Youth

Each month, LDS youth around the world study a different doctrinal principle that is coordinated across Young Men, Young Women, and youth Sunday School classes. The topic for August is Commandments. The youth will learn how obedience to Heavenly Father’s commandments affects their happiness in this life and their progression toward eternal life in the world to come. As youth keep the commandments and continually repent, they will manifest their love for the Lord and keep themselves free from worldly influences.

Since moving back to a family ward I have spent most of my time working with the youth. Other than a brief stint as a Relief Society teacher (cushiest calling ever…) I have either worked in the Sunday School with the 14-15 year olds or as the Laurels advisor. I found Sunday School to be particularly challenging, both because the mixing of genders often changes the dynamic, and because you tend to have less of a personal relationship with the kids than if you work in the Young Women/Men organization. To make matters worse, when I was teaching Sunday School we were still using the Gospel Doctrine manual, which had no suggested activities and was in no way tailored to help teachers reach teenagers. I like to think my frequent complaining letters about this through lds.org helped them move toward the new curriculum. The women of Exponent II were having a conversation on the backlist about how to work with youth and there were so many good ideas that we decided to make it into a post. Many of these ideas come from the other bloggers. If you readers have any more ideas of how to make church more engaging for teenagers, we would love to hear them.

Enrollment for the youth religious education program of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has increased some 4 percent in the past year to reach over 390,000 — the highest enrollment ever. The seminary program, created over 100 years ago, now reaches teenagers in 150 countries. Seminary is a four-year religious educational program for high school-age students run by the Church. It is open to teenagers of all faiths and is taught in a variety of formats. Seminary program enrollment has grown steadily for the past few years, but this school year’s increase is more than double that of the previous one.

Young women dressed in bright spring colors filled the choir seats of the Conference Center in Salt Lake City as Church leaders addressed a capacity crowd—as well as Church members worldwide via satellite—during the annual General Young Women Meeting March 30. The entire First Presidency—President Thomas S. Monson, President Henry B. Eyring, and President Dieter F. Uchtdorf—attended the event, where President Uchtdorf and the Young Women general presidency spoke.

In a world where movie stars, pop culture, and reality television are defining standards of beauty and dress, Latter-day Saint women should be distinct and different, say general auxiliary leaders of the Church. The way Latter-day Saint women dress reflects an “outward understanding of an inward commitment,” said Sister Elaine S. Dalton, Young Women general president.

Some 2,000 youth received counsel from the Young Women general president March 23 on how they, like other Latter-day Saints, can be “saviors on Mount Zion.” Sister Elaine S. Dalton was the featured speaker at a family history youth devotional held in connection with the three-day RootsTech 2013 Family History and Technology Conference at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City. The devotional could be viewed live via Internet streaming.