Sisters serving missions & forgoing marriage?

[sandman45]

/agree great post! thanks

[gkearney]

My issue with all of this is that we are putting the focus on the wrong party, that is the young women. In our western culture it is the men who by and large initiate marriage even today. If they are delaying marriage then the sisters might as well do something worthwhile like a mission. I know of no 19 year old young women in my stake with any prospects of marriage. Most do not even have a steady boyfriend and in many cases know few worthy lds young men at all and I live in an area with more men than women in the church. It takes two to form a marriage. In some cultures marriages are not left up to the vagaries of romance, they are arranged by the families. That is one way to deal with this situation but it has never been a tradition in our faith to do that and I can not imagaine that it would ever be so now.

So before everyone jumps on the girls for forgoing marriage for missions we should address the issue of young men not stepping up and being a man and taking the responsibility of a man. One of those responsibilities in our culture is to initiate marriage and the establishment of families. If the young men of the church are unwilling or unable to do that we should not be judging the young women who choose to serve a mission harshly.

[AussieOi]

I have six daughters, Darren. They have been raised in a home where their mother has modeled everything they should hope to become and nothing -- not a hope chest (which they do have), not a mission, not a college degree, not a hobby or a job -- will deter them from what each one of them appears to be destined for.

We emphasize a lot of things in the upbringing. While I understand the heart of a teenage girl often rests on Prince Charming and the ideal of home, marriage and children we have tried MIGHTILY to enforce the idea that marriage is a decision they make only once and there is just one place to go get it.

We have equally made such efforts with our son.

The forces out there working against them are horrific. The pressures are very real. Instead of diminishing the value of a mission we're instead promoting the idea of their spiritual progression. I don't foresee any of them having marriage prospects any time soon so we're discussing the mission option as a good means of keeping them focused and prepared, just as we do with Temple work, attending Institute, etc. The need for meaningful service early in life is great and will go far to help them in married life with children.

My children tell me there is a lot of "buzz" amongst the faithful youth about going on missions. "Everybody's doing it", they say. I get where you are coming from. I just don't think the "member doctrine" is as strong as you're making it in some areas.

I cant tell you how beautiful that was to read

Neither can I tell you how utterly, utterly sad and tragic that was to read either.

[AussieOi]

Sometimes I wish some of the men on here would spend just as much time on focusing on what men are supposed to be doing instead of worrying so much about what women are supposed to be doing.

You've been badly let down by men, haven't you Nan.

Very sad

[Darren]

My issue with all of this is that we are putting the focus on the wrong party, that is the young women. In our western culture it is the men who by and large initiate marriage even today. If they are delaying marriage then the sisters might as well do something worthwhile like a mission. I know of no 19 year old young women in my stake with any prospects of marriage. Most do not even have a steady boyfriend and in many cases know few worthy lds young men at all and I live in an area with more men than women in the church. It takes two to form a marriage. In some cultures marriages are not left up to the vagaries of romance, they are arranged by the families. That is one way to deal with this situation but it has never been a tradition in our faith to do that and I can not imagaine that it would ever be so now.

So before everyone jumps on the girls for forgoing marriage for missions we should address the issue of young men not stepping up and being a man and taking the responsibility of a man. One of those responsibilities in our culture is to initiate marriage and the establishment of families. If the young men of the church are unwilling or unable to do that we should not be judging the young women who choose to serve a mission harshly.

I like how you are thinking here.

Back in Joseph Smith's day the typical teenage years for the Young Men were spent in apprenticeships or establishing a farm, by 18 years old they were very much getting married and beginning their lives together in their young ages.

Fast forward to today and the emphasis has shifted from the Culture of the Free Enterprise System of these Young Men apprentices and farmers to becoming a perpetual "Bachelor" at Socrates' University with magic papers from the State and Culture of Babylon. Greek history is loud and clear, that the university educated were not encouraged to marry and have family life, as part of becoming the philosopher kings and administrators of the State (Plato's book The Republic).

We need to fix our LDS Culture and get it back to the Culture of Joseph Smith and his ancestors. Doing so is part of what is needed in saving our Constitution and establishing Zion. Then the Sisters can rely on the Brothers to do their work and womanhood can recapture its essence.

