They should go back to those talks for 2 1/2 minutes each for general conference, packer would still get in trouble, but anything important can be said into 1/2 minutes. It doesn't even take me to add menace to say that the mormon is a fraud and a fake and a cult...see less than 2 1/2 minutes.

I should think a professional GA with a lifetime of experience could do even better and stop wasting time going on forever about next to nothing.

Most of those 2 1/2 minute talks were so boring they seemed like a slow motion bad dream. I think they were considered a way to involve more members and train them in public speaking. It would have been better to accept volunteers who like to speak and leave out those who hate it, but that isn't the morg way.

I remember them. But I only remember them in context of Sunday School talks. When I was young (in SE Idaho), the had Sunday School, not primary. They didn't have blocks and your talks were not to exceed 2 1/2 minutes. Conference talks were always long enough to put anyone sitting down fast asleep from what I remember.

Combined Sunday School was very structured back then. There was also a "gem" that began "Jesus said..."

I remember......they would say...please repeat, and the audience would repeat.

they were during sunday school. This was during the non-block time, and we had the sacrament then as well as in the later sacrament meeting. I remember cutesy little 2 1/2 minute talk books you could buy to the reduce stress and anxiety of your 2.5 minutes of fame.

I forgot all about them!! At the time, 2 1/2 minutes even seemed like forever..

When I was a little feller, I ws so tormented about what to say during one of those talks. My grandfather taught me a little riddle that I actually got up and recited.

"When I get on the stand,
My heart goes pitty-pat.
For fear someone will say,
Whose little dunce is that."

i believe my tbm parents still have a book or two about giving those talks-i gave quite a few myself. to be fair, even though i was just regurgitating garbage, it was great public speaking experience. to this day (i am a college instructor) i can rarely give a lecture without telling a joke-as i was instructed to do by mom to 'get my audience's attention :)

They don't still have 2 1/2 minute talks? Who knew? I can't remember which was worse: giving one or listening to one.

The best 2 1/2 minute talk I ever heard was given by a hippie convert who went on and on about the coming apocalypse and why he chose to live in a dugout in the desert. After about 10 minutes of this the bishop made him leave the stand and sit down. I never saw that guy at church again. This must have been around 1974 or so.

so true! and if you were smart you kept them...and used them again another time. like anyone noticed :)

Isn't it funny that they actually called it a 2 1/2 minute talk? Like it was some sort of timed thing and if you went over something bad would happen? I remember giving them quite a few times. We had a book with gems of thoughts you could basically read and the congregation would think you were so smart! haha

We used a book called "Talks for Tots"

They probably did away with them because the freaking brown-nosing prayers took at least 2.5 minutes.

But I can't remember what I said. (obviously not very important)

K

Found this gem...Probably will look familar to many:
http://openlibrary.org/books/OL5868216M/2_1_2_minute_talk_treasury.

How I remember! For a church with an eternal message, the LDS sure have done a lot of changing. During Sunday School we also practiced singing hymns. We had a great musical director who actually taught what the notes meant and led us through not-so-familiar hymns verse by verse. It was actually a learning experience for those who had never studied music.

As I recall, SS was 1 1/2 hours in the morning, and Sacrament meeting was 1 1/2 hours in the afternoon. Primary met on a weekday after school.

Ah, those were the good old days.

I think mutual (MIA) might have been Tuesday nights and primary on Wednesday afternoons?

and there wasn't another block that was pounding on the door.

Actually I do remember the other wards pounding on the door. I was in a ward with mostly really old people downtown, and they talked forever. Except the 2 1/2 minute talks.