Most organizations have a mission statement. It supposedly encapsulates in a paragraph or two what the organization is supposed to be doing, what the broad goal is that guides the activities of the organization. Some individuals try the same thing and write a “personal mission statement.” As with so many words, “mission” has a specific meaning in the Church, going on a two-year proselyting adventure in some foreign country or US state or, for seniors, some sort of service or administrative mission supporting this or that Church function. In the military, the term carries a narrower meaning: a specific operation assigned to a unit or commanding officer by a higher authority. You probably remember this line:
Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a mission, and for my sins they gave me one. Brought it up to me like room service. It was a real choice mission, and when it was over, I never wanted another.
So today let’s talk about two things (using my new 2-for-1 format). Let’s talk about faltering states/governments. And let’s talk about “the mission of the Church,” which I might have kicked around a time or two in previous posts, yet it remains a relevant topic. What is the Church about these days? Is it a well-funded organization in search of a purpose?
In the World: Faltering States, Failing Models
I’m talking about country-level states, not states like Texas or California (although you might well argue those states are faltering, too). Here’s one good article, at The Atlantic: “The China Model Is Dead.” In simple terms, the article argues that the Chinese government, which controls the economy, has overinvested in real estate and production while paying little attention to the broader market and consumer demand. Too many unoccupied residential and commercial buildings. I’ve been to China and seen this first-hand: empty buildings, constructing new apartment buildings while some existing ones are unoccupied. Rising unemployment, particularly for young graduates (which depresses consumer demand, fewer people with money to buy the overproduced products and over-available real estate). The subtitle to the article sums it up: “The nation’s problems run so deep, and the necessary repairs would be so costly, that the time for a turnaround may already have passed.” Top-down mismanagement of China’s economy has led to a dead end and it’s going to get worse before it gets better.
There are almost daily articles discussing the decline of Russia’s economy, induced not by decades of economic mismanagement but by fallout from the Ukraine War that Putin plunged the country into. He didn’t mean to get stuck in a quagmire, an economic and diplomatic black hole, but he has. International companies have pulled out of Russia, lots of talented young people have fled the country, etc. Rulers and governments of both countries, of course, are still secure in power. In democracies, you can always vote the bums out at the next election. That’s the supreme advantage of a democratic government. In authoritarian regimes, a change of government is much tougher to pull off once an autocrat or a single ruling party consolidates its power. In autocratic states, rulers rarely acknowledge anything along the lines of “yes, we screwed things up the last dozen years, we’re going to try a new set of policies and institutions.” No, they find someone else to blame for their failures and they stick with the failing model for decades until they either face military defeat, a revolt from increasingly desperate citizens, or an internal coup.
The link here is the name of the first article. When I read “The China model is dead,” I immediately thought, “Maybe the Mormon model is dead.” What is the Mormon model or mission? What was the old one, what is the current one, what might the next one be? If the current model (whatever it is, see next section) is dead, how would we know it?
In the Church: Faltering LDS Mission, Failing LDS Model?
As “the mission of the Church,” you might throw out something like “bring salvation to all of God’s children,” but that’s too broad. That might be God’s plan, but for an earthly organization you need something a little more concrete, something that is a little more focused and is reasonably achievable given present circumstances. I would argue that the Church as an organization redefines its mission every generation or two.
For the first generation, it was simply to gather the hundreds or thousands of converts to one location (Kirtland, Far West, Nauvoo) and build the Church. The second and third generation struggled to cross the plains and establish a stable Mormon state/society in the mountains of the West, first in the Salt Lake Valley, then colonizing north and south under the leadership of Brigham Young. This was initially surprisingly successful given the magnitude of the challenge, but the continuing practice of plural marriage undermined the goal of stability and provoked continuing conflict with the US government. Stability was finally achieved only after the First Manifesto (1890), statehood for Utah (1896), and the Second Manifesto (1904).
Moving into the twentieth century, I’d argue that for the first half of the century, the mission was two-fold: normalizing relations with the US government (by truly rejecting the practice of plural marriage and adopting the two-party system of the rest of the nation) and consolidating the financial and organizational health of the Church as an institution. That being achieved by mid-century, during the second half of the century (or at least through the mid-80s) the focus/mission of the Church moved to missionary work and strengthening the organization to deal with growth, both domestically and internationally. Currently, missionary work is still a theme and we still send out lots of proselyting missionaries, but without the kind of success seen in the sixties and seventies. This failure is quite evident in light of (1) the ongoing challenge of finding something to do for missionaries who don’t have anyone to teach (and going around knocking on doors is increasingly frowned upon, at least in the US) and (2) the institutional challenge is now how to deal with shrinking membership, not growth; combining wards, not creating new ones. The Church is dealing with the aftermath of the last mission, which had success for a generation or two but is now in the rear view mirror.
