I’ve become aware that it is now seems to be more common for wards to be combined to form a single unit. This is something that has happened to my own ward recently. I am so happy. And apparently we’re not the only stake where this is happening. It was only last year that I had thought this would be unthinkable (because statistics) to those running the church. Back in my 2013 post “Growing Up Mormon in Britain”, I wrote:
“Picture, if you will, a world away from Utah… Where the culture is one of obedience; trying to run the church right, trying to follow the programs. Where wards are divided as soon as there are the minimum necessary number of Melchizedek Priesthood holders, so that everybody who will has at least one calling, sometimes as many as three.”*
In the city I grew up, we went from one ward to four, and gained a second building, from the time I was born to the time I left for university. My then ward had also seen the formation of a branch, later reabsorbed into the originating ward. I’ve seen this happen with branches a number of times during my lifetime in the church, so didn’t regard that as unusual. Wards were a whole different ballgame however; they stayed.
It was only of the order of twenty or so years ago that a rash of new stakes were formed in Britain. My husband and I moved into one such new stake not long after we married. There were then two wards sharing our chapel, and within a few years a third was created. It certainly kept us busy. I imagine at some point during this period complaints about the difficulty in running all the programs, and folks holding multiple callings, finally reached the top somewhere, and instructions began to be heard, though were often not adhered to, that members should have just one calling. In that ward I generally had two.**
After a decade or so we moved to our current ward and stake. Our small city comprised two wards, sharing a building. We hadn’t been here long, when we suffered some boundary adjustment, losing some of our ward members to the neighbouring ward; not the first time boundaries had been shifted about here.
So, not so long ago when we heard the two wards would be having a special conference, I was pretty much expecting another boundary adjustment. I wasn’t happy at the prospect. The neighbouring ward would be the one to gain, and our ward was barely coping, what with the levels of ill health in some of the auxilliaries.
However, just before the conference, we had the sister missionaries over for dinner. One of them had spent time in a city that had given it’s name to one of those new stakes, and which had once been part of the stake in which I grew up. Back then there had been two wards in that city. This sister informed me that since then there had been as many as three, but that now, there was just the one ward. I was stunned. Really! Just one ward in that city, and there had been three? Never mind the two I remembered. It was at that point I began to hope.
I discovered later that the area from which we moved, where there were three wards sharing a building, has gone back to two wards. And in Japan, where my husband had attended for few years more than 20 years ago, there had been two wards sharing a building. This had been increased to three at some point, but is now down to one.
Everyone I’ve spoken to about the recent combining of the wards in our city is delighted, though there may be some who were unhappy with it. The missionaries love it, because a) it makes street contacting easier – there’s just the one meeting time and those same missionaries will be there in Sunday meetings, b) they don’t have to grapple with the whys and wherefores of geographical boundaries when teaching family members of recent converts who had been living on the other side of the boundary, especially when it’s all in the same building anyway. We’re not a large city. There’s a larger pool of active and healthy members available to serve in the various positions. It’s better for the small numbers of youth and primary children to be together. It feels like somebody might have been listening, because how do you, on the one hand follow the injunction that each member should only have one calling when you’re expected to run the programs anyway, and the numbers don’t add up? Either the one calling instruction is ignored, or worse, some things get farmed out as “assignments”, which is much the same thing but without the benefit of a sustaining vote and setting apart. It feels like somebody might have been listening, because how do you find time to help and fellowship new members when you’re run off your feet on a Sunday, and your spare time is spent knee deep in preparation or attending meetings during the week?
Now the building really can feel like the centre for the whole church community in the city, undivided by artificial boundaries. Now, for example, we can hold an after church munch and mingle because we aren’t required to clear the building for the other ward. It feels like we can breathe. And hey, we’re still smaller than those Utah wards, I’ll be bound.
- What changes, if any, have you noted where you are?
- What do you perceive to be the benefits of a) dividing a ward? b) combining wards?