God Bless,
Darren

[Darren]

No wonder the men of God support and sustain you sisters in your unique roles, for the act of deserting home in order to shape society is like thoughtlessly removing crucial fingers from an imperiled dike in order to teach people to swim.
--Elder Neal A. Maxwell

Sister Barbara Winder, General Relief Society President in 1986 said: “It is important for all of us to learn homemaking skills; whether she is married or single, every woman is a homemaker."

President Gordon B. Hinckley stated that “God planted within women something divine.” That something is the gift and the gifts of motherhood. Elder Matthew Cowley taught that “men have to have something given to them [in mortality] to make them saviors of men, but not mothers, not women. [They] are born with an inherent right, an inherent authority, to be the saviors of human souls … and the regenerating force in the lives of God’s children.” Motherhood is not what was left over after our Father blessed His sons with priesthood ordination. It was the most ennobling endowment He could give His daughters, a sacred trust that gave women an unparalleled role in helping His children keep their second estate. As President J. Reuben Clark Jr. declared, motherhood is “as divinely called, as eternally important in its place as the Priesthood itself.” --Sister Sheri Dew

President J. Reuben Clark said, “May God … give you the vision of the true homemaker, that you will be able to save by this course, not alone Zion, but the world. And that is your destiny … to save the world.” (Relief Society Magazine, Dec. 1949, p. 798.)

[Darren]

"The Announcement," the minimum age when sisters may choose to serve a mission, was it a new policy based on the "new reality" in the church culture of members promoting other options for women than marriage at a young age, or was the new policy based on a transformation in the roles God has for women in the eternal plan?

For the end of April, the new group of missionaries this week at the MTC has more sisters than elders, normal was 15% female missionaries and its now a little more than 50%.

Missionary shift: More Sisters enter the MTC than Elders
A couple of weeks ago, something historic happened at the MTC- for the first time ever there was a group of incoming missionaries with more female missionaries than male missionaries. Several people have mentioned online that there were more sister missionaries than elders in one of the Wednesday groups in the month of April.
A Mission Prep teacher at BYU told me that this last semester he taught one class with about 100 women preparing to serve a mission and only about 5 men.

Traditionally 12% to15% of young women in seminary serve missions. Of course the hope is that these percentages will change with this age change. If my analysis is correct, the proportion of eligible young women serving will increase, the number of young women serving will more than triple.

Until the change, young women were encouraged to go on a mission only if they felt they were unlikely to get married in the next year or so. Whether this was official policy or simply de facto practice, it was pretty standard. Therefore, there was an assumption that young women who served missions were less marriageable. These factors were a major headwind for young women who wanted to have the kind of rich, culturally and spiritually and personally enlarging experience that a mission provides, and a desire to serve the church and the world. Changing the age will effectively nullify any suggestion that missions are for women who can’t get a date. ... this policy change will have a dramatic impact on young women in the church.

God Bless,
Darren

[gkearney]

While I think Darren sometimes over reaches on his points one thing is clear in his last point. Changing the age for young women to serve missions will have profound and as yet unknown impacts upon the church and the cultur that surround it.

[Darren]

I am for marriage, not for promoting missions for young women.

Mitt Romney's case for getting married young
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/7656 ... young.html
As reported by the Deseret News, Mitt Romney, former presidential candidate, spoke at Southern Virginia University's commencement on April 27, 2013. Eleanor Barkhorn from the Atlantic focused on Romney's suggestion and encouragement to marry young.

"This is a promise: 'Launch out into the deep, and your nets will be filled.' How do you do that? Well, getting married is one way to launch into the deep. I'm so glad I found Ann when I was still so young. Combining your life with another person, particularly someone—men and women as different as we are, this combination is tremendously challenging and enormously rewarding." (Mitt was a newly returned LDS missionary of 22 years old and Ann was 19 years old when they married.)

Romney articulates the so-called "cornerstone" theory of marriage: that marriage is an institution worth building life on, not something to enter into once you're already established in life. This vision of marriage is countercultural at the moment, of course: As the National Marriage Project's "Knot Yet" report shows, people are getting married later and later, and more and more people are seeing marriage as a "capstone" to life's achievements rather than a foundation for those achievements (and inevitable disappointments).

When many women are about to start careers or perhaps are contemplating marriage and starting families, Mormon women can now instead serve missions shortly after high school.