So where are we now? Correlation has played a strong role institutionally for the last few decades, but “standardize policies and curriculum around the world” is hardly a rousing mission statement. That might be a tool to more effectively accomplish something; that “something” is the current mission we are looking for. Winning the culture war (fighting for the conservative side) might have been a mission of LDS leadership from about the mid-80s to about 2010, but that war is over and the conservatives lost, so that isn’t really a candidate for the current mission of the Church unless you’re living in the past.
Building more temples is another candidate mission, made credible by the fact that the Church is, in fact, building more temples, and announcing even more temples, and leaders just love to talk, talk, talk about temples. But “build more temples” is too narrow, even if you expand it to include getting more people to visit the temple more often or get more LDS youth to do more temple baptisms. That’s a strictly internal focus, with little or no engagement with “the World.” It’s a pseudo-mission. You could have a thousand temples, with every singly adult LDS visiting a temple once every month, and you would still have the unanswered question about the forward-looking mission of the Church. What do we do the other 29 days a month? Even if you had 100% temple attendance and that strengthened and fortified the membership, the question remains … strengthened the membership to do what? The “what” is the missing mission.
Here’s why this topic is of interest to me and seems relevant. At Conference, you hear the same several topics addressed every six months. Nothing new under the sun. Weekly sacrament meetings are increasingly just rehashes of an assigned talk from the most recent Conference. People get callings and maybe do them. A ward party or potluck a couple of times a year. It’s just sort of a routine, a set of habits, with no particular urgency or even relevance. People are just going through the motions. Senior leadership is doing this year pretty much what it did last year or the year before.
In the second half of the twentieth century, there was “every member a missionary” and the metaphor of the stone cut from the mountain getting bigger as it rolls forth. That was in line with the missionary-focused mission of the Church in that era. I just can’t come up with any parallel slogan or metaphor that captures the current focus or mission of the Church right now, in 2023. The disturbing thought is that the Church just doesn’t have a new mission to fill the void of the exhaustion of the “missionary work and institutional growth” mission that worked for a generation or two last century. It’s like the difference between driving down I-80 in Nebraska, headed for Chicago, and just driving down I-80. What are you doing? Case 1: “I’m going to Chicago.” Case 2: “I’m just driving down the freeway.” If feels like the Good Bus Zion is just driving down the freeway. It’s not really going anywhere.
So here are some things to discuss.
- Do you share the sense that most Mormons and most local leaders are just going through the motions?
- Do you have any slogans to offer that presently serve the same role in the Church that “every member a missionary” and “every young man should serve a mission” did fifty years ago?
- Yes, the Church and the members can just soldier on without a compelling mission … for a while. But not forever. At some point, people just lose interest, like when you scroll through the many offerings on Netflix but still can’t find anything to watch. Maybe Covid was a catalyst for this. Right now, a lot of people just seem to be losing interest in what the Church is doing and what it has to offer.
- The big one: What do you think the current mission of the Church is? Or, if you think it doesn’t have one at the moment, what do you think the mission of the Church ought to be?
Wheat & Tares 
The current slogan and mission is “Stay on the Covenant Path”. So essentially the mission of the church has become a goal to retain it’s membership.
Personally I am uncomfortable with this as a mission statement. To me the goal for each member should be to follow Jesus Christ by loving our neighbors. The church itself should be focused on building an open accepting community that offers the love of Christ to any person in any situation that wants to be part of that community and feel Christ’s love from it’s members.
“Stay on the Covenant Path”, doesn’t mention following Christ in mourning with those who mourn and comforting those who stand in need of comfort. Covenants are symbolic of something else, and so are empty in and of themselves if we don’t fulfill them by actually following Christ. More and more the symbols themselves feel like the focus, when they should all be pointing to following Christ by loving others.
“Stay on the Covenant Path” is about saving yourself by conforming to a symbolic social standard. I feel like the phrase comes from fear of members leaving, a bit of condemnation for those who do, and also a bit of “we are better than you” directed to nonmembers. This isn’t a feeling that will result in acceptance of others and increased membership. A fear of abandonment is a poor foundation to build on in any relationship.
The Church has two main missions in my opinion: #1 is to retain members; #2 is to manage wealth. And both of these missions or objectives have lead to the temple binge that we are currently experiencing. When you announce and build temples, you directly affect #1 and #2. I believe the Brethren have decided to focus on the TBMs and not worry about more progressive folks or criticism. Getting everyone to focus on temples is one way to motivate the TBM crowd and it makes the Church appear to be bigger and stronger even if membership numbers don’t support that.
