Since the announcement of the age change by
President Monson a year ago, the response
has been absolutely remarkable.
At the time there were about 58,000 missionaries
in the field.
Right now there are approaching 80,000 missionaries
in the field.
There’s hundreds more couples out serving
than there were a year ago.
Every group of young missionaries is up significantly.
There are significantly more sister missionaries
serving now than there were before.
It's gone from about 15 percent of the missionary
force to about 24 percent during this past
year.
There's about 11,000 more sister missionaries
serving than there was a year ago.
This rising generation is saying, "I can go.
I can see how this will fit into my life."
And so they're making their plans accordingly.
They're structuring their education, their
work opportunities and other things so that
they can go.
And they're planning from their Young Women
years to go.
And although it's not an obligation, it's
clear that many young women are choosing missionary
service as something they want to do.
And when one chooses that out of the desire
of their hearts, they make wonderful, wonderful
missionaries.
We hope that everybody remembers that not
only did President Monson call for more young
missionaries, but he invited those who were
approaching retirement age, as their circumstances
and health would allow, to leave home and
family and to dedicate a period of time to
couple missionary service.
And so we hope that hundreds more — thousands
more — will accept that invitation, and
we certainly have wonderful places for them
to work.
To me I think the thing that I will always
remember has been this response by a group
of young people, thousands of them, tens of
thousands of them, as they listen to a prophet
and then simply said, "Yes, I'll do it."
And for me I'll never forget that.
Whether it be the internal staff here at the
Missionary Department, or even whether it
be the response by the Quorum of the Twelve
Apostles who make — still make — every
single missionary call, everyone has worked
to meet the need in a very timely manner.
And as a result, there is no difference in
the amount of time that it takes from the
time a stake president submits the calls until
the time someone receives their call.
This younger group of missionaries is absolutely
wonderful.
They are coming in anxious to learn; they
are coming in in response to a call from the
prophet of God.
They are coming in having, in many cases,
their senior year in high school having been
far different than what they ever imagined
it would be, where they have focused all year
long on getting ready for missionary service.
They're coming in wanting to learn and wanting
to serve.
They are younger.
But they are worthy and they are able and
they're anxious to serve, and it's been an
absolute joy working with them.
Before the announcement there were 48 countries
where it was already permitted for 18 year
old young men who had graduated from high
school to begin missionary service.
… Really it's the United States and North
America which is coming into sync with some
of the rest of the world.
Well, when you have a lot more missionaries
coming in, certain changes needed to be done.
… At the Provo MTC, as an example, we've
developed what we call the West Campus, some
facilities from BYU, which BYU has made available
to us.
And in addition to that, an apartment complex
which has been converted.
… The international MTCs are all running
at capacity now.
And wherever we've been able to increase the
capacity in those MTCs, those projects have
been undertaken or ongoing.
Perhaps the biggest change, though, is not
just the numbers and physically where we put
people, but we've looked at our entire training
model and reduced training time at the MTCs
by about 30 percent — whether you're learning
a language or not learning a language.
And that has allowed not only a greater number
of missionaries to go through, but allowed
us to really look at our training model and
see if there's some things we can do to improve.
At the newly created missionary training center
in Mexico we're seeing wonderful things happen.
In addition to Mexican missionaries and some
missionaries from Latin America being trained
there who already speak Spanish as their native
language, we have many North Americans who
are not going to serve in Mexico going to
Mexico City now and being able to learn Spanish
in a Spanish speaking country in Mexico at
the new MTC in Mexico City.
It's a wonderful blessing.
As mission presidents receive larger groups
of missionaries, one of the things they've
had to do is learn how to adapt.
But the idea that we treat every missionary
as an individual worthy, wonderful young servant
of God remains true no matter how we have
to adapt to larger numbers.
The wife of a mission president now is far
more involved than she was before.
Always, of course, that's subject to their
individual family circumstances and their
personal circumstances.
But that said, particularly with larger numbers
of sister missionaries, we are so grateful
for the personal involvement of the mission
president's wife, working with, training,
helping resolve concerns, whatever it might
be with regard to sister missionaries.
It seemed appropriate, given the large increase
in the number of missionaries, including a
large increase in the number of sister missionaries,
to look at the way missions are managed.
… So now the mission president's wife, the
sister training leaders, together with the
zone leaders, the assistants, and the mission
president, compose what is called the mission
leadership council.
They meet together monthly; they counsel together
about the needs of the mission.
They discuss problems, and we are observing
just as in every other level of the Church
that when men and women of faith counsel together,
there is a much better result than when we
do it any other way.
We are profoundly grateful to the membership
of the Church for responding faithfully in
tithes and offerings and, more recently and
significantly, to President Monson's invitation
to make generous contributions toward missionary
funds and to the general missionary fund of
the Church.
Those funds are being utilized to assist missionaries
that otherwise would not be able to afford
missionary service.
Elder Nelson made the comment in a recent
conference address that for those couples
that are not yet able to serve, or perhaps
might not ever be able to serve, they could
send their dollars on missions.
And that was consistent with President Monson's
more direct invitation to contribute specifically
to the general missionary fund of the Church.
And we hope that everybody will continue to
respond to that because that's the way that
thousands upon thousands of missionaries are
able to be supported.
Missionary work is core to the fundamental
purposes of the Restoration of the gospel.
And so we view this as a time when the Lord
has made available the resources to support
the missionary fund and also the resource
to do the work of salvation.
Social media and technology is a wonderful
development for missionary work.
The first thing to remember is that missionaries
will do what they've always done, which is
that they will preach the gospel.
… They'll be able to communicate in ways
that they haven't been able to before.
And so missionaries in many test missions
have been using social media, primarily Facebook,
to communicate with ward members, ward mission
leaders, bishops, investigators, new members,
the less-active and others.
And it's proven to be very, very effective.
We view this development as one of the most
significant things to have happened in missionary
work.
But again, it's a tool to accomplish the purpose
of the work of salvation and preaching the
gospel.
It's not in and of itself something that's
going to change.
Missionaries are still going to preach the
gospel; the number of tools that they have
available to them is going to expand.
We hope for greater communication, not just
by Facebook, but by using a range of tools
that are going to become available.
Some of it will be social media; some of it
will be access to devices which will allow
for communication, something like a small
tablet device or perhaps a smartphone in some
parts of the world.
The implementation will not be the same everywhere.
In some parts of the world there's robust
Internet access, and in some parts of the
world there's not.
The rollout is underway.
We're still in a test mode.
But by sometime next year, in 2014, we anticipate
that this technology and the use of digital
devices will begin to be broadly available
throughout all of the world where it's safe
to do so and where we can legally do so.
Missionary work is an act of love.
It's a free-will offering whether you're an
elder or a sister.
There is no compulsion in the Church of Jesus
Christ.
Part of that active love, wherever you go,
is to serve the people wherever you're serving.
And when that is done with the proper motivation
of just wanting to help and be of service,
without any expectation of reward, what we
find is that the people love the missionaries
and the missionaries love the people.
And there is a bond that is developed that
perhaps can't be developed in any other way.
At times we provide the service and get nothing
back.
At times we provide the service and what we
receive back is the love and the affection
of those people that we've served.
I think that this is a time of great enthusiasm,
not just by a young generation rising up and
saying “Yes, I'll go on a mission,” but
by members and their leaders understanding
that now is the time to … further every
aspect of the work of salvation.
