Building Janitorial Assignments

It’s hard to find people to fulfill the cleaning obligation, I get it, but the answer isn’t to go ahead and sign people up without their consent.

I’m also not a fan of the trick where they make an assignment (where you had no input whatsoever) and then tell you it’s also your responsibility to find a replacement if you can’t meet the obligation that you never agreed to.

Bishop [redacted], we can’t clean the building on our assigned Saturday. I’m assigning YOU that Saturday. If you can’t do it, it’s your responsibility to find a replacement. Then wipe your hands of it, just like they did when they sent that email.

IMO this is one of the things that tithing should go towards, upkeep of the building. It’s a crime that church HQ doesn’t reemploy more resources that they collect from local wards back into the local wards.

I’ve seen that assignment model in the past. It didn’t work. They’ll just end up with a bunch of no-shows and the results will be largely the same as they were before but with more resentful and guilt ridden members.

I’ve seen that assignment model in the past. It didn’t work. They’ll just end up with a bunch of no-shows and the results will be largely the same as they were before but with more resentful and guilt ridden members.

Yes, we haven’t gone to church in a few months since the ward consolidation, we didn’t make it to tithing settlement, and we are actively visiting another church with a more vibrant youth and young adult program (we are wanting to give my son exposure to other possible church communities as he prepares to fly the nest since it seems unlikely that he will be active LDS). That leads me to wonder, who all did they send this email to? If it is to everyone that they have email addresses for, do they really expect inactive and less active members to clean the church building?

I can only hope that when they make the actual assignments, they only include the active members. Otherwise, you end up with people assigned on paper that won’t be there (ghost assignments).

If for any reason you feel you should be exempt from this opportunity to serve, or choose not to participate, please let me or Bishop [redacted] know.

DW and I had a conversation about whether or not we should ask to be opted out of the assignment list. Unfortunately, that conversation would probably be super awkward and would raise more red flags on the Roy family than if we just stayed silent. I told my wife that if anyone asks, we can just say that we didn’t get the emails because of the spam filter. If they try to commit us to a particular date in person or over the phone then we can have pre-existing commitments on those dates.

IMO this is one of the things that tithing should go towards, upkeep of the building. It’s a crime that church HQ doesn’t reemploy more resources that they collect from local wards back into the local wards.

As a humorous aside, a few days ago I was contacted by the new family history leader to see if the company I work for might be interested in giving our old obsolete computers to the family history center to replace their even older set of computers. I refrained from asking her why the church doesn’t have enough money to buy new computers. :crazy:

The email probably goes out to everyone in the ward but I’m sure they’re more careful with the actual assignments. Eventually I’d expect there to be an email communicating the assignments.

DW and I had a conversation about whether or not we should ask to be opted out of the assignment list. Unfortunately, that conversation would probably be super awkward and would raise more red flags on the Roy family than if we just stayed silent. I told my wife that if anyone asks, we can just say that we didn’t get the emails because of the spam filter. If they try to commit us to a particular date in person or over the phone then we can have pre-existing commitments on those dates.

Fight passive-aggressive with passive-aggressive.

I’m sure that factors into their approach. Their approach has had to evolve into a method where they’ll get the most participation or a method where doling out the assignments is less awful of an experience. All that buildup to say that their approach has the possibly intended/possibly unintended side effect of making people conclude that it’s easier to go ahead and clean the chapel than to find an excuse, find a replacement, etc.

I forgot about the other half of your post where you say you only get contacted when the church wants something from you. I remember having that same realization several years ago while sitting in church. If someone came up to me to chat, I knew it was going to be to ask me to do a church chore. Never a hello, never a how are you. It was a deflating feeling. Thankfully that’s changed in recent years.

I’ve often complained that my relationship with the church always felt like a one way street. Hopefully everyone is doing a better job of making sure that isn’t the case, myself included.

The way I interact with other people is to follow an admonition from Max Dupree, the author of The Art of Leadership and Leadership Jazz. He makes a comment in one of these books “It’s generally best to treat employees as volunteers”. He was speaking about paid employees in this context. So, if it’s best to treat even employees as volunteers, how much more applicable is his statement to actual volunteers?

I think a better approach is to email the ward to ask who is willing to clean the chapel on a certain frequency. Then create a schedule of the willing members and confirm the times work for the willing volunteers.