I fully expect the missionary program to be modified sooner rather than later in a way that somehow merges with temple activity. Maybe missionaries in the future will work temple shifts because getting new members aint happening. And when you announce and build temples at the current rate, it’s hard to criticize them for sitting on their money. And it really looks like the Church is becoming bigger and stronger. Great PR. We will see more and more “Covenant Path” propaganda because that is the most effective way to retain faithful members and use wealth.
There were two things talked about but only questions related to the second topic.
The first topic contrasting authoritarian states with democracies didn’t really do anything for me. Why? We don’t really know the state of things in China or Russia. They aren’t really going in the same direction. China has problems but it’s also essential to the world as it is now because of its wealth and because it seems to be one of the major manufacturing places in the world, something our country has willingly given up in the past 60 years because they can get more money. Russia seems to be on a path to self-destruction again. It could be an important part of the world economy but is so self-absorbed in its image that it is ignoring global reality. On the other hand, can you call the United States a democracy? We can’t even agree about the results of our last presidential election and at the same time have many states restricting election laws because people aren’t voting “correctly.” We also have the leader of one party someone who is truly an authoritarian while members of that same party label the leader of the other party a socialist/communist/authoritarian because they’ve always done that even though he’s not exhibiting any of those types of behaviors.
As for the church’s new mission, it would be nice if they just led out morally like the prophets of old calling out society in general for their wickedness. The church leaders will specifically call out any moral wrong an individual may or may not do but when it comes to our society, either in the US or in the world, their statements are so lukewarm and weak that either side can say they are calling out the other side. The division in our politics makes it so that going to church is a chore for just about everyone. The progressive members get tired of being called names and the conservative members resent being asked to wear masks, get vaccines, or listen to the other side.
I’m sorry to be so negative. I definitely feel that the political climate in the world is affecting the mission of the church. But what we need is a clearer understanding of what the politics really are and a church willing to do more than retain its members and money.
The Church defines its mission like this: Living the gospel of Jesus Christ; Caring for those in need; Inviting all to receive the gospel;
Uniting families for eternity (General Handbook 1.2). And then in 1.4 it says: “Prayerfully seek to know how you can help bring about God’s purposes in the lives of those you serve. God will direct you through the promptings of the Holy Ghost.” I desire to be a more compassionate, loving person (which is how I understand “living the gospel of Jesus Christ”). I appreciate all that the Church and its members individually do to care for those in need (and we all can do more, especially with those billions the Church has). I see “inviting all the receive the gospel” to mean just living in a loving and kind way, being a light, and a good caring human being. I have learned a lot about “uniting families for eternity” as one of my children recently came out, and my view of what it means to be “united” as a family has broadened so much in the last few years, in a beautiful, expansive way. I find a lot of daily motivation and direction for me personally in that mission.
On the mission, I think lws329 hit it on the head. Current mission statements include “Stay in the Boat” and “Stay on the Covenant Path” and “Don’t be a lazy learner.”
I want to focus on this question: Do you share the sense that most Mormons and most local leaders are just going through the motions?
I had two callings until recently. I was a YM advisor and a boys activity day leader. I can no longer do both and so I asked if I could be released from YM advisor. This seemed to surprise the bishop and I briefly shared that (1) I asked for this calling two years ago and asked if I could send a weekly email like the YM do to the youth and parents giving them helpful information about upcoming activities and (2) the emails were not working because none of the leaders ever knew what they were doing two minutes from now let alone two weeks from now and (3) I had no idea post-Boy Scouts what we are trying to accomplish because we have no budget and we have no goals and I was tired of being part of a poor-man’s sports league.
The Bishop validated everything I said. I tried to be fair that we are all unpaid labor and coming up with meaningful activities that can be done in an aging church building that only lasts 60 minutes is challenging, but I felt like we weren’t even trying anymore. But I don’t think the leaders are going through the motions because they don’t care; I think they are going through the motions because there is no support to do anything meaningful. And I felt particularly handcuffed as an advisor because I’m not in charge so my suggestions to do things better never materialized. Because they required work.
FYI boys activity days rocks! And bonus is that nobody cares about this calling so I literally can do whatever I want =).
