Sisters serving missions & forgoing marriage?

[Darren]

Over Half the Women in the Church Are Single

In a recent interview with the Mormon Channel "When Life Is Less Than Ideal," Sister Carole M. Stephens shared a surprising statistic:

"I don't know if you are aware that we've reached a point in the Church now where more than half of our women are single," Sister Stephens shared. "Women in Relief Society 18 years and older, just about 51 percent are single."

http://www.ldsliving.com/Sister-Stevens ... ly/s/84962

[brianj]

Over Half the Women in the Church Are Single

In a recent interview with the Mormon Channel "When Life Is Less Than Ideal," Sister Carole M. Stephens shared a surprising statistic:

"I don't know if you are aware that we've reached a point in the Church now where more than half of our women are single," Sister Stephens shared. "Women in Relief Society 18 years and older, just about 51 percent are single."

This leaves me wondering what percentage of active adult men in the church are single. If there is a significant population of men who aren't getting married, there is a problem that needs to be looked into and dealt with. But if only a small percentage of men are unmarried then I say good for the women maintaining their standards instead of dating outside the church.

[simpleton]

To me the role of a wife and a mother is a mission and that specifically involves saving souls. And I think it is a sad state of affairs with the decline of the family.

[Sunain]

Over Half the Women in the Church Are Single

In a recent interview with the Mormon Channel "When Life Is Less Than Ideal," Sister Carole M. Stephens shared a surprising statistic:

"I don't know if you are aware that we've reached a point in the Church now where more than half of our women are single," Sister Stephens shared. "Women in Relief Society 18 years and older, just about 51 percent are single."

This leaves me wondering what percentage of active adult men in the church are single. If there is a significant population of men who aren't getting married, there is a problem that needs to be looked into and dealt with. But if only a small percentage of men are unmarried then I say good for the women maintaining their standards instead of dating outside the church.

I think that's a very deceiving stat, like many of the church's statistics as of late. What percentage of the 51percent are widowed or divorced? I'm guessing pretty high.

The church keeps saying there are a ton of unmarried single women in the church. They must not be in Canada that's for sure! There is more never-married single males here in my area. There is definitely a problem that is being ignored by the Quorum of the 12 when it comes to YSA/SA which the YouTube leaks showed. The rhetoric of getting married right after you come home from your mission is no longer compatible with the worlds economic and social conditions and it's not an issue of faith being required, it's just unfortunately the way the world is in the last days. Satan is making it harder to get married, it's a different attack vector on the family.

Why LDS Millennials Aren't Marrying, "We’re scared."

Many LDS millennials listed marriage as an important priority and goal. The problem? ... "We’re scared ... We’re willing to commit. We just don’t want to commit to the wrong thing."

"We want to be madly in love. We dream of the total package. We long to marry with complete assurance that we’re making the right choice. We want to reduce the risk of watching our marriages fail, a scene most of us have likely seen all too often. We scrutinize every possible choice until there seems to be no choices left. We want to be sure."

Combined with the advent of social media and texting, pressure from all sides, and a righteous desire to find the right person and start a happy marriage, it’s no wonder millennials feel the need to play it safe.

"Who we marry is one of the most important decisions we will ever make; we need to place great weight on the choice and choose carefully. But when we swing to the extreme, paralyzing ourselves in an effort to stay emotionally safe, we are likely missing the opportunities we are so desperately seeking for."

http://www.ldsdaily.com/home-and-family ... he-church/

I don't think it's scared of commitment, more like scared for economic reasons. Many of discussions I've been in during YSA classes seems to indicate that the issue is economic. President's Holland's all you need is $300 to get married is often referenced as the apostles being a bit out of touch with reality these days.

[Darren]

To Prepare a People
Ensign January 1979, By William O. Nelson

The Lord’s law of consecration, restored in the early days of the Church, still applies to us.