If there aren’t enough volunteers to cover the Ward’s needs, there could be a second appeal indicating the short fall, and asking for more help.

If in the end there just aren’t enough people to do it, then I suggest paying someone out of the Ward budget.

I think one of the worst examples of Christlike leadership is the statement that “we are not a church of volunteers, we are a church of assignments”. That is the way of totalitarianism in my view, manifested in a small way in the email Roy received.

I have to confess, one observation I’ve made from the inside of leadership at the ward and stake level is that the church is rather tight-fisted with funds given to the wards. I had a situation where there weren’t enough HP members to home teach all of the people assigned to us. So I sent out letters at $50 a month in stamps plus the cost of toner. The Bishop acknowledged these letters made a difference when he met with the less active. The letters I sent were the only bit of gospel information they received in their inactivity. But as I was paying tithing and a bit of a fast offering, I got tired of the $600 per year I was spending on postage back in 2010’s. I asked the Bishop for a budget for this an he refused.

Then I heard he SENT MONEY BACK TO THE STAKE at the end of the year, unspent. I sense this is a bit of a feather in the cap of the local Ward leader who is allotted funds but doesn’t use them all. It made me feel very despondent about our priorities as a ward. It was clear that outreach to less actives was only important if it was free to the church. Needless to say, I stopped sending the letters.

I just wish that church membership wasn’t so much of a chore (literal chores in this case).

Me too. I have often thought that the LDS church is for plodders. You end up doing the same thing over and over again, and a lot of it doesn’t lead to any results. You hear the same messages all the time, sacrament meeting is the same boring meeting, and although there have been improvements in the former home teaching program (now ministering) that too is somewhat monotonous.

One thing I wish Hustle M. Nelson would do is go back to a paid janitorial service. I have to admit, some of the janitorial staff I experienced at home and on my mission got this kind of crankiness about them that made it tough sometimes, but I would rather put up with that than be on the list for chapel cleaning.

To spice up the church experience, there are a few things the church can do:

a) Make ministering something you do when there is a legitimate need in the family and you are invited — like when they invite you because they are sick and need a blessing, need counseling due to unemployment problems, etcetera. It’s a structure that is in place to make sure all of these anomalous service requirements aren’t placed on the backs of the leadership. Regular interaction is encouraged to create a relationship of trust so the ministeree feels comfortable calling their minister when there is a need, but it’s not mandated. Keep up with PPI’s to feed the structure and keep it going.

b) Call itinerant speakers from the stake as whole –– some of your best speakers, and have them travel around the stake for every sacrament meeting as the keynote speaker. Maybe you get the same speaker once every two months or so. You can keep the other two speakers so people get the opportunity to grow, but make sure your best speakers are in each ward each week. This will make sacrament meeting more informative and enjoyable. If this isn’t possible due to the number of speakers needed — cut it back to a regular guest speaker at a frequency the Stake can handle.

c) increase the budgets to the wards for ward socials, and programs.

d) Start introducing modern songs into the hymn book like songs from Janice Kapp Perry, Bryce Neubert and other contemporary LDS artists. For example, although an older song (I am still stuck in my early twenties when I was a missionary), Have You Received His Image in Your Countenance was a hit song for Janice Kapp Perry, and as a ballad, I think it could fit into an LDS sacrament meeting just fine. Jesus Was No Ordinary Man was also a good song by Janice that could work in a sacrament meeting. We Are As the Armies of Helaman was also good. There are probably contemporary LDS artists that I’m not aware of that have pioneered some good songs for sacrament meeting.

e) Consider some duo or trio musical performances as a regular occurrence. Not a gospel rock band like you see in a lot of mainstream churches, but a piano-violin, piano-guitar, piano-flute, or a small string ensemble, and of course, the old standard — piano and vocals — depending on availability in the ward or stake. I see no problem with drawing on the stake for roles that require talent or specialization so there is a wider pool of talent from which to draw. With consideration for the needs at the ward level though. More than once I have seen the Stake call talented people to Stake positions when the Ward in which the member resides is hurting for good people. None of that!!!

f) Favor big wards where the full program of the church can be implemented rather than small wards, even if this means investing in more buildings. I have been in too many Wards where ward-splitting just placed a huge burden on the backs of the committed leaders. For example, I have had callings where I had a full presidency, but I was the only one that was really committed. All the other people were only half or a quarter there, or not there at all. When I had a full, committed presidency, church service was so much more of a joy than when I was the only committed member of the presidency.