President Spencer W. Kimball - Do Not Postpone Marriage and Children

While some of our young people marry early, yet there seems to be a tendency toward delaying marriage. Time is passing. Time is fleeing. We have no guarantee for continued living. Procrastination is a veritable thief. We cannot wait for marriage until we have accumulated the knowledge we finally will need and want to have in order to create.

But, of course, marriage cannot wait for that. We shall marry, have our families, teach and train them, while we are learning these other things and building toward our creatorship. Marriage should come when we are reasonably young, to procreate and bear children, to have the patience to teach and train them and to grow up with them. Hence, marriage is a must, an early must.

As I visit with (Elder) missionaries I remind them of their many specific goals: to get their marriage, their family, their education, their occupation, their training. They can, by careful planning, have all the blessings they want if they take first things first.

(Elder) Missionaries should begin to think marriage—when they return from their missions, to begin to get acquainted with many young women so that they will have a better basis for selection of a life's companion. And when the time comes they should marry in the holy temple and have their families, and complete their education, and establish themselves in a profitable and rewarding occupation, and give themselves to their families, the gospel, and the Church.

Brothers and sisters, this is not a matter of jest. It isn't anything to laugh about. This is the most serious thing in all the world that lies ahead of you unmarried young people.

When people have found their companions, there should be no long delay. Young wives should be occupied in bearing and rearing their children. I know of no scriptures where an authorization is given to young wives to withhold their families and to go to work to put their husbands through school.

This is about all that you young people need, two ideas: (1) Where am I going? (2) How do I get there? Again: First, what is my goal, and, second, how do I reach it? Of course, that includes numerous lesser secondary goals. If we turn our eyes from our basic goal and get diverted along the way, we shall, like Little Red Riding Hood, lose our way and run into trouble with the wolf. Basic then to this goal is proper and lasting and loving marriage.

God Bless,
Darren

[Darren]

But now there’s another question we need to stop asking. It’s brand new, suddenly popping up now that the age for girls to serve missions has dropped to 19. It’s, “So, are you putting in your papers?” Young Mia Maids and Laurels are freezing in a panic in the hallways, pinned against the wall without a prepared answer.

And for some, the answer is an enthusiastic “Yes!” But what about the girls who don’t wish to serve missions? It isn’t expected, as it is for young men, yet the pressure is suddenly on to join the tidal wave of applicants.

And young women are even less equipped to handle awkward questions than those of us who’ve been around the block before. They’re suddenly put on the spot and don’t know if they should feel guilty, angry, frustrated, sad, or just burst into tears. Some find the thought of leaving home scary. Some question their testimonies. Some wonder why they don’t feel a burning desire to do this. Maybe some don’t know if they’re worthy. Others are shy and can’t imagine teaching anything to anyone. Or they want to stay in school. Or they want to get married. They’re praying about it and simply don’t know, yet. They have a dozen reasons why they might not wish to answer that question, and not one of them is our business.
http://ldsmag.com/article/1/12616

[EmmaLee]

FWIW, this part (below) is just as applicable to young men.

Some find the thought of leaving home scary. Some question their testimonies. Some wonder why they don’t feel a burning desire to do this. Maybe some don’t know if they’re worthy. Others are shy and can’t imagine teaching anything to anyone. Or they want to stay in school. Or they want to get married. They’re praying about it and simply don’t know, yet. They have a dozen reasons why they might not wish to answer that question, and not one of them is our business.
http://ldsmag.com/article/1/12616

[gkearney]

Would not those same conditions apply to the young men as well. I'm sure we have all encountered missionaries who, dispute being worthy, should never have gone on missions. Then there are those who while willing to serve find that they are unable to do so due to health, physical or mental, reasons. Cornering them in the halls of church puts them into a terrible spot.

[firend]

My issue with all of this is that we are putting the focus on the wrong party, that is the young women. In our western culture it is the men who by and large initiate marriage even today. If they are delaying marriage then the sisters might as well do something worthwhile like a mission. I know of no 19 year old young women in my stake with any prospects of marriage. Most do not even have a steady boyfriend and in many cases know few worthy lds young men at all and I live in an area with more men than women in the church. It takes two to form a marriage. In some cultures marriages are not left up to the vagaries of romance, they are arranged by the families. That is one way to deal with this situation but it has never been a tradition in our faith to do that and I can not imagaine that it would ever be so now.

