When I was active in the church, I noticed most of the kids were being sent to crappy third world countries. A couple of kids whose parents were high in the church or parents had money were sent to Europe. I had a friend who spoke German, but her family was average and she got One of the South American countries.
My friend who took Spanish, but came from an affluent family got Sweden. I know some of it is what the family could afford, but why did they say it was from some high authority in the church praying over it. The guy I was seeing at the time was trying to talk me into going on one, and since I was just starting to learn German, he said if I talked to the bishop, I could get a German speaking country? Was that true? If so, is it fair?

You probably wouldn't have been able to pick your mission or language. That's reserved for cream of the crop families.

Mission assignments are done by computer assignment. Read these older threads for more insight.

http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,992522
http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1814360
http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1815016

Warning: Just in case you weren't fully aware, this is an ex-Mormon site, filled to the rafters with apostates from the church. We're not afraid of the church's arbitrary rules, and so there's some swearing.

I knew someone who spoke very fluent German,Polish English,and was sent to Taiwan. Go figure. He was from a well to do family, but not sure if they had any sway.

No, it's not fair, but that's the way of politics.

Being a missionary is an unpaid sales job, and that's why they coerce young kids into doing it. Think about how and what missionaries are trained to do. They are intensively trained to tell half-"truths" to people who won't know the difference. And for what? What good does it bring the person they've just lied to? Thou shalt not bear false witness aganst thy neighbor. But it's okay if I lie TO him? No, no it's not. The leaders lie to members, and train the members to lie to non-members. It's not right, and it's not "fair." How can "lying to" also be "loving" your neighbor?


You don't see adults doing this job, and that's your first clue. They WON'T do this job, so they make their kids do it. That's pretty disgusting.

Two years. It's like a jail sentence. Stigma if you don't go. It's evil to do this to kids.

The "unfair" begins way, way before the country is picked. It's not a revelation, it's a job without pay, coercion of minors (because it starts way before 18-19), politics and all about "growing" their stacks of cash.

tenex Wrote:
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> You don't see adults doing this job, and that's
> your first clue. They WON'T do this job, so they
> make their kids do it. That's pretty disgusting.

Well, actually you do - "Senior Missionaries". They not only serve, but fully PAY their costs for the privilege of doing so - in some cases more than once. I guess they really want to earn as many 'celestial points' as they possibly can.

I served in Poland in the mid-90s. We had 10 elders, all who started with the letter 'M' through 'P'. (think Meyers, McCully, O'Brien, Patton).

We joked that the call was alphabetically assigned...there was an uncomfortable silence and we didn't think about it again.

Spend a Swedish winter eternally wandering through the snow and ice knocking on doors of people who don't want to talk to Mormons.
0 investigators, 0 baptisms, lots of pretty girls and you can't.

Kiruna would have been the worst. Luckily I saw it in summer

Gatorman

Hockey Rat, thanks for giving me the opportunity (probably the 11th) to pimp my favorite exmo thread in the whole world:

http://www.postmormon.org/exp_e/index.php/discussions/viewthread/18763/

The title is Best Apostate Mission Moments. There are some awesome stories in it. 99%, maybe even 100% of them are true!

My brother had two years of high school level French when he was called to the Paris, France mission. I figured that had to have been why, because of his two years training - saved some time teaching him in the MTC - and he was able to hit the ground running once he landed in France.

He didn't make a single convert while there. The French love their wine and coffee, and were mostly Catholics when he went.

He was there when the first stake was formed however, from a mission. Still, no converts on his watch. But he had a really good time even if he could only drink soda pop.

Taking a language probably helps you slightly get your mission call. I grew up in Texas but refused to take Spanish because I didnt' want to end up in Latin America. Too many guys from my stake came home sick with parasites for me to endure that.

I took 5 years of French and ended up in Paris. It helped that they split our mission right before I went. They also opened up Greece that year.

More importantly, it shows that you can learn a language. They probably get few missionaries who know Korean, but they know someone who could handle French, Spanish, or German could probably tackle Korean better than someone who never tried.

Then again, my sister failed HS Spanish and they assigned her to Japan. She lasted 2 weeks in the MTC and then went home. They tried to reassign her to Illinois, but she was done by then.

axeldc Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Then again, my sister failed HS Spanish and they
> assigned her to Japan. She lasted 2 weeks in the
> MTC and then went home. They tried to reassign
> her to Illinois, but she was done by then.

Some people just get lucky!

Here's a funny story about the autopen that occurred on my mission.