I have asked the question in a different way in the past: what are we selling? what are we marketing? I know that we aren’t selling goods and services in the marketplace, but there are some similarities. For a while after 1830 it was the truth restored, which I think is a powerful message, and then maybe gather the faithful to Zion. Then, as mentioned in the OP, normalizing relations with the US government consolidating the financial and organizational health of the Church as an institution became the mission of the leadership, even if it was not a message that was broadcast to the people, followed by missionary work and strengthening the organization to deal with growth, both domestically and internationally. Since then, we have seen strong families as the product we sell, though that marketing attempt didn’t work because people quickly realized that strong families exist outside the church, and troubled families within. We also marketed good health (join the church, live the word of wisdom, and you’ll have great health), but that marketing message also didn’t work because many members are in poor health while many non-members are in great health. Sometimes we hear a perversion of another message: pay your tithing, and you’ll soon be rich.
I am not sure that “stay on the covenant path” is a complete message, but maybe no message is complete. It has some charm and good, but allow me some license to create a new verse in between vv. 3 and 4 of 1 Cor 13: “And though I receive all my covenants and check all the boxes, and have not charity, ________________” (fill in the blank). (If not familiar with 1 Cor 13, see the pattern “though x (all good stuff) but I have not charity, then nada, néant, or nothing” repeated 3 times, in vv. 1-3.) One can do all manner of great and good things and still not know the Lord, according to the Sermon on the Mount.
Our “follow the prophet” mission statement (I think that’s a mission statement) doesn’t ring my bell, because Christ is our example and it is He whom we should be trying to follow, and “follow the prophet as he follows Christ” isn’t a slogan that I think will catch on. “Follow the prophet” also sounds a little too close a cult of personality for my taste (convert, not raised in the church). I understand that people say that they can’t see the Lord because He’s in heaven, so they need someone one earth to follow. I get that, but that sounds a lot like the cult of the saints, something that we reject.
I like: “We teach the people correct principles, and let them govern themselves.”
Really interesting post, Dave. Some of your discussion makes me think of a psychological theory I remember reading about in school that I think was called Action Identification Theory. If I recall correctly, the gist was that if people think of themselves as doing something that’s part of a thing bigger than themselves, they’ll be more motivated and persistent. I think this matches nicely to your example about driving down I-80.
I really don’t have a good idea about what the Church’s mission is now. I think other commenters are spot on about retaining members being a key focus, but this just feels like the Church is treading water. It’s not a grand, organizing idea that’s really going to motivate people to do things.
I wish the GAs would come up with a mission that’s focused on making the world better. They certainly have the resources. There’s no lack of problems. What if they decided that we need to clean the Earth up if Jesus is ever going to come back, and started giving talks about climate change? Even better, what if they put their money where their mouth is and spent Church wealth on things that would help reduce it.
But I’m not holding my breath. Coming up with bold new visions that will inspire people isn’t something that’s in the skill set of people the age the top GAs are.
I seem to be hearing about “Gathering Israel on both sides of the veil” a lot. Maybe that is the slogan. I guess that would be temple work and missionary work? It seems like the church thinks if a person is engaged in either of those things there is a better chance they will stay in the church. I personally don’t like the phrase Covenant Path. I would much rather be a Disciple of Jesus Christ.
All the temple building feels like an actual Potemkin village at this point, but what do I know? I pass an LDS temple every day on my commute, and there are cars in the parking lot. It’s not full by a long stretch, but there are patrons. For me, temple attendance falls into the “play stupid games” (worthiness interviews) “get stupid prizes” (temple attendance including eternal polygamy and second class status for women) category. Clearly I’m not the target audience. I know it’s meaningful to others, so to each his own.
If the current mission is “Stay on the Covenant Path” which I think it is, at least de facto, the problem is that it’s a set of milestones that are largely complete at specific points, and therefore it has too many built in exit ramps at every “step” of the “path.” If you serve a mission, then stay single too long, you have a built in exit ramp. If you are married in the temple, but you don’t have kids, there’s an exit ramp. If you have kids who choose not to stay in the Church or are LGBTQ, you’ve got a huge exit ramp and contruction workers pointing you to exit at every opportunity.
Plus, once you’ve been married in the temple, you literally have no new steps from age 25 (or whatever age you marry) until death. You are just “enduring to the end,” which is frankly a recipe for going through the motions or phoning it in. If you have kids, your new “mission” can be keeping them on the Covenant Path(TM) thru temple marriage, but again, there’s nothing for empty nesters. It’s just kind of churning in perpetual irrelevance until you die.
Imagine a mission like “Eliminating homelessness” (providing housing for all) or “Connecting generations worldwide” (tuning the entire world into the power of genealogy). If a Church’s mission is only focused on the members, it’s not really a mission. It’s just a country club.
Thanks for the comments, everyone.
