A mission is not a natural act. This is something I believed long before I went with my companion and two other elders to an R-rated movie. (More about that later.) But I was reminded of this today when I saw our local missionaries’ car in the ward parking lot. Someone had written graffiti on the windows, making it look like high schoolers on their way to the homecoming football game. Instead of “Beat the Blue Devils”, or “Go Panthers!” it had LDS themes: “CTR” in a shield; “We’re Mormon Missionaries”; and my favorite, “We (heart) Mormon Girls.”
Yes, “We (heart) Mormon Girls.” Now, if that doesn’t inspire confidence in member-missionary relations, I don’t know what does.
Our missionaries are young, and they may even be immature enough to have decorated the car themselves, but I somehow doubt that it was their own graffiti. More likely, it was written on the car by the missionary fan club while the elders were in meetings. Still, it reminded me of my own mission experiences.
I went on my mission back before “the bar” was raised. If anything, it was as low as it had ever been. I went when males were called for 18 months, and with the way that transfers worked out, I served just 17. Granted, it seemed much longer than that, but still, the bar was low. Very low.
For instance, my mission president didn’t mind us seeing movies once a month, as long as they were “clean” movies. At the time, I didn’t even look at the marquis when we went to the small-town theater on P-Day and saw a matinee. There wasn’t much skin, but there was a lot of violence in that movie. It was a natural thing for four 20-yr-olds to do. The un-natural thing happened when one of the ward members came through the theater whispering, “Elders? Elders, where are you?” He wanted to take us to the district leaders’ baptism in a nearby town. Not finding us at the apartment, he looked around, asking himself where we might be. Seeing the theater down the street, he assumed we were there, despite the fact that it was an R-rated action flick playing. See, I told you the bar was low.
So I’m going to cut our missionaries some slack when I see their car decorated with graffiti, even if it is their own handiwork. Part of the reason is that I’m not looking to convert anybody. But the more important part is that a mission is not a natural act. As I recall, Joseph Smith himself said something to the effect that if you keep a spring wound too tightly, it will break. Even Elder G, the tightly-wound companion with whom I suffered tension headaches, loosened his spring when the next James Bond movie came out. Besides, the girls I heart are Mormon girls, too… although I never wrote it on my car windows.
We expect a lot of our missionaries, and rightly so, but sometimes we forget that they are just kids. I think sometimes members are too quick to judge them and too slow to help and nurture them.
My dad said it best. He said that he tries to treat the missionaries are he would want his kids treated on their missions. He’s had 4 that have served.
So with that in mind if I were to see “I [heart] mormon girls”, I’d probably laugh and take comfort that at least their looking forward to temple marriage.
Speaking of the sprint wound to tightly: What is the deal with not allowing members to feed the missionaries anymore? I don’t get it. Is this just in the Pacific NW? I know I would like my kids to be fed on their missions, and Lord know I couldn’t cook on my mission.
In our area, they aren’t even allowed to get meals and can only stop by if they present the Restoration message. Jeez, cut them some slack!
Hopefully they have lots of service to perform, because I feel certain that our ward has been tracted various times over and they won’t have much else to do! Not natural, indeed.
I believe it’s on a mission-by-mission basis. It sometimes changes with the change of mission presidents. I’ve lived in missions that have had no-feeding policies as well as missions that encourage member meals. I agree with you though, that I think we feeding the missionaries is a good thing–they have to eat anyway, right?
Great essay, Mike. You should send it to the Tribune. May be, Kirby will get it published for you.
I think you make some good points, Mike. I know the bar was not set very high in my mission.
Anyway, the point I want to respond with, however, is kind of tangential: I do not think the bar has actually been raised. I think the number of missionaries dropped off before the alleged bar was raised, or was beginning to. Rather than admit that fewer Mormons were serving, the LDS religion claimed it was raising the bar, covering up the drop in missionaries. Well, that is my (conspiracy) theory, at least. What do you think?
I think the intent was indeed to raise the bar. As this mandate was given, so too were stricter guidelines for us to follow when interviewing the youth prior to their missions. A lot of emphasis began to present itself in the curriculum, and at least in our Stake, there were more interviews during the year or two before mission age than we had done previously.
Good question, SofP. It seems to me that the “raising the bar” effort might be both a recognition of changing demographics within the church (SofP’s view) and an effort to increase devotion, preparedness, or however one might put it (Tim’s view). Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t think that the church leadership are surprised by things such as the end of the baby-boom and the effect this has on church demographics, at least in the US. Of course, I don’t know what percentage of missionaries come from various regions in the church. I’m positive that the church research division analyzes such things, but we don’t have access to those numbers. (Maybe someone who studies missionary issues knows this kind of info?)
I remember the R-rated movies we went to see Michael. Hindsight is 20/20. We are a lot older and hopefully a little more mature and wiser(maybe not in my case) however, I wished we could live that part of our mission over again. Our mission president lent us an inch and unfortunately we took it 200 miles. Just a quick story on that. The first time I was introduced to an R-rated movie on our mission was through our District Leaders in the area we were both serving. I remember vividly that it was An Officer and a Gentlemen and needless to say there was plenty of skin and sexual content. In order to protect my innocence I remember our District Leaders covering our eyes during the dirty parts. WHAT WERE WE THINKING!!! WHY DIDN’T I WALK OUT OF THE THEATRE. DUH! Collosal mistakes but live and learn. I figure that I will need to go on a senior mission at some point in my life in order to make up for the youthful mistakes I made on ours! Great article and I love our full time missionaries!
While we are on the topic- (slight language warning)
I have to share with you one true quick story about a recent missionary. This Elder was giving a talk on following the teachings of Christ. Anyway, at one point in his talk he slipped up and said “You know, I’ve never been too an_l about keeping the commandments, but…”. The sudden realization on his part and the collective jaws dropping was more than he could take. He held out like a trooper though and completed his talk, but he asked to be transferred that week. Poor guy-I felt really bad for him.
Heinee, you didn’t walk out of the theater because you were 20 years old! That was my point. At that age, people aren’t really intended to be, well, all missionary-like. Even the GAs take off their ties once in a while. (What was the name of the GA who was in a 4-wheeler accident a few years ago? And if I remember right, it happened on a -gasp- Sunday.) No one is intended to go for prolonged periods of time with their spring tightly wound. Not 50- or 70-yr olds, and not 20-yr olds.
Its great to hear from you, heinee.