So before everyone jumps on the girls for forgoing marriage for missions we should address the issue of young men not stepping up and being a man and taking the responsibility of a man. One of those responsibilities in our culture is to initiate marriage and the establishment of families. If the young men of the church are unwilling or unable to do that we should not be judging the young women who choose to serve a mission harshly.

I like how you are thinking here.

Back in Joseph Smith's day the typical teenage years for the Young Men were spent in apprenticeships or establishing a farm, by 18 years old they were very much getting married and beginning their lives together in their young ages.

Fast forward to today and the emphasis has shifted from the Culture of the Free Enterprise System of these Young Men apprentices and farmers to becoming a perpetual "Bachelor" at Socrates' University with magic papers from the State and Culture of Babylon. Greek history is loud and clear, that the university educated were not encouraged to marry and have family life, as part of becoming the philosopher kings and administrators of the State (Plato's book The Republic).

We need to fix our LDS Culture and get it back to the Culture of Joseph Smith and his ancestors. Doing so is part of what is needed in saving our Constitution and establishing Zion. Then the Sisters can rely on the Brothers to do their work and womanhood can recapture its essence.

God Bless,
Darren

+1

[Darren]

Thank you again, Friend.

The young men take upon themselves "The Oath and Covenant of the Priesthood" as they progress throughout the Aaronic Priesthood and when they become Elders. The sisters have no Sister's Version of The Oath and Covenant of the Priesthood or anything like unto it, their covenant to keep is Womanhood and Motherhood.

Serving a mission is part of Priesthood Commitment.

So the expectations for the young men will be different from that of the young women, as it should be.

Carlos E. Asay, General Conference, October 1985
Of all the holy agreements pertaining to the gospel of Jesus Christ, few, if any, would transcend in importance the oath and covenant of the priesthood. It is certainly one of the most sacred agreements, for it involves the sharing of heavenly powers and man’s upward reaching toward eternal goals. None of us can afford to be ignorant of the terms of this contract. To do so might cause us to miss the mark in our performance of duty and result in the forfeiture of promised blessings.

A gospel covenant is a holy contract. “God in his good pleasure fixes the terms, which man accepts.” (Bible Dictionary, LDS ed., s.v. “covenant”.)

The two parties to the priesthood covenant are man and God. Man covenants to do certain things or meet certain conditions; God cites promises that he will give in return.

President Kimball defines priesthood, in part, as “the means whereby the Lord acts through men to save souls.” (Ensign, June 1975, p. 3.)

“Ordination to the priesthood is a prerequisite to receiving [blessings], but it does not guarantee them. For a man actually to obtain them, he must faithfully discharge the obligation which is placed upon him when he receives the priesthood.” (Marion G. Romney, in Conference Report, Apr. 1962, p. 17.)

Jacob, the Book of Mormon prophet, testified, “We did magnify our office unto the Lord, taking upon us the responsibility, … [teaching] them the word of God with all diligence; … [and] laboring with our might.” (Jacob 1:19.)

I underscore the words taking responsibility, teaching the word of God, and laboring with might in this inspired quotation. These are critical actions related to the exercise of priesthood power.

Perhaps I can place in clearer perspective all that I have said about the oath and covenant of the priesthood by relating a story based on a true experience.

The son of a very wealthy man was called to serve a full-time mission. He entered the mission field and began his work. At first things went well; however, as he met rejections and as other challenges of finding and teaching surfaced, the young man’s faith wavered.

Mission associates gave encouragement, but it did not seem to help. One day the young man announced to the mission president that he was abandoning his call; he was returning home. The mission president did all within his power to dissuade the missionary. It was to no avail.

When word of the missionary’s decision reached the father, he obtained permission to visit his son in the mission field. In one of many tense conversations, the father said, “My son, I have lived for the day when you would serve a full-time mission. I did so because I love you and I love God. And I know that there is no work more essential than that of teaching truth to the peoples of the world.”

Somewhat sobered by his father’s words, the son meekly replied, “Dad, I didn’t realize that a mission meant so much to you.”

“It means everything to me,” the father declared. Then he added with some emotion, “All my life I have worked and saved with one person in mind: you. And my one goal has been to provide you a decent inheritance.”

“But Dad,” the son interjected, “the work is difficult and I don’t enjoy …”

The father didn’t allow him to finish his sentence. Instead he asked, “How can I trust my businesses to your care if you cannot prove yourself by serving the Lord for two short years?”

