New LDS Seminary Curriculum

[Tannhauser_1509]

I read an article recently on the official website for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: “Seminaries to Implement New Doctrinal Mastery Initiative”. Click on the link to read the full article.

Does anyone think that the church, in making these changes, is responding to a new generation of youth who are tired of the convoluted and sentimental answers church officials often give to inquirers within the faith? Does anyone think these are the first steps toward an official consolidation of LDS doctrine in an attempt to enter into better dialogue with the teachings of other religions?

What I’m used to now is my Mormon peers pretending that they have everything in common with me and/or that their doctrines are actually more substantial than everybody else’s.

 

[Chris-WA]

I read an article recently on the official website for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: “Seminaries to Implement New Doctrinal Mastery Initiative”. Click on the link to read the full article.

Does anyone think that the church, in making these changes, is responding to a new generation of youth who are tired of the convoluted and sentimental answers church officials often give to inquirers within the faith? Does anyone think these are the first steps toward an official consolidation of LDS doctrine in an attempt to enter into better dialogue with the teachings of other religions?

What I’m used to now is my Mormon peers pretending that they have everything in common with me and/or that their doctrines are actually more substantial than everybody else’s.

The church probably won’t come out and say it directly, but this is more likely an attempt to stop the bleeding of LDS leaving in droves due to members learning the real history of the church online. The churches worst nightmare is a mass exodus of its youth, so they are trying to innoculate members against the vast amount of info they are getting from the internet. The new curriculum will probably follow the lead of the recent church essays about the more controversial topics that have led so many LDS out of the church. And just like the essays, they can’t be totally honest because if they were people would be really lining up to leave.

 

[thephilosopher6]

Yep, this is another desperate attempt to keep their youth from leaving. Indeed, in a world where information can be accessed so easily, young Mormons are now learning that everything they were taught while growing up isn’t exactly in line with facts. Now, the LDS church has to find a new way to twist and distort the facts in order to keep them in line with their beliefs and teachings.

 

[Marie5890]

It’s to inoculate the upcoming generations.
Mormonism, like many other denominations, are loosing members at a high rate. However for them, it has to do with the reality that they were not forthcoming with the real history of the LDS church.

The information age, internet, has been educated their younger people when they would not.

There is an LDS poster here who is younger, and by their posts, I can tell that they are unaware of what the LDS church used to teach, (or at least, keeps chalking it up to the old and worn out excuse of “it’s their opinion”) and now, have changed those teachings. So I am thinking that at some level, the more recent pivots are working.

 

[RebeccaJ]

There is an LDS poster here who is younger, and by their posts, I can tell that they are unaware of what the LDS church used to teach, (or at least, keeps chalking it up to the old and worn out excuse of “it’s their opinion”) and now, have changed those teachings. So I am thinking that at some level, the more recent pivots are working.

I see it as behavior control, by hoping that young minds can be inoculated against being inquisitive. It’s only going to deepen the feelings of betrayal, when the inoculation wears off.

 

[Marie5890]

I see it as behavior control, by hoping that young minds can be inoculated against being inquisitive. It’s only going to deepen the feelings of betrayal, when the inoculation wears off.

True

 

[NeuroTypical]

“…more likely an attempt to stop the bleeding of LDS leaving in droves…”
“…another desperate attempt to keep their youth from leaving…”
“…Mormonism, like many other denominations, are loosing members at a high rate…”

 

[Marie5890]

“…more likely an attempt to stop the bleeding of LDS leaving in droves…”
“…another desperate attempt to keep their youth from leaving…”
“…Mormonism, like many other denominations, are loosing members at a high rate…”

http://i64.tinypic.com/119cf9f.png

Are you saying that graph represents active Mormons?? Really?? Just because someone is on the books, doesn’t make them a believer

cumorah.com/index.php

 

[NeuroTypical]

Are you saying that graph represents active Mormons??

Nope - not sure how you saw me saying that. I thought I was pretty clearly responding to quoted comments on this thread claiming we’re bleeding, leaving in droves, loosing [sic] members at a high rate.

