posted
Okay, you say that we may well be deluding ourselves that people who serve missions are more mature. And that even if they ARE, what's so great about maturity anyway.
There's no answer to that except to say that if you saw them for yourself you would see it too. It's very marked. Anyone can dismiss any observation at all by saying it's only bias.
Maturity is good because it makes makers out of unmakers. It focuses people's energy on the positive. Maturity means less destruction, less debt, less drugs and vandalism, happier more stable families, more education, more accomplishment, more love and peace and understanding, less acting out. Of course maturity is good!
Don't think this is regimented coercive oppression, either. It's not. It comes from the heart, from within. Strict regimentation by authoritarianism doesn't lead to maturity, it leads to rebellion and stubborn opposition.
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But I also know that I have my sack of rocks to carry around and shouldn't go judging other people.
I've said that repeatedly too.
I merely pointed out that it didn't seem particularly funny to me, nor did I find it particularly emblematic of maturity. ON that ONE THING!!!
Bear with me here! I'm a big supporter of the person who made that post. I see myself all over that story. I understand leaving. I've said it before. Oh, maybe that was in the thread that got deleted.
I don't really see it as one of those needing to walk in another's shoes kind of thing.
The person in question was situationally immature. Not at the time, mind you. I'd've done the same thing. But in later thinking it was a funny story. It wasn't a funny story. It was sad.
And that's not a failing. It's a realization he hadn't come to yet.
Making that realization was a maturational event.
I hope it doesn't devalue the whole missionary experience for him. I would argue that it shouldn't. No WAY! Things don't have to be perfect in retrospect to be valuable, do they?
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quote:One that the leadership supposedly repudiated (i.e., it is NOT a right of passage). But they HAD to say that, didn't they? Why, because everyone was/is treating it AS a right of passage.
No, they didn't have to say it. Why would they have to? Because people outside the church thought it was wrong that it was a rite of passage? The leadership do their very best to make the church a contributory body to society and to encourage its members to be good citizens, but they don't give a flying fig as to non-members' opinions of doctrine or ordinances.
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I'd bet my life that it doesn't devalue his mission for him. But the original poster hasn't psoted on Hatrack since then, and I can only imagine what he thinks of the people here after the way he was treated. Dogpiled and excoriated even after retreating from the field of battle. Whether or not you liked the story, he was excited to share it, and as an insecure newbie, he got blasted by long-time posters. What was that about maturity?
posted
I don't know if I missed something in the original post, but I didn't see any "insisting that RMs are more mature than others their age". I certainly saw some people saying that that tends to be the case, and it isn't suprising that something like a 2 year commitment of service, any service, would have such an effect. I think the touching on a point of sensitivity goes the other way around. It seems people are terribly offended that anyone would suggest such a thing.
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quote: But the claim is "MORE" mature -- universally.
I haven't seen anybody make this claim. I've seen you campaigning against it, but I haven't seen anybody actually say that's what they believe.
Of course it's not true universally. If a person goes on a mission, doesn't work and doesn't serve, wasting his time and his companion's, he might be worse off for going on a mission. Two years of doing good will make you a better person. Two years of selfishness will make you a more selfish person.
quote: And I'm probably pretty insulting about it in my approach because I care a lot less about it than you do. And I'm fairly unapologetic in my non-caring attitude.
So I've noticed.
quote: There's no answer to that except to say that if you saw them for yourself you would see it too. It's very marked. Anyone can dismiss any observation at all by saying it's only bias.
This is what I was trying to say before. I don't know how you (Bob) feel so confident saying that it's false without having seen it yourself. Of course, if you'd seen the affects, and then declared that it was false, that's another matter entirely.
posted
Question, am I making it up, or did several people assert that LDS kids are more mature than other people's kids of the same age?
That's the only question I've been trying to address here.
When I was 21, I was running a lab in graduate school and teaching courses. You're telling me I was less mature than a kid who was knocking on doors and talking about God.
My buddy who went into the army and taught jungle survival -- less mature.
My friend who started a taxi company -- less mature.
My friend who became a session musician -- okay, bad example.
My friend who went into seminary -- also less mature.
My buddies who went to medical school -- less...