Four times during 1829 the Lord directed Joseph Smith to “seek to bring forth and establish the cause of Zion.” (See D&C 6:6; D&C 11:6; D&C 12:6; D&C 14:6.) From the time of this command until the day of the martyrdom, the Prophet labored diligently toward this end. This motive of his ministry was once tersely described in these words: “We ought to have the building of Zion as our greatest object.” (History of the Church, 3:390)

The vision of a modern Zion was not a fanciful Utopian scheme, nor one of the contemporary communal experiments. The Prophet’s vision came by revelation, making him intimately familiar with the glory of Enoch’s Zion. https://www.lds.org/ensign/1979/01/to-p ... e?lang=eng

When will the Mormon Culture stop trying to build Zion by Babylon's ways? The United Order was lived for hundreds of years before the 8th century by the lost tribes of Israel, and this is the society that Thomas Jefferson tried to model for the new United States of America (Cleon Skousen, "The Majesty of God's Law").

I am ready to save the constitution by utilizing the Zion Culture example from our lost tribes of Israel Scriptures and Culture.

Where do you and your culture stand on this?

Or shall we keep sacrificing our youth unto a Babylonian Empire?

As I have said many times, youth in our lost tribes of Israel Church of the pre-8th Century got married early in life, because they and their society had a unification of Purpose.

God Bless,
Darren

[brianj]

I don't think it's scared of commitment, more like scared for economic reasons. Many of discussions I've been in during YSA classes seems to indicate that the issue is economic. President's Holland's all you need is $300 to get married is often referenced as the apostles being a bit out of touch with reality these days.

Don't forget that, although the divorce rate among Latter-day Saints is far lower than that of the general population, plenty of people growing up within the church have seen either their own parents or the parents of friends break up. They have seen the pain it causes and all the other negative effects. They have seen the damage that can last a very long time after a marriage ends, children used as pawns by bickering parents, and children losing all contact with one parent because of improper actions by the other.

What guy wants to get married, have a couple happy years, a couple difficult years, a divorce, lose half his stuff, then have to pay an outrageous amount in alimony and child support or face jail when the mother so often is given a pass by the courts for consistently refusing to obey court orders regarding the father's visitation?

Materialism is another big concern. I remember when I was a college student at Ricks girls would call a guy spiritual not because he was, but because spiritual was a code word for "he has his own car." And from what I hear, it's only gotten worse with time.

[Darren]

No Young Woman Should Be Judged for Not Serving a Mission
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland

“President Monson never intended for all of the young women in the Church to go on missions by dropping [the] age [to 19]. We’re very grateful for those who go. It’s changed the face of the Church. … But we do not want anyone feeling inadequate or left out or undignified or tarnished because she did not choose to serve a mission. And we’re a little irritated with young men who say, ‘Well, I’m not going to date you because you didn’t serve a mission.’ … We do not want that kind of climate over dating or marriages. … It isn’t our place to pass a judgment.”

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Face to Face broadcast, Mar. 8, 2016

[Lizzy60]

My Sacrament meeting program from last week listed the missionaries serving from my ward. There are currently eight -- two young men, and six young women.

Does anyone know where to find the church wide breakdown on the number of men compared to the number of women serving now?

[Darren]

My Sacrament meeting program from last week listed the missionaries serving from my ward. There are currently eight -- two young men, and six young women.

Does anyone know where to find the church wide breakdown on the number of men compared to the number of women serving now?

http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/topic/missionary-program

Currently, single men between the ages of 18 and 25 number 48,521 (66 percent). Single women over the age of 19 total 19,543 (26 percent) and retired couples number 6,015 (8 percent) of those serving.

[Darren]

LDS sister missionaries assaulted in Chile
By Tad Walch
May 1, 2015 8:40 a.m.


SALT LAKE CITY — Two LDS sister missionaries were assaulted during a home invasion Thursday morning in Temuco, Chile.

"Early yesterday morning, the apartment of four sister missionaries in the Chile Concepcion South Mission was broken into, and at least two of the sisters were assaulted," said Eric Hawkins, a spokesman for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The missionaries immediately notified police, who arrested two men, according to published reports in South America.