Instereo, thanks for the response. I don’t know about your take on China and Russia — I think we can know something about what’s going on there — but I think we agree that it is really important to understand as much as we can about Russia and China, and craft an effective foreign policy response. It’s the challenge of this decade, maybe of this century. If we screw it up, there could be dire consequences. US democracy is holding on by its fingernails, but it’s still holding on. If LDS leaders really believe the LDS revelation that the US Constitution was drafted by inspired men (suggesting divine influence and approval), they had better speak up before it’s too late. That could help thousands of Mormon voters in Arizona and Nevada make the right choice in 2024.
Faith Over Fear, thanks for the positive, hopeful response.
Georgis, nice restatement using different words. Ten or fifteen years ago, I think “follow the Prophet” would have been a good slogan, but I think it has been displaced by “Follow the Covenant Path” lately. Once I realized that has the same cadence as “Follow the Yellow Brick Road,” I can’t get it out of my head.
Ziff, key word “motivation.” You’re right, there just isn’t much in the current Mormon package to get people motivated or excited. If they showed Seinfeld reruns in a room next door to Gospel Doctrine,it would be packed.
Angela C, so does the Church just look at empty nesters as cash cows? I’m sure LDS leaders regularly lament the desires of some ENs and retirees to just visit the grandkids and otherwise enjoy their retirement, as opposed to doing senior missions and serving, serving, serving until death. That’s what apostles do, so that’s what they think everyone should do.
Dave B., please allow for a correction to one statement: “I’m sure LDS leaders regularly lament the desires of some ENs and retirees to just visit the grandkids and otherwise enjoy their retirement, as opposed to … serving, serving, serving until death. That’s what apostles do, so that’s what they think everyone should do.”
Respectfully, I do not think that the apostles serve, serve, serve until death. They are on the payroll until death. They call it a stipend and not a salary, but it is a regular deposit in the bank, and it isn’t for a paltry amount that compares to a senior’s social security payment. They work for a salary until they die, and their work has great benefits including no medical costs and they get full pay even when they don’t work for sickness, and if they need a driver they get that, too. If I got paid low six figures whether I showed up for work or not, even for weeks at the time due to illness, and all my medical bills were covered, then I could work until I was 99 years old.
No, the apostles, whose temporal needs are all well satisfied, want people on pensions and social security to pay out of their own pockets to serve, serve, serve. I think that it is great when senior members choose to serve, but we should remind ourselves that they are making a much larger sacrifice, for their using their old age pensions to pay for their food, medical, housing, transportation, tithing, everything. As fewer people retire with corporate pensions, social security and personal savings will be all that they have, and I expect that few people will be able to serve missions.
I’d say the current mission of the Church is to maintain the illusion of growth. That’s where all the temples are coming from, certainly, and it’s the easiest way to pretend there isn’t a massive implosion of membership in large parts of the world.
I think all of the Q15 are true believers who never dreamed they would someday be presiding over a shrinking church. So the “maintain the illusion” mission is as much about massaging their own uneasiness as it is about gaslighting the world.
If the current mission of the church is retaining the members/stay on the covenant path, then by and large, it is the church that is just phoning it in.
I live in one of the areas where they consolidated 3 stakes into 2 about 10 years ago. It was fairly helpful for several years. Attendance is declining again. All of the stake’s youth (often their family with them) attend a couple of the wards so they can have volume to be effective.
I’ve listened in on presidency planning meetings, and I am fully convinced that the presidency and many, many that continue to attend are dedicated and sincere.
The church could, but does not, provide support. As others have noted, there’s no curriculum (formerly there was the BSA and PP). The budgets are doled out by skinflints. Sometimes funds are snatched back.
*IF* upper church leaders have a mission, they need to act like it. They need budgets to support it. They need to find ways for families and youth and individuals to find purpose, and fulfillment in church attendance and engagement. They need to hire church cleaners.
I agree with others that looking outside of our church, focusing on bettering the world and serving our fellow people in ways that Christ taught, and generously funding these endeavors, would add much to retaining members. In many real ways, the “Stay on the good ship Zion” message is fear based, and hollow.
Dave B: I don’t think leaders know what to do with empty nesters, and I’m not sure they ever needed to think about it that much before. The idea of empty nesters leaving the Church was probably mostly nothing to worry about (demographically, this is still probably the lowest attrition group) due to them being online less (therefore not doing external reality testing of church claims like younger demographics), and having a much higher sunk cost. You’ve spent decades paying tithing (to the detriment of your own retirement savings), and raising kids in the Church. If even one of your kids stays in the Church, you are probably more likely to stay in as well, in solidarity if nothing else. But I am quite surprised at just how many empty nesters are leaving. It’s a shrinking demographic that used to be a captive audience, easily taken for granted. Obviously some of that is due to LGBTQ issues, but I don’t think that explains it all.
