Mormons and General Conference

by admin April 4, 2020 Post Comment

Twice a year Mormons all around the world convene for General Conference.

Conference is, it’s a biannual conference where leaders from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints share messages that lend direction, wisdom, guidance, gratitude, and inspiration to all who listen. Along with all that, conference is meant to inform the members of the general conditions of the Church.

It takes place in the Conference Center in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah the first weekends of April and October. 21,000 people can be seated in this center along with the Tabernacle Choir, the Prophet and Apostles, the Quorum of the 70 and other auxiliary leaders. Such as the leaders of the worlds largest and oldest women’s organization.

In the audience you will find people from all over the world.

A few years ago, I got to attend Conference with a friend from Chile. Conference is translated to 94 different languages and broadcasted to members all over the world.

During Conference, we sustain the current and new leaders by raising of the right hand. We also say thank you to leaders who are being released by the same signal.

We also learn Church stats. For example, membership numbers, how many missionaries are out, how many temples there are and which ones are in the making.

General Conference is truly inspirational!

Not only do we go over Church basics during conference but we get to hear from Church leaders.

They share inspirational messages for the world to hear! Messages vary in topics that each person picks for themselves.

The first General Conference occurred in the Book of Mormon.

Literally in chapter 2 of the Book of Mosiah in the Book of Mormon.

And it came to pass that after Mosiah had done as his father had commanded him, and had made a proclamation throughout all the land, that the people ^agathered themselves together throughout all the land, that they might go up to the ^btemple to ^chear the ^dwords which king Benjamin should speak unto them.
Mosiah 2:1

He proceeded to tell the people a lot of really awesome stuff. King Benjamin was a great king. Go read the story. You’ll like it.

In modern days, the first conference was held by Joseph Smith shortly after the organization of the Church on June 9th, 1830. Only 27 members were present.

Nowadays there are a whopping 16 million members and 30,500 congregations world wide!

General Conference is welcome for all to watch, listen to, or read!

Whether you believe in the Church or not, there are some real gems in the messages that apply to everyone. And as we are all in quarantine, I can’t imagine that you have much else to do.

Conference is 10am-12pm, 2pm-4pm MST Saturday and Sunday. There are a number of ways to watch General Conference. The way I watch it is on the Church website. You can also use the Church’s YouTube channel.

Covid-19 will affect General Conference in April 2020

Because of this pandemic, General Conference will be unique. People will not be in attendance and we will all have to watch from our homes. But that’s not what will make it truly unique. This conference marks 200 years since the First Vision of Joseph Smith. That’ll be it’s own article though. I’ve included a link to learn more about that below.

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