The news reports said the attack happened at about 6 a.m., when the men entered the apartment brandishing a BB or pellet type of gun.

"The sisters have received medical attention and are being cared for by appropriate professionals and by their mission president and his wife," Hawkins said. "We are profoundly saddened by this incident and pray for these missionaries and their families.”​

One of the four sister missionaries is from Argentina, one is from Chile and two are from the United States, according to a story by BioBiochile.

The men also stole items from the house.
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/8656 ... Chile.html

[gkearney]

Darren, will you be posting news stories about LDS young women who are not on missions who have the misfortune to be victims of crime? Or do you post only news that supports your particular hobby horse?

[Darren]

Mormon church to ask its missionaries: How safe do you feel?
by Peggy Fletcher Stack, Religion News Service, The Salt Lake Tribune, Jun. 5, 2017

Salt Lake City

They wear bike helmets and seat belts. They travel in pairs and follow a strict routine, making sure to be in bed by 10:30 p.m. They spray their clothes with mosquito repellent and watch out for faulty heaters. They don’t swim, drink or engage in risky behavior and are carefully supervised.

But Mormonism’s nearly 70,000 full-time missionaries are assigned to nations across the globe, where they spend two years or 18 months looking for potential converts. That means some toil in dangerous locales. Some have witnessed or been victims of horrific violence, natural disasters and political instability, where they have had to flee from gun-toting rebels, car-burning protests and charged rallies. Many have survived muggings, train wrecks, dengue fever and other assorted diseases.

Now the world seems to be getting even scarier. But how bad is it for the faith’s army of proselytizers?

This week, officials in the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are sending a lengthy, detailed — and anonymous — survey to its young force of male and female missionaries, asking pointed questions about their safety.

Mormon authorities want to know what it’s like on the front lines for these 62,000 emissaries.

“The safety of missionaries is of great importance to the church,” LDS Church spokesman Eric Hawkins said in a statement. “This survey is to help us better understand the day-to-day experiences and perceptions of missionaries around the world related to physical safety.”

No single act or series of occurrences triggered the outreach, he said. Rather, the survey contains questions about whether missionaries have experienced or observed physical harm, such as being punched, kicked, choked, restrained, bitten by a dog or in any other way injured.

It also asks about harassment, including obscene gestures, catcalls, exposure or stalking. It wants to know if respondents have been grabbed, groped, kissed or otherwise sexually assaulted — and, if so, when and where.

One section has queries about housing — whether missionaries feel safe and have fire escapes and clean water.

Identities will be kept confidential — even the respondents’ mission presidents won’t have access to them — to guarantee candor.

“The data from this survey will help us identify areas or circumstances where missionary safety may be at the greatest risk,” Hawkins said. “We intend to use the results to review and modify, as needed, missionary safety guidelines and instructions.”

LDS leaders believe these zealous volunteers “are divinely watched over in the work they perform,” he said. “However, we believe it’s important to understand their circumstances and make appropriate adjustments when needed.”

Hawkins added that the results may spur leaders to “alter assignments or provide missionaries with more specific guidelines to enhance their safety.”

One such adjustment happened last year, when an outbreak of Zika virus and other mosquito-borne ailments prompted the church to allow female missionaries to wear long skirts or dress pants — typically forbidden in the dress code — to protect themselves from insect bites. That change affected missions in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Central America, Europe, Mexico, the Pacific, Philippines and South America.

Traditionally, though, Mormon missionaries suffer fewer accidents and deaths than others in their age cohort — starting at 18 for “elders,” or men, and 19 for “sisters,” or women.

That’s partly because they are “instructed to minimize the objects they have with them and only carry cash sufficient for that day’s needs,” the church’s policy states.

“If accosted by thieves, missionaries are trained not to resist, to avoid confrontation and to give up whatever money they have.”

In 2013, about a dozen Mormon missionaries died, well above the typical average, which hovers between three and six a year.