- Do you think we may have been too quick to divide wards in the past?
- Do you see this as a change in strategy, and if so, why do you think such a change might be necessary?
Discuss.
*At 17 I had three callings: on the Laurel class presidency, assistant choir pianist, and cultural arts director on the activities committee.
** That would be ward pianist with some responsibility for ward music (there was no music chair), and either: primary teacher, YW leader, RS teacher, and finally RS Presidency member (but still teaching).
Wheat & Tares 
Well, we had two very different experiences where we lived and where we know live.
I joined the Church in 1982 in the Santa Clara Valley, home of Silicon Valley. The Church had been growing rapidly prior to that time and there were about 8 stakes in that area. The Ward we joined had been created about a year before that and two Spanish Branches had been created as well.
After that point, the growth essentially stopped. within 18 months, our Ward was combined with 3 others to form 3 wards. So 4 into 3. We moved shortly after that and over on our new side of the Stake 3 Wards were made into 2. Eventually, an entire Stake was dissolved. After we moved, another stake was dissolved and a few buildings were sold. And the shrinking continues as home prices prohibit moderate income young families from moving there.
Here in Colorado Springs, the opposite has happened. Our Ward has split or had parts taken three times in 12 years. the Stakes here (4) have an average of 12 units and could be split into a new Stake. We average one or two new Wards a year in the area. Yet, most of the growth in in the north part of town where the new housing is being built.
It’s not so much as the Church is growing in the US as it is being re-distributed to other parts of the country it seems.
I live in the south, but not deep south (US) in very much a growth area – suburbs sprawling several miles per year. I am losing track of all the times we have been split as a ward and stake. But I do get a taste as we had a split several years ago. We finally could fit into the classrooms, but the amount of callings per person went up noticeably. I can understand not wanting to combine too soon only to have to split again, but when the trajectory is either down or very slow growth I think it is best to do some combining.
I tend to agree with Jeff, it’s largely caused by re-distribution. According to Cumorah.com as of 2013 LDS membership in the UK as a percentage of total population (0.27% – 0.30%) has remained nearly flat since about 1990.
It does have a lot to do with redistribution; we lived in Behas in 03-04 during the real estate boom and wards where we lived in town were just starting to be gutted as everyone moved out to the newly constructed suburbs where they were throwing up wards left and right.
Most recently we moved into a ward where 1/3 of us are new move ins and the ward went from smallest to largest in the stake bc land prices finally dropped low enough to make building affordable again in Rexburg. In general I’m in favor of the middle sized wards; big enough to only have one calling, small enough that you recognize everyone.
I wasn’t aware that it was common to split wards when it wasn’t necessary for space concerns or because of distance issues (which it wouldn’t be if the wards are still meeting in the same building). I guess I can see this being quite different internationally than in the U.S., but my own experience has been one of being in wards in several different places (TX, NJ, UT, CA, PA, VA), and for the most parts, the wards I was in were too large, rather than too small, and often they couldn’t be split because it would require another church building, which wasn’t an immediate option.
Thanks for the comments folks.
I’d agree redistribution is one factor, but it doesn’t feel like it’s only one. There seems to have been more emphasis on actually applying the guidance on one calling per person recently, whereas before it often seemed to be given lip service only, or dismissed as unworkable. Now it feels like folk are actually getting down to the nitty gritty of what it means to put it into practice. I’m also aware of wards that have increased in size, but which haven’t been divided when prior experience would have led me to believe that this would have happened. To have serving members less stressed, under less pressure feels like a good thing to me, for several reasons.
Not the least of those reasons is the number of retired couples putting in mission papers (and often serving several missions), taking them away from serving in their home wards, and away from assisting their extended families. These are the folk with the most time to give to callings. Otherwise there are the students, working singles, working couples, families (where often both parents or the lone parent are working). Those older folk who remain are often in poor health. Then there are those in need. And many new converts have poor English language skills, and need greater help to become integrated in the church community. And that takes time.
