On RfM I hear about MIA teenagers given adult callings to "church break" them. I didn't want to believe it.

Yesterday a 15 year old boy was called to be a Ward Family History Consultant and another 15 year old as a Ward Missionary!

There is plenty of time to hold a responsible church calling if that's your thing. Why oh why can't kids just be kids as long as possible? My heart broke for those two boys.

Sounds like the morg is desperate. No more active adults to fill the ranks of the sundry jobs no one else wants. Hopefully the boys will run away as soon as they are drained of self-esteem for failing in their callings.

Who is going to want to be preached to by a 15-year-old?

The same thing has been happening in my ward. They're giving these callings to the youth so they can be involved in temple work and because they're savy with technology. If it helps at all, none of them actually end up doing anything because they're too busy with life/school and it's a lame calling.

Same thing happening in my ward too. Two different youth both turned 18 and immediately they called each to teach separate primary classes.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/31/2015 10:52PM by goodeye.

Good point, Happy visitor.

I accompanied my mother to her calling as Ward Family History Consultant. Nobody ever came to the library. It was boring and freezing because the computers had to be kept cool. I tried using the computers while I did some job hunting but they had so many software blocks I could barely use them.

Plus my mother knows absolutely nothing about Family History and even less about technology. I think it was just a pathetic way of giving her a calling since she still did, at the time, believe in Mormonism but was kind of old and not too useful.

Yes, the FamHist libraries are becoming irrelevant because so much can be done from home now.

And this is a vicious circle because ChurchCo apportions library computers based on use. Very few patrons = very few computers.

Remember how Nazi Germany began conscripting 14-15 year-old boys as home guards at the end of the war? It was a sad time.

Are 15-year-olds really all that interested in genealogy?

I don't think so, but geneaology and indexing is a monthly activity at MIA in our ward.

If they're trying to keep kids in the church, indexing is NOT the way to go.

I was a ward missionary at 16 and received a second calling at 17 as a primary teacher. It was a lot of extra work for me on top of school and I didn't do a very good job at either calling. But they didn't seem to care. I knew it was to make sure that I would attend every Sunday (because I skipped church a lot) and to "church break" me. This was back in the late 90s and I guess it did contribute to me staying in the church, when I probably would have left then, and consequently marry an RM at 19.

Myron was thinking along my lines....let's give young teenagers a Panzerfaust.

They also conscripted old men, and look how senior missions are encouraged much more these days.

Is it that they've given teens adult callings, or is it that the church has had adults doing juvenile jobs?

They could never even convince me to do home teaching when I was a teen. There's no damn way they'd have been able to get me into a serious calling like that!

I'm sooooo glad I'm out. Sounds like they're getting desperate to fill positions, and to keep people busy.

I think it's a great idea. It will burn those kids out before they turn 18. No missions for them thank-you.

On the other side of the coin, they called a 72 year old guy to be the scout leader. Nice guy, knows his stuff, but is tired, especially of church. He likes a nice vodka cranberry once in awhile, and coffee helps him get going in the morning. He won't be confessing anything to anyone, he's way past that thinking.

I don't think this is a new thing, necessarily. It was going on in the 70s.

I was called as a junior sunday school teacher at age 16. I was junior sunday school chorister at 17.

I was called to direct the ward roadshow at age 14. That really burned me out even though the show took first place in the stake competition. I was called again at age 15 and said definitely no.

I was inactive by age 19 so early callings didn't work for me.