Was there a problem with the quote function or something? I can see those quotes quite clearly on my post…

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

“…more likely an attempt to stop the bleeding of LDS leaving in droves…”
“…another desperate attempt to keep their youth from leaving…”
“…Mormonism, like many other denominations, are loosing members at a high rate…”

http://i64.tinypic.com/119cf9f.png

pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/04/23/why-muslims-are-the-worlds-fastest-growing-religious-group/

You have no idea how much I hate religions flashing their growth charts.

Just because a group may experience net growth does not mean it’s okay not to take seriously the people leaving.

 

[NeuroTypical]

You have no idea how much I hate religions flashing their growth charts.

Ummmm… ok… So, hi Gavin, my screen name is NeuroTypical. I’m not a religion, I’m a guy who lives in Colorado. My real name is Rob. I made this chart by cutting and pasting raw data into Excel and using the chart function.

If I did something to come across as a “religion”, or “flashing” the chart, I apologize. Surely there’s enough hate in the world already, I don’t want to provoke any more…

As for not taking those who leave seriously, not sure how you got that out of my post either. I didn’t address them at all. Was just responding (as I tried to clarify with my last post) to some of the comments in this thread.

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

Ummmm… ok… So, hi Gavin, my screen name is NeuroTypical. I’m not a religion, I’m a guy who lives in Colorado. My real name is Rob. I made this chart by cutting and pasting raw data into Excel and using the chart function.

If I did something to come across as a “religion”, or “flashing” the chart, I apologize. Surely there’s enough hate in the world already, I don’t want to provoke any more…

As for not taking those who leave seriously, not sure how you got that out of my post either. I didn’t address them at all. Was just responding (as I tried to clarify with my last post) to some of the comments in this thread.

Well, I was not the one claiming that Mormons are leaving the church in “droves,” mostly because I don’t believe in membership statistics per se as proving anything about an organization. I care much more about the underlying causes of growth or decay. What I meant to address on this thread was the general state of the youth in the LDS Church; their being members does not automatically make them people of faith.

And yes, I actually thought that religion as an abstract entity was behind your screen name. (Not really.)

But I can, indeed, say that a “religion” is the source of those figures, however you illustrated the raw data, because the LDS Church is the only organization that knows their own membership statistics. I found the very same numbers on a Wikipedia article with the references linking to LDS sources.

 

[thephilosopher6]

“…more likely an attempt to stop the bleeding of LDS leaving in droves…”
“…another desperate attempt to keep their youth from leaving…”
“…Mormonism, like many other denominations, are loosing members at a high rate…”

http://i64.tinypic.com/119cf9f.png

Many Mormons today claim to be “cultural Mormons.” They don’t believe in the teachings of the LDS church but they remain apart of it because their family has been apart of it and it’s their cultural identity.

 

[RebeccaJ]

“…more likely an attempt to stop the bleeding of LDS leaving in droves…”
“…another desperate attempt to keep their youth from leaving…”
“…Mormonism, like many other denominations, are loosing members at a high rate…”

http://i64.tinypic.com/119cf9f.png

I’m sure, with 85000 missionaries out and about, the number of people on the LDS membership lists continue to grow, but this is not a measurement of youth activity and retention. The numbers I keep seeing around, on LDS and non-LDS sites, are around 35% active in the US and 10% in Latin America.

Missionaries still have an issue with “baseball baptisms”, as reported a few weeks ago where Mormon missionaries in Mexico were detained by police when they tried to baptize 3 young boys without their parent’s consent. In this case, the kids were promised candy and soft drinks. Gotta get those numbers!! But these types of baptisms are paper only. The baptized never learned anything about Mormonism and certainly have never been active in the Mormon religion. But there they are, counted in your graph.

I remain unimpressed with the LDS self-proclaimed growth, as it is obviously ignoring facts that contradict the numbers. It’s along the same inoculation for the Mormon youth. Just keep saying “We’re Growing!”, and of course, that means All Is Well, All Is Well.