Church is boring as all get out, and getting worse with the continually dumbed down curriculum and culture war political dog whistles mixed in. Plus, people are fleeing religion in general. For people to stay in, it needs to offer them something deeply meaningful and personally beneficial. Cleaning the church building for free isn’t the same as doing something meaningful. Listening to the same lessons in GD that the Primary is doing isn’t something meaningful. Talks about talks and hearing people gush about the absolutely mediocre content being presented is not meaningful.
For a long time there was talk about the three missions of the church. Then there were a couple of exciting announcements, the reinstitution of the Perpetual Education Fund, and as recently as 2009, the announcement of a fourth mission: caring for the poor and needy. It seems like that one never really got off the ground, and is heard about much less these days.
My thoughts are along the same lines as Angela’s. It seems like young families are the bread and butter of the church and it’s struggling to discern how to become more relevant to a more diverse collection of individuals. The young families around me seem preoccupied with raising their kids in the church which comes with plenty of milestones and rights of passage. Temple work has always seemed to me more suited to retired couples so maybe that’s why there is so much attention on temple building. The Church is going to become less relevant to spiritual growth in the future but I don’t think they are willing to make the drastic changes that could improve a relationship to the Devine. Its rich enough they don’t really need a mission statement anymore and there will always be political fights to spend money on which will rally a small group of die hard members. Maybe they’ll surprise me and invest 5 billion dollars in underserved communities next year or actually show the membership what it means to lead out against racism. It just seems more likely they’ll be suing some remote city for the right to build a towering lighted steeple.
As others have mentioned, retention is the goal of the moment. Religion is in a slump at a macro level – it’s not just a Mormon thing. It’s a repeat of almost exactly 100 years ago during the American Religious Depression that lasted from ~1925-1935. Pretty much all churches are playing defense right now.
Are MOST active members/leaders going through the motions? Nah, not most. Certainly some, but it’s probably in line with trends in other churches.
Maybe a slogan like, “Do good in our communities and the world.”
The “covenant path” sure seems like the mission at the moment…it’s fine, but not particularly inspiring or driving any specific goal other than spending money on temples and retaining people.
I will say that the LDS church is good at playing the long game. This isn’t the first slump, it won’t be the last…but this time they’re sitting on a mountain of resources to help them ride it out.
A GREAT post.
You spent a whole post talking about mission statements without acknowledging the actual declared mission statement?
One of the more interesting General Conference talks was by Elder Robbins in 2014 title “Which Way Do You Face”. The talk begins with Elder Robbins sharing advice he received from President Oaks: “A Seventy does not represent the people to the prophet but the prophet to the people. Never forget which way you face!”
There is no secret. There is no hiding. The Church is a top-down, command-and-control hierarchy. What this hierarchy means is the Church can only present as “mission” those efforts that can be managed from the top. The three main programs being Temples, Missions and Education (BYU schools and Seminary). What this means for members is if you or family benefits from these programs you will find meaning in the Church mission. If not, then members must come up with their own reasons for staying in the church.
Of course the Church as a corporation has many activities and programs. And the Church has its huge investment fund. But these are not meant for the members! There is a massive separation between the lay church and the corporate Church and I see no effort by leadership to reduce this separation. A problem for leadership is the corporate Church wants to be noticed for spending and influence for good causes, but it doesn’t like attracting attention to how much money its has and the influence it exercises for corporate, self-serving purposes.
The larger problem for leadership is the lay church is weakening. There are a variety of reasons for this, many of which are discussed on this forum. The question for the Church and its leadership is what is it doing to strengthen the lay church? The obvious answers are tied to the main programs mentioned above. Members make and keep Temple covenants, Members go on missions and support their children to go on missions. Members participate in church education, especially Seminary and Come Follow Me. Are these programs sufficient? I think they are able to maintain the lay church at a seemingly level altitude. But these programs do not build church culture.
Culture is established by the participants in the immediate organization. The culture may be influenced by the “top=down” but the greater influence is the attitudes and ideas held by the organization participants. Historically, the church culture was entirely organic. It was made up of new converts engaging in a pioneer activities – whether starting new communities like Kirkland and Nauvoo, or settlements in Missouri and Utah. The modern Church does not provide these cultural shaping experiences. More importantly, the Church has been living off the cultural inertia of the “Pioneer” church and that history is fading fast.
