One Million Mormon Missionaries and Counting

The Salt Lake Tribune reports that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has enlisted their one millionth missionary.

“The first million was hard,” said Elder Dieter Uchtdorf, a member of the church’s Quorum of Twelve Apostles who sits on the church’s missionary executive committee. “The second million will be easy. [The number of missionaries] will grow and it will grow fast.”

Mormon founder Joseph Smith believed he had a mandate to “proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people.” Shortly after establishing the church with six people, Smith sent his younger brother, Samuel Smith, to neighboring towns with a knapsack full of copies of the Book of Mormon, the faith’s unique scripture.

Now scores of young men and women, older single women and retired couples serve the church as full-time missionaries for 18 months to two years. They are assigned in pairs to proselytize, perform humanitarian service, help people trace their genealogy or anything else church leaders ask them to do. They pay about $400 per month for the privilege; those who cannot afford it can be subsidized by the church.

“They face rejection and sometimes verbal abuse, but they soldier on,” Ballard said. “It’s a marvelous thing what these young men and women and couples do.”

Read the whole story.

HT: SermonAudio

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