That's what has been said. Isn't it?
I beg to differ.
I've tried to explain what a great time the 19 - 21 year age is. How it is full of growth for everyone.
Oh, and I'll have to ask you to pay closer attention to the self-effacing endings to my posts when they are there. They aren't there to ERASE what I've said. Far from it. They are there to put everything in context.
I truly believe that I have no place to judge others when it comes to these things. I'm not judging ANY individuals.
And I felt the need to explain that situational maturity is a better concept than "MATURITY."
A mature person can do shockingly immature things. Does that make them immature? Or just make them immature in that situation?
I think it's the latter. We've had this discussion before.
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quote: it isn't suprising that something like a 2 year commitment of service, any service, would have such an effect. I think the touching on a point of sensitivity goes the other way around. It seems people are terribly offended that anyone would suggest such a thing.
I'm not following your line of thought here Bev. I haven't seen anyone argue that two years of some experience (whatever it may be) is NOT a growing experience. I think we were just trying to say it doesn't have to be a missionary experience.
I spent a year as a homeless person -- that was a learning experience. I've spent 18 years as a parent -- that has been a HUGE learning experience.
Farmgirl (who got interrupted with a phone call in the middle of this post, lost her train of thought, and is probably well past Bev's post by now)
posted
Sorry I brought the thread back to answer your question, Bob. I didn't mean for it to get so weird.
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posted
*shrug* I don't agree with the request to grow up faster. I made a whole post on why that isn't necessarily true.
I do think they mature spiritually at a much greater rate - that's to be expected! They are focusing on nothing else for two years. I think they sometimes seem more mature because of spiritual maturation - it's unusual enough in the general population of 21 year olds that the rest gets extrapolated. But you definitely don't need to go on a mission or be in a seminary to get that spiritual maturation by early twenties, as is evidenced by Hatrackers - one in particular.
quote: One might say that Mormons are expected to grow up sooner than others of the same age.
It's a pretty big jump from that quote to saying that mormons believe that every single returned missionary will be more mature than every single person of the same age that didn't.
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posted
He was responding to Bob's comment about parents being concerned for their children serving missions. If you look at the context, he was saying that the youth were deemed to be mature enough already to be given such a big task, nothing about them coming back and being more mature than other people.
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posted
Ah, Bob, I see what you're saying now, I think, maybe. This is in response to we LDS always saying everything about our church and stuff is so great and wonderful all the time (implying that it's so much better than all the other churches). <laughs> Okay, I totally get that. That is true, we do that. Because we really believe it to be true, of course. And probably we should keep our thoughts to ourselves about that. Certainly being smug and insufferable is no virtue! <laughs>
So I do apologize for that! And I'll try to do better. But it's true that I really do believe it's the best church, and that its teachings are true. But I understand that other people feel their own churches are the best, or their own decisions not to go to church, and I respect their beliefs.
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quote: One might say that Mormons are expected to grow up sooner than others of the same age.
When I read this, it didn't make me think of missions at all.
LDS folks marry younger, have children earlier and take on life responsibility in general younger than other folks. I mentioned in another thread that my daughter is marrying soon. She's not quite 22, and she has an older sister on a mission.
She's lived here with me on Maui for the past 3 years, since she graduated from high school, and she recently moved back to the mainland to marry her high school sweetheart who just returned from his mission.
Her friends and co-workers and even some of the church members here can not understand why she wants to get married SO YOUNG!!! To her schoolmates and friends and family in Idaho, she is doing exactly as she has been expected to all her life. Every member of our extended family to date (except her older sister) was married younger than she.
I don't think it's necessarily a positive thing that our youth are encouraged to marry so young, but I think we definitely expect our young adults to grow up sooner than other groups (at least in the US)do.
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quote:a mission is considered . . . a recognition of that person's individuality and reaching of maturity.