Kristine, I’m with you on the ideal size of the ward. I don’t think it’s an ideal I’ve much experience of however, given previous trends in Britain, which kept wards small.
Megan, I guess I can’t say for sure why they did it that way, but it seems to have been accompanied by a lot of rhetoric about growth, and the rate of growth, as if splitting us up would somehow increase that rate, or keep it coming or something. I suppose there might be something to be said for a small group of people all struggling together, but at some point we’re going to burn out. For lifelong members my age (mid40s) we’ve been at the childhood end, where our parents were serving long hours and going out to meetings, which for me (as the eldest), meant lots of having to take charge at home. Then serving in our own callings whilst trying to raise our own kids, but in a different climate, where we’re now told to be there so we know what our kids are doing with computer access that didn’t exist during our own teens. In my case, and many others this translates as less willingness to have both parents attending meetings at the same time, so I think my generation is putting its foot down more when it comes to service demands. Whilst my parents generation were in many cases able to rely on extended family support (because they weren’t members and therefore not busy with callings), this is much less available now a) because of relocation for work and education etc being more common and family is further away, and b) senior couple missions I mentioned.
Also, I find the years of spending much of my time serving in the church in multiple callings, in addition to relocating as a family to different parts of the country, I’ve pretty much lost the knack of integrating in the local community outside the church (if I ever had it much, given how heavy the ‘not of the world’ rhetoric was in my youth), sadly.
I don’t think I’m the only one, who when asked by the missionaries, do I know anyone to refer to them, the answer is that I don’t know anyone outside the church very well at all. Keeping us all that busy in small units would seem to have backfired so far as that goes.
Ah yes. The point of “I am so busy with my calling(s) that I don’t even know my neighbors – who think I am a bit of a snob and don’t ever (want to) interact with them.”
About 15 years ago I had a chance to actually associate quit a bit with a community group. I loved it and got to know a bunch of people. It was great. But as I got callings that were more time-intensive, I have only really gotten to know 1 person in my neighborhood – and he just happens to have lived in Utah for 10 years and is well aware of the church and not interested.
Ugh, Behas = Vegas. Darn autocorrect. Hedge if it’s true that they are abandoning small wards I’m excited. I always kind of felt they liked splitting wards and then put tons of pressure on the members of small wards that if they didn’t want 3 callings it was up to the ward members to grow the ward through missionary work. At least that’s what it’s felt like whenever I’ve been in a ward split. So great news with a new philosophy. Burnout in small wards is killer.
I once had a stake president (Western US, not Utah) with a strong bias in favor of having small wards–so everyone had a “opportunity” to serve (a lot). He once did a 2 into 3 split that took half of our “relatively” large (on paper only because the average attendance was in the mid 30% range) ward, along with half of another to create a new ward. Parenthetically, he did this without first consulting (unaware of the meaning of the concept, let alone the value of, “counseling” or “councils’) either of the 2 bishops NOR his presidency! That was over 5 years ago. My ward continues to struggle. Attendance now averages in the mid 30% range which yields 105 to 120 attending church–or about 65 adults that will accept callings. Nearly all those between 21 and 65 have an average of 1.8 callings. We had to drive about 7 miles (yes, not Willie Handcart) to a building in another stake because our building (right in the middle of our ward boundaries) couldn’t handle another unit.
And, he declared forcefully, this was inspired by God. Baloney!
This is just another aspect of leadership roulette. Some leaders (local or general) are biased in certain ways, while others are biased differently. The operative word here is “biased.” That is what councils/counseling together can mitigate. This is one aspect of what D&C 121 is referring to with “…as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion.”
Sounds grim fbisti, though the numbers you cite are on the larger side of average for wards I’ve experienced here. I’m hoping the change in strategy is lasting and real.
