@J S A, or @James Stokes, Just for my notes, can either of you tell me from the official CDOL, the date in January 2023, that the former "Korovou Fiji District - 2094592", that has been reported here by Matt Martinich, was officially consolidated/merged with the "Nausori Fiji Stake - 523526"?
I am very happy that the temple in Brasilia will be dedicated in an environment of guarantees and democratic freedoms, very different from the chaos established last year. The bare faces of the sides and the low tower of the building still bother me a lot, but I imagine that the interior is beautiful.
Chris, I haven't had much time lately to figure out the extent of information to which I have access through the CDOL. I looked up the units in question a couple of different ways, and didn't see anything on there to indicate when the district was merged with the stake in question. The odd thing is that I couldn't find anything on the stake in question, which didn't come up using either the unit number, unit name, or even both. I've mentioned in the past that it appears my access to the CDOL is very limited, so I don't know how much help I will be able to be on questons like this. Sorry about that.
On another note, the Church announced the opening arrangements for the Brasilia Brail and Bentonville Arkansas Temples today. Surprisingly, both of them will be dedicated on the same day (September 17). I was surprised they scheduled those dedications so far out. That may mean that less temples could be dedicated this year than I have thoughout and stated here in the past. Hopefully at some point, teple dedications will pick up. But I'm not sure what it'll take to get there. Here are the sources about today's announcement:
@Matt, Just a reminder. In your sidebar lists of Stakes and Districts Organized and Discontinued each year. Don't forget to add the "Ufa Russia District" that was merged / consolidated into with the neighboring "Yekaterinburg Russia District" last November 6th.
"miro said... @ Chris D ... Ufa Russia District (277517) - Historical Release Dates from callings make me guess that the change happened on 6. Nov 2022
CDOL under search for Fiji brings all of these units - discontinued or active status when you drill down under discontinued - it doesn't provide a date -
Name Location Type Status Ba Fiji District (611972) Fiji District Discontinued Korovou Fiji District (2094592) Fiji District Discontinued Labasa Fiji District (611964) Fiji District Discontinued Lautoka Fiji District (605689) Fiji District Discontinued New Zealand/Fiji/Tahiti/Cook Islands Area (780626) New Zealand Area Discontinued Novato 2nd Branch (Fijian) (1182161) California, United States Branch Discontinued Suva Fiji 2nd District (606456) Fiji District Discontinued Suva Fiji District (603589) Fiji District Discontinued Fiji Suva Mission (2015757) Fiji Mission Active Fiji Suva Mission Branch (363146) Fiji Branch Active Labasa Fiji District (2101939) Fiji District Active Lautoka Fiji Stake (525200) Fiji Stake Active Nausori Fiji Stake (523526) Fiji Stake Active Sacramento 4th Ward (Fijian) (2088606) California, United States Ward Active San Francisco 2nd Branch (Fijian) (545201) California, United States Branch Active Suva Fiji North Stake (527327) Fiji Stake Active Suva Fiji PEF Self-Reliance Center (463876) Fiji Welfare Employment Resource Center Active Suva Fiji Stake (516007) Fiji Stake Active Suva Fiji Temple (706353) Fiji Temple Active Taveuni Fiji District (617768) Fiji District Active CDOL
Chris, based on the information J S A shares above, I was able to view the same data that was shared above. When I clicked on Korovou Fiji District, the only information it showed was the active date., nothing I could see on when it was discontinued. That's just based on what I can see, as I don't know the extent of the information to which I have access as a Sunday School Secretary. But as I S A said in the comment above, "when you drill down, (I think J SA meant scroll down),under discontinued, it doesn't provide a date." Apparently J SA anticipated your question and addressed it above.
The posive developments in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya and Angola are quite exciting. Nigeria especially has a very long way to go. Hopefully the 2 new missions will allow more outreach.
At same point there will probably be a Tamale Ghana Mission. It may not be for a little time still.
@Chris D, @YSA, @James When I checked in CDOL Korovou Fiji District (2094592) - Historical I clicked the Tab "Historical Information" (Translated from german so the name might be a little different), There I see the following line Calling Name called released Distriktspräsident Ernest B. Vitinavulagi 30 Apr 2017 15 Jan 2023
The same for other callings. So I would say the date is 15 Jan 2023
Maybe i can see more than others in CDOL but i don't think so. I am just a ward financial clerk.
miro, I looked but didn't see anything like that. I'm the Sunday School Secretary, so there may be different clearance levels for ward clerks than there is for organizational secretaries. Thanks.