There was an awkward pause as the son pondered the father’s question and studied his anxious countenance.

Then with measured words, the father promised, “My son, my only heir, if you will be faithful in this calling and prove yourself worthy in every respect, all that I possess will be yours.”

Noticeably touched by these earnest pleadings, the son rose to his feet, embraced his father, and sobbed, “I will stay.”

The son did stay in the mission field; he did serve faithfully from that day forward. And yes, in due time, he received from his father the promised inheritance, even all that his father had to share.

My brethren, we are the sons of God. He has endowed us with his power, and he has called each of us to serve missions in a place called mortality. Our missions mean very much to him, and they should mean everything to us. In this mortal life, we are to prove ourselves worthy of his love and worthy of the inheritance he has offered.https://www.lds.org/general-conference/ ... d?lang=eng

Young Sisters have other obligations, separate from that of the men, that do not include going on missions.

God Bless,
Darren

[EmmaLee]

That's true, Darren; and I agree - the young men have a priesthood duty here. I was merely pointing out that those specific things apply to young men, as well (as in, young women do not have a monopoly on them ).

Some find the thought of leaving home scary. Some question their testimonies. Some wonder why they don’t feel a burning desire to do this. Maybe some don’t know if they’re worthy. Others are shy and can’t imagine teaching anything to anyone. Or they want to stay in school. Or they want to get married. They’re praying about it and simply don’t know, yet. They have a dozen reasons why they might not wish to answer that question, and not one of them is our business.

[Melissa]

The church does not push the women to serve, they just don't want to discourage them from serving if they desire to. I was never asked to serve by any bishop, if I wanted to I would have had to say something. I also was not pushed to get married and start a family either. The men get home from a mission and they are encouraged to marry. If a woman who is 19 wants to serve she should. I had a friend that was told she needed to serve a mission (PB) and it was a duty in her eyes. She dated but would not consider marriage until her mission was complete. This has not in anyway delayed her role, she is a mother and a great wife ( infact, the man she married was a real man, not a "pretty" boy like she dated before her mission).

19 year olds these days are dumb, maybe serving a mission is just want they need to grow up. You men ought to not discourage this because that means she wont make your early years of marriage miserable being the immature dumb girl caught up on appearances and other things. The mission should surround her with the spirit and she should become spiritually refined as a woman and be ready to be a stellar helpmeet to her "righteous" husband.
A mission just might weed the world out of her a bit and allow her to focus on her god ordained role.

[sandman45]

The church does not push the women to serve, they just don't want to discourage them from serving if they desire to. I was never asked to serve by any bishop, if I wanted to I would have had to say something. I also was not pushed to get married and start a family either. The men get home from a mission and they are encouraged to marry. If a woman who is 19 wants to serve she should. I had a friend that was told she needed to serve a mission (PB) and it was a duty in her eyes. She dated but would not consider marriage until her mission was complete. This has not in anyway delayed her role, she is a mother and a great wife ( infact, the man she married was a real man, not a "pretty" boy like she dated before her mission).

19 year olds these days are dumb, maybe serving a mission is just want they need to grow up. You men ought to not discourage this because that means she wont make your early years of marriage miserable being the immature dumb girl caught up on appearances and other things. The mission should surround her with the spirit and she should become spiritually refined as a woman and be ready to be a stellar helpmeet to her "righteous" husband.
A mission just might weed the world out of her a bit and allow her to focus on her god ordained role.

you bring up a great point Melissa.. gonna have to +1 this

[AussieOi]

The church does not push the women to serve, they just don't want to discourage them from serving if they desire to. .

oh come on, you've been a member long enough to know how pressure works, and the impact of a rabit nutjob fundo young womens leader or seminary teacher can have on these girls

refer patriachal blessing saying go serve a mission (note: define "mission")

how can a revelation be received for a person to do something that didn't come to them directly? does that fly with people?

[Melissa]

The church does not push the women to serve, they just don't want to discourage them from serving if they desire to. .

oh come on, you've been a member long enough to know how pressure works, and the impact of a rabit nutjob fundo young womens leader or seminary teacher can have on these girls

refer patriachal blessing saying go serve a mission (note: define "mission")

how can a revelation be received for a person to do something that didn't come to them directly? does that fly with people?

I dont know about you AussieOi.