Curiously President Nelson is encouraging the fading! I find this fascinating because it is not at all clear there is any intent to replace the fading Pioneer Heritage of the Church with anything new or better. This is one reason I believe members are wondering about the mission of the Church. They sense the departure of something meaningful – the Pioneer experience – and they don’t see anything that is culturally meaningful being added to the Church. To emphasize the contrasting experiences. My parents and previous generations had a direct hand in building church communities and physical buildings. My generation and later have the experience of serving in church callings. There is a massive gulf in the two experiences. Modern Latter-day Saints simply do not have the opportunity to build new things and see the fruits of their work. Rather, modern Latter-day Saints, like most modern people, are consumers and not builders and that creates a much different culture of people.
Thanks for the comments, everyone. The comments have added a lot to my discussion in the OP.
Mike Spendlove: “I’d say the current mission of the Church is to maintain the illusion of growth.” Yeah. They will stop publishing membership stats before they will acknowledge anything like “net membership declined last year …” Even though we all know that active membership is shrinking in certain areas (when they combine wards and stakes, as noted by Trout Fishing in the following comment) and possibly overall for the Church. Although I would call this a leadership priority, even a leadership imperative, rather than a “mission of the Church.”
Angela C. (second comment): “For people to stay in, it needs to offer them something deeply meaningful and personally beneficial. … Listening to the same lessons in GD that the Primary is doing isn’t something meaningful.” The new CFM curriculum was an opportunity to fill that void. A missed opportunity, IMO.
Bill, yes the semi-official three or four missions of the Church seem to be MIA.
Mike Sanders, see Bill’s comment. Explain why the three or four missions of the Church are hardly mentioned in General Conference. Proclaim the gospel, perfect the Saints, redeem the dead, care for the poor and needy. That’s just a restated list of the major programs of the Church (read A Disciple’s comment): Missions, Education, Temples, Welfare Program. That’s your org chart or your annual budget categories, not a mission statement.
A Disciple — great comment! That’s a post, not a comment, and I might just steal it the next time I post (gonna be out of town a few weeks). I would liken your observation about the void in “LDS culture” in the wake of the fading of the Pioneer Thing, with nothing to replace it, to the dropping of Boy Scouts for the LDS boys’ youth program, replaced by … more or less nothing.
Disciple, I remember that talk, and I remember Elder Packer teaching something similar. I understand that teaching, and it makes a lot of sense. I also know that the Lord is fine with his people coming to Him with their problems, and engaging with the Divine, even almost arguing with the Divine, is OK. I’m thinking Job, in whom the Lord found no fault for his arguing with God and with his three friends about God’s apparent unfairness of his terrible situation.
If God is willing to listen to people, and to receive their complaints, and if he encourages it and does not punish it, I wonder if God’s servants should be willing to listen and to hear the people in their struggles. I admit that God has an infinite capacity to hear from many people at the same time, and men do not have that unlimited capacity, so men cannot do as much as God. But an attitude of “I face the people and speak for the Lord, and therefore I don’t listen to the people, and I don’t care one whit about their thoughts,” that seems a little arrogant. Maybe it is necessary in a large church, but let’s be honest–we see the same attitude at times down to the EQP, Bp, and SP levels, too. Jesus worked with people individually, including the Syro-Phoenician woman. He heard her, rejected her because she was not of the house of Israel, still listened to her, and He changed His mind and blessed her. That’s great leadership, ministering to an individual instead of only administering to a group. We see a lot of administering, and I hope that some ministering is also happening. Sometimes it is hard to see.
In furtherance to Mike Sander’s query, here is from the Church’s website: “The mission of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is to help all of God’s children come to Jesus Christ through learning about His gospel, making and keeping promises with God (covenants), and practicing Christlike love and service.”
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/learn/about-us?lang=eng#footnotes
Here is my prophetic 5-fold mission for a revitalized church. I’ve posted this before but I’ll do it again because it’s that good:
1. Stewardship of God’s creation = environmentalism
2. Glory of God is intelligence = education, scholarship, grants
3. Charity never faileth = projects to alleviate poverty, hunger, homelessness, etc.
4. Gathering of Israel = far more inclusive outreach, reduction of loyalty-based criteria for joining (tithing, coffee), more partnership with other groups with similar values
5. Youth = youth participate in local projects and can choose to serve missions related to one of the above 4 things.
The very notion that there is nothing constructive and edifying for empty nesters to do is…. 100% correct. We have jettisoned so much in LDS life that there is nothing to do but break out the white clothes and stand in the temple, smiling and nodding at patrons as they walk by. Or serve missions where the “more valiant” leaders tell you where to go and what to do. I’m currently trying to avoid that. I’m just too grumpy to fill those rolls and honestly, if I served a mission I could not encourage anyone over 50 to join. Why do that and die of boredom? There are far too many other health risks!