At the end of a zone meeting, the conversation among us drifted into the rigid rules. A bunch of us had our little white bibles in hand so we began to joke about reading the rules according to our own interpretation. Our ultra pious ZL, rebuked our loud laughter and began to lecture the entire zone about belittling the missionary handbook. My comp told him off by stating that everybody had the same xeroxed signature and the ZL blew up! He simply refused to believe that a machine would sign ETB's name. I added more gasoline to the fire when I said that ETB was extremely ill and in bad health (This was 1992 and he was MIA during GC). The ZL became so enraged that he attempted to punch me in the head, but I twisted/turned at the last moment so I got slugged in the back instead. My DL intervened by tackling the punk.

I would have one more altercation with the ZL over my personal "Skip-Bo" cards, but I'll leave that for another day.

A friend's daughter knew Japanese fluently but was sent to West Virginia. What a waste.

Another one of the Mysteries! God, but ghawd is deep!

Considering that the Japanese have a near zero conversion rate, West Virginia was likely a tradeup for the mission moderators. At least in WV she would stand a better chance of converting gentiles. Japan it would be a lose-lose for the church.

or some other Japanese-speaking community in the U.S.

I have a hispanic surname and totally look white.

Was called to Texas. First day out was asked to learn Spanish (to replace an elder going home.) They probably needed another Spanish-speaking elder and decided I would be the one...not knowing that I didn't speak a lick of Spanish. Too late. I got asked.

Got no training, just told to learn it. I did.

Glad I did. I use it all the time in work and now I'm out of the church. Best of both worlds, lol.

So, I can only guess that I was chosen because of my last name. So there.

I served in the mid 70's. Does anyone remember the made up language that TSCC created and used it to give as test to prospective missionaries as part of submitting their paperwork? They guy looked at my results and said I did "very well". I ended up going to Korea. Korea, 20 years after the end of the war was no Beverly Hills



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/16/2016 11:40PM by misterzelph.

misterzelph, no KPop for you back then heh?:)

I remember pogum pop. I liked it.

I remember the test, however I don't think it was a made-up language. As I recall, after we were finished they identified the language to us as Urdu (spoken in Pakistan).

thanks for the info. I always wondered about that.

Does the church really send people to middle eastern countries?
( Israel doesn't count) that's a death sentence

back in the day, 60's and 70's, there were a couple of pair of missionaries from the Swiss Mission working in Beirut. That ended when things got rough there. I've known a senior couple who worked in Amman Jordan where there is a large branch subordinate to whatever has replaced the Swiss Mission and the Vienna East mission, and they worked only with the Christian population. The branch has even sent out missionaries but has no young missionaries assigned, only the seniors apparently. we just learned that there were some missionaries working in Turkey but were from some other mission like Armenia and were illegally working there as 'volunteers'. i have no idea where they were working but it had to be among the few Christians.

You sound like getting called to Europe is some kind of prized assignment. That sure wasn't the attitude when I went to Brazil in the late 60s. We felt sorry for the poor schlubs going to Europe. Two years of total rejection. That didn't sound like fun.

GBH's son was in my group. He went to Argentina. So much for "the royalty goes to Europe " theory.

My mission president asked for a missionary with computer skills ... and the church sent me to California.

That is how my "sacred" calling worked for me.

for 13 months of my mission (in 3 different segments) I was the OFFICIAL mission programmer.

This is anecdotal, but...

Father A payed lots of tithing and was involved with ward leadership = son went to Australia.

Father B payed only sporadic tithing and was in Elder's quorum = sons went to Guatemala and Honduras.

All of the above people were members of one extended family.

Today it isn't so safe to be a missionary anywhere outside the USA or in the USA.

More parents would rather their sons/daughters serve closer to home if for the simple reason they are closer even if their idealizations of what's safe isn't really all that different here or abroad.

One of my brothers sons just finished a mission to Las Vegas. My other brother's son was originally sent to South America but was waylaid, and reassigned to Las Vegas some years ago, because of State Department warnings.

With claimed worldwide Mormon membership, it appears no longer necessary to call teenagers on missions since almost all missionary work (which, as of late, has become rather unproductive) can and should be done locally. Calling a teenager from Texas to serve in California and a teenager from California to serve in Texas is rather stupid anyway you look at it. And then to have much of that time spent in doing "chores" for members is the height of hypocrisy. What's next - toilet scrubbing missions?

For the most part, the only "converts" coming from the "mission field" are the missionaries themselves - and the unholy fifteen fully know this to be the case. It's well past the time for the brethren "to get real"!

Don't give them any ideas. They could assign some kids, er, uh, "Elders" to the MTC to memorize material safety data sheets for all sorts of cleaning supplies and lead the toilet scrubbing for the ward houses in their mission areas.

When I went I stated on the application for a two year slavery that I spoke Spanish fluently and so was summarily dispatched to Argentina.

Just for the record, South American countries aren't crappy. They are kick ass. I love Europe too, but Chile was top notch. I could live there and be happy