I have never been pressured to serve a mission at all by anyone, no one even ever asked from young women, bishopric, relief society, young adults, etc.

I do not know the specifics of my friends dedication to serve a mission and why it was so important to her. I do know that when I met her in high school she was a great example to me of her faith and dedication and strength. She knew who she was and what she wanted. I would never had told her not to serve and marry instead, it would have been against the plan for her. She knew it, and I trusted her. - in fact it was never even an issue.

Why do so many people care if a 19 year old woman delays getting married (hoping to find someone) for 18 months to serve the Lord?? That should be a desired woman. Is it because she doesnt go straight from daddy to husband? Cant leave her alone for 18 months? Wy must women live a higher standard than men? You know, like when a man has sex he is cool but a woman is called a demeaning name? .... Just for example

[AussieOi]

Why do so many people care if a 19 year old woman delays getting married (hoping to find someone) for 18 months to serve the Lord?? .

1 word- menopause

never mind we've got 20 pages of quotes explaining the #1 responsibiity to is develop towards marriage

never mind gods charge "go forth and multiply"

never mind there are other ways to serve the lord.

my objection is not that they do- even though aside from some specific sisters I personally believe it is a sign of a failure in their lives (as in- not that they have failed, but that life has failed them), my objection is that these girls will be brought up by well meaning sisters with the voice in their ears for 15 years from the day they leave nursery "when you go on a mission" or a derivation of.

the roles for our youth were very clear. boys got the priesthood, sang i hope they call me on a mission

girls had other focus

i dont want a return of stepford wives dormant women with no growth development education or magnification of their own selves. i just dont want to see them on missions

if they had until 60 to have kids, no, even then no.

this is wack

we have 18 year old snot nose kids with ZERO life experience or empathy, telling people to give up and change lifestyle choices, completely incapable of relating

it also puts pressure on families with their kids goign earlier and now girls too

that 19th year for boys, the 1 year out of school wasd really important for them to learn and develop
nd earn some money
the other things is because we get so little (read none) revelation from our prophets, small administration changes like this take on them a life of their own, and become revelations, and people say oh god wants girls to go on a mission and boys at 18

THAT is where those dangerous unbalanced fundo teachers damge their youth, not that they werent anyway I guess


sigh, iots a losing battle

what have we become.

but the numbers are up! praise the lord the church must be true. calvinistic puritanism and the protestant ethic proves this is gods work marching on, look, the proof is in the numbers

the church is very healthy, we have record numbers going on missions

[skmo]

I believe it was Bruce R. McConkie that said if the church were not true, the missionary program would have destroyed it long ago. I can't say I find much fault with this.

The problem I see is that sisters are now going to feel the same obligation to go that men do. When I went on my mission, the sisters we got were women who WANTED to go, not really ones who felt they HAD to go. As such, I didn't see sisters who wanted to go to the local youth or young singles dances, didn't spend half their time worrying about someone stealing their love interest back home.

It'll be a shame if that changes.

[AussieOi]

I believe it was Bruce R. McConkie that said if the church were not true, the missionary program would have destroyed it long ago. I can't say I find much fault with this.

The problem I see is that sisters are now going to feel the same obligation to go that men do. When I went on my mission, the sisters we got were women who WANTED to go, not really ones who felt they HAD to go. As such, I didn't see sisters who wanted to go to the local youth or young singles dances, didn't spend half their time worrying about someone stealing their love interest back home.



It'll be a shame if that changes.

Another reason the more I learn about that man the less respect I have for him (assumes he did say it, but I have heard this many times)

I was GUILTED heavily on my mission by the modus operandi.

Blame the missionary for his disobedience for lack of results for a mission.

Throw away lines but they stick and become part of our CULTure.


These are kids. Thrown in the deep end, doing an incredible job at a time our bodies are going haywire, while every other 20 year old we know is getting smashes, lucky and educated 2 years ahead of us
And now we want to throw raw 18 year olds into this.

The responsibility of a missionary is to teach
the D&C says a responsibility of an apostle is to baptize.

Can we poke fun of these guys? Do you think they get into the baptismal fonts much?