Very happy to hear about more progress in Africa. It is really hard to comprehend how many cities and towns still remain unreached despite highly receptive populations and mission outreach for four and a half decades as of this year. No doubt that in the somewhat near future, millions of people on the African continent alone will find and join the Church.
Kimberly, probably about as advantageous as having separate language alternative stakes instead of having them integrated into the regular local language wards and branches. Just a thought.
Actually, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints leadership is much more willing to create YSA stakes than to create stakes separated by language. At some point in the 1980s the leadership of the New York New York Stake tried to split off a Spanish-language stake, but this was vetoed by the central leadership of the Church. There is today a YSA stake in the New York City area.
In some areas, such as college campuses with large numbers of Latter-day Saint students, crating YSA stakes is almost unavoidable. The advantages in Las Vegas clearly have not yet been seen as enough to justify creating one, but the balance of issues just changed in November, although it started changing a year or two ago.
Prior to I believe sometime last year, but maybe the year before, the rule was that members of high councils and stake presidencies in YSA stakes all needed to be married or over 30. That rule was dropped, and just in November the leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints went to other way and said that the only two callings in YSA units that should be filled by married people are stake president and bishop. I guess in theory you can still fill some callings with single people over age 30, but that seems unlikely.
Prior to around that start of 2022 YSA stakes allowed for creating wards that ignored existing stake boundaries, and for calling leadership over YSA units that ignored existing stake boundaries. So if one part of a large urban city had most YSAs, you would not need to provide all the leadership over those wards from the stake in that part of the city. The drawback to YSA stakes though was that it meant you had to come up with a full stake presidency and high council from the melchizedek priesthood leadership in surrounding stakes. So in theory you could have a large number of YSAs, who could well staff wards, but if your overall stakes could not support that it could not easily lead to a new stake.
Now, since most of the stake leadership is YSAs, you just have to see if the local YSAs are enough to support a stake, with the exception of finding married men to serve as the stake president and bishops. Since you would need the bishops in the case of a YSA ward in a regular stake, the only losses to the surrounding stakes are the stake president, and being able to call YSAs to stake callings.
Even that though may be less of a less than one might think. One stake calling my stake has YSAs in is as missionary preparation class teachers, and I think you could make that a trans-stake calling. Also my stake has very rarely called YSAs to stake callings. I was very surprised when I was in the Ann Arbor Michigan Stake and they called a sister from our YSA ward to be stake relief society secretary, but I was told that was common in that stake.
The 3 YSA stakes in Virginia and 1 in New York are fairly recent. Almost all other YSA stakes are in Arizona, Utah or Idaho.
On the issue with the new temple presidents, it is interesting the Church News article says all will begin service in September but the ones over Bentonville Arkansas Temple, who will begin when that temple is dedicated. That temple is being dedicated Sep. 17, 2023. However due to how editing happens, the person writing the article may not have known that when writing the article.
The new leaders of Praia Cape Verde Temple are taking over for a couple who has only run the temple for 15 months (well, will have run it 15 months by September), but that couple's call was announced in 2020. They may have done things to prepare for the temple opening, so that may be why they are being released so soon.
I think we are to 22 of the 23 new temple presidents coming from in the Temple district, although President Dil for Hamilton New Zealand Temple lives in Auckland, so he will be outside the temple district once that temple gets complete, but he is in the temple district as it exists today.
Also, Logan Temple is getting a new president, so the closer for renovation will almost certainly not be until after September.
I also noticed that Scott and Sandra Clark who will be president and matron of the Bentonville Arkansas Temple are currently temple workers. I would assume they are workers in the Oklahoma City Temple since they live in Bentonville.
Bentonville to Kansas City is probably a slighly nicer drive than Bentonville to OKC, as it is mostly rural Interstate with limited traffic based on my experience. To get to OKC, you need to get past Tulsa, which does have traffic on some days, and the distance is roughly comparable.
Johnathan, a reasonably good estimate (minus a couple thousand in nations without reporting) would likely come from the Church Newsroom, which lists 736,701 at year-end 2021. This is likely well above 800,000 now based on some of the reports we have been getting. My best guesstimate would be in the 810-820k range.
