I have a step child on a mission is the east coast of the USA. I get an email report every week. Its been 5 months since she went on her mission. It seems like summer camp. They go to the beach everyday for study time. The play basketball a lot. The go on tours and boat trips too. Visiting all the members all the time to give them lessons. They just seem to have so much fun. As for the spiritual side nothing really deep. Its "we feel good about so and so." WE "talked to so and so." The people the missionaries are talking to are single and no families. I have not had a letter that says this was a deep spiritual experience Even going to the temple is "fun"

Is this the way the missionary program is today. If it is its seems like a waste of time.

Yes, but it beats being drafted and having to fight in Vietnam!


Or is that over now?

I wish I'd joined the Coast Guard or the Air Force instead of missionizing;

If I stayed I'd have a lot of VA benefits, a good pension, and I could have returned to the occupation I had prior with my seniority rights preserved.

The beard ban at BYU isn't over.

It is supposed to be free labor with a force of door to door salesmen like Fuller Brush Salesmen. However, that model isn't working and they don't have much else for them to do.

The main purpose is to provide a rite of passage. The young warrior boy leaves home to hunt and arrives home as a man! You know, all that kind of thing, showing that he survived and is a dedicated tribe member.

Now it is not safe for people to go door to door, and anyone who has not been in a coma already knows about the Mormon schtick.

I think the church is trying to keep people from leaving the church at this point. They've already eliminated most things that were "fun." Maybe they are trying to provide an experience that isn't drudgery so the missionaries don't go home and bad mouth the experience.

I think a lot of it depends on the individual leaders and how much "fun" they allow.

I think the church still believes that if serving a mission is perceived as a positive then the young people will stay active. As for the church growing from having missionaries chatting online, I think there are very few converts. I agree that young people's time would be better served by pursuing work, education or even self-discovery. However, I am glad that some of the endless browbeating, need to repent for lack of baptisms and being told that you are worthless is coming to an end or at least scaled back.

I like the idea that they go around the area and somewhat enjoy themselves.

I had a companion go ballistic on me several times for not staying focused on missionary work. We stopped at the only semi-public restroom in our area (save for returning to the apartment). It was a Catholic church and featured a beautiful garden. While he was communing with God on the crapper, I was outside with my cheapo plastic camera taking a few snapshots of red and purple bougainvillea flowers.

The angry elder returned and saw my camera and pushed me to the ground. He screamed- "We're not tourists! We are supposed to be proselytizing and not taking pictures."

And this was the same elder who insisted that we take our laundry to the apartment laundromat on Monday morning 12:01 so we we could finish by 3am to nap and his plan was for us to play basketball uninterrupted from 5am to 5pm.

The prick called the zone leader who rushed over to the apartment to confiscate my camera. I did not give him my camera but unscrupulously searched through my luggage and took a camera (which was a very nice one with a broken film door- it was gifted to me by a departing elder who did not want his family to find out that he had broken a thousand dollar Nikon camera).

At the next zone meeting, the broken camera was staring at me as the mission president grilled me about the differences between serving a mission and being a shutterbug. He kept the camera and it was never returned to me along with my seized Mormon Tabernacle Choir Tapes.

You weren't allowed to take photos? Really? Boy did your mission have a telephone pole up their collective butts.

I bet the mission prez had the film door fixed and had himself a nice camera.

Brother Of Jerry Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> You weren't allowed to take photos? Really? Boy
> did your mission have a telephone pole up their
> collective butts.
>
> I bet the mission prez had the film door fixed and
> had himself a nice camera.

Not when you are ordered to be teaching discussions 7 days a week.

This MP employed so many draconian policies: he got the word out that unless members would give a name of a friend willing to be taught the lessons, we couldn't go to their home for a shared meal. That alone hurt a lot of members who enjoyed feeding the missionaries.

One Xmas we were forbidden from spending the day at a member's home. Lots of other crap like not being able to attend a banquet for helping adults earn their GED's or the hospital volunteer appreciation dinner/awards. We performed a lot of community service as it made the church look real good except we were denied the recognition because it interfered with proselytizing.

About ten years ago the church started reporting number of "service missionaries" serving. I don't think they ever gave a clear explanation of what a service missionary was, nor why they felt the need to report such a statistic. It's not like outsiders like us were chomping at the bit to find out how many non-proselytizing missionaries there were.

I fully expect the number of "service missionaries" to climb. Rather than having lots of regular missionaries honing their basketball skills, better to get some free labor out of them.

And I am still expecting that some day, the church will create a series of "American History: Settling of the West" campgrounds/RV parks across the country, staffed by service missionaries, designed to convert the motorhome crowd. LDS Inc already owns the land for the campgrounds.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/28/2024 01:08PM by Brother Of Jerry.