I live in Northern Utah, and about 10 years ago my stake was dissolved and the ward boundaries were reconfigured. Members were moving out of the area into more distant, newer suburbs, and the demographic was/and is, becoming more diverse.
We have had times where our ward population continued to decrease after that, but lower housing prices have begun to attract younger LDS families (who knows for how long?).
We still have issues with staffing in the ward; my wife has three callings. I currently only have one, but it’s pretty intensive.
A few years ago, I was living in a Utah County ward that was too big. Half the congregation was on folding chairs in the gym for sacrament meeting (attendance of 250-280), the choir held practice at a home because the building was literally never available, and I gave a talk exactly once in the eight years I lived there.
Now I live in a nearby state in a struggling ward with sacrament meeting attendance between 100-120, and we have the opposite problem. Active members get to speak every 6 months, everyone has multiple callings, and still significant duties go unfilled. I’m really hoping we combine with the other ward that meets in our building (the third unit is the stake single adult branch).
The stake president says he’s considering it, but that the finial decision is not his. (He can make a recommendation only, and then it gets passed on to SLC.) Maybe this is to avoid the situation described by fbisti.
Growing up in rural PA, we had a long difficult commute to church (26 miles each way on icy country roads), so we were glad when they split us into a new branch. The stake felt that the ward we left didn’t have enough leadership, so we got sucked back in, and there was definitely some resentment as people didn’t have nearly as much to do. Then we split off again, slightly different boundaries, into another branch, but this time still meeting in the same building as the ward we split from. We tried for years and years to get our own building, but nobody would sell land to Mormons because the prejudice was so strong against the church. Ultimately, that branch finally became a ward, and later a third ward formed as well. They’ve continued to grow, something we never thought possible when I was still living there, but they are still meeting in that same building, 26 miles away.
Stake Presidents can’t just change wards, splitting and combining them at will. it has to be submitted to the regional leadership and to SLC. it is the leadership there that approve it.
I was involved in a comprehensive study of some wards in our stake in California with the idea of combining one weak Ward into two stronger ones and a Spanish Branch into two others.
The justification was pretty solid, but the Area President, at the time, said “no, I think the weak Ward is going to grow.” Well, it didn’t and they ended up doing it anyway after we moved here and that guy moved on. That is close to when they also dissolved a Stake.
We’ve seen a lot of growth in our Ward in the past year to over 460 people. We are finding it hard to give callings to everyone, so some are just hanging out at the moment. And we have to keep reminding ourselves, “Oh yeah, he or she already has a calling.” Let’s give it to someone who doesn’t.
The overall principle should be to serve the needs of the people, current and (prospective) members alike. Factors such as density, members’ activity, transportation, and resources available (e.g., meetinghouses) vary so much that attempting to design the ideal ward can’t be accomplished on a ‘cookie-cutter’ basis.
I recall some years ago that there were several hundred members in the city of Detroit proper, belonging to several different suburban wards. The “thought” was the so-called ‘Pie’ or ‘spaghetti’ model, in effect allocating the poorer, more humble members amongst the more affluent suburban wards. Needless to say, not only cultural issues, especially with interested prospects and recent converts, and especially logistics (too many members without their own cars, commute times of an hour each way into the city and back TWICE every Sunday, etc) had a strong negative impact on convert retention in the Motor City. Someone finally wised up and split off Detroit (and I believe also Hammtrack and Dearborn) into a distinct Detroit district, under the mission, which at the time was unheard of. Then several small but fairly accessible facilities were secured (I believe they were all rented), a major criteria being access to local bus routes. The Church decided that de facto ‘segregation’, though not of itself desirable, was far better if the city-residing members could readily get to their respective congregations. This is supposed to have helped quite a bit in member retention in urban areas. I have heard that this idea has been tried, to at least the extent of forming several small urban branches in a major city (like Philadelphia, which has urban branches in Frankford and South Philly) even if the parent Stake Center is in a more tony area. A further example was in New York City, where districts were likewise broken off from the parent Stakes (New York NY and Plainview NY) and within 20 years became stakes in their own right.