Anyone know the best way to find data about language groups? Ex. after the Armenian branch in Glendale was dissolved, it continued on as an Armenian group, that had a separate Armenian Sunday School, and sacrament meeting and priesthood/relief society in Armenian once a month. When I lived there a group leader was officially called and set apart, but I don't know how to find data about this. Would it be in CDOL? And is it available outside CDOL?
I know similar groups have been established in other places (Persian in the Westwood Ward, Russian in the Hollywood Ward, Vietnamese in a Taylorsville Ward, Amharic in a DC Ward, etc.), but I don't know if they were as formal with a group leader being called or anything.
Incidentally I'm working with a ward right now that wants to do something for a large French speaking membership (mostly African immigrants). Is it better to do things informally until a branch can be formed or should we try to establish a formal group like Glendale did with the Armenians? If the latter, do we register that formally with the Church?
Groups in Stakes, Missions, and Areas Groups are small authorized gatherings of members overseen by a bishop, branch president, or mission president. The stake or mission president may recommend creating a group in the following circumstances:
Travel for its potential members to meet with a ward or branch is difficult.
A small number of members speak a language that is different from those in the ward or branch.
Members in the military are best served by being in a group (see 38.9.4).
To propose creating a group, the stake or mission president submits a request to the Area Presidency. Only the Area Presidency can approve the request.
A group must have at least two members. One must be a worthy priest in the Aaronic Priesthood or a worthy Melchizedek Priesthood holder.
In stakes, the stake president assigns a bishop or branch president to organize and supervise the group. In missions, the mission president assigns a branch president to organize and supervise it.
Generally, a group can be created to serve members who live in one or more units within a stake or district. Group membership is limited to those who live within the boundaries of the participating unit or units. Groups do not cross stake or district boundaries.
The stake president, mission president, bishop, or branch president calls a group leader and sets him apart. The group leader organizes and conducts group meetings, which include the administration of the sacrament.
A group leader does not hold priesthood keys, and he is not authorized to:
Receive tithes and offerings.
Counsel members about serious sin.
Give informal or formal membership restrictions.
Perform other duties that require priesthood keys.
Typically, groups use the Basic Unit Program (see 36.6).
Membership records of group members are kept in the ward or branch that supervises the group.
Church headquarters does not assign a unit number to groups.
When a group qualifies, the stake or mission president may propose for it to become a branch.
YSA Stakes really help in Regional YSA Coordination and planning stake-level YSA activities. Plus it allows YSAs to be the sole focus and not seen as an afterthought that can happen in other stakes.
On a bright side for California, San Clemente Stake just created 2 new wards (Shorecliffs Ward and Tierra Grande Ward) to bring up to 12 wards in the stake. Just a few years ago, San Clemente Stake only had 8 wards.
In Idaho Falls, several years ago I lived in a ward that had a ASL (American Sign Language). group assigned to it. We had interpreters in Sacrament meeting and the 5th Sunday class. But held their own separate sunday school, priesthood, and relief society meetings. I have been curious to why It is not listed as a language unit on meetinghouse locator.
Great news about San Clemente! Sounds like that stake may split in the foreseeable future.
Indonesia is, at this point, more than a dark horse for a temple in my opinion. Although it is hard to gauge how successful missionary work is there. A quarter billion people and one mission. That is quite lobsided. I would love to see more resources dedicated there purely because of the vast potential of people who would be able to be reached.
Finally, back to temples. My wife and I have been trying to schedule our temple appointments from now until the end of March (we go every Friday since it best works with my work schedule). We had the hardest time finding sessions and even though quite a few have already been added on top of the baseline schedule, they tend to be full already - that is for all types of ordinances, even weeks in advance. There is certainly an impact from the updated ceremonies but this is not the whole story. I believe the trajectory has been clear before and this has only accelerated it. Maybe Germany is due for a third temple after all, probably Hamburg or somewhere out west.
@Matt, With about 6 weekends before April 2023 Conference, is it too early to start posting our Top 10 or 20 possible Temple Announcements and or Dark Horse selections?
Sorry if this is too vague, but I was informed that a Filipino group in my stake (Anchorage Alaska North) is making preparations to become a branch. Unfortunately, I don't know any other details, such as what the group is called or when it is expected to become a branch. I saw a picture a couple of months ago that a friend of mine attended at a group activity, where it looked like there were at least 20 people in attendance, though that's not to say they are all part of that group.