In other words, they are ALREADY considered an adult member of society who can take on the risks and responsibilities represented by missionary life. Now, a mission may or may not increase the maturation level -- and what that means itself depends on cultural qualifiers -- from when they left. From an LDS perspective (what mature means in the Mormon culture), there is a huge change that is both hard to pin down and distinct from those who haven't gone of comparitive age. I will say that those who don't go do have the ability to achieve that same hard to define quality of Mormon expected maturity, but it usually takes longer. Converts are the quickest to pick up on those same attributes, and the more serious of them usually with more abundance than the younger counterpart returned missionaries. Sadly, most long time members don't recognize this quality for a reason that I haven't pinned down. Perhaps it has something to do with group dynamics that has been popping up in the discussion. (quick personal aside: I love you converts. You are the lifeblood of the LDS Church and it saddens me that more is not done at a local level to recognize your contributions.)
I have certainly known missionaries who came back unchanged and equally as immature as when they went. Almost always, however, it was those who didn't take the purpose of missionary life very seriously that were the least impacted. Some of them do "grow up" once in the mission field and realize what devotion means. Usually, such change is a very hard and painful transformation like a butterfly trying to emerge from a hardened cocoon.
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posted
Wow, I definately know a lot more about missionaries than I did before reading this thread. I found it very interesting. I don't want to derail too much, but I do have a Morman question. In my limited experience, it seems that Mormans tends to marry young and after very short engagements. Is this true, or just a weird trend that I've seen in the people I know? If it's true, why is is true?
posted
I think that tends to be true. I think it probably has something to do with the importance Mormons put on marriage, ie: finding an "eternal companion", and starting a family. Many single LDS feel out of place because of just how family oriented the doctrine and society of the LDS church is. For better or for worse, that is how it seems. From my observation at least. Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
Thanks Bev. Here's another question. If young people who are Mormans tend to marry early, how does the Church deal with divorce? Statistically, marrying young puts you more at risk for a divorce. However I would think that if the Morman church puts a lot of emphasis on marriage than divorce is really frowned upon. Are there things in place to help these young marriages succeed, like counseling, etc.? Again, I'm just curious.
posted
Good question, Space Opera. You are certainly correct that divorce is not encouraged, though the church is very supportive of women and children getting away from abusive, evil men. Commitment is so very important, especially since LDS believe in eternal marriage. Eternity is a pretty long time.
I think the church offers free counseling, but I am not sure how that works. And whether or not people think that counseling is actually effective is up for grabs.
I wonder how much the marrying young effects divorce specifically among LDS. I am not aware of any study done on that specifically. But I have *heard* (not sure on this) that while non-temple (non-eternal) LDS marriage has as high if not a higher divorce rate than the national average, LDS temple marriages have significantly lower divorces. Someone else might be able to give better info on that tho.
I certainly have seen my share of LDS who marry young an naive, not particularly well prepared for marriage, and get divorced. It makes me very sad to see. Any divorce breaks my heart to see, even divorce that is truly necessary because then it means that one or both really suffered in the marriage.
I almost entered into a horrible marriage relationship when I was younger and more naive. I thank my lucky stars (actually I sincerely thank God) that I was saved from that. I will tell my story sometime, maybe my next landmark.
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posted
"LDS folks marry younger, have children earlier and take on life responsibility in general younger than other folks."
While it's true that non-LDS folks now tend to artificially extend adolescence, I should point out that assuming adult responsibilities does not automatically make someone mature enough to properly handle those adult responsibilities. In other words, 22 may or may not be young to be marrying regardless of whether someone is Mormon or not; the only difference is that Mormons may be expected and culturally encouraged to do so, and might therefore have a better support network set up to assist people who make that expected choice.
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posted
I never said that LDS people were more mature or more ready to accept adult responsiblities than anyone else, just that we are expected to do so at a younger age than many other groups are. I don't think anyone has suggested otherwise.
In addition to my own family's anecdotes - I was watching a DVD version "When Harry Met Sally" the other night on cable (with commentary at the bottom of the screen instead of voice-overs), and it mentioned that Meg Ryan was only 27 when she was playing a 33 year old woman who was starting to feel her biological clock ticking. She said it was difficult for her to play the part because "at 27, I'd never even thought about having a baby." or something like that. I can not relate to that at all. It seems almost silly to me to suggest that a 27 year old is too young to have a child, or even to be thinking about it.
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posted
I can't think of anything that will make a young person mature faster than giving them real responsibility.
