Age factor affects mission field, college choices
Missionary applications are piling on the desks of bishops after the recent announcement of a decrease in the minimum missionary age for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
“About 700 applications are typically started each week,” said Church spokesperson Michael Purdy in a statement. “In the two weeks following the announcement, that number increased to approximately 4,000 per week.”
“I was watching Conference on on TV when I heard President Monson announce the age drop,” said Strawsee Christiansen, a 19 year-old freshman majoring in pre-physical therapy. “I was flooded with relief and I just knew I needed to go on a mission.
Christiansen said the idea of serving a mission always felt good to her, but she felt by the time she was 21, she would probably be in a program with her education that would be difficult to leave for 18 months and get back into.
Christiansen said she is waiting for a missionary who will be home in less than a year.
“If I go on a mission, it will be that much longer until I can be with him,” she said. “If the age was still 21 to serve a mission, I don’t think I would get to serve.”
Christiansen said she joined a mission prep class shortly after General Conference.
“The class started off with three or four girls,” she said. “After the announcement the class doubled, but only with girls.”
“Well, it sucks for me because that is a lot of the girls that I could be dating leaving, but I can see why girls would want to go after this change,” said Kenny Jardine, a returned missionary and senior in business administration. “By the age of 21, they are already three years into school, almost graduating. Being 19 makes a mission fit easier into their life schedules.”
“This is the craziest thing that has ever happened to me in my whole entire life,” said Riley Hunter, an 18-year-old undeclared freshman. “Everything that I ever had planned changed. I woke up to my phone being overloaded with text messages letting me know I can get my papers in.”
Hunter said before the age change, he would’ve had to wait until four-and-a-half months before his 19th birthday to put his papers in and would not be able to leave until after his birthday on June 29th.
“I have wanted to get out on my mission as so
on as possible,” he said.
Hunter said on the Sunday night when the announcement was made, he had an interview with his bishop and had his mission papers turned in three days later. He was familiar with what had to be done to get the papers in because he had been planning and preparing for his mission.
Hunter said part of the plans he had before his mission was to attend a winter and spring semester of school. He said now he will start his schooling after his mission.
Jardine has a brother who is a senior in high school. He said his brother has a late birthday and was also going to take the year before his mission to commit to college education. Now, once he is graduated, he can hand his papers in and head out on a mission.
Many young men and women taking advantage of the age change means there will be less freshman on campus.
“Kids are freaking wild and reckless freshman year,” Jardine said. “If they go out in the mission field right out of high school, they won’t waste as much time and it will give them some life experience under their belt to take with them to college.”
The age change has some parents worried if 18-year-old boys and 19-year-old girls are mature enough to serve missions.
“The age drop is good depending on the person,” said Kim Pence, a sophomore majoring in nursing and mother to five children. “Some kids need it so they don’t get distracted with life or get into things that they shouldn’t, but some kids aren’t ready at 19 so they really won’t be ready at 18.”
– haileehousley@gmail.com