If that ASL group was the one on Gladstone, then I used to live in the apartments right across from it (about 10 years ago). I attended that one at times if I missed the earlier YSA Sacrament Meeting.
Don't know if you got your question fully answered, but my old Kentucky Mission created a French/Swahili Branch in Lexington, and a French Group in Louisville (African Immigrants - many from Republic of Congo). Turns out, they're actually calling missionaries to speak French in the Louisville Mission now, whereas before it was just Spanish & English.
I couldn't find the original post I read about it. But here's a Facebook thread that discusses it. (I thought you might want to see what they did there as an example).
Yes, on Gladstone. I lived in that ward between about 2012 and 2015 before I bought my house in Ammon. Regular family ward that hosted the deaf for the region between I think Shelley and Rigby, but it seemed that at least half if not more actually lived in the ward boundaries.
44 comments:
@J S A, or @James Stokes, Just for my notes, can either of you tell me from the official CDOL, the date in January 2023, that the former "Korovou Fiji District - 2094592", that has been reported here by Matt Martinich, was officially consolidated/merged with the "Nausori Fiji Stake - 523526"?
Greatly appreciated the update.
I am very happy that the temple in Brasilia will be dedicated in an environment of guarantees and democratic freedoms, very different from the chaos established last year. The bare faces of the sides and the low tower of the building still bother me a lot, but I imagine that the interior is beautiful.
And from the photos, it looks like the position of the end stone plaque will cause Elder Andersen to have to dip his toes in the reflecting pool.
Chris, I haven't had much time lately to figure out the extent of information to which I have access through the CDOL. I looked up the units in question a couple of different ways, and didn't see anything on there to indicate when the district was merged with the stake in question. The odd thing is that I couldn't find anything on the stake in question, which didn't come up using either the unit number, unit name, or even both. I've mentioned in the past that it appears my access to the CDOL is very limited, so I don't know how much help I will be able to be on questons like this. Sorry about that.
On another note, the Church announced the opening arrangements for the Brasilia Brail and Bentonville Arkansas Temples today. Surprisingly, both of them will be dedicated on the same day (September 17). I was surprised they scheduled those dedications so far out. That may mean that less temples could be dedicated this year than I have thoughout and stated here in the past. Hopefully at some point, teple dedications will pick up. But I'm not sure what it'll take to get there. Here are the sources about today's announcement:
https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/news-for-temples-in-brazil-and-the-united-states
https://www.thechurchnews.com/temples/2023/2/13/23593475/bentonville-arkansas-brasilia-brazil-temple-dedication-date
And for anyone who might be interested in my analysis on this update, you can find that here:
https://stokessoundsoff.blogspot.com/2023/02/breaking-temple-news-opening.html
My thanks once again to you all.
@Matt, Just a reminder. In your sidebar lists of Stakes and Districts Organized and Discontinued each year. Don't forget to add the "Ufa Russia District" that was merged / consolidated into with the neighboring "Yekaterinburg Russia District" last November 6th.
"miro said...
@ Chris D
...
Ufa Russia District (277517) - Historical
Release Dates from callings make me guess that the change happened on 6. Nov 2022
February 6, 2023 at 10:54 AM"
CDOL under search for Fiji brings all of these units - discontinued or active status
when you drill down under discontinued - it doesn't provide a date -
Name
Location
Type
Status
Ba Fiji District (611972) Fiji District Discontinued
Korovou Fiji District (2094592) Fiji District Discontinued
Labasa Fiji District (611964) Fiji District Discontinued
Lautoka Fiji District (605689) Fiji District Discontinued
New Zealand/Fiji/Tahiti/Cook Islands Area (780626) New Zealand Area Discontinued
Novato 2nd Branch (Fijian) (1182161) California, United States Branch Discontinued
Suva Fiji 2nd District (606456) Fiji District Discontinued
Suva Fiji District (603589) Fiji District Discontinued
Fiji Suva Mission (2015757) Fiji Mission Active
Fiji Suva Mission Branch (363146) Fiji Branch Active
Labasa Fiji District (2101939) Fiji District Active
Lautoka Fiji Stake (525200) Fiji Stake Active
Nausori Fiji Stake (523526) Fiji Stake Active
Sacramento 4th Ward (Fijian) (2088606) California, United States Ward Active
San Francisco 2nd Branch (Fijian) (545201) California, United States Branch Active
Suva Fiji North Stake (527327) Fiji Stake Active
Suva Fiji PEF Self-Reliance Center (463876) Fiji Welfare Employment Resource Center Active
Suva Fiji Stake (516007) Fiji Stake Active
Suva Fiji Temple (706353) Fiji Temple Active
Taveuni Fiji District (617768) Fiji District Active
CDOL
@J S A does it show the date the Korovou Fiji District leadership was released? we could consider that the merge date.