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posted
I just realized I don't know that lds are expected to take on mature responsibilities at a younger age that other people. *thinks* From what I've observed from hatrack and Lost Boys etc you LDS love kids and take good care of them. That means kids have good home lives, people they can rely on. Kids have rules and family time and regular meals and scheduled bedtimes. More supervision and rules than many non-LDS kids obviously. Sure, they may have more chores at home (especially in larger families) and more requirements at church as far as required activities. OTOH, those activities are all supervised and carefully planned, just as missionaries have very specific planned lives. I just looked at all the rules for BYU housing. They try to leave as little possibility for misconduct as possible. Which is great, I suppose, but...I'm not seeing any expectation for early maturity or adult responsibility and choices in all this. Less expectation, if anything.
The expectation of early marriage and having kids right away is really the only early maturity expectation I'm seeing and we're still talking age 21 for boys which isn't that young. And the girls have all grown up in a culture where being a wife and mother is what they've been waiting for their whole life. Of course they want to get started asap. Plus these young adults have very supportive parents and church to help them out. Out of curiousity, how many young LDS get monetary support after marriage to get started? How many get monetary support for going on the mission?
Am I making any sense? If LDS kids have all these mature expectations, then why all the rules? And how can they grow up so much more or at least faster than other people when they have this invisible framework of rules and family support? I'm not seeing early maturity or early maturity expections, I guess. I'm not saying you don't have them. Just tell me what I've missed seeing. Right now I just see big safety nets, which is not really all that different from my own family.
posted
Theca, thank you! That's exactly what I think about the BYU rules. They aren't dumb rules - I certainly lived most of them (not the curfew ones) through of college - I just didn't need to be babysat in order to do it.
My family did NOT encourage us to marry extremely young, and I was trying to think of how. I think part of it was the financial deal - you can mooch off the parents for room and board as long as you are (1) single, and (2) getting your bachelors. Once you graduate from college and/or get married, you are cut loose from the parental monetary support. The point being is that if you are mature enough to get married, you are mature enough to live as an adult. You're not going to get the outside trappings of an adult life while still being dependent on your parents for existance.
I don't know how well that worked - officially, there were/are no safety nets. That has had an interesting effects in some ways.
And being on a mission is NOT being on your own as an adult. You set your own schedule, but you're with someone 24 hours a day! Someone else takes care of all the bills and gives you an allowance for food. That's not being on your own - that's being mollycoddled. It's great! I loved it. It just wasn't being a functioning adult.
posted
While I do not doubt that going away on a mission, joining the army or doing volunteer work in Mexico are all maturing experiences, I believe that the fact that all these adventures involve a prolonged separation from ones community can inflate the perception of the maturity gained to the disadvantage of those choosing to spend the corresponding time closer to home. The mechanism is the same that makes you marvel at how much your nephew has grown since you last saw him a year ago, whereas you fail to remark on the change that has happened in your own child who you have watched continually during that time. The young man going off to college may change and mature to the same extent as his brother away on his mission, but since he comes home every weekend to have dinner with his parents, who thus have the opportunity to watch the process unfold gradually, it is less noticable and notable.
quote: Out of curiousity, how many young LDS get monetary support after marriage to get started? How many get monetary support for going on the mission?
I don't have any numbers, but I'll share our situation. I paid for essentially none of my mission. My maternal grandparents tried to pay for half of the mission for each one of their grandkids that went on one, and they were able to do so for me. My parents paid for the other half.
I have to say that this wasn't the best way to do things. While I felt like it was a big sacrifice just to go on a mission, it wasn't nearly as much as some of the other missionaries had to do. Some missionaries leave school and work for a year or two just saving up money for a mission. I was a weenie compared to these guys.
A lot of the Americans that go on missions are in the same boat as I -- mommy and daddy pay for the mission.
Then, when I got back from my mission, that was pretty much it from my parents. I put myself through school from that point on.
When I got married, my parents didn't help out at all. They would have given me a car if Mary didn't already have one, but since we didn't need it, they didn't.
