When my friends find out that we go to church every week for three hours at a time, I get lots of big eyes and replies like “You’re crazy! Why would you do that?!”

I’ll be the first one to admit that some weeks, three hours does feel quite long.  Thankfully the three hour block of meetings is broken up into chunks, so usually time goes by at a good pace.

The main part of our Sunday church service is when everyone in the ward (or congregation) comes together for Sacrament Meeting, a 70 minute service held in the chapel.  I have three small children (5 years, 3 years and 1 year old), and it takes some work to teach our children how to sit reverently, and we by no means have it down!  My 1-year- old daughter isn’t close to being able to sit still, and sometimes I’ll rock her in the back of the chapel, sometimes I’ll take her out for a short break to stretch her legs.  During Sacrament meeting, we sing songs of worship, take the Sacrament, listen to talks given by members of the congregation, get to hear special musical numbers, and take care of ward business (announcements about upcoming activities, announcing changes with responsibilities at church).  My ward has Sacrament Meeting as the first meeting of the three, but my parents ward has this meeting at the end.  I love Sacrament meeting because it gives me a feeling of family unity within my ward when we all worship together.

After (or before) Sacrament meeting, all the children 18 months to 3 years old are provided with a nursery they can attend. In nursery each week, the children have snack and song times, story time, and a lesson about a principle of the gospel, followed with lots and lots of play time.  Often there is also a little craft the children get to do that reinforces the lesson they were taught that day.

When children are 3-11 years old, they attend Primary for 2 of the hours each Sunday block.  Half of Primary is spent in a large group Sharing Time, with singing and a lesson.  The children get to put on part of the program each week in this meeting, presenting talks they prepared, praying, and reciting scriptures. The second half of Primary is where the children are broken up by age and have Sunday School.  My 5 year old son loves Primary!  His teacher is so loving and puts a lot of work into her lessons each week, and we hear him singing the church songs he learns all week long.  He has given talks in Primary twice, and gets excited each time.

For youth 12-18 years old, and all the men and women in the ward, the second hour is spent in Sunday School.  The adults learn together, and the teenagers are usually separated into two or three classes by age group.  Each year, the lessons focus on a particular book of scripture, and are the same lessons around the world. The teachers are ward members who are called on to prepare a lesson each week and present it to the class.  We have wonderful Sunday School teachers.

The last hour is possibly my favorite – if I can say I have a favorite!  Girls 12-18 attend Young Women, women meet together in Relief Society, and all the males from age 12 up meet in Priesthood (another link).  The men have a short opening meeting with announcements, prayer and song, and then the teenagers and adults have separate lessons. Everyone has the same lesson in each group, but I like the opportunity to have lessons and conversations as just women for those few minutes each week.

When I worked with the Young Women several years ago, I loved the chance we could take to focus on just these awesome girls for one hour each week, and the needs that teenagers have – these girls are so special and meeting their needs is so important!  I’m sure the men who are in charge of the teenage boys have similar feelings.

I love the sisterhood and love I feel in Relief Society, and I’m excited to get to attend this meeting again after spending time serving in Young Women and Primary for a few years.  It’s always interesting to chat with my husband after church and see what angle his Priesthood lesson took.  We think it’s fun to discuss how each others Priesthood or Relief Society lessons went that day and how they were different or similar.

So yes – Mormons go to church for three hours, and it can sound like a long time!  But every minute is important, used wisely, and fulfills an important purpose. And thank goodness we’re in three different classes during that time and not sitting in one seat in one room the whole block!

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**Please note: The answers in “Ask a Mormon Woman” reflect the thoughts, perspectives, and experiences of individuals. Although here at Mormon Women: Who We Are, we strive to have our content consistent with the Church’s doctrine and teachings, we do not speak officially for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. For official information about or from the Church, please visit www.mormon.org or www.lds.org.

Have a question you would like to ask? Send an email to us at gmail, with username ‘mormonwoman’

The post Ask a Mormon Woman: Why do Mormons go to church for three hours? appeared first on Women in The Church of Jesus Christ.

– Curious about sacrament meetings in the LDS Church from the perspective of a visitor? See this reporter’s article.

– You’ll often hear Mormons talk about how the most important part of our Sunday meetings is the sacrament. For more of an explanation of (and articles/scriptures about) what the sacrament means to us, see here.

– Explanations of what goes on at our meetings can be found here, here and here.

[Editor’s note: If you ever visit a sacrament meeting, you may wonder about whether or not to take the sacrament. You may even feel a little nervous about that part of the meeting. Please don’t! We love having visitors, and more than anything, we want you to feel welcome and comfortable. Since most people do wonder about this, though, since a main purpose of this ordinance is to allow us us renew our baptismal covenants, typically those not of our faith will simply pass the trays of bread and water along to the next person. However, there is no harm or offense if someone who is not LDS partakes of the sacramental emblems.]