Chris, based on the information J S A shares above, I was able to view the same data that was shared above. When I clicked on Korovou Fiji District, the only information it showed was the active date., nothing I could see on when it was discontinued. That's just based on what I can see, as I don't know the extent of the information to which I have access as a Sunday School Secretary. But as I S A said in the comment above, "when you drill down, (I think J SA meant scroll down),under discontinued, it doesn't provide a date." Apparently J SA anticipated your question and addressed it above.
It does not show a date of release.
The posive developments in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya and Angola are quite exciting. Nigeria especially has a very long way to go. Hopefully the 2 new missions will allow more outreach.
At same point there will probably be a Tamale Ghana Mission. It may not be for a little time still.
@Chris D, @YSA, @James
When I checked in CDOL Korovou Fiji District (2094592) - Historical
I clicked the Tab "Historical Information" (Translated from german so the name might be a little different),
There I see the following line
Calling Name called released
Distriktspräsident Ernest B. Vitinavulagi 30 Apr 2017 15 Jan 2023
The same for other callings. So I would say the date is 15 Jan 2023
Maybe i can see more than others in CDOL but i don't think so. I am just a ward financial clerk.
miro, I looked but didn't see anything like that. I'm the Sunday School Secretary, so there may be different clearance levels for ward clerks than there is for organizational secretaries. Thanks.
I wonder if the Las Vegas metro area will get a YSA Stake if it hasn't already. I know it has quite a few YSA Wards.
There was a big push to create YSA stakes like 10 years ago 2012-2013ish. Ever since then, not so much it seems.
Very happy to hear about more progress in Africa. It is really hard to comprehend how many cities and towns still remain unreached despite highly receptive populations and mission outreach for four and a half decades as of this year. No doubt that in the somewhat near future, millions of people on the African continent alone will find and join the Church.
What are the advantages of creating a YSA stake instead of having the YSA wards be part of the regular stake?
Kimberly, probably about as advantageous as having separate language alternative stakes instead of having them integrated into the regular local language wards and branches. Just a thought.
The first Temple leadership for the new Bentonville Arkansas Temple have been announced today.
https://www.thechurchnews.com/2023/2/16/23598272/temple-presidents-arizona-arkansas-alberta-new-zealand-africa
Actually, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints leadership is much more willing to create YSA stakes than to create stakes separated by language. At some point in the 1980s the leadership of the New York New York Stake tried to split off a Spanish-language stake, but this was vetoed by the central leadership of the Church. There is today a YSA stake in the New York City area.
In some areas, such as college campuses with large numbers of Latter-day Saint students, crating YSA stakes is almost unavoidable. The advantages in Las Vegas clearly have not yet been seen as enough to justify creating one, but the balance of issues just changed in November, although it started changing a year or two ago.
Prior to I believe sometime last year, but maybe the year before, the rule was that members of high councils and stake presidencies in YSA stakes all needed to be married or over 30. That rule was dropped, and just in November the leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints went to other way and said that the only two callings in YSA units that should be filled by married people are stake president and bishop. I guess in theory you can still fill some callings with single people over age 30, but that seems unlikely.
Prior to around that start of 2022 YSA stakes allowed for creating wards that ignored existing stake boundaries, and for calling leadership over YSA units that ignored existing stake boundaries. So if one part of a large urban city had most YSAs, you would not need to provide all the leadership over those wards from the stake in that part of the city. The drawback to YSA stakes though was that it meant you had to come up with a full stake presidency and high council from the melchizedek priesthood leadership in surrounding stakes. So in theory you could have a large number of YSAs, who could well staff wards, but if your overall stakes could not support that it could not easily lead to a new stake.
Now, since most of the stake leadership is YSAs, you just have to see if the local YSAs are enough to support a stake, with the exception of finding married men to serve as the stake president and bishops. Since you would need the bishops in the case of a YSA ward in a regular stake, the only losses to the surrounding stakes are the stake president, and being able to call YSAs to stake callings.