I think have a YM-YW organization with one set of people for the Sunday lessons and one person for the Weekly Activity would be a good idea. They had that in California when I lived there, and the youth programs thrived.

g) Put the Seminary Program fully online to relieve parents and youth the burden of attending early morning seminary.

Just a few ideas spawned by your comment above Roy.

Somewhere between 2001 and 2010 the program was changed from something that was important to galvanize our youth – “develop personal character and and receive eternal blessings” into a program of responsibility that falls mostly to adult members. A 2010 letter from the Australia Service Centre Manager describes the continued rollout of the program and the phasing out of the last remaining employee “meetinghouse cleaners” at that time:

In October 28, 1998 and May 2001, The First Presidency asked “… Church members

to assume greater responsibility for cleaning and caring for Church meetinghouses.” Bishop

H. David Burton in the June 1999 Ensign said, “Members of the Church are invited to

participate in the cleaning of their buildings in such a way that, by their sacrifice, they will

come to honor and respect and love these beautiful houses of worship.”

During last General Conference training meetings with the Presiding Bishopric and

Directors for Temporal affairs, the direction was given to continue to roll out the member

participation program with the aim of having members of the Church take full responsibility

for the cleaning and caring of all Church meetinghouses without the need for any paid

cleaners. This effort is Church wide and has the support of the First Presidency and our

Pacific Area Presidency. A number of stakes/districts and meetinghouses in Australia, and

indeed throughout the Pacific, have already resumed this responsibility. For the smaller

number of remaining meetinghouses this will begin in March 2010.

We are thankful for the care and concern our meetinghouse cleaners have given to

their assigned meetinghouses. In the coming weeks their Facilities Manager will meet with

them individually to discuss the details of their employment. We would appreciate your

support and interest in the continuation of this member participation program. Your Facilities Manager will soon be in contact with the stake/district/mission president to assist a smooth

and successful transition.

“This inspired program is designed to bless the lives of all members… We have

received many good reports of how leaders and members are heeding the counsel of Church

leaders in caring for the Lord’s houses of worship.” Pacific Area Presidency letter to

Stake/District Presidents, December, 3, 2008

We appreciate your assistance in these matters as we move forward together in supporting the Brethren.

I find it interesting that this 2010 letter quotes the first sentence from the 1998 and 2001 FP letters asking “Church members to assume greater responsibility for cleaning and caring for Church meetinghouses,” while conspicuously leaving out the part about this being a job primarily for the Aaronic Priesthood.

From there it appears that it has been left to local leadership how to direct this “member participation program.” My ward until recently had passed around a sign up sheet in RS and EQ meetings. We recently converted to a rotating assignment schedule and this change is what prompted my original post.

When I was running Activity Days, I could have gotten reimbursed for the money I spent on the program. I didn’t – in part because the process of doing so was explained in a minimally helpful way “if you spend money on the program, you can keep the receipts and turn them in to the financial clerk”.

There wasn’t any follow up (and I didn’t ask).

My main problem is that if I managed to keep all the receipts together (bigger “if” back then), and I figured out who the individual was (sometimes I knew), and “if” I made it in front of that individual – what if they said “No”? to my request? What if the male person in front of me with the keys to the funds went down line-by-line disparaging my expenses?

I half-brought it up to the women who ran the Young Women’s program one day and they said the roughly the same thing as the Primary leader had. They were “possession-is-9/10ths-of-the-law” making a spaghetti dinner for the youth group in the kitchen at the time (“reheating in the kitchen” my butt – though technically they were “re-heating” the cooked pasta noodles and “warming” canned pasta sauce, and adding toppings and seasoning to “pre-cooked” bread). In any case, their activities were “cooking” in my book that were literally taking place under a “reheating only – do not cook” sign in the kitchen, so we really didn’t continue the conversation (in part because while I commend them feeding the youth, nuances of obeying the rules was clearly not their focus).

I could have done more then hide behind a self-righteous mask of “my family is more righteous because we aren’t doing the reimbursement” and I didn’t want to put in the work. I could have asked better questions and advocated with the female leaders for a walk-through of the process the first time (the same women who were running PTA as well as the church programs in their spare time whose service capacity intimidated me).

The church organization could have supported me by having a more transparent process and an online workflow to accept receipts on (they do take tithing donations after all.