As long as, like a similar thread on LDS cultural “imperialism” (e.g., assuming that what’s good for the Wasatch Front or white-bread suburban America is good for the rest of the world), the needs of the people that supposedly are being served are prioritized, rather than any mania to have ‘impressive’ numbers that serve to create an LDS version of a ‘Potemkin village’.
In the ’90’s there was a beautiful historic chapel out in a small town in the west with one-of-a-kind architecture. The ward fit perfectly. A GA traveling through commented that they needed to move into a bigger building and ‘if you build it they will come’. They sold the little chapel and built a “model A” style chapel that filled up over the next decade. It was used as an example of ‘faith proceeding the miracle’. Faithful leaders do these sorts of bold things. Leaders without vision and faith don’t “plan for blessings”. (Whatever.)
In our stake, the borders were drawn in crazy lines in order to split the ward. The stake president got a lot of kudos for “growth” when in actuality, we just barely squeaked by with the minimum requirements and split the wards to do it. Everyone feels they are spread too thin and many families miss being with each other.
I really love this post and love the trend to merge wards. Out in the ‘mission field’ this makes a heckuvalotta sense.
1) It calms down the “expand or die” mentality
2) Lets everyone worship at a reasonable hour instead of 8:30am and 5:30pm.
3) Might help leadership roulette. With more people to chose from, hopefully there will be better leaders. Such large wards also force bishops and SPs to rely on their counselors and the women’s organizations, which is a good thing.
4) The new mega-ward might be able to accomplish work because of their size. Wards with 600+ people can build Zion by specializing in things like genealogy and primary.
So, Utahhiker, The Other Clark, I’m getting the impression that where stake and ward boundaries are geographically much smaller in the first place, they’re much more sensitive to demographic redistribution trends, which would make sense, as the communities within those boundaries are likely to be a lot less diverse. Maybe? That would seem to account for what appears to be the more common formation and dissolution of both wards and stakes, and I’m imagining it doesn’t come with quite the same baggage as such things might elsewhere.
I don’t know much about the various US towns and cities, and the extent of diversity within geographic boundaries outside Utah. What I can say is my own city in Britain is very diverse, even in small pockets. Social housing, owner-occupied and larger detached homes are pretty mixed up throughout the city. There is also some diversity of employment within the city, and even from here a lot of folk commute in to London to work. Perhaps Jeff and Kristine, you could give further light on the demographic trends you mentioned earlier in that respect.
Hawkgrrrl, still the difficult commute then? Ah well. We have some members live more rurally, though not as far as 26 miles – it’s less than twice that distance between here and other towns/cities in a number of directions. We’re much more compact I guess,having less space to spread out. There is a small branch situated on the edge of a country town not that far from here, and their boundary is very large, and peculiarly shaped, keeping it mainly rural. I would have thought that anyone living far from the building )which isn’t central) would have found it easier to attend in their nearest city. But it is a thriving branch. However that town and nearby towns and villages within the branch boundary are popular places to live, for a particular demographic.
Douglas, I think your first paragraph is so important. Yes. And your example demonstrates the importance of accessibility.
Our church building is on a bus route, though buses don’t start too early or run too frequently on a Sunday. For most it would involve changing buses in the city centre to get there, though it is only a 5 minute ride from the centre. For that reason, our meetings now start at 10am, so that those arriving by bus can arrive on time.
annon, megaward is definitely overstating it. I doubt we’re going to see 600+ attending, though doubtless that could well be the number on the roles. I’d be surprised if we’re reaching 200 attending even after the merger.
Our last stake we certainly had crazy boundary lines when three wards were created from the two. That was not long after the new stake had been formed, and yes the SP was of the type to want to demonstrate growth. Thinly spread indeed.
