Aaronic priesthood boys can now baptize in the temple

[Corsair]

Mormon Church Changes Rules for Temple Baptisms, Allowing Male Youth to Officiate in Ordinances

This is from the First Presidency letter dated 14 December 2017:

Under the direction of the temple presidency, young women (ages 12-18) with a limited-use temple
recommend may assist with baptistry assignments currently performed by sister temple ordinance
workers and volunteers.

Under the direction of the temple presidency, all priests in the Aaronic Priesthood with a limited-use
temple recommend may officiate in baptisms for the dead, including serving as the baptizer and as a
witness. Bestowing the gift of the Holy Ghost continues to be solely a Melchizedek Priesthood function.

You may be wondering, "What can the Young Women now do in temples?" The answer is: hand out towels.

Actually, I can think of a number of ways this will be helpful to the LDS church like increasing the devotion of many youth. Also, it will hilariously backfire in certain situations. Unfortunately, "Studio C" is unlikely to do a sketch on this.

[slavereeno]

Wow, I see them really doubling down on the youth in any way they can. They must be worried about loosing them.

[MoPag]

You may be wondering, "What can the Young Women now do in temples?" The answer is: hand out towels.

How do they not realize how stupid, pathetic and insulting this sounds? Why even mention the YW at all? Why not just ignore them like they usually do? Is this really the COB's idea of equality? I saw this stupid announcement all over FB last night-Happy TBMs sharing this great news! What they don't realize it that all their non-members friends are probably appalled at the blatant sexism.

Special shout out to COB spies--- This is embarrassing!!!

[Corsair]

I am going to actually volunteer to assist with the next youth temple night in my ward. It's going to be amusing to see the young men jockeying to perform the baptisms of some of the more popular young women. I'm sure that the issues will eventually work themselves out, but this transition period will be entertaining.

[Jeffret]

This would really make me wonder what in the world church leaders are thinking, but it's pretty clear that they're not. Or perhaps more accurately, that their primary thinking is how to shore up the privileges and powers they hold. Serving people, dealing with issues, or actually doing something about retention are clearly not high on the list.

Yes, I'm sure that this will help strengthen some people's devotion to the church, but it will also create more issues for others. The young women definitely get socialized in the Church into accepting their role in it as second-class citizens, with no regard, consideration, or power. But society is shifting and girls in society are receiving and pursuing more equality and better treatment. The whole #MeToo campaign and Time Magazine's person of the year is just one aspect, but they've been quite significant. I don't see including girls in a revamped Temple and Priesthood Preparation class will do all that much to convince them they're not being slighted. The disparities in their temple activities will be quite stark. Before, their temple roles were pretty similar, sit around and wait for a while for your turn, get dunked a number of times, and then get hands on your head. Now, the differences are going to be stark. Admittedly, it will do a better job of teaching them their expected roles at a younger age, but it will do so as society shifts around them and at an age of their greatest growth towards independence and rebellion.

I don't see how this can be a net positive for their retention of girls, which is reportedly getting quite dire. For that matter, I don't see it being a net positive for their retention of boys, either. And churches that do a poor job of retaining the girls / women do a poor job of retaining the boys / men.

[Red Ryder]

This just reflects the pool of worthy melchezidick men attending the temple continues to shrink!

I imagine the conversation with the Q15 and Temple Presidencies went like this:

Temple People: let's limit the number of baptisms the youth can do to 5 per session.

Q15: no, no, that will slow down the work!

Temple People: well than what do you suggest?

Q15: uh... Let us pray about it!

Outside consulting firm: Let the 16 year old boys do it. They can already baptize outside of the temple, right? Let them do it inside the temple since it's the fake priesthood and same ordinance! No doctrinal changes we have to walk back in the next PR meetings.

Q15: that's a genius idea! Why didn't we come up with that?

Q15 to Temple People: we've prayed about it and the 16 year old boys will do it!

Temple People: that's brilliant! We thank thee o god for a prophet!

Temple People: what should the girls do?

Q15: let them hand out towels?

Seriously this is a non issue. They can already baptize people so let them baptize dead people too!

[FiveFingerMnemonic]

I read somewhere that organizations with serious problems often make increasingly irrational decisions as time goes on and the issues aren't resolved. It sure feels sometimes as if that is what is occurring these days. Unintended consequences occurring from what they think are inspired decisions.

[MerrieMiss]

You may be wondering, "What can the Young Women now do in temples?" The answer is: hand out towels.

How do they not realize how stupid, pathetic and insulting this sounds? Why even mention the YW at all? Why not just ignore them like they usually do? Is this really the COB's idea of equality? I saw this stupid announcement all over FB last night-Happy TBMs sharing this great news! What they don't realize it that all their non-members friends are probably appalled at the blatant sexism.

Special shout out to COB spies--- This is embarrassing!!!

Yes. As a teenager in the 90s, I was always put off by the "you're so special" rhetoric. Stop telling me I'm special. You know who gets told they're special? People who aren't special.

Young women (ages 12-18) will now have the opportunity to “assist with baptistry assignments currently performed by sister temple ordinance workers and volunteers.” This can include helping individuals to assignments, scheduling (presumably), making sure everything is running smoothly, passing out towels at the baptistry, and others. Young Women’s leaders the world over will rejoice.