However, even the higher number remained well below death rates for those same age groups across U.S. and world populations — as tracked by the World Health Organization and several prominent academic journals. Like-aged rates of death for non-missionaries are six to 20 times higher, depending on the measures used.

Still, there have been occasions in which Mormon emissaries were evacuated from a country.

In the 1970s, missionaries in Argentina were given codes to call to find out whether to stay put or head to Buenos Aires, should that country go to war with Chile (it didn’t).

In the 1980s, Haiti was rocked by coups, and elders and sisters were locked down each time.

In 2004, senior LDS couples in Siberia had to keep passports and cellphones on them at all times and couldn’t wear their missionary name tags in certain neighborhood or cities because of tensions with the United States.

In recent years, civil unrest in Ukraine and the Ebola outbreak in Liberia and Sierra Leone caused church authorities to withdraw or move some missionaries to more stable regions.

In 2013, an 18-year-old missionary was among survivors of a horrific train derailment in Spain that killed at least 80 people. And last year, several missionaries were severely wounded in the terrorist bombing at an airport in Belgium.

But missionaries can’t stay out of airports, or urban centers, for that matter. These young Latter-day Saints often find their greatest spiritual successes among the down-and-out in rough neighborhoods — including U.S. inner cities — teeming with hostilities and potential threats.

By hearing directly from missionaries, Mormon authorities hope to balance these competing needs: finding people to baptize while keeping the baptizers from harm.

“Listen to and follow the promptings of the (Holy) Spirit, which can warn you of danger,” the faith’s so-called “white handbook” counsels missionaries.

But surveys from the actual troops can help, too.

[Darren]

MAJOR Gender MIlestone in LDS Missionary Work

For the first time in LDS History...Female missionary candidates will out number male candidates at the Provo MTC. This milestone will be reached within the next few weeks according to a source. The impact this will have on the overall make up of the missionary force, if it is a trend and continues, will be significant. What it says about young Mormon males is also telling...fewer males are choosing to go on missions.

I have a close family member currently in the MTC. Per this person's letters, in the next couple of weeks, the MTC will for the first time have more women than men in residence. I cannot confirm the statement and the only evidence I have is the word of a family member who is a current missionary. I am interested​ in anyone out there who can confirm or refute this statement.

My family has been discussing it as a neat little fact and how great it is that women are serving missions. I on the other hand only heard it as confirmation that the church has horrible retention of young men and that the already existing demographic disaster in Utah is going to get worse. The number of missionaries are already at the low levels they were at when the age was lowered; if half those missionaries are women the church is in big trouble.

... I realize a big culture shift has occurred with expectations of women serving missions, but it is still a major problem if the church is back down to pre-change total numbers yet the percent male is now at or near 50%.

http://mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/vie ... &p=1058571

[Lizzy60]

MAJOR Gender MIlestone in LDS Missionary Work

For the first time in LDS History...Female missionary candidates will out number male candidates at the Provo MTC. This milestone will be reached within the next few weeks according to a source. The impact this will have on the overall make up of the missionary force, if it is a trend and continues, will be significant. What it says about young Mormon males is also telling...fewer males are choosing to go on missions.

I have a close family member currently in the MTC. Per this person's letters, in the next couple of weeks, the MTC will for the first time have more women than men in residence. I cannot confirm the statement and the only evidence I have is the word of a family member who is a current missionary. I am interested​ in anyone out there who can confirm or refute this statement.

My family has been discussing it as a neat little fact and how great it is that women are serving missions. I on the other hand only heard it as confirmation that the church has horrible retention of young men and that the already existing demographic disaster in Utah is going to get worse. The number of missionaries are already at the low levels they were at when the age was lowered; if half those missionaries are women the church is in big trouble.