Even that though may be less of a less than one might think. One stake calling my stake has YSAs in is as missionary preparation class teachers, and I think you could make that a trans-stake calling. Also my stake has very rarely called YSAs to stake callings. I was very surprised when I was in the Ann Arbor Michigan Stake and they called a sister from our YSA ward to be stake relief society secretary, but I was told that was common in that stake.
The 3 YSA stakes in Virginia and 1 in New York are fairly recent. Almost all other YSA stakes are in Arizona, Utah or Idaho.
On the issue with the new temple presidents, it is interesting the Church News article says all will begin service in September but the ones over Bentonville Arkansas Temple, who will begin when that temple is dedicated. That temple is being dedicated Sep. 17, 2023. However due to how editing happens, the person writing the article may not have known that when writing the article.
The new leaders of Praia Cape Verde Temple are taking over for a couple who has only run the temple for 15 months (well, will have run it 15 months by September), but that couple's call was announced in 2020. They may have done things to prepare for the temple opening, so that may be why they are being released so soon.
I think we are to 22 of the 23 new temple presidents coming from in the Temple district, although President Dil for Hamilton New Zealand Temple lives in Auckland, so he will be outside the temple district once that temple gets complete, but he is in the temple district as it exists today.
Also, Logan Temple is getting a new president, so the closer for renovation will almost certainly not be until after September.
I also noticed that Scott and Sandra Clark who will be president and matron of the Bentonville Arkansas Temple are currently temple workers. I would assume they are workers in the Oklahoma City Temple since they live in Bentonville.
Bentonville is currently assigned to Kansas City. They certainly seem qualified with their extensive service in the church.
@Pascal Friedmann
Speaking of which, anyone know the rough estimate for current total number of members across all of Africa?
Bentonville to Kansas City is probably a slighly nicer drive than Bentonville to OKC, as it is mostly rural Interstate with limited traffic based on my experience. To get to OKC, you need to get past Tulsa, which does have traffic on some days, and the distance is roughly comparable.
Johnathan, a reasonably good estimate (minus a couple thousand in nations without reporting) would likely come from the Church Newsroom, which lists 736,701 at year-end 2021. This is likely well above 800,000 now based on some of the reports we have been getting. My best guesstimate would be in the 810-820k range.
Anyone know the best way to find data about language groups? Ex. after the Armenian branch in Glendale was dissolved, it continued on as an Armenian group, that had a separate Armenian Sunday School, and sacrament meeting and priesthood/relief society in Armenian once a month. When I lived there a group leader was officially called and set apart, but I don't know how to find data about this. Would it be in CDOL? And is it available outside CDOL?
I know similar groups have been established in other places (Persian in the Westwood Ward, Russian in the Hollywood Ward, Vietnamese in a Taylorsville Ward, Amharic in a DC Ward, etc.), but I don't know if they were as formal with a group leader being called or anything.
Incidentally I'm working with a ward right now that wants to do something for a large French speaking membership (mostly African immigrants). Is it better to do things informally until a branch can be formed or should we try to establish a formal group like Glendale did with the Armenians? If the latter, do we register that formally with the Church?
37.7
Groups in Stakes, Missions, and Areas
Groups are small authorized gatherings of members overseen by a bishop, branch president, or mission president. The stake or mission president may recommend creating a group in the following circumstances:
Travel for its potential members to meet with a ward or branch is difficult.
A small number of members speak a language that is different from those in the ward or branch.
Members in the military are best served by being in a group (see 38.9.4).
To propose creating a group, the stake or mission president submits a request to the Area Presidency. Only the Area Presidency can approve the request.
A group must have at least two members. One must be a worthy priest in the Aaronic Priesthood or a worthy Melchizedek Priesthood holder.
In stakes, the stake president assigns a bishop or branch president to organize and supervise the group. In missions, the mission president assigns a branch president to organize and supervise it.
Generally, a group can be created to serve members who live in one or more units within a stake or district. Group membership is limited to those who live within the boundaries of the participating unit or units. Groups do not cross stake or district boundaries.
The stake president, mission president, bishop, or branch president calls a group leader and sets him apart. The group leader organizes and conducts group meetings, which include the administration of the sacrament.