Who writes this crap? It's so hokey.

[FiveFingerMnemonic]

Do the young women get to take underwear sizes and hand out hanes briefs to the boys too? That would be awesome!

[Red Ryder]

MerrieMiss,

You're special! Own it girl!. Just own it.

[wtfluff]

...increasing the devotion of many youth...

I think this is the crux of the "new" news.

Just like reducing the mission age, this is about trying to keep the youth busy on the hamster wheel that is mormonism, so that they don't have time to figure out that they are actually on a useless hamster wheel that takes 10% of their income, and probably even more of their time, and literally steals their identity.

Don't be surprised if some kids get "callings" to "work" on the temple-hamster-wheel a few hours each week.

[Red Ryder]

The letter also states the Priesthood Preview for 11 year olds will change to include the girls. It will be called the Temple and Priesthood Preparation meeting"

The Primary’s Priesthood Preview meeting will be modified to include both 11-year-old boys and girls and will be called the Temple and Priesthood Preparation meeting. This will be an opportunity for priesthood, Primary, and youth leaders to help girls and boys, and their parents, understand the significant blessings of temple service, priesthood service, and making and keeping sacred covenants. For more information, see Primary.lds.org.

Why don't they just marry all the 12 year olds? I mean to each other... To each other!

[Jeffret]

Don't be surprised if some kids get "callings" to "work" on the temple-hamster-wheel a few hours each week.

I have a hard time believing the net effect of that will be positive for the church.

[moksha]

I am going to actually volunteer to assist with the next youth temple night in my ward. It's going to be amusing to see the young men jockeying to perform the baptisms of some of the more popular young women. I'm sure that the issues will eventually work themselves out, but this transition period will be entertaining.

We all know that when white pants poke out it is from air bubbles in the water.

[Rob4Hope]

Trying to let younger people participate is a double-down--they are trying to show new things so they can keep people hungry and attached.

JS did that: when people started to waffle, he came up with some new more grand plan or program. The church is doing the same thing, and this DOES have an impact on the youth.

[wtfluff]

Don't be surprised if some kids get "callings" to "work" on the temple-hamster-wheel a few hours each week.

I have a hard time believing the net effect of that will be positive for the church.

Which makes me wonder: Do you think that the board of directors for the Corporation of the President would say that the missionary age change has had a net positive effect on "the church"?

[Corsair]

I have a hard time believing the net effect of that will be positive for the church.

Sure, but It is positive for the church right now. My Facebook page lit up with all the excited believers anticipating new devotion from 16-18 year old boys. The excitement for the girls feels a little bit forced, but I'm sure that many will enjoy doing administrative work or being on towel duty. Certainly it will be positive for many, particularly the pre-missionary young men and women wanting something new(?) to do with temple worship. I think it will produce a positive effect for the LDS church for a while until teenagers see the insider mystique of the temple slowly dissolve in front of them.

The Gilbert, AZ temple is quite close to my house. I have ward friends who work there in various capacities. One devout man in my ward manages the baptistry several hours a week. During the first year of the temple (2014) the baptistry was constantly used and it could be a two wait with loads of excited teenagers waiting to perform proxy ordinances. The next year it was busy, but the wait was down to 10 minutes or so. By 2016 it was always easy to get in the baptistry and this past year he has been disappointed by how quiet it is most of the time. Another ward friend is a shift worker for endowments. He regularly urges people to attend the temple because he feels slightly, personally responsible for all the ordinance workers on his shift when it is lightly attended or worse, empty.

Let the believers enjoy this small policy change. My wife came excitedly bounding into my office last night to tell me this news. I think I got in a bit of trouble when I was not sufficiently excited along with her. There is no need to rain on their parade when the teenagers do it for them over the next year or two as the excitement wears off.

[tearjerker]

Several years ago our ward would be assigned our youth temple nights by the temple (also sealing assignments, and ward temple nights).

At the time, our youth attending those sessions would number from 10 to close to 30, a large number for our area.

We actually had a harder time raising the required PH for those sessions, than finding youth willing to attend. We were about an hour away from the temple, and if we attended on a Friday night we usually ended up at a pizza place afterwards, and it became a youth outing better than most other activities available.

Needing 2 witnesses, 3 in the confirmation room, 1 recorder, usually 2-3 for baptisms, (and 2-3 ladies to hand out towels and help in the changing room) adult staffing was our major issue. Now that number is cut in half?

This change may be more about staffing problems than the perceived advantages to the youth involved. If you need less adults to attend with the youth, it may be easier to get enough adult supervision and/or drivers to get the kids to the temple.

Supposedly our temple spends up to 1 million dollars a year for maintenance and upkeep, so whatever it takes to keep these places busy will be important to SLC. If you look at the schedules for some of the smaller temples, they have very limited hours during the week. Even here there are sessions where the temple needs to assign workers to attend a session just to make the prayer circle viable.

[Thoughtful]

Wow, I see them really doubling down on the youth in any way they can. They must be worried about loosing them.

Well, they're about to lose my 3, based on this policy change.

[Jeffret]

Wow, I see them really doubling down on the youth in any way they can. They must be worried about loosing them.

Well, they're about to lose my 3, based on this policy change.

Could you clarify?