... I realize a big culture shift has occurred with expectations of women serving missions, but it is still a major problem if the church is back down to pre-change total numbers yet the percent male is now at or near 50%.

http://mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/vie ... &p=1058571

I heard that one reason the missionary age for young men was lowered to 18 was to give them the opportunity to leave for their missions before they became "distracted" by college, working, worldliness, etc. In other words, get them out on a mission before they disqualify themselves.
I guess that is not working, seeing that fewer young men are serving missions, rather than more. Also, with more young women heading out on missions, (my ward is a good example -- 6 women and 2 men) perhaps some young men are feeling that's it not so much a "Priesthood" duty any longer. The praise the young women in my ward are receiving for serving missions, although I am sure it's deserved, is probably a bit discouraging for the young men. The women are going beyond what is expected, while the men are only doing what is expected by serving a mission.

[gkearney]

OK so I did predict this some time ago but time for a few statistical items to consider.

1. Just because the number of young women are way up it does not follow that the number of young men are way down. Several things can be happening here. Most likely it is that with lowing the age to 19 you are suddenly making a mission a reality to young women who in the past might not have gone either because they were married, likely to soon be so or established in careers by the age of 21. So increasing the numbers of young women does not mean that less young men are going. The two are not related in this way. You could have just as many boys coming into the system as aways and still have this situation.

2. Young women "churn" faster through the system. That is they serve for 18months while the young men serve for 24 months this means that there is more opportunity to move more numbers of young women through the system then is the case for young men.

3. In many places in the world young men are not in a position to take two years out of their lives. They might have extended families to support, be needed in the family business, or have military obligations for example. Also young men die at a greater rate then young women. And this doesn't even begin to address moral issues which might come into play but those would impact both genders.

4. Finally there is demographics to consider. LDS families, just like families in general, are much smaller today then they were a generation or two ago. So if you had a family of say seven children, 4 boys and 3 girls and one or two of those boys choose not to go on missions it isn't a big loss as the church still has at it disposal 2 or 3 other boys from that family to pull from. Today however the loss of a single boy to the pool of missionaries can be keenly felt.

The question going forward is what does the introduction of sisters to missionary activity do to the culture of the church moving forward? For generations missionary service has been a sort of male rite of passage for young men. Th at is now no longer the case.

[Darren]

OK so I did predict this some time ago but time for a few statistical items to consider.

1. Just because the number of young women are way up it does not follow that the number of young men are way down. Several things can be happening here. Most likely it is that with lowing the age to 19 you are suddenly making a mission a reality to young women who in the past might not have gone either because they were married, likely to soon be so or established in careers by the age of 21. So increasing the numbers of young women does not mean that less young men are going. The two are not related in this way. You could have just as many boys coming into the system as aways and still have this situation.

2. Young women "churn" faster through the system. That is they serve for 18months while the young men serve for 24 months this means that there is more opportunity to move more numbers of young women through the system then is the case for young men.

3. In many places in the world young men are not in a position to take two years out of their lives. They might have extended families to support, be needed in the family business, or have military obligations for example. Also young men die at a greater rate then young women. And this doesn't even begin to address moral issues which might come into play but those would impact both genders.

4. Finally there is demographics to consider. LDS families, just like families in general, are much smaller today then they were a generation or two ago. So if you had a family of say seven children, 4 boys and 3 girls and one or two of those boys choose not to go on missions it isn't a big loss as the church still has at it disposal 2 or 3 other boys from that family to pull from. Today however the loss of a single boy to the pool of missionaries can be keenly felt.

The question going forward is what does the introduction of sisters to missionary activity do to the culture of the church moving forward? For generations missionary service has been a sort of male rite of passage for young men. Th at is now no longer the case.

Well said gkearney, this speaks volumes about change in the culture of the Church.

I realize that what we are witnessing in the church is an evolution from the pre-1990s version of the primarily domestic USA version of the LDS Church to the post 21st Century version of the International LDS Church, currently in progress.

But is the LDS Church really ready for such an evolution, and with the old version (with old cultural norms) in tow, what will be the troubles and conflicts ahead?

Will the Book of Mormon be enough to get us into the International Mindset? Will there be other Scriptures to help us in the evolution to the new International Mindset?

We will see these things and much more, and as I have been saying, the Scriptures of the lost tribes of Israel are now available to make evident the needed structural reworkings of the new International Version of the church. That without which would spell disaster for the church and would bring about The Cleansing.