On your point 3, we have the same Bishop as my former ward, but this time he has experienced counsellors, which I think can make a huge difference. Learning to delegate is much more necessary, so I’m hoping we’ll see less micromanagement. He is a lovely well-meaning person, but big on micromanagement.
I’m really hoping we can see more of a community emphasis, and less of, as you put it, “expand or die”.
Jeff “Stake Presidents can’t just change wards, splitting and combining them at will. it has to be submitted to the regional leadership and to SLC. it is the leadership there that approve it.”
Yes, we were told our change had been on the cards for year, so there must be a lot going on in the background that isn’t seen by the general membership. We were also approval for the merger had to come from Salt Lake, from President Monson himself. I’m curious to know if women are involved in these types of consultations.
“We’ve seen a lot of growth in our Ward in the past year to over 460 people. We are finding it hard to give callings to everyone, so some are just hanging out at the moment. And we have to keep reminding ourselves, “Oh yeah, he or she already has a calling.” Let’s give it to someone who doesn’t.”
No ward I’ve been in has even begun to approach that number. We were always split much earlier.
So I’m beginning to wonder, now that everything is moving online, and calling assignments have to go online, to what extent does that make it harder for leaders to present an optimistic picture of what is actually happening on the ground, in terms of members attending, and who is actually doing the callings? It becomes a lot more obvious to those higher up if callings aren’t filled, or folk have multiple callings. Assignments would show up as unfilled.
RE: “Stake Presidents can’t just change wards, splitting and combining them at will. it has to be submitted to the regional leadership and to SLC. it is the leadership there that approve it.”
I am aware of that. And, given that all the data on # of Melch priesthood, YM/YW, Primary, etc. (and, hopefully, attendance at Sac Mtg) cannot be fudged in the application (bcuz MLS sources actual member records to create the counts), then how did God (GAs are inspired by God, remember) approve leaving my ward with 2 Cub Scouts, 7 Boy Scouts, 3 Priests, 9 HP (the new ward had 29), and about 20 Elders (new ward had 40)? The total Primary was left with about 40 kids. AND, all those numbers are not corrected by the % of each of those groups that actually attended church. The newly created ward initially had 52% avg attendance at sacrament meeting–down to the high 40% now. If our bishop had been involved he could have pointed out all these weaknesses in the SP plan–hence, the irreplaceable value of counseling with the bishop.
No, this was not the appropriate thing to do–even on paper–and SLC didn’t see that. Pardon my ranting, but it has been so very much harder than it should have been in my ward–driven by one man’s bias.
fbisti,
I can only speak to the one I was involved in. The two of us working on it tried to give consideration to all those factors you stated, not just MP and tithing. We had several scenarios to present and a recommendation. Since all the wards and branches were all about 35% activity, we expected to see about the same after the combination.
But, as I stated, it was all for naught because the Area President nixed it before it even got to SLC.
Hedge, I highly doubt Pres. Monson is involved in boundary changes. The approvals come at the area level and then approved by the GA in charge of that Area. In the US, that would be a Pres of 70, in other parts, like yours an Area president. The bureaucrats in SLC make the change at that point. But I am speculating a bit.
Jeff, I highly doubt it too. But our SP emphasised Pres Monson had had to sign it. He really emphasised the whole Pres Monson knows about this, when he addressed us. Sounded weird to me, but just reporting.
Midwest here…… Husband grew up driving 45 mn to church. About 10 years ago, a branch was formed within 15 mn of where he grew up. They met in schools for a few years. They eventually got a building of their own when they had a huge influx of Supervalu employees to an already growing area. It was a thriving ward for a few years. Now, many of the families and Supervalu employees have moved away, and it really isn’t a ‘ward’ anymore, but more branch size, and they’ve had to do some juggling. The inlaws teach both seminary and primary.
I think the division of wards is largely up to the people in charge trying to make the best decisions with limited data and conflicting goals. There are also unintended consequences.
