New Callings

This post will have quite a few words and ideas that you might not understand if you aren't a Mormon. So, in my usual way, I am going to explain it to death. I hope you find it interesting and stick with me because I do have something I will talk about, after I have brought you up to speed on a few things.

In our Church we don't have any paid clergy. We all have callings, which is just a fancy way of saying that we all have a church job. This keeps the church running smoothly. A calling can last for up to five or more years, usually bishops serve in their position for at least five years. Then there are the people who are teachers.

We have a program called Primary for children from three to twelve. Each age has a separate class of their own with their own teacher.

At the age of twelve they graduate into Young Men's or Young Women's.

Young men's and Young women's are each their own separate groups. The groups are each split into three groups depending on age.

The young women's start out with Beehive's. This is for the girls 12 to 13. After Beehives they go into Mia Maids. That's for the 14 and 15 year olds.

And, you didn't hear this from me, but Mia Maids are sometimes one of the hardest groups to be in charge of for the simple reason that they are 14 and 15.
When they turn 16 they go into Laurels and they stay there until they turn 18.

The boys are set up the same way. They start as deacons at twelve, move on to teachers at 14, and become priests at 16.

Let me also explain that the teachers don't actually teach, and I don't think a priest has ever officiated at a wedding. Those are just their titles at those ages.

Each of these groups from the 3 year olds to the 17 year olds have their own teachers. The only thing is that when it's young men's and women's the teachers are called advisers.

Then we have the librarians, they hand out teaching materials, chalks and erasers, pictures, easels to put the pictures on, and they also run copies of whatever needs copying.

For the adults, that would be the ones not teaching in Primary or Young Men's or Women's, We have our Women's group, known as Relief Society. There is a Relief Society President. She has two counselors. They have their hands full with quite a lot. It's their job to make sure that all the families in the ward are receiving help if needed. When someone is hospitalized, or has a baby, the Relief Society is in charge of phoning around and having members bring dinner in to help those families.

They do many good works. Too many to list here.

The men actually have two groups. There are the Elders. They are mostly the younger men (Younger as in mostly under 50.) This group has an Elder's quorum President. He has two counselors. My husband Don was Elder's Quorum President for a few years when he was in his late forties. He was very busy. I sometimes didn't see him as much as I would have liked, but I did try to support him in his calling.

In our church we don't just serve each other, we try to help out people and organizations in our community that need help.

Now the other men are in a group called High Priests. These are the older guys. There can be quite a few young guys in this group too though. You have to hold the office of High Priest to be made a Bishop or one of his counselors. There are also some Stake positions where you need to be a High Priest.

The High Priest's leader is called the High Priest Group Leader.

Okay. I believe this should be sufficient background for my dear friends who are not members of my church.

My husband Don and I were called into the Stake President's office almost a month ago.

Oh, oh, I guess a little more background might be necessary here.

The Stake President is the one who is in charge of a bigger geographical area, we call it a Stake. A Stake is made up of several wards. Think of it like a school district that resides over all the different schools in a certain area. You can compare the district to the Stake and each school to a ward. You go to which ever Ward who's boundaries you live in. If you move to a different part of town then you would most likely be in a new Ward.

Possibly even a new Stake.

All right, back to my story. Like I said earlier, Don and I had been summoned to come meet with our Stake President. You aren't usually told why. That might seem somewhat ominous, but it's just the way they do things.

In a way it kinda feels like being sent to the Principal's office. Don't worry though we weren't in trouble.

Not in trouble at all actually.

As it turned out we had been asked to come see the S.P. because he wanted to give Don a new calling. The new calling was for Don to be our Ward's new High Priest Group Leader.

(From here on out I will just say the HPGL. Much easier to type.)

We were really quite surprised to have Don given this calling. The leadership callings are usually pretty labor intense. Don of course accepted the calling very humbly. I was, maybe, slightly less humble. I was thrilled for my husband. He is such a good man and an extremely dedicated leader. I knew that he would do a really good job as the new HPGL.

The thing that was hard for me was that you aren't supposed to talk about the new calling to anyone, until he or she is officially given their calling in Sacrament Meeting. That would be our main worship service.

It is really hard to not tell people that you talk to all the time about the new calling. I was so proud of what a great guy he is but I was expected to keep it to myself. I know I have heard the reasons for this required secrecy, but darn if I can remember what they are. Nevertheless, I was good. I didn't squeal. Well one teenie-tiny little bit.

I told my daughter Heidi. After all she lives two hours away in Spokane. Who is she gonna tell?

Yesterday in church it soon became very clear that Don wasn't the only one receiving a new calling. They were releasing people from their old callings left and right. And then giving those same people new callings. It doesn't often happen this way. Changes are usually made one or two at a time. Like say a family is moving out of the ward. They need to be released from their callings.

Yesterday just happened to be one of those times when several changes are made at once.

So now Don is our ward's HPGL. I don't need to be told that I won't be seeing quite so much of him. I already know that he will be gone quite a lot because, after all, he has already been an Elder's quorum Pres.,

I am so proud of him. He is very firm and steady in the church. I'm not nearly as good as he is. I sometimes tend to be a little rebellious, and I have a tendency to be overly critical at times. I am working on doing better, but compared to my husband I have quite a ways to go.

Don, of course, never nags me about things like that. He knows I have a tendency to sometimes see things my own way. He just loves me anyway. We have carved out a really nice relationship for ourselves over the last almost 32 years. He helps me with some things and I help him with others.

I love this guy of mine. Sometimes I could just scream at him, which I don't, because that would give me a headache. But I have to say that most the time I realize just how lucky we are to have each other, and then I am happy.

And I know that he will be one of the finest High Priest Group Leaders ever!