What does it mean to council?

[Anonymous]

I second this type of topic

Quote:

Or just some study topics to get to know the bible more:

“Deep study of Ruth and other biblical women figures we don’t spend enough time on”

“Jesus parables and how they can be interpreted today” (we don’t spend enough time talking about Jesus in our church)

As a woman in the church I would love to truly learn about early sister’s in the church. You could start with the obvious leaders and move on.

[Anonymous]

And recent sisters…like Sister Okazaki.

[Anonymous]

I am still confused about what it means to council. I will throw out some possibilities and I would like some feedback.

1) A planning meeting to make plans/future decisions for the non-council Sundays. This could be where teaching assignments are discussed… also the content of what should be taught.

2) I was thinking this morning about how the relief society was founded as an organization to do charity work. I imagine that council Sundays could be spent brainstorming and planning service projects. Volunteer at the soup kitchen or the warming station. Collect food for a shelter or community food pantry. Make hygiene kits to be sent to disaster areas. etc. etc.

3) Discussion and planning about the needs of the people in the group. I like how some other churches do prayer requests. People in the group can ask the person praying to ask for God’s blessing upon their life hardships. I think it is helpful to feel like the group is collectively praying over your challenge (if you want). Also it can be a real easy way to begin to identify what the needs are in the group. Yes, we can also discuss inactives and their needs from a position of love and service. We can pray for them and perhaps lighten their burden by serving them. If I were in leadership I might begin doing prayer requests on council Sundays.

Is that what it means to council? From what I am hearing it sounds like some/many wards are using council Sunday as a non-corelated lesson opportunity. What appears to be the intent of the change?

[Anonymous]

Roy wrote:

I am still confused about what it means to council. I will throw out some possibilities and I would like some feedback.

1) A planning meeting to make plans/future decisions for the non-council Sundays. This could be where teaching assignments are discussed… also the content of what should be taught.

Right now things are so heavily correlated that most of the topic assignment decisions are made by an extremely small group of people. The Q15, the SP, the BP, the EQP. We don’t council about what we’d like to discuss in our lessons, we follow the script.

Roy wrote:

Is that what it means to council? From what I am hearing it sounds like some/many wards are using council Sunday as a non-corelated lesson opportunity. What appears to be the intent of the change?

I think the intent was your #2 and #3 but I think many of us have fallen into habit. Like you say, first Sunday becomes the only non-correlated lesson… that’s also based on a conference talk :crazy: … but you get to chose the talk this time. :eh:

[Anonymous]

Roy wrote:

3) Discussion and planning about the needs of the people in the group. I like how some other churches do prayer requests. People in the group can ask the person praying to ask for God’s blessing upon their life hardships….

Is that what it means to council? From what I am hearing it sounds like some/many wards are using council Sunday as a non-corelated lesson opportunity. What appears to be the intent of the change?

In our priesthood quorum…we talked in council about some members who were impacted by flooding…and there was an immediate need to help them.

The quorum proposed to the bishop a group of people to go to their house that Sunday afternoon and sand bag, the bishop approved, the service was needed.

I don’t think a typical Sunday with correlated lessons would have produced those results. The change was that the quorum members had a voice to say they wanted to go do something…and they went and did it…on a Sunday. The following sunday there were tears of grattitude from those that were served in time of need. It was very heart-felt and genuine. It was not prescribed or correlated or organized from stake to ward leaders.

The change was the members of the quorum knowing what needed to be done, and given the council meeting to determine the action…and doing it.

I have doubted what these councils would mean to us…but I saw the good people in my ward doing something with the opportunity to council properly. And they did it. And I was humbled by it.

It won’t always be success…but…with change came opportunity. We all determine what we do with these opportunities.

[Anonymous]

Would they have come together to do that without a council?

Say it’s a typical Sunday where the plan is to read from a conference talk but during PH opening exercises someone brings up the need. Does the PH body shift focus to the need and have an extended PH opening exercise or do they move on to the conference talk lesson?

Emergencies like those are the kind of thing that you don’t want to wait around until first Sunday.

It seems we struggle with the council concept and genuinely struggle with how to fill 45 minutes with this thing called council. Maybe we could dedicate 10-15 minutes at the beginning of each meeting to council about meeting people’s needs because from my vantage point first Sunday is… what do we talk about for 45 minutes? I don’t know. Let’s have a genealogy lesson.

[Anonymous]

nibbler wrote:

Would they have come together to do that without a council?

Probably. Maybe just another way…bishop would have told PEC to tell HT to call some people and organize a group. Probably would have happened that way.

[Author]

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