDS growth has
been very rapid, throughout the urban to rural
spectrum in the eastern half of the country.
Since 1990, patterns of Church growth support
the argument that conversions have factored
strongly in spatial growth patterns, along with
natural increase and migration. The Church
membership geography is quite dynamic
(Crawford, 2005) because of its emphasis on
proselytising amongst other faiths in all parts of
the country. Non-English speaking wards and
branches have grown rapidly in number since
1990, especially in metropolitan areas, which is
evidence of the Church’s appeal to international
immigrants. This fact, along with the possibility
that Mormon missionaries are also having success
with inner-city racially diverse populations, may
explain why the Church is growing relatively
faster in urban counties.
The second conclusion is that the spatial dias-
pora or diffusion of Mormonism through migra-
tion and conversion has resulted in more similar
relative distributions of Mormons across the
country compared with the general population
since 1990 (see Newman and Halvorson, 1984;
Laing, 2002). The Hoover and DG indices have
emphasised both the varying internal LDS geog-
raphies such as the clustering of Mormon adher-
ents across the country, and the perceptible
deconcentration resulting in more spatial similar-
ity between the LDS and the general population.
This convergence can be partly attributed to the
greater relative growth of the LDS in the eastern
parts of the country where a large portion of the
general population lives. It is also apparently tied
to a great influx of those of other faiths into the
Mountain West and Pacific regions which has
outpaced the growth of the LDS in many places
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
S. M. Otterstrom
where they have had an historically strong pres-
ence (see Fig. 9).
A third finding is that while the Mormon dias-
pora has been ongoing, existing local clusters of
Mormons have been strengthened (such as Mesa,
Arizona, and Utah County, Utah) while new
gatherings have sprouted across the country
(such as central Florida and even New York City)
and continue to grow more rapidly in compari-
son with surrounding areas. Proximity to people
of the same faith appears to have its pull. This
combined diaspora and gathering paradigm ties
in with the Church’s two-fold injunction for its
members to both spread their faith across the
world while at the same time gathering into their
local wards and stakes to develop ‘Zion’ (Zion is
defined as ‘a group of God’s followers or a place
where such a group lives’) (Ludlow, 1992: 1624,
537).
With all the changes that have occurred since
1990 in the distribution of the LDS population,
there is still a noticeable divide between East and
West. The traditional ‘Mormon Culture Region’
(Meinig, 1965; Bennion, 1995a,b) continues to be
evident as the largest concentrations or gather-
ings of Mormons are still in Utah and the greater
West. Thus, in one respect there is still a great
difference between the distribution of the LDS
and the general populations in the US, even with
the recent LDS growth in areas with small
numbers of Church members. However, if the
relative size of the Mormon population continues
to ebb in the West and flower in the East because
of interregional migration and conversion trends,
the ongoing convergence of the spatial distribu-
tions of LDS and general populations will signal
a more far-reaching diffusion of this distinct reli-
gious body across the American landscape.
NOTES
(1) The term ‘stake’ is derived from a reference in the
Old Testament (Isaiah 54:2–3) (Ludlow, 1992:
1412).
(2) See Heaton et al. (2005) for a non-spatial analysis
of Mormon demographic characteristics. Table 2
shows the official church membership percentages
by region and includes all members whether or not
they were assigned to specific wards or branches.
(3) The city-systems are trading areas defined as Major
Trading Areas from the Rand McNally 1990 Com-
mercial Atlas and Marketing Guide (Rand McNally,
Popul. Space Place 14, 231–252 (2008)
DOI: 10.1002/psp
Divergent Growth of Mormons in the US
1990). They are preferable to states for regional
analyses because they depict a more unified,
related economic region by taking into account
such factors as transportation patterns, employ-
ment, and newspaper circulation. The atlas states
that ‘the boundaries [of the trade areas] have been
determined after an intensive study of such factors
as physiography, population distribution, newspa-
per circulation, economic activities, highway facil-
ities, railroad service, suburban transportation,
and field reports of experienced sales analysts’
(Rand McNally, 1990: 39). Each of the 46 Major
Trading Areas used in this paper comprises one or
more of the nearly 500 smaller Basic Trading Areas
as defined by Rand McNally. The Major Trading
Areas allow for a more consistent analysis of
regional processes than either states or other
regional groupings because of their larger popula-
tions overall and the fact that they all have more
dominant cities as centres of their systems.
(4) This is one weakness of the Hoover index in that
it does not distinguish between different spatial
types of concentration.
(5) Additionally, the Puerto Rico LDS membership
decline from 23,404 in 2001 to 20,683 in 2004, could
be attributed to out-migration of Puerto Rican
Moracons to the U.S. mainland (Deseret News,
2002; Deseret Morning News, 2005.)
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I appreciate the thoughtful comments and advice
given by the anonymous reviewers and the
proofreading work done by Laurie Weisler.
Thanks are also due to the Religious Studies
Center and the College of Family, Home and
Social Sciences both at Brigham Young Univer-
sity for their financial support of this project as
well as to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-
day Saints for the ward and branch population
figures they provided.
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