Temples to Return to Full Operation

[bluebell]

10 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

At our temple, we’ve been having a problem with thin sessions resulting  from people neglecting to cancel their online reservations when they decide not to show up, thus wasting available slots.  I wonder if that has been a problem elsewhere. 

That has been a problem at the Billings Montana temple.  My parents have mentioned it.

[Scott Lloyd]

29 minutes ago, Duncan said:

it has been here as well but I don't know to what extent-it is really too bad for people who want to go, could go but someone forgot to cancel or whatever and yeah empty seats

 

25 minutes ago, bluebell said:

That has been a problem at the Billings Montana temple.  My parents have mentioned it.

I think it might become less of a problem as restrictions are lifted on the number of patrons per session that are accommodated. No-shows make more of an impact when there are fewer slots to begin with. 

[Metis_LDS]

I do not want to rain on the parade, however here is a an item from front page of New York Times today 17 March.

Europe’s rising caseloads could foreshadow a second Omicron surge in the U.S.

It is what we are seeing in the United Kingdom right now.

[Hamba Tuhan]

10 minutes ago, Metis_LDS said:

It is what we are seeing in the United Kingdom right now.

Same here. Our positive cases from the past two days have been our highest since mid-January, and we're prepping for them to go even higher. At the same time, even as case numbers have trended upwards, hospitalisation figures have hardly moved, and deaths have stalled.

This doesn't mean, however, that we aren't experiencing disruptions. For example, we have so many sick teachers that pretty much every one of our schools has had to combine classes, and we are on the verge of having to resume remote learning. The trigger for this is 25 per cent of teaching staff sick; some of our schools have already gone above 20 per cent.

Edited March 17, 2022 by Hamba Tuhan

[Tacenda]

1 hour ago, Metis_LDS said:

I do not want to rain on the parade, however here is a an item from front page of New York Times today 17 March.

Europe’s rising caseloads could foreshadow a second Omicron surge in the U.S.

It is what we are seeing in the United Kingdom right now.

I just read of China's recent lock down. I guess it's not time for me to get rid of my masks. 

[bluebell]

Some of that might be because they were locked down for so long that a lot of people haven't been exposed to the virus yet, and no a lot of people suddenly are.  Exposure and sickness will happen, since the virus isn't going anywhere.  Vaccines don't stop that, they just seem to make it less likely that people will be hospitalized and/or die.

Or it could just be the new variant, which appears to be more contagious than omicron but not any more lethal.  Time will tell.

[Calm]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

Some of that might be because they were locked down for so long that a lot of people haven't been exposed to the virus yet, and no a lot of people suddenly are. 

The Chinese vaccines do not appear to be as effective on their own against Omicron either…

https://www.voanews.com/a/china-promotes-vaccines-around-the-world-but-critics-point-to-lower-efficacy/6357649.html

https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2022/02/03/sinovac-vaccine-efficacy-against-omicron-increases-following-mrna-booster-yale-study-finds/

Good vaccination rates though, so hopefully helps with hospitalization and deaths…

https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-maps/countries-and-territories/china/

They are tons better than the US in terms of those…

There have been 123,773 infections and 4,636 coronavirus-related deaths reported in the country since the pandemic began assuming they aren’t lying through their teeth or just missing substantial numbers of cases for some reason*** (my guess is both are going on and the death count is likely much higher, but even at 100,000 deaths, their tactics would be very effective, whether or not one believes they are appropriate/moral).  Still, given their population is almost 8 billion (about 27 times the US, where the death count is approaching 1 million)….

***https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00104-8 (we don’t have excess deaths numbers from China to be able to estimate how well they are reporting).

 

Edited March 18, 2022 by Calm

[Scott Lloyd]

I just heard from my shift coordinator. He has not received official word from the temple presidency (we’ve been on hiatus the past two weeks) but reports he has heard from those who have been working there the past couple of days indicate masks are no longer required. Of course, masks remain an option, particularly in close-contact areas such as initiatory. 
 

This is welcome news. 

Edited March 19, 2022 by Scott Lloyd

[Duncan]

My bro. is a temple worker here and he works Saturday mornings when it is much busier than on thursday mornings, when I typically attend, so I will ask him about how many show up, masks and capacity and all that. I strongly suspect though people will still wear masks or a majority of them but guess we'll see what happens!

[Scott Lloyd]

5 minutes ago, Duncan said:

My bro. is a temple worker here and he works Saturday mornings when it is much busier than on thursday mornings, when I typically attend, so I will ask him about how many show up, masks and capacity and all that. I strongly suspect though people will still wear masks or a majority of them but guess we'll see what happens!

Going by my observation at Sunday meetings, where the mask requirement has been lifted for over a month, I rather suspect that non-maskers will be the solid majority in the temple — assuming the requirement has indeed been lifted. 
 

It will be nice as a temple worker not to have to fill the role of mask police. 

[Calm]

53 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

, I rather suspect that non-maskers will be the solid majority in the temple — assuming the requirement has indeed been lifted. 

And I suspect it will strongly depend on where you live, so Scott may live in an area of few masks and Duncan where masks remain the majority. 

[Duncan]

So, according to my brother by some didn't show up and never cancelled so the sealing was disjointed and had to scramble to find others. Everyone was masked that he saw, not super busy though. In one of three sessions they have on Saturday they had 8 men and 8 women, one might have been a walk in though. According to him they are going to go to 50% capacity starting in April sometime.

[Scott Lloyd]

On 3/18/2022 at 4:12 PM, Scott Lloyd said:

Going by my observation at Sunday meetings, where the mask requirement has been lifted for over a month, I rather suspect that non-maskers will be the solid majority in the temple — assuming the requirement has indeed been lifted. 
 

It will be nice as a temple worker not to have to fill the role of mask police. 

 

On 3/18/2022 at 5:07 PM, Calm said:

And I suspect it will strongly depend on where you live, so Scott may live in an area of few masks and Duncan where masks remain the majority. 

 

On 3/19/2022 at 1:12 PM, Duncan said:

So, according to my brother by some didn't show up and never cancelled so the sealing was disjointed and had to scramble to find others. Everyone was masked that he saw, not super busy though. In one of three sessions they have on Saturday they had 8 men and 8 women, one might have been a walk in though. According to him they are going to go to 50% capacity starting in April sometime.

Just finished my midday shift. Didn’t see a single mask all day. Not on patrons, not on ordinance workers, not on administrators or presidency members. Not in initiatory, not in the endowment session where I officiated. 
 

I did see a member of my ward as the evening shift was coming on who said there were three masks in his preparation meeting. I wonder if they were like me: I was going to wear a mask going in, because I hadn’t gotten official word. But I forgot at the last minute to put it on, and when I saw everyone else, I didn’t bother. 
 

Added later: It was an unusually busy day, as substantially more folks are signing up online for appointments with the expanded accommodation, which been increased by more than double. 

Edited March 21, 2022 by Scott Lloyd

[Peacefully]

I attended church today without a mask for probably the second time in the last year. We had around 60 in attendance and only three masks. Those administering the sacrament are no longer masking. 
 

On another note, both my husband and I have been to the doctor in the last month for sinus infections and were told they haven’t seen COVID cases for awhile.