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Lots of talk how the church has become boring and tedious. It certainly is not the church of my youth in the 70s Considering there is church monitoring of this site let’s give them some suggestions to make church more enjoyable. To me church should be a place you want to go not a place you have to go. I suspect the vast majority of youth feel it is a have to.
My idea is to quit trying to make the church the same everyplace. Correlation killed the fun. Let stakes have some autonomy to create programs and fund them. What is fun in Utah is not fun in Africa.
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Change the name ti The Morfun church. We could have the Book of Morefun. Just kidding.
More fun experience? For me it means focusing on making the day to day programs good and stopping these drudgerous tasks like chasing after less actives all the time. It’s draining and the return on effort invested is very low. I visited 200 homes over 3 years of less active and saw nothing come of it.
Consider a burger joint that advertises the best hamburgers and dining experience around. Then when you go there they have one burger flavor and are out of condiments. The floor is dirty and the bathrooms disgusting. You have to DELIVER.
I have a story about a Ward I attended where the people were hardworking and prepared and it went really well — it rekindled my testimony after 7 years. Stick me in a typical ward with uncommitted people all the time and I burn out. Put me in a meeting where every other person is apologizing for not being prepared and that gets old
Yes, “how great will be your joy”, but how much joy is left after you subtract all the unrequited effort, negative comments from testimony-barren less active members, and rejection?
Good programs – spiritual, informative, helpful to your daily life — these are things that make the experience worthwile.
I do not think I have any idea of my own … just stuff that I have experienced with fun at some other churches. 1) Sponsor trunk or treat – Halloween Carnivals – Easter Egg hunts. These events are fun, can bring in the community, and keep less actives foot in the door at church.
2) Potlucks – Hypothetically Potlucks take very little administration planning because everyone brings something.
3) Movie nights – can we show a movie? Particularly if it has a good message like the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe?
4) video game tournaments? Mario cart?
5) hosting vacation bible school?
6) Small groups. This is a blanket category that includes everything from book clubs, to small study groups, to game night enthusiasts, young families meeting up at a park, etc. Some enduring friendships can originate here.
7) marriage classes, parenting classes, financial independance classes.
girl’s camp mindset. My daughter told me that they were not making an effort to invite the less active girls to girls camp because girls camp was a reward for the girls that had been diligent in doing the YW program all year round. To just come to girl’s camp when you hadn’t been a frequent attender otherwise would seem like cheating/freeloading. It strikes me that this attitude is not particularly welcoming to outsiders or those on the margins.Roy wrote:
I do not think I have any idea of my own … just stuff that I have experienced with fun at some other churches.1) Sponsor trunk or treat – Halloween Carnivals – Easter Egg hunts. These events are fun, can bring in the community, and keep less actives foot in the door at church.
2) Potlucks – Hypothetically Potlucks take very little administration planning because everyone brings something.
3) Movie nights – can we show a movie? Particularly if it has a good message like the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe?
4) video game tournaments? Mario cart?
5) hosting vacation bible school?
6) Small groups. This is a blanket category that includes everything from book clubs, to small study groups, to game night enthusiasts, young families meeting up at a park, etc. Some enduring friendships can originate here.
7) marriage classes, parenting classes, financial independance classes.
girl’s camp mindset. My daughter told me that they were not making an effort to invite the less active girls to girls camp because girls camp was a reward for the girls that had been diligent in doing the YW program all year round. To just come to girl’s camp when you hadn’t been a frequent attender otherwise would seem like cheating/freeloading. It strikes me that this attitude is not particularly welcoming to outsiders or those on the margins.
1 & 2 we regularly do but not necessarily as community events (although ostensibly the community is invited advertising is non-existent to minimal). Our potlucks are monthly “linger longers” and it really is a true pot luck – no assignments are made.
3. We have done in the past, and it was fun.
4. We also have done, but as a youth activity and not recently.
5. For some reason not on the church agenda/part of correlation. I’ve heard it said before that this is because we have Primary weekly as opposed to the churches who do VBS and do not. I think with the current focus of “home centered, church supported” the idea of VBS is less likely. That said, isn’t YW camp (and probably future YM camp) just VBS (more likel VBoMS) for older kids?
6. I think the Brethren would love to see this, and it’s not like it never happens. My ward does have a group of ladies who have a book club. There was a time when my wife went to a weekly play date thing when the kids were small (several moms would meet at the park or somewhere, kids would play and moms would gossip).
The thing is these have to be grass roots things – hence my view that we are in or moving toward the post correlation church.The groups are not meant to be correlated or programmed. 7. Our ward has done and does these things (self reliance is sort of ongoing). Ostensibly the public is invited but again no advertising.
8. Completely opposite here. In fact it was a small issue because some who had not “signed up” showed up and our state laws are very stringent on having the physical and permission paperwork etc. Our Scout troop was more non-members than members.
Thank you DJ. It sounds like your area has more fun than our area does. I do get that some of this changes by area.
DarkJedi wrote:
That said, isn’t YW camp (and probably future YM camp) just VBS (more likel VBoMS) for older kids?
