TexasCHLforum.com

troglodyte wrote:

jmra wrote:

mloamiller wrote:My church posted 30.07 signs, but no 30.06. To my knowledge, nothing has been said or announced, just quietly implemented.

CC is very prevalent in our congregation. Normal Sunday attendance is around 6500+, and I suspect we have 200+ carrying each Sunday, not counting the off-duty LEOs. I know for a fact that out of our 20 member Sunday School class, almost half have their LTC and most carry every Sunday (many of the wives don't always carry at church as they are often working with kids at some point).

If your normal attendance is 6500 and you have 200+ carrying, you are way above statistical probabilities.
I'd be willing to bet your estimate is way off. I'll explain: LTC makes up 3% of the population (3% of 6500 is 195). Obviously demographics can skew this number some but not by much. It's safe to say that at least half of LTC holders rarely if ever carry. Statistics would suggest that at most there would be under 100. Given the number of times that people on this forum have been corrected regarding the incorrect belief that church carry is illegal and the number of LTC I've encountered that simply can't understand why someone would need to carry at church, I'd be willing to bet the number is substantially lower than 100.
I believed for a number of years that carry in our was significantly higher than it actually is until multiple conversations with people that I knew were licensed revealed that they either didn't carry at all or didn't carry at church. Of course YMMV.

In our congregation of approx 1500 I know of well over 100 members that have or at least have had their CHL in the last 10 years because I either set up the class for them or taught them after I became an instructor. I also know that there a a good number that had their's previously or got theirs from a different instructor. How many do I not know about? I estimate we have about 150 licensed in our congregation. I would t be surprised if there were many more. How many carry? Not as many as I would like.

It would be interesting to know how many failed to renew and how many are current but simply do not carry. Over the last several years I have done some very unscientific research where in causal conversation I ask a number of question whenever I learn someone has or has had a LTC. What I have learned through that research is that less than 25% of LTC holders carry regularly after at least one month of obtaining their LTC. It seems that the most common response I hear for not carrying is the difficulting in concealing a weapon. I found this to be the case with 90% of the women I have spoken to. My wife is a prime example of a LTC holder of 7 years who has resisted dressing around a firearm and will not purse carry. She always has a firearm in the car, but I can count on one hand how many times she has actually CCed.
I was also surprised at the number of people I have encountered who went through the process without ever intending to carry, it was simply a way for the individual to make a political statement. I don't know what the renewal percentages are, but I have spoken to many who didn't renew simply because they never carried. I was also very surprised at the number of people I have spoken to who took a class but never submitted the paperwork. When asked why the responses varied from procrastination to being overwhelmed with the level of responsibility associated with carry to learning that they did not qualify based on information given in the class.
The most surprising results of my non-scientific research is people that I would have sworn would not leave the house for church unarmed had either stopped carrying at church or had stopped carrying altogether. I blame complacency.
ETA: just out of curiosity, when you say that you have helped 100 people in the church obtain their LTC, is that 100 people that took your class or 100 people who actually followed through and obtained their license? The reason I ask is I have a friend who attended a large church and gave free or greatly reduced classes twice a year at the the church. He stopped doing it because in following up with those who attended he discovered that the majority who attended never got around to submitting the paperwork. Just wondering what your experience has been.

Richbirdhunter wrote:

jmra wrote:

mloamiller wrote:My church posted 30.07 signs, but no 30.06. To my knowledge, nothing has been said or announced, just quietly implemented.

CC is very prevalent in our congregation. Normal Sunday attendance is around 6500+, and I suspect we have 200+ carrying each Sunday, not counting the off-duty LEOs. I know for a fact that out of our 20 member Sunday School class, almost half have their LTC and most carry every Sunday (many of the wives don't always carry at church as they are often working with kids at some point).

If your normal attendance is 6500 and you have 200+ carrying, you are way above statistical probabilities.
I'd be willing to bet your estimate is way off. I'll explain: LTC makes up 3% of the population (3% of 6500 is 195). Obviously demographics can skew this number some but not by much. It's safe to say that at least half of LTC holders rarely if ever carry. Statistics would suggest that at most there would be under 100. Given the number of times that people on this forum have been corrected regarding the incorrect belief that church carry is illegal and the number of LTC I've encountered that simply can't understand why someone would need to carry at church, I'd be willing to bet the number is substantially lower than 100.
I believed for a number of years that carry in our was significantly higher than it actually is until multiple conversations with people that I knew were licensed revealed that they either didn't carry at all or didn't carry at church. Of course YMMV.

There is over 900,000 CHL holders in Texas, I wonder what percentage of us are evangelical Christians?

Don't have time to look it up right now but IIRC not that long ago a big deal was made about more than 50% of the population being unchurched. Have no idea how those who are churched break down denomination wise. Not sure if our neck of the woods would be a little more churched or not or if churched people are more likely to obtain a LTC than unchurched. I haven't seen anything that would suggest that to be the case.

mloamiller wrote:My church posted 30.07 signs, but no 30.06. To my knowledge, nothing has been said or announced, just quietly implemented.

CC is very prevalent in our congregation. Normal Sunday attendance is around 6500+, and I suspect we have 200+ carrying each Sunday, not counting the off-duty LEOs. I know for a fact that out of our 20 member Sunday School class, almost half have their LTC and most carry every Sunday (many of the wives don't always carry at church as they are often working with kids at some point).

If your normal attendance is 6500 and you have 200+ carrying, you are way above statistical probabilities.
I'd be willing to bet your estimate is way off. I'll explain: LTC makes up 3% of the population (3% of 6500 is 195). Obviously demographics can skew this number some but not by much. It's safe to say that at least half of LTC holders rarely if ever carry. Statistics would suggest that at most there would be under 100. Given the number of times that people on this forum have been corrected regarding the incorrect belief that church carry is illegal and the number of LTC I've encountered that simply can't understand why someone would need to carry at church, I'd be willing to bet the number is substantially lower than 100.
I believed for a number of years that carry in our was significantly higher than it actually is until multiple conversations with people that I knew were licensed revealed that they either didn't carry at all or didn't carry at church. Of course YMMV.

Excaliber wrote:

jmra wrote:I bet if someone ran the numbers they would discover that OC is something most churches will seldom if ever encounter and spending a lot of time worrying about it is pretty much a waste of time.
I ran the numbers using some very liberal gestimates where firm data was missing and based on those numbers the probabilities suggested that, absent an announcement from the church welcoming OCers, we might encounter an OCer once every couple of years.
As others have stated, addressing these instances individually makes a lot of sense to me. Playing devils advocate (excuse the pun), I wonder how many evil doers would mistakingly assume that a 30.07 sign equated to a gun free zone making the posted church a much greater target than it was previously.

If someone were to act on that mistaken assumption, it would likely be a mistake they'd make only once.

However, it is still something I would like to avoid.

I bet if someone ran the numbers they would discover that OC is something most churches will seldom if ever encounter and spending a lot of time worrying about it is pretty much a waste of time.
I ran the numbers using some very liberal gestimates where firm data was missing and based on those numbers the probabilities suggested that, absent an announcement from the church welcoming OCers, we might encounter an OCer once every couple of years.
As others have stated, addressing these instances individually makes a lot of sense to me. Playing devils advocate (excuse the pun), I wonder how many evil doers would mistakingly assume that a 30.07 sign equated to a gun free zone making the posted church a much greater target than it was previously.