A group leader does not hold priesthood keys, and he is not authorized to:
Receive tithes and offerings.
Counsel members about serious sin.
Give informal or formal membership restrictions.
Perform other duties that require priesthood keys.
Typically, groups use the Basic Unit Program (see 36.6).
Membership records of group members are kept in the ward or branch that supervises the group.
Church headquarters does not assign a unit number to groups.
When a group qualifies, the stake or mission president may propose for it to become a branch.
YSA Stakes really help in Regional YSA Coordination and planning stake-level YSA activities. Plus it allows YSAs to be the sole focus and not seen as an afterthought that can happen in other stakes.
On a bright side for California, San Clemente Stake just created 2 new wards (Shorecliffs Ward and Tierra Grande Ward) to bring up to 12 wards in the stake. Just a few years ago, San Clemente Stake only had 8 wards.
In Idaho Falls, several years ago I lived in a ward that had a ASL (American Sign Language). group assigned to it. We had interpreters in Sacrament meeting and the 5th Sunday class. But held their own separate sunday school, priesthood, and relief society meetings. I have been curious to why It is not listed as a language unit on meetinghouse locator.
Great news about San Clemente! Sounds like that stake may split in the foreseeable future.
Indonesia is, at this point, more than a dark horse for a temple in my opinion. Although it is hard to gauge how successful missionary work is there. A quarter billion people and one mission. That is quite lobsided. I would love to see more resources dedicated there purely because of the vast potential of people who would be able to be reached.
Finally, back to temples. My wife and I have been trying to schedule our temple appointments from now until the end of March (we go every Friday since it best works with my work schedule). We had the hardest time finding sessions and even though quite a few have already been added on top of the baseline schedule, they tend to be full already - that is for all types of ordinances, even weeks in advance. There is certainly an impact from the updated ceremonies but this is not the whole story. I believe the trajectory has been clear before and this has only accelerated it. Maybe Germany is due for a third temple after all, probably Hamburg or somewhere out west.
@Matt, With about 6 weekends before April 2023 Conference, is it too early to start posting our Top 10 or 20 possible Temple Announcements and or Dark Horse selections?
Sorry if this is too vague, but I was informed that a Filipino group in my stake (Anchorage Alaska North) is making preparations to become a branch. Unfortunately, I don't know any other details, such as what the group is called or when it is expected to become a branch. I saw a picture a couple of months ago that a friend of mine attended at a group activity, where it looked like there were at least 20 people in attendance, though that's not to say they are all part of that group.
@Chris D., my vote is to wait until the 2nd-3rd week of March for temple predictions.
I think we can do temple predictions at any day of the year. I see nothing wrong with that.
@Ryan Searcy
I have a friend in Wasilla. Is that in your stake?
@L. Chris Jones
If that ASL group was the one on Gladstone, then I used to live in the apartments right across from it (about 10 years ago). I attended that one at times if I missed the earlier YSA Sacrament Meeting.
I liked it. Nice and quiet. :)
Perhaps we were there at the same time?
@MLewis
Don't know if you got your question fully answered, but my old Kentucky Mission created a French/Swahili Branch in Lexington, and a French Group in Louisville (African Immigrants - many from Republic of Congo). Turns out, they're actually calling missionaries to speak French in the Louisville Mission now, whereas before it was just Spanish & English.
I couldn't find the original post I read about it. But here's a Facebook thread that discusses it. (I thought you might want to see what they did there as an example).
https://m.facebook.com/groups/KentuckyLouisvilleMissionaries/permalink/10158884621802097/
@Johnathan Reese Whiting
Not my stake, but Wasilla is pretty close by, only an hour away.
Yes, on Gladstone. I lived in that ward between about 2012 and 2015 before I bought my house in Ammon. Regular family ward that hosted the deaf for the region between I think Shelley and Rigby, but it seemed that at least half if not more actually lived in the ward boundaries.
Unlike the comment above, it appeared that this ASL group crossed stake boundaries, probably due to the number of deaf members in the region.
@Ryan Searcy
Cool cool. Just curious. :)
@Pascal Friedmann
I forgot to say thanks for the Africa stats. :)
@L. Chris Jones
Ah...so we were there at the same time. Probably bumped into each other in the hallway. ;)
I think my brother and his family were in your ward.
And I moved to Gladstone with my roommate from Ammon, so we flip-flopped.
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