Yes. I think that girls camp, youth conference, and the newly announced “For the Strength of Youth” (a sort of mini EFY) all have those similar purposes. One advantage of VBS is that it opens up the church to inactives / non-members that are looking for activites to keep their kids busy during the summer. They usually invite the family to attend the church service together on the sunday after the VBS to see a slideshow of the activities and experience the church’s worship service.
DarkJedi wrote:
The thing is these have to be grass roots things – hence my view that we are in or moving toward the post correlation church. The groups are not meant to be correlated or programmed.
I do think that there should be at least a minimal level of administrative support to facilitate small groups. Can some expenses be reimbursed? Can we meet in the church? Can we advertize in the ward program? Put posters up on the wall? Is there a primary contact or organizer? Who do I call if I have questions?We have a history of seeing “grass roots” with suspicion. Maybe we will get over that with time.
Quote:8. Completely opposite here. In fact it was a small issue because some who had not “signed up” showed up and our state laws are very stringent on having the physical and permission paperwork etc. Our Scout troop was more non-members than members.
Also good to hear. And I completely support the need for proper paperwork.
Roy wrote:
Thank you DJ. It sounds like your area has more fun than our area does. I do get that some of this changes by area.The interesting thing is I don’t feel like we do. I generally agree with Cadence that church is boring and tedious, and that includes activities.
Quote:I do think that there should be at least a minimal level of administrative support to facilitate small groups. Can some expenses be reimbursed? Can we meet in the church? Can we advertize in the ward program? Put posters up on the wall? Is there a primary contact or organizer? Who do I call if I have questions?
I don’t think any of this is outside the scope of what the leadership might envision. I think their worry is that some local leaders will “program” the stuff because we’re so used to being programmed. I think most of the resistance to the recent changes (including ministering) is just that – they aren’t being told how, when, and where to do it so that can’t do it because for so long we’ve been told how, when and where. I’ve brought this up in meetings too – if we look back at Joseph Smith we see that he often seemed to understand what God wanted but not how to do it. That part was for him to figure out. Some things worked fine (and still do), others needed tweaking, and others needed to be done completely differently.
Quote:We have a history of seeing “grass roots” with suspicion. Maybe we will get over that with time.
This is actually a more recent issue, basically since correlation. Home teaching, Sunday School, Primary, YW, YM, and a host of other things all began as grass roots efforts.
Roy wrote:1) Sponsor trunk or treat – Halloween Carnivals – Easter Egg hunts. These events are fun, can bring in the community, and keep less actives foot in the door at church.
Trunk or treat is one of the two yearly activities we do. In the past we had two consecutive bishops that
hatedHalloween. We had to fight to keep it on the schedule. :crazy: 
Roy wrote:2) Potlucks – Hypothetically Potlucks take very little administration planning because everyone brings something.
I was in a ward that did it once a month, not connected to fast Sunday. I always enjoyed these.
Roy wrote:3) Movie nights – can we show a movie? Particularly if it has a good message like the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe?
We’ve done this a few times. It was fun. The only thing is that we still had to have the gospel purpose. We watched stuff like
Meet the Mormonsand Joseph Smith: The Prophet Of The Restorationand spent some time afterwards leaning on people to give the missionaries referrals. Let’s let our hair down, watch a “normal” movie, and have fun being together. Coming together is enough of a gospel purpose.
Roy wrote:4) video game tournaments? Mario cart?
We’ve done this too. They were a hit. Mario Kart… if you’re willing for some people’s kids to learn some new words, sure!
Roy wrote:6) Small groups. This is a blanket category that includes everything from book clubs, to small study groups, to game night enthusiasts, young families meeting up at a park, etc. Some enduring friendships can originate here.
This isn’t so much the case today but in the past the church banned (or warned against) study groups meeting outside of official church meetings. I haven’t heard that warning in years and with the new home-centered, church-supported theme maybe they’re encouraging study groups?
Roy wrote:
girl’s camp mindset. My daughter told me that they were not making an effort to invite the less active girls to girls camp because girls camp was a reward for the girls that had been diligent in doing the YW program all year round. To just come to girl’s camp when you hadn’t been a frequent attender otherwise would seem like cheating/freeloading. It strikes me that this attitude is not particularly welcoming to outsiders or those on the margins.
That really makes it sound like the YW view the program as more of a chore than something they actually enjoy doing.
I can recall a number of major activities we did in my youth. Things that would never happen today. It was so much fun in those days. Probably because we were not obsessed with keeping everything on a spiritual level. We might have said a blessing on the hot dogs roasting on the fire but that was about it. Last youth conference I participated in as a leader I thought the kids were going to revolt. Every action had to be tied to some perceived spiritual message. So so boring.
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My new ward is going camping overnight this weekend – everyone together at one park. No separation by sex or gender. I live in a highly conservative state, but there is a great mix of ideas and life experiences in this ward – and in my last ward. (I just started a new job and am renting an apartment while my wife and daughter remain in my last ward.)
Many of the things I might propose take time and effort. And who would do them? The same individuals that are already holding time consuming and energy draining callings? With nobody at the local level on staff it makes it hard to expect anything more than the basics.
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