A big example here in Salt Lake City has to do with the student wards up at the University of Utah. Having attended the University of Utah, I know that student attendance is pretty “fluid”. When I was there, I would sometimes attend my parents’ ward, sometimes a UofU student ward, sometimes a ward where a friend was having a farewell or homecoming, or even just a ward where I knew there would be some cute girls. We (my friends and I) typically attended every week, but to the Church, it probably looked like we were inactive because it was always somewhere different.
Several years ago, the Church decided that they wanted to be able to track the young adults better. They dissolved all the student wards at the University of Utah except 6 – which are restricted to only those people actually living in the dorms on campus. All of the young adults were then supposed to attend geographically-based wards in the valley, with whoever happened to live in that area – whether they were going to the U, going to other schools, just working, or just in between things. And because they didn’t want to compete with the valley wards, the Church dissolved all of the LDS social clubs on campus as well.
Now fast forward a few years. While they can “track them better”, kids are dropping out. They don’t want to go to the same ward with kids they went to high school with – they want to go with UofU students. Many of my children’s friends have become “pseudo-active”, for lack of a better term, and many LDS kids are now going to other schools. The % of LDS at the University of Utah is now under 20% (from closer to 50%). It’s really sad to see.
“The two of us working on it tried to give consideration to all those factors you stated, not just MP and tithing.”
I’m surprised at the notion of only two people working on it. We’ve had various divisions and additions since I have lived here, and the method has always included a committee made of both men and women, from families at all stages to consider the impact on car pooling etc. The members were partly chosen for their ability to keep the specifics private. These committees met several times leading up to a re-drawing, and I assumed it was standard practice.
Of course the final submission was up to the stake president, and final approval from up the line–but folks always felt that rank-and-file had given input, which helped with buy-in at implementation.
kt, teaching seminary and primary sounds like very hard work. Sounds like an area very susceptible to demographic change.
Mike S. “I think the division of wards is largely up to the people in charge trying to make the best decisions with limited data and conflicting goals.”
I don’t think that’s incompatible with use of an overall strategy, be that within an individual stake or area – how these things might assist or hinder in the area plan for instance. But maybe I just like to see patterns in these things.
I can’t imagine that tracking them better as an aim is going to go down well with students, or anyone really. Sounds like it would have been better to let them carry on ward hopping.
Naismith, thanks for that interesting addition. Perhaps it’s down to the local leaders who they consult/ask to look at it. I’ve no idea who was consulted here. I’m glad some of these working groups consult women as well as men.
“but folks always felt that rank-and-file had given input, which helped with buy-in at implementation.”
That sounds like a good way of doing things. I don’t know that the rank and file ever felt this way in any of the changes I’ve experienced. More in the way of a sudden announcement with a weeks notice that “something” would be happening. Maybe I’m just not part of the in crowd that would know, but most people seemed not to know, and those who were given callings in the new ward were interviewed the day of the announcement, and asked not to say anything to anyone even for the next hour, so that the SP could do the announcing.
(Late to the party as usual.) Hedge, you said, But our SP emphasised Pres Monson had had to sign it. He really emphasised the whole Pres Monson knows about this, when he addressed us. Sounded weird to me, but just reporting.
I think it’s another example of our cultural predilection for claiming divine revelation for the most mundane and businesslike of decisions. Just like President Monson personally reviews and signs every mission call. (I had an MTC companion who was outraged at the thought that his call letter had been signed by autopen. 🙂 ) “The Lord has REVEALED TO ME that AngelSoft is the appropriate brand of toilet paper for chapels in this stake’s bathrooms! All in favor . . .”
You get the idea.
New Iconoclast, I do indeed. Our current crop of stake and ward leaders are in some respects very black and white in their views, or at least come across that way (SP, Bishop), that the things they say in some respects strike me as terrifyingly naive.
On the other hand they are also very dedicated, caring, and really want to do their best.