Mary's parents, on the other hand, did help us out quite a bit. They gave us quite a bit for the wedding, etc., which we didn't even spend all of (that was kosher -- if we could save money, we got to keep the money). Each year when bonuses came out, Mary's father would send us a big fat check that really was a substantial percentage of our yearly income. Without those checks, I don't think we could have made it through school and the children without getting student loans. (We had one child when we both got our bachelors, and two, almost three when I got my masters.)
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quote: My family did NOT encourage us to marry extremely young, and I was trying to think of how. I think part of it was the financial deal - you can mooch off the parents for room and board as long as you are (1) single, and (2) getting your bachelors. Once you graduate from college and/or get married, you are cut loose from the parental monetary support. The point being is that if you are mature enough to get married, you are mature enough to live as an adult. You're not going to get the outside trappings of an adult life while still being dependent on your parents for existance.
Very much the same in my family. But Theca, many of your observations do hit home. It is an interesting discussion to ponder if this promotes maturity or not. I think it depends on the "execution" of the situation.
Edit to respond to Porter's post: In my family, once you are married you are "on your own" technically, but since my parents are quite wealthy, they were generous with gifts. I suppose that could be deemed help. They figured it was just the best way to use their money. I know their gifts did help us out quite a bit. But they did not pay for our college tuition, housing, or other things. It was more like, "Hey, its Christmas. Have some money!"
posted
Yeah, regular gifts of money that make up half the year's income counts as help. If you're getting money from your parents, then you're not on your own.
On your own = no living at home, no money from parents.
Oh, and Porter might be exaggerating just a wee bit on how much we received from Dad's bonuses. We did get a nice wedding gift though.
Porter and I both came into our marriage with thousands saved up and no debt. At all. That really helped us get through when we were spending more than we were making.
And just when it seemed we were going to run out, my parents would just happen to give us a Christmas or bonus gift that would just barely get us through.
Then before he graduated, he got a great job and we paid off our small student loan without even accruing interest.
To this day, the only debt we have ever had is our house. (Well, excepting the small student loan that never had a chance to have interest.)
posted
I'm not sure that's fair. I don't get money from my parents, except that I have the ability to earn a good income, due largely to the fact that they strongly encouraged us to go to college, paid for that college, were extremely patient about giving us second, third, and fourth chances while we figured out what we wanted to do in college, changed majors several times, tried and failed in several things, supported us after college until we found jobs, kicked our behinds until we actually hit the pavement long enough to find jobs, were emotionally supportive as we changed jobs, finding the right career paths, helped by keeping kids, gave presents of a substantial nature that improved our quality of life, in one case gave a loan that helped one of us buy a house, etc. etc.
We were self-sufficient in the sense that we could have managed and eaten and paid bills without them, but that doesn't mean that their ongoing support, both emotional and material, wasn't of huge benefit to us.
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posted
That's what I mean - you weren't on your own then. If you couldn't live your life without them, then you're not on your own. Not being on your own is okay, if it's okay with those who are helping you. It just doesn't count as being self-sufficient. If you couldn't do it without them, then you are still partly dependant.
Not that I'm advocating what my dad did. I am completely and utterly self-sufficient and have been for years, but I have than a few problems with trust stemming from feeling forcefully abandoned.
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posted
We were on our own in the sense that we couldn't expect help from anybody. Each year when the help came, it was a surprise. One year it didn't come. I don't know what year that was, because I didn't notice it. We always planned everyting as though we would get no help, and for a while we were pleasantly surprised.
edit: We could have lived our lives without the help, but we probably would have had to get student loans like most people.
posted
mph, yes, that's what I mean. Well, I mean two things. That help, when it came, was a gift and not expected or planned for.
The other thing I mean is that without their earlier help in the form of college tuition and more importantly, the expectation that I WOULD go to college and be able to support myself, I would be in a much worse position financially.
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posted
"Does that mean we will never really be on our own?"
Bluntly, yes. It means you will always be pampered. Whether you consider this an insult or not -- and I don't mean it that way -- depends entirely on whether or not you think of independence as its own virtue.
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That is true, we do that. Because we really believe it to be true, of course. And probably we should keep our thoughts to ourselves about that. Certainly being smug and insufferable is no virtue! <laughs>![[Wink]](wink.gif)