– Curious about what the inside of a LDS meetinghouse looks like? See some photos here, or an interactive tour here.

– Want to see where the nearest LDS Church building can be found? See the Church’s meetinghouse locator.

p.s. Did you know we also use our buildings during the week for other purposes? These include youth activities; gatherings just for women (called Home, Family, and Personal Enrichment nights); firesides (usually a talk or special music shared with a group on a selected topic, either held locally or sometimes broadcast via satellite); ward parties; training meetings for various church assignments (callings); interviews; service projects; and adult institute classes (in some areas).

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We all breathed a sigh of relief as we turned onto the highway;  we were down to the last sixteen miles of our six-hour journey. It doesn’t sound like much, but six hours of driving had worn us out. [This was no ordinary drive on straight, you-can-drive-75-miles-an-hour freeways. After navigating through the winding, treacherous roads in the majestic Colorado mountains (with children who had never been in a car long enough to cross our state border), we were ready to be done.]

At sunset, we arrived at the place we called home for a week of vacation. I have to admit that the thought of getting up early to drive another hour and a half to get to church was hardly stomachable. But on Sunday morning, we dutifully readied ourselves (packing a cooler since the round-trip drive would be as long as the meetings) and headed off to worship with people we had never met.

Should I even say that we made it earlier than we usually do for our meetings that are less than five minutes away? (Go figure.) Seriously, though, that was the first evidence of blessings from heaven, because we left later than we should have (and there was that camper that was going so slow…). We considered it a little miracle that we were there for the sacrament. The other specific blessing was that the topic in the third hour of our meetings (a combined Relief Society/Priesthood lesson, not uncommon on fifth Sundays) was on a topic my father-in-law was pondering for his new church responsibility (calling).

But we didn’t need specific tender mercies to know that being at church was simply the right place to be. My mother-in-law leaned over to me in Sunday School and whispered that she had been tempted not to come. I confessed that I had felt the same way. We looked at each other and both shuddered to think of what we would have missed.

We felt the Lord’s Spirit strongly as these good, kind, welcoming people shared their thoughts about spiritual and temporal preparedness (the combined lesson topic), read quotes from our beloved leaders, bore their testimonies about various gospel principles, and inspired us to be better people. I felt a love and kinship with these strangers. But they weren’t strangers. They were my brothers and sisters, and I felt that strongly as we worshiped together. I left the meetinghouse spiritually filled–and so very, very grateful.

As I wrote that evening in my journal about this experience, I was reminded of a scripture I have always loved:

And after they had been received unto baptism, and were wrought upon and cleansed by the power of the Holy Ghost, they were numbered among the people of the church of Christ; and their names were taken, that they might be remembered and nourished by the good word of God, to keep them in the right way, to keep them continually watchful unto prayer, relying alone upon the merits of Christ, who was the author and the finisher of their faith.

And the church did meet together oft, to fast and to pray, and to speak one with another concerning the welfare of their souls.

And they did meet together oft to partake of bread and wine, in remembrance of the Lord Jesus.
Moroni 6:4-6

This experience was a reminder to me that it’s worth a little sacrifice (which I know many people make every Sunday) to attend our meetings. I’m sure we could have had a lovely day together as a family doing Sundayish things. But it would not have been the same. I was reminded of why we are commanded to meet each week. There is a power and Spirit associated with meeting together, renewing (and keeping) covenants, and nourishing each other with the “good word of God.” I am grateful to my brothers and sisters in Montrose, Colorado who nourished me and my family. Our vacation would not have been the same without the blessing of gathering with them to worship.

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Read more about Mormon Sunday worship:

Remember the Sabbath Day, to Keep it Holy

Visitors Welcome

What to Expect at a Mormon Church Service (from this post)

Inside a Mormon Chapel (photos)

The post We Believe: A Sabbath “Sacrifice” appeared first on Women in The Church of Jesus Christ.

Sheila wrote and let us know about this site. As we looked at the site, we immediately found interesting articles. For example, read about a recent UCLA study focusing on how women deal with stress (hint — they either “tend or befriend”). Enjoy Joy Lundberg’s post about a new song she wrote with Janice Kapp Perry, “The Value of Virtue.” You can also access the sheet music, available here for noncommercial use.

Maryann writes:

This link is to a video my husband made for me after studying Sister Beck’s talk, “Mothers Who Know.” It highlights points from her talk that were meaningful to him (which he says I exemplify, but I’m just trying my best), with various images and a nice musical score in the background.

Doug and Laurel shared a website they have created called Mormons Made Simple. They purpose is to share “simple, explanatory videos to explain the Mormon faith.” Take a look at videos about The Book of Mormon and about what to expect when attending an LDS Church service.

Do you have a video you have created, a site that has interested you (or that you think might interest our readers), or other content you would like to share? Email us at ‘mormonwoman’ AT ‘gmail’ DOT ‘com’ and we’ll consider it for future posts. Or, if you prefer, simply include a link in the comments section.

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