 

[RebeccaJ]

I read an article recently on the official website for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: “Seminaries to Implement New Doctrinal Mastery Initiative”. Click on the link to read the full article.

Does anyone think that the church, in making these changes, is responding to a new generation of youth who are tired of the convoluted and sentimental answers church officials often give to inquirers within the faith? Does anyone think these are the first steps toward an official consolidation of LDS doctrine in an attempt to enter into better dialogue with the teachings of other religions?

What I’m used to now is my Mormon peers pretending that they have everything in common with me and/or that their doctrines are actually more substantial than everybody else’s.

Maybe they’re trying to make seminary more interesting, because, back in the day, I thought I was going to die of boredom. D.I.E. I say.

But seriously, I mainly sat there thinking the teachers were full of it. Skipped going for several months, until the seminary teacher informed my bishop who then informed my dad, who then informed me I was going. So I did, and continued to think the entire time that I wasn’t on board with what was being taught.

The Mormon history part, was mainly, how wonder Joseph Smith was and how awful “The Saints” had it. Which, I highly doubt, will change.

 

[Tarquin]

Does anyone think that the church, in making these changes, is responding to a new generation of youth who are tired of the convoluted and sentimental answers church officials often give to inquirers within the faith? Does anyone think these are the first steps toward an official consolidation of LDS doctrine in an attempt to enter into better dialogue with the teachings of other religions?

No, I do not. Every few years, curricula in various organizations is updated, or at times a big announcement comes of a major improvement. The major ones I’ve seen have been format changes.

This time, however, there may be an additional change. The “ten doctrinal points” have been a part of seminary for a while.

Acquire Spiritual Knowledge
The Godhead
The plan of salvation
The Atonement of Jesus Christ
The Restoration
Prophets
Priesthood and priesthood keys
Ordinances and covenants
Marriage and family
Commandments

These are foci, variously, in the four years of seminary - Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and Church History. (I think I got those right.) Then the Church site lists three “principles”:

Acting in faith
Examining concepts and questions with an eternal perspective
Seeking further understanding through divinely appointed sources

These three 'principles" are taught in all church settings, and in personal meetings (“interviews”) as the need requires, which includes seminary and institute classes.

Actually, the ability of students to engage in apologetics for their religion is somewhat weakened as memorization of scriptures supporting their views is reduced or eliminated: “The new Doctrinal Mastery will replace Scripture Mastery—where students memorize specific scriptures throughout the standard works—and will still coordinate with the book of scripture students are studying that year.” If in fact “Doctrinal Mastery” involves reasoning about doctrines and passages brought up by others, that would be a good thing, but I’ll have to see it in action before I can tell if that is what is happening. “That means Doctrinal Mastery becomes topical, not sequential” - which sounds like the studies, the years of study, are to become four years of various “topics” rather than four years of four separate books (Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, History of the Church). There will, however, still be scripture references because the curriculum designers “figured out a way to get the scriptures in there …” They are starting with an undetermined portion of class time, but I can see how this could evolve into taking up the entire class time. “Time will tell.”

 

[Tarquin]

…whereas LDS Church records count anyone who has ever been baptized, demographers and pollsters count only those who currently identify themselves as Mormon." “self-identified adult Mormons make up not 2% but rather 1.4% of the adult US population—that’s about 4.4 million LDS adults.” “retention rates of young people (young men especially) raised Mormon have dropped substantially in the last decade: from 92.6% in the 1970s–2000s to 64.4% from 2000–2010. Rising rates of disaffiliation go a long way towards explaining the gap between LDS Church records and the ARIS population estimates.” (religiondispatches.org/mormon-numbers-not-adding-up/, 2012)

Another method for calculating numbers, which distinguishes between growth via conversion and growth via children born, is at mormoninformation.com/stats.htm

Wikipedia, not always reliable, offers the following chart related to changing rate of growth:
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/LDSvsWorld10YearMA.png

Huffington Post argues that as the federal government changes how it counts “unemployed” and “cost of living,” so the Mormon Church changes how it counts membership numbers: huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/05/how-did-mormons-grow-so-f_n_1479579.html

Another set of analyses, sometimes favoring the Mormon claims of greater growth, are at:
fullerconsideration.com/membership.php and at fullerconsideration.com/membershipmethodology.php

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

No, I do not. Every few years, curricula in various organizations is updated, or at times a big announcement comes of a major improvement. The major ones I’ve seen have been format changes.

