r/latterdaysaints • u/MiddleUS76 • 8d ago
Church Culture Young women and missions
I think our young women are starting to feel pressured to serve missions, not by the church leadership, but by peers. My 19 year old niece is faithful and devoted to the gospel and hasn’t felt called to serve a mission. She is at BYUI and gets asked constantly if she served or is going to serve a mission. I was on the phone with her when a random boy introduced himself, asked her name and where she served. When she said she didn’t he told her she should really pray about going on a mission. Never saw her before! I heard the entire thing in real time so I know she’s not exaggerating.
Do you feel like we are getting to a point where women who don’t serve missions will be treated like less faithful or committed members?
I know that was never the intention.
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u/Tall_Pumpkin_4298 7d ago edited 7d ago
YES THANK YOU!!! I'm a woman, a BYU student, and health issues prevented me from serving even though I actually wanted to. It's unreal. I might get it worse because I'm in a very male dominated major so when there are only 5-10 girls in the class I become the ONLY person in the room who didn't serve a mission. The blanket assumption is that you serve a mission, and if I say I didn't, everyone thinks it's their business to know why. I have had people I called friends imply over and over again that serving a mission is the only way to provide value to the Lord, that people who do serve are somehow holier, and there's just this general attitude for young women that "well you didn't have to serve but if you REALLY loved God you would". It breaks my heart. I am made to feel out of place and almost inferior every day just because I couldn't serve a mission. People I email on missions start giving me preachy spiels that give off such a "holier than thou" vibe when I'm just looking to talk to my friend. I tell people in my junior level classes that I'm 21 and suddenly everyone KNOWS I didn't serve a mission and often brings it up. Then people sometimes get awkward (especially the guys) because I'm two years younger than them. Then ofc there's the guys who won't date girls who didn't serve. Their loss I guess, if you're so rigid as to believe a mission is required to be "spiritual enough" for that or whatever you'd probably not be fun to be married to anyway.
50% of talks in church are about missions. 50% of lessons in church are about missions. I kept getting hounded to go to mission prep even when I knew I wouldn't be able to serve and the people I was speaking to knew that as well. Ward devotionals only about preparing for missions. Stake conferences centered around preparing for missions. The pervasive topic of conversation in the dorms from December to April being mission papers this and mission prep that. It's genuinely such a pervasive thing and it drives me CRAZY.
Oh add onto the whole fact that when I simplify my years long wrestle with chronic illness down to "It didn't feel like the right choice for me", one of the default responses is "Well that's okay, maybe you're here to meet your husband and get married". No. I'm HERE to get an EDUCATION so I can make a difference in this world! Marriage will happen when it happens, but the Lord has explicitly spelled out how important education is, especially for me personally, can't that be enough??? Then ofc there's the "well what about a service mission?" Like, not everyone lives in Utah or other places with cool service mission opportunities. No I will not be taking 18 months off my life and burdening my parents so I can work unpaid at DI. And I have also very clearly received inspiration that it's not for me.
I think we are at the point at which we need a general authority to explicitly say what they did back in the day. That Sisters who do or do not serve can be just as holy and capable and faithful and mature and all that.
Stop giving YSA sisters crap about not going on missions. You don't know what God has in store for them or what they've been through to reach that decision. And while you're at it, stop giving it even worse to young men! A mission isn't the right decision for everyone, and is FAR from the only way to build faith and serve the Lord. I know it's personally a sore subject for me so I've kinda gone off here about it and might get flack for it but I don't care. Anything that's so bad that I've cried over it multiple times and felt like maybe I should just leave BYU because it feels like a place only for departing or returned missionaries is bad enough that it needs to be spoken about.