Just embracing the Progressive Agenda of the Left will not save the church.

The Old International Version of the Church, found in the Scriptures of the lost tribes of Israel will come to light, and the up and coming reinvigorated International Version of the Church will blossom and take hold, and will bring to an end all Babylonian/Greco/Roman Government.

The destiny of the New International Version of the church is found in King Nebuchadnezzar's Dream:

Dan. 2:34-35 "Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces."

And the various elements of which the image was made were broken into pieces and

"became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away."

The wind had carried away the destroyed elements,

"and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth."

God Bless,
Darren

[gardener4life]

You know I saw the title of this post and wanted to comment about how bad it is right now.

When I used to date a few years ago (maybe 6 or 7 + years ago I had these kinds of experiences)...I only tried to date people I believed were also members. (I have adhered and still support the idea its best if you can marry in your faith, particularly for a sealing and for blessings of born in the covenant. )And when I'd run into sisters, too often when I invited to date someone or tried to get to know them I kept running into the fact that the sisters would only ask about my tax return figures, instead of who I was or what I was interested in. Nothing mattered but the tax return line being enough, and not also if I was a good person or not. This happened many times. It was so bad that I think I went three years without a date, all because I didn't have a huge income, no house, and no big expensive car while I was temple worthy and a returned missionary. And then too another response was that they'd go on a date with me for $50 or $100 dollars. (I didn't follow this level of thinking just to state so after you read that.) And those were the LDS sisters...next to BYU.

My sense is that I hope the sisters know we care about them and they are wonderful. There has to be some of them that are faithful now.

But when you run into this type of behavior over and over and over, you have to wonder OK, maybe those people talking about a cleaning happening soon are right. I can't imagine how it would be OK for the good people to get nothing and only people seeking wealth get 'blessings'. Some of the dating experiences now from people like me are so extreme I wonder if people even believe that this is how the sisters are treating the priesthood now.

[Darren]

Source: http://www.fullerconsideration.com/membership.php

Toys R Us to Close Down: Record Low Fertility
Toys R Us (which also runs Babies R Us) cited (a) troubling reason for its collapse: sagging birth rates.

“Most of our end-customers are newborns and children,” writes the toy chain’s management. “Our revenue [is] dependent on the birthrates in countries where we operate. In recent years, birthrates have dropped or stagnated as population ages.”

It’s so obvious, most people don’t even consider it. But a toy chain’s business model is dependent on, well, children. One of the reasons toy retailers are dying is because their base of small customers has become…well…too small.

The U.S. fertility rate is now at an all-time low. Some experts estimate it could be nearing 1.77 children per woman, which is well below what’s known as the “replacement rate”—or that number of babies each couple must have on average in order to keep the population from shrinking.

With trends like this in progress, the closing of toy stores may be merely a bellwether of further effects of low fertility to come.

As I explained on this program back in December, low fertility is also an unfulfilling way to live as a society. In a 2014 Pew poll, two out of five mothers nearing the end of their childbearing years said they wish they’d had more kids.

Babies are catalysts… they lead adults to care more about the future: to save, invest, make sacrifices, and defer gratification. With fewer children, there’s less of that other-centered love that children inspire. And our already me-centered culture may yet become even more me-centered.

Folks, the negative consequences of a culture that fails to see children as the blessings they really are and who view family as a second priority at best, far outweigh any short-term gains. If you couple child-free lifestyles with our society’s disregard for marriage and support for abortion, we will deprive ourselves of more than just toy stores. We’ll be depriving ourselves of a future.

https://www.christianheadlines.com/colu ... -play.html

[Sirocco]

Toys R Us also donates to Planned Parenthood... so it's quite literally supporting the killing of its future customers.

[Darren]

We have always been told to have all of the children we can while we are young, by our church leaders. There are consequences to our culture for doing the opposite of this advice. Traditional Culture Matters. Why??? Superhuman2020.

God Bless,
Darren