This time, however, there may be an additional change. The “ten doctrinal points” have been a part of seminary for a while.

Acquire Spiritual Knowledge
The Godhead
The plan of salvation
The Atonement of Jesus Christ
The Restoration
Prophets
Priesthood and priesthood keys
Ordinances and covenants
Marriage and family
Commandments

These are foci, variously, in the four years of seminary - Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and Church History. (I think I got those right.) Then the Church site lists three “principles”:

Acting in faith
Examining concepts and questions with an eternal perspective
Seeking further understanding through divinely appointed sources

These three 'principles" are taught in all church settings, and in personal meetings (“interviews”) as the need requires, which includes seminary and institute classes.

Actually, the ability of students to engage in apologetics for their religion is somewhat weakened as memorization of scriptures supporting their views is reduced or eliminated: “The new Doctrinal Mastery will replace Scripture Mastery—where students memorize specific scriptures throughout the standard works—and will still coordinate with the book of scripture students are studying that year.” If in fact “Doctrinal Mastery” involves reasoning about doctrines and passages brought up by others, that would be a good thing, but I’ll have to see it in action before I can tell if that is what is happening. “That means Doctrinal Mastery becomes topical, not sequential” - which sounds like the studies, the years of study, are to become four years of various “topics” rather than four years of four separate books (Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, History of the Church). There will, however, still be scripture references because the curriculum designers “figured out a way to get the scriptures in there …” They are starting with an undetermined portion of class time, but I can see how this could evolve into taking up the entire class time. “Time will tell.”

If your claim is that you think this new curriculum will, by and large, weaken students’ apologetic prowess—as you said, “the ability of students to engage in apologetics …] is somewhat weakened as memorization of scriptures supporting their views is reduced or eliminated”—then what is the church’s aim?

It’s still early, and hard to say; I understand that. We have yet to see these changes implemented. I’ll take this upcoming school year to glean from seminary students whether they are hearing about contrasting viewpoints to the doctrinal particulars the teachers raise in class, and how they’re being taught to engage with the teachings of their church with seriousness and a genuine inquisitive attitude: as the article itself states:
"[Students] are being asked these questions by their peers and they are seeing them all the time—daily, hourly on social media—so those questions have become part of their lives,” Elder Clark said. “This is something they are getting every single day and so we felt strongly that we needed to create seminary as a place questions were not only welcome, but embraced. We engage questions, and then we learn how to work with our students to address their questions in a way that not only helps them find answers, if there are answers, but helps them learn a process that equips them as individuals to be spiritually self-reliant.”

 

[gazelam]

Are you saying that graph represents active Mormons?? Really?? Just because someone is on the books, doesn’t make them a believer

cumorah.com/index.php

One-tenths of all Americans describe themsleves are “former Catholics”. See pewresearch.org/daily-number/americas-former-catholics/. Has the RCC removed those people from their books? Or do they a keep record of them in the hope that they’ll return?

 

[Tannhauser_1509]

One-tenths of all Americans describe themsleves are “former Catholics”. See pewresearch.org/daily-number/americas-former-catholics/. Has the RCC removed those people from their books? Or do they a keep record of them in the hope that they’ll return?

The Catholic Church in the United States has noted this statistic, and is always seeking new evangelistic as well as catechetical remedies to this disconcerting trend in American religious culture. What’s the parallel you’re drawing, exactly?

Has the Catholic Church “removed those people from the books” in the since that she invalidates their baptism? No. They’ll always be on the books in that regard. But does the Church still see it as a serious problem worth taking measures to resolve? Yes.

Which, strangely but not really, brings us back to the OP: is the LDS Church taking legitimate measures to address the issue of their youth not retaining active participation in the faith?