I feel bad posting a serious response after all these great posts. :) When I got the calling extended, the bish called it "physical facilities coordinator". Talk about difficult - trying to keep a straight face as he fumbled when I didn't jump up and down at the "opportunity" he was giving me. He just kept talking, trying not to sound lame but making it worse. We're family friends so I let him down easy.
They pay people to clean the bathrooms now, but have monthly volunteers do light cleaning on most of the church in heavily mormon populated areas like Utah
"& then we went to the chapel for our turn to clean with another family. I will say that never has a church been this well sterilized! DONE! My job was windows, but I thought of every single place that needed to be disinfected & it's now the cleanest place ever! **** was VERY diligent as well as the **** family! What a nice feeling!"
I had dinner the other night with a lapsed Mormom friend of mine (who lurks on RfM but as of yet hasn't posted, although he says he wants to once he figures out how to use his new computer).
He informed me that his hometeacher recently (meaning the end of November) left a voice message that the ward hometeaching program was being changed in ways to, well, clean up its act.
That change, the hometeacher relayed in the message, was that on occasion the hometeacher would invite all his assigned familes to go to the local wardhouse, where they would meet up, then clean it up.
My friend said this sparkling new wrinkle in the hometeaching program would mean that instead of 12 monthly visits to the homes of an assigned family, twice a year or so the hometeacher would dutifully assemble at the wardhouse with the sheep placed under his care for an edifying experience in spiritual sudsing.
My friend said that his hometeacher pitched the new progam by describing it as an opportunity for "service."
My friend was flabbergasted by the news and, just to make sure, contacted members of his extended family in the area to see if, in fact, this was the Mormon Church's new approach to hometeaching. He said he was informed that, indeed, this wardhouse worker bee Janitors-for-Jesus initiative was being implemented as a periodic replacement during the calendar year for the traditional hometeaching visit to family homes.
I asked my friend what he thought of this development. With an irritated look on his face and in a slightly raised voice (we were at a restaurant), he replied that his personal idea of service was not to clean the property of "a multi-billion dollar corporation."
He added that his wife's reaction was likewise less than enthusiastic. She noted that this meant people bringing along their kids--which meant that they would simply run around out of control. (His wife works in the Young Woman's program, so couldn't be described as a slouch).
I asked my friend how he responded to his hometeacher's invitation to join him and the other assigned families in an inspiring adventure of group wardhouse cleaning.
He said he simply ignored this inner-cleansing call to service. He also said that he didn't expect any resistance from his hometeacher, describing the HT as a laidback kind of guy who, when he made his visits to their home, only knocks, doesn't come in and sometimes brings along goodies.
There you have it--another prophetic initiative to protect Morg profitability.
Come to church, brothers and sisters, and scrub the bathrooms.
"Brother Urinitus, by the power of the holy Melchizedek priesthood, which we hold lay our hands on your head and we set you apart as a latrine srubber in the Scheiss 2nd Ward in the Merde Stake of Zion.
Now Brother Urinitus at this time we bless you that you will be of a strong nose to withstand the evil odors caused by those who do not flush. We bless you also with a keen understanding so that you do not mix ammonia and bleach.
These and all other blessings the Lard sees you stand in need of, we do confer upon you at this time--in the name of Jesus Christ Amen."
They perform washings, and anointings of the lard's true, sacred, and celestial thrones, and do this work vicariously on behalf of the long departed janitors.
If one family craps out of their duty, they will be blackballed by their other HT families. If the other families crap out, too, the HT's will have the responsibility of doing the cleaning, right? Doesn't almost every Mormon man have to be a HT?
Can you imagine the increased contention between parents and children? It's hard enough to get them to clean their rooms!
What a horrible cult of coertion and sadness!
Another Mormon lie: Come on, kids, it'll be fun, and it'll bring families closer together.
apparently they made my nephew and all the other primary kids in my sister's ward where stickers that say "every member a janitor" a few weeks ago in celebration of this new "opportunity". if that's not a cult, then i don't know what it.