Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Lutheran denominations/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was archived by The Rambling Man via FACBot (talk) 00:25, 5 September 2018 (UTC) [1].[reply]

List of Lutheran denominations

Featured list candidates/List of Lutheran denominations/archive1

Nominator(s): Bnng (talk) 22:19, 16 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Between February and April of this year, I significantly expanded this list, more than octupling the size of the list (at least in terms of the byte size). The most significant improvements I made were 1) organizing the denominations into tables, 2) adding the year each denomination was founded, 3) adding the current membership of each denomination, 4) adding references (the list previously had four references; it now has 295), and 5) adding denominations that were not previously included in this list. This list should now include practically every active Lutheran denomination in the world.

Looking at the FL criteria in detail, I believe this list meets them all:

1. Prose - The list includes only a few short paragraphs of prose, but I believe these meet professional standards.

2. Lead - Short and to the point, but I believe it does define the scope of the list.

3. Comprehensiveness - I have done my best to include every active Lutheran denomination in the world. If it isn't completely comprehensive, it should be extremely close.

4. Structure - The division by international affiliation (LWF, ILC, CELC, and unaffiliated) has been in place since the list was first created. I think this division makes sense and makes the list easier to navigate. The ability to sort denominations by country, name, founding year, and membership should also aid in navigation.

5. Style - The list does have a number of red links, but after looking at a few other FLs, it seems that this is not necessarily a deal-breaker. Also, I intend over the next several (6–12?) months to create a series of "Lutheranism in (country)" articles, and to link each of the redlinked denominations to those articles. See Lutheranism in Angola for an example.

6. Stability - The only major changes in the past several years have been my edits expanding the list.

Although I think the list looks fairly good as-is, I would obviously be happy to make any changes others feel are necessary. Bnng (talk) 22:19, 16 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

I would give a date for the numbers. "As of January 2018" or something like that. Just giving numbers for a religion without giving a date is somewhat useless.
why did you use two "--" and not just one "–" (en-dash) or "—" (em-dash)?--Lirim | T 21:16, 23 June 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your feedback, and my apologies for getting back to you so late; this past week has been a busy one for me. I have added a note to each of the tables indicating that the membership numbers are the most recently available numbers as of April 2018. Some of the sources I used didn't include a date, but I'm reasonably confident none of the numbers are more than a decade old, and I know most are less than three years old.

As for using "--" rather than an en- or em-dash, I believe I copied that from another FL. If you think an en- or em-dash would look better, I can certainly change it. Just let me know which you would prefer. Bnng (talk) 01:50, 2 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The list looks fine, but I wonder if it could be improved by merging the tables and using 3-color backgrounds instead. Also, a world map could be nice, coloring where each of the 3 players is present. Also, a mini-section summarizing the 3+1 headers could also be better, so that way you can compare the 3 organizations a bit. Nergaal (talk) 10:55, 6 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I initially thought about putting all the denominations into one large table, but I ultimately decided against it, for a few reasons. First, there are currently eleven church bodies that are members of both the LWF and the ILC (and that number is steadily growing), which would complicate a simple colorization scheme like the one you proposed. (Thanks for mentioning that idea, though; after reading it, I realized I forgot to add a footnote to those church bodies, indicating their dual membership.) Second, using a colorization scheme to indicate membership would not allow the readers to sort the church bodies by membership, which seems like a drawback. One way around this problem, and an idea I toyed with for awhile, would be to add separate columns to indicate membership in the LWF, ILC, CELC, and possibly also the World Council of Churches. This would show the dual membership arrangements very clearly and would allow the readers to sort the table by membership if they wanted, which are definite pluses. The downside is that it would make the table more complicated and a bit messy, and might make them too wide for easy reading on most computer screens. The current split into four separate groupings (in place since the list was first created) seems to me like a good compromise between navigability and conciseness. That said, if you or anyone else can think of a way to combine these tables in a way that avoids those pitfalls, I would love to hear it. I don't really like the fact that several denominations are duplicated in two separate tables.

I like the idea of including a map, and I'd be willing to put one together, but I'm not sure exactly how I would do it. In addition to the problem of denominations with dual memberships, many countries also have multiple denominations, some affiliated with the LWF, some with the ILC, some with the CELC, and some unaffiliated. I'm not sure how I'd include them all in a single map. I'm also limited by the fact that this is about the most complicated map I'd be able to create on my own.

Finally, I think your idea of adding a short section comparing the various groupings is a good one, and I will try to put together something to that effect either tonight or tomorrow. Bnng (talk) 16:16, 6 July 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by TompaDompa

As noted above, there are a lot of WP:Redlinks. This is a deal-breaker to me. For now, I think the best solution is to remove the links.
I'd suggest using ~~a centered en dash~~ (<center>–</center>) for missing information rather than "--".
- On second thought, I'd suggest using {{N/A}}, {{N/A|Unavailable}}, or {{Unknown}}. TompaDompa (talk) 00:16, 20 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
There are a lot of empty cells. I looked at a few of the sources, and it should be possible to give at least approximate years (e.g. "c. 1984", "1982–1986", or "1980s") for many of them. I don't know about the membership numbers, but it might be possible to give approximate figures for some of them too.
The visual appeal would be greatly helped by some kind of image or images. A map would of course be ideal, but an image of Martin Luther would be a pretty good start.
There's plenty of room the expand the WP:LEAD. I'd suggest explaining more about the LWF, ILC, and CELC as a start.
Instead of footnotes, I'd suggest adding a column called "Notes" to improve readability. This would make the table wider, but the improved readability is more important in my opinion.
The "Ref" column should be "Refs", using the {{abbr}} template.
I noticed some discrepancies. The text says that the LWF includes 145 church bodies. I count 141 entries in the list. Likewise, the text says that the ILC includes 38 church bodies, whereas I count 39 entries. Finally, the text says that CELC includes 32 church bodies, but I count 22 entries in the list.
The number of members for the LWF should be mentioned in the text preceding its table (as is done for the other two, as well as in the WP:LEAD).
Avoid using the "This list [...]" phrasing, as it is clunky. Instead, try summarizing the contents (e.g. "There are XX affiliated and YY unaffiliated denominations, not including groups that have been merged into other groups (e.g. Hauge Synod), nor groups that have become defunct (e.g. Eielsen Synod)."
The word "million" should be preceded by a non-breaking space (74 million instead of 74 million). This turns up a few times.
The sorting by year is broken for the entries with "c." values. I'd suggest using ~~{{Sort}} or {{Hidden sort key}}~~ sort keys to solve this.
A few of the references need to be fixed. A list (which unfortunately contains false positives as well) can be found here.

This should be possible to bring up to WP:Featured list standard (the topic is definitely suitable), but right now there's a long way to go, I'm afraid. TompaDompa (talk) 14:54, 10 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Bnng has not edited Wikipedia since early July. If they do not respond to continue this nomination and/or no-one adopts it, I shall archive it in a few days time. The Rambling Man (talk) 13:33, 31 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Closing note: This candidate has been archived, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FLC/ar, and leave the {{featured list candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through.

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.