If you are around 50 years old or so, and you are not on the leadership track, it is over. I just scanned over our ward membership rolls and there is a growing percentage of active older adults without callings and no, it is not because people turn callings down. I think it is because the leaders are so busy saving the parents of preteens that the Boomer and older Gen Xer demographics simply do not matter.
Does anyone else see this or am I old and delusional?
Old Man, it surprises me that you think the leaders are working hard to save the preteens when they have gutted the youth programs and replaced BSA and Personal Progress with nothing. I am a Gen X mom and when I think of my youth experiences versus what my younger Gen Z kids are getting at church I can assure you it is night and day. We had values and colors and songs. I was never a PP fan but found a lot of value in the old theme and motto and all the values I was taught. They even took the names away so the YW have no identity. I have no idea how they expect these kids to want to stay in this church. We live in TX and the other churches around us have amazing youth programs compared to ours, I have YW and all of their leaders for the past several years have been far too busy to devote much to their callings. Women are much busier than when I was a youth and can’t devote as much time, thought, or energy to these callings is what I have noticed. I can’t blame them but it does make me sad for my girls. They don’t enjoy going, I long for a YW president who can just express love to my girls but have yet to see it. Most are going through the motions but quite disengaged. And don’t get me started on the fact that SLC has not seemed to notice that high schoolers get the same church curriculum 3 times a week between Come, Follow Me, seminary and SS. I teach youth SS and they’ve already heard all my lessons in seminary. It’s unnecessary and poor design. What’s the mission for the youth? I can’t figure it out.
Your on point Old Man. My wife and I faded out of church attendance for many reasons and everything you wrote is spot on about how empty nesters are treated. Our bishops had no answers for us. No one came to minister….nada. I come from LDS royalty you might say and when I met with my bishop after 5 minutes his answer to my concerns were to “just resign”. I told him I shouldn’t need to after all the blood and treasure my family has given to the church.
With that said. Our friends in the ward still invite us to many non-church outings.
I thought the new church slogan was ” Every Member a Janitor “.
“they have gutted the youth programs and replaced BSA and Personal Progress with nothing”
Exactly! This is the futility of the LDS Church organization and the perfidy of its leadership. The General Authorities have gutted the church of meaningful social and educational activity. Bishops and Stake Presidents are accountable for going along with the destruction and not demanding substance.
You can search and find articles about the 2019 rollout of the new youth program. Those familiar with the 4H program chuckled as the announced program was a copy of it. But the LDS version is a cheap imitation. Actually, the LDS version is a fraud. It doesn’t exist!
The real 4H is a worthy program that provides kids not only activity but real leadership experience. Several of my kids participated in 4H and became club leaders. They competed in 4H competitions and enjoyed friends and excellent mentors.
There is no reason why the LDS church could not replicate the 4H model for its youth. But the General Authorities are lazy and unwilling to make the investment and commitment. They talk the talk of caring for the youth and then expect lay members to “make it all happen”. All the while they pile on the lay leadership umpteen other responsibilities with no additional resources.
The pattern of program failure in the LDS church is something that should draw at least an explanation. Certainly the General Authoritirs must see the discrepancy between what they promise and what they deliver! Do they? Why don’t they seem to care?
Extremism has become the practical outcome and de facto mission of life of the church for an overwhelming number of members. Radical views are perfectly acceptable while moderating view are despised. Leadership has tried to state policies to temper the situation, but their messages are ambiguous, always stated but never taught. They simply have no effect.
With a quick look around, the Church would see a remarkable example of how to change for the better right in front of their eyes. Pope Francis has driven the Catholic Church from theocratic and anti-sexualized orthodoxy to a church that is committed to pastoral care of their fellow Catholics. GAs could adopt the vision of Francis, accept clergy that also believe and train them to teach the members. Hopefully, this brings members back to rational society.
Until some remarkable change like this happens within the Church, the public will continue to distain the religion, membership will drop and missionary efforts will fail with all but the most extreme. Sadly, leadership succession and the current GAs make this seem impossible.
I completely AGREE, your food allergy.
IT’S THAT GOOD
Each one is a meaningful, and practical, application of scriptural teachings.
I’m reposting it too.
your food allergy
September 13, 2023 at 2:30 pm
Here is my prophetic 5-fold mission for a revitalized church. I’ve posted this before but I’ll do it again because it’s that good:
1. Stewardship of God’s creation = environmentalism
2. Glory of God is intelligence = education, scholarship, grants
3. Charity never faileth = projects to alleviate poverty, hunger, homelessness, etc.
4. Gathering of Israel = far more inclusive outreach, reduction of loyalty-based criteria for joining (tithing, coffee), more partnership with other groups with similar values
5. Youth = youth participate in local projects and can choose to serve missions related to one of the above 4 things.