    I have no way of proving this, but an experience from the 1970s has led me to believe that there are "bowling leagues" in America and that they meet at "bowling alleys" regularly and perhaps frequently.

    So, if this is true, the church should take advantage of this possible phenomenon and call faithful members to find and proselytize these "bowling leagues" . . .

    Yes, I, too, believe that I am inspired!

How soon we forget.

Baseball baptisms.

ETA: problem with bowling is it is one of the few sports where beer is consumed during the game. And it is too blue-collar.

Motor homes are kind of blue collar too, but motorhome owners clearly have more disposable income than bowlers, and the owners, unlike baseball kids, are often retired, and relatively well-off. Follow the money.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/28/2024 01:31PM by Brother Of Jerry.

It is mostly by internet now, they spend most of their time trying to contact people through social media.

The other thing they do is ask people what they can do for them. My Nephew who has been back from his mission about a year now, would send weekly E-Mails telling us about the service projects they did that week. Sure they had the occasional sit down missionary lesson, but the pictures he took showed that they spent a great deal of time sight seeing while searching for the newest service project.

Compared to my days, and the stories my brothers and sisters told me. Today's missions are extended vacations.

He could have taken that time doing service projects by spending that amount of time in an apprenticeship and learning to become a skilled worker. Service projects mean work. So a young person if they want to work should try an apprenticeship and get paid and trained for their work. It will pay off later.

The perception todays missionaries are getting is a different reality than when I was younger in the Church.

I saw this Nephew over the Christmas Holiday. He had grown out his hair, and stood in a corner of the room with about 30 in attendance for a family gathering.

I noticed him and walked up and asked him how he was doing. He smiled, and grunted a "I am OK", but I knew he was lost.

Those two years LDS Corp. takes are better used to grow and advance yourself. Like you you pointed out he could have been far more productive in moving his life forward doing something that had real value. Instead he ends up cleaning peoples yards or helping them move with no objective except the hope you get to give a religious presentation to please a bunch of out of touch old men. Granted he got to see and be part of another culture, but heck you can do that on a vacation over a couple of weeks. Or better yet, get a job in that country, immerse yourself, and get paid at the same time.

Now he is back with the expectation that he should follow the path of all prior missionaries.....get married in the temple and have kids.

How depressing is that!

I was in a regional priesthood meeting about 25 years ago and the general authority present wanted to make a point how important the priesthood holders in the church were. He said the church was only growing at 1% and most that growth was born in church baptisms. He said the missionary effort is not very productive but their research showed most members who served missions stayed in the church. He said there’s very few worthy priesthood holders in the world.

So missions are basically there to retain the young single adults. The church is obsessed with retaining it’s born in church members because its conversion of non-members is extremely low.

I found with missions a lot of what it’s like is based on the mission president. You can have a real dictator or a happy go lucky type.

Except for administrative overhead + some misshs have cars, correct?

Missionary 'service' is mostly participant-paid!

How about making missionary support a deduction from tithing?
Shhhh! Don't spread that idea!!

Correct. Most missions have a fleet of leased cars. Also missions are a flat rate now so if you are serving in an expensive mission the church pays some of that cost. Of course what the church pays other members have paid for.

I've heard that no matter the standard of living in your mission, they make sure you starve...

I served in New York City and we lived in some real dumps but we were far from starving. The Jews and Italians kept us well fed. We ate fresh bagels and calzones. Lot’s of pizza. Wonderful pasta dishes and pastrami on rye. One delicatessen fed us for free.

My mom send us some McDonald’s coupons and I just laughed.

Missions may be less stress and more fun these days, but it seems like more missionaries than ever are cutting their missions short and coming home early.

  
    

Haha, yep.

The church just want the young men captive for two years for intensive brainwashing right when young people become adults and start to find their way in the world. After the brainwashing go marry a LDS girl and make us some more members.

What does the rigor of the mission matter as long as the young women get their RM?

The mission is the joke. Mormon marriage is the punch line.

Not really. Not efficiently nor fast enough.

I have been considering the "white board meeting" and trying to wrap my head around the idea of kidnapping children from Haiti in order to make them mormon."It's for the children" tactic blows my mind. Orphaned children to be transported only to Utah.

Then I saw Gov Cox down at the Mexican border a few weeks ago creating more conflict about illegal border crossings. I wondered if what Cox really wants is children without guardians in order to make them mormon. To replace the Haitian children that didn't make it to Utah.

We know by now the church doesn't care about laws of the land.

I would never have thought this in a million years if not for Tim Ballard's white board meeting.