[Darren]

1 word- menopause

never mind we've got 20 pages of quotes explaining the #1 responsibiity to is develop towards marriage

never mind gods charge "go forth and multiply"

never mind there are other ways to serve the lord.

my objection is not that they do- even though aside from some specific sisters I personally believe it is a sign of a failure in their lives (as in- not that they have failed, but that life has failed them), my objection is that these girls will be brought up by well meaning sisters with the voice in their ears for 15 years from the day they leave nursery "when you go on a mission" or a derivation of.

the roles for our youth were very clear. boys got the priesthood, sang i hope they call me on a mission

girls had other focus

i dont want a return of stepford wives dormant women with no growth development education or magnification of their own selves. i just dont want to see them on missions

if they had until 60 to have kids, no, even then no.

this is wack

we have 18 year old snot nose kids with ZERO life experience or empathy, telling people to give up and change lifestyle choices, completely incapable of relating

it also puts pressure on families with their kids goign earlier and now girls too

that 19th year for boys, the 1 year out of school wasd really important for them to learn and develop
nd earn some money
the other things is because we get so little (read none) revelation from our prophets, small administration changes like this take on them a life of their own, and become revelations, and people say oh god wants girls to go on a mission and boys at 18

THAT is where those dangerous unbalanced fundo teachers damge their youth, not that they werent anyway I guess


sigh, iots a losing battle

what have we become.

but the numbers are up! praise the lord the church must be true. calvinistic puritanism and the protestant ethic proves this is gods work marching on, look, the proof is in the numbers

the church is very healthy, we have record numbers going on missions

O the wise, and the learned, and the rich, that are puffed up in the pride of their hearts, and all those who preach false doctrines ... they will say: All is well in Zion; yea, Zion prospereth, all is well!

great rant AussieOi

God Bless,
Darren

[Darren]

The http://thenotmom.com/ movement is well under way in our country, the effect that this is having on our Mormon Culture is becoming more apparent with more young sisters serving missions.

There are women without children among TV’s new breed.
The female leads of House of Cards, Parade’s End, Girls, The Good Wife, Enlightened, Homeland, Parks and Recreation and Game of Thrones are very different sorts of women who share one important trait: The ‘new breed’ represents an evolution for TV’s women … women without children.

Stay-at-home mothers are only 14 percent of U.S. women. For a little historical perspective, that's a 50 percent drop over the past 40 years. Television mirrors, and even helps drive, social norms and trends. NPR's Neda Ulaby wondered how accurately it might depict working women today.
TV is actually doing a pretty good job of depicting women with careers.
Careers, meaning the kinds of jobs a young girl might aspire to, like the female neurobiologist on "The Big Bang Theory."
Or all those women lawyers, doctors and detectives handling procedurals, like the ones on "Law and Order: Special Victims Unit."
Or the small-town city councilwoman on "Parks and Recreation," who meets two, real-life female senators.
These are the working women Geena Davis hopes girls will see on TV and want, eventually, to be. She and her daughter were watching children shows when she became troubled by their terrible lack of gender parity. So she started her institute.
Washington, D.C., is where you'll find today's TV women most consumed by their careers - on "Homeland" and "Scandal." Those happen to be Jennifer Newsome's favorite shows. She's a documentarian who's examined representations of women in the media. She sees this problem: Nearly all those characters have something in common besides their careers - no kids.
As part of her research, Newsome asked a Hollywood executive about this vexing absence of working moms on shows. Here's what the executive said: Well, you know, our focus study group, they weren't comfortable with the mother working so hard and blah, blah, blah, blah. It can be uncomfortable to watch "Nurse Jackie," a working mom over 40, struggling to hold it together.

God Bless,
Darren

[gkearney]

The http://thenotmom.com/ movement is well under way in our country, the effect that is having on our Mormon Culture is becoming more apparent with more young sisters serving missions.

Darren - Just where are the young sisters that you are so exercised about suposed to find men to marry at the age of 19? It take two to make a marriage but yet you seem determined to place the fault here on the girls. With no marriage prospects, and very few girls of 19 have such prospects, just what do you think they should be doing with their time if not serving a mission? It's either that or going to school or work. Perhaps you feel they should go out bar hopping in hopes of snagging a husband that way?

You make it sound as if these girls all as a string of boys falling over each other with proposals of marriage and they are just turning these fellows aside in order to go out on missions. Go talk to some girls of this age and ask how many have any immediate prospects for marriage, no many I'm willing to wager. Come now lets get off the "blame the girls" hobby horse here.