Meet the Preston Ward- Longest Continuously Operating Unit in the Church

[ZealouslyStriving]

Very Cool Story:

https://www.thechurchnews.com/living-faith/2024/07/23/preston-ward-branch-longest-continually-running-unit-church/?utm_campaign=churchnews-en&utm_content=entry&utm_medium=social_share

 

[Kenngo1969]

@sheilauk, any thoughts (not necessarily about this Ward in particular, but about the state of the Church of Jesus Christ generally "across the pond")? 

I love the multiracial, multicultural, melting-pot aspect of the Ward.  From the looks of things, what unites its members is far stronger and more important than what might divide them.  See Doctrine and Covenants 38:27.

[The Nehor]

I was there on my mission. It was a good ward.

Don’t remember it being that much of a melting pot at the time. I mean, probably more so if you counted the less-actives. The ward probably had around a 20% activity rate when I was there. Hopefully that has improved.

[Stargazer]

1 hour ago, The Nehor said:

I was there on my mission. It was a good ward.

My wife has friends who live in Preston and attend that ward. The Baynes family.

1 hour ago, The Nehor said:

Don’t remember it being that much of a melting pot at the time. I mean, probably more so if you counted the less-actives. The ward probably had around a 20% activity rate when I was there. Hopefully that has improved.

The UK has become a huge melting pot. Demographically, the country was 95.4% white in 1981, but in 2021 it was only 73.5% white British. The non-white British are concentrated in the larger cities and towns, especially London. The London temple president is from Nigeria, I believe. My wife and I spent a couple of weeks in Taunton, Somerset a few months ago, and the current Taunton ward bishop is from Nigeria, and I think about a quarter of attendees in Sacrament meeting are black, mainly from Nigeria. In fact, they did the sacrament prayers in both English and one of the Nigerian languages, I forgot which one. 

I'm in a ward in southeast England that has about 20% activity rate, and I think that our entire stake is generally at that level. We have a few non-white members, but just a few. More interesting to me has been the nationality of our full-time missionaries. Over the past five or six years we have had a large number who were not from the US or the UK. We've had only sister missionaries for the past couple of years. Our two current missionaries are black; one from Missouri, and the other from South Africa. The two before them were a black sister from Portugal, and a caucasian sister from Armenia! I say "caucasian" because she was from the area of the Caucasus mountains! About three years ago we had two elders from Papua New Guinea of all places!

[The Nehor]

12 hours ago, Stargazer said:

My wife has friends who live in Preston and attend that ward. The Baynes family.

The UK has become a huge melting pot. Demographically, the country was 95.4% white in 1981, but in 2021 it was only 73.5% white British. The non-white British are concentrated in the larger cities and towns, especially London. The London temple president is from Nigeria, I believe. My wife and I spent a couple of weeks in Taunton, Somerset a few months ago, and the current Taunton ward bishop is from Nigeria, and I think about a quarter of attendees in Sacrament meeting are black, mainly from Nigeria. In fact, they did the sacrament prayers in both English and one of the Nigerian languages, I forgot which one. 

I'm in a ward in southeast England that has about 20% activity rate, and I think that our entire stake is generally at that level. We have a few non-white members, but just a few. More interesting to me has been the nationality of our full-time missionaries. Over the past five or six years we have had a large number who were not from the US or the UK. We've had only sister missionaries for the past couple of years. Our two current missionaries are black; one from Missouri, and the other from South Africa. The two before them were a black sister from Portugal, and a caucasian sister from Armenia! I say "caucasian" because she was from the area of the Caucasus mountains! About three years ago we had two elders from Papua New Guinea of all places!

Things have probably changed. I think I was there in 1999. It was a strong ward at the time. Sounds like my mission composition. It had an eclectic group of missionaries from all over the world. Only about 50% American and Canadian. A lot of the rest from Europe and a bunch scattered from Africa and South America. We had one missionary who was the first missionary from an Eastern European nation. He got held in the Mission for a few extra months so the Mission President could give him extra leadership training before he went home to bolster the church in his nation.

[halconero]

14 hours ago, Stargazer said:

My wife has friends who live in Preston and attend that ward. The Baynes family.

The UK has become a huge melting pot. Demographically, the country was 95.4% white in 1981, but in 2021 it was only 73.5% white British. The non-white British are concentrated in the larger cities and towns, especially London. The London temple president is from Nigeria, I believe. My wife and I spent a couple of weeks in Taunton, Somerset a few months ago, and the current Taunton ward bishop is from Nigeria, and I think about a quarter of attendees in Sacrament meeting are black, mainly from Nigeria. In fact, they did the sacrament prayers in both English and one of the Nigerian languages, I forgot which one. 

I'm in a ward in southeast England that has about 20% activity rate, and I think that our entire stake is generally at that level. We have a few non-white members, but just a few. More interesting to me has been the nationality of our full-time missionaries. Over the past five or six years we have had a large number who were not from the US or the UK. We've had only sister missionaries for the past couple of years. Our two current missionaries are black; one from Missouri, and the other from South Africa. The two before them were a black sister from Portugal, and a caucasian sister from Armenia! I say "caucasian" because she was from the area of the Caucasus mountains! About three years ago we had two elders from Papua New Guinea of all places!

I'm in the bishopric of Whitechapel ward in central London and we're definitely majority minority. I would say a plurality of members are 1st generation immigrants from Africa or the 1st generation born in the UK.

And yeah, same phenomenon regarding missionaries - the current comes form mainland China, Finland, French Guiana, Hong Kong, Hungary, and Tazmania.

[Stargazer]

On 7/26/2024 at 12:03 PM, halconero said:

I'm in the bishopric of Whitechapel ward in central London and we're definitely majority minority. I would say a plurality of members are 1st generation immigrants from Africa or the 1st generation born in the UK.

And yeah, same phenomenon regarding missionaries - the current comes form mainland China, Finland, French Guiana, Hong Kong, Hungary, and Tazmania.

I believe the Church is using the British Isles as a convenient training ground for non-US/Canada missionaries. 

What Soros-funded ivory tower are you associated with, by the way? <- I don't expect an answer, but since you put it in your Location, for the fun of it I thought I'd ask.

[Calm]

On 7/26/2024 at 5:03 AM, halconero said:

I'm in the bishopric of Whitechapel ward in central London

When did you move to London?

[Stargazer]

On 7/26/2024 at 12:03 PM, halconero said:

I'm in the bishopric of Whitechapel ward in central London

I'm a little hesitant to mention this, but I will do it anyway. Your anonymity online could be compromised by revealing your church calling and ward. I'd tell you more about it, but I tried sending you a message, and you can't receive messages right now.

[halconero]

I'm fine not being

On 7/31/2024 at 9:32 PM, Stargazer said:

I'm a little hesitant to mention this, but I will do it anyway. Your anonymity online could be compromised by revealing your church calling and ward. I'd tell you more about it, but I tried sending you a message, and you can't receive messages right now.

No problem. I'm not all that concerned about maintaining anonymity here, to be honest. I've even shared my public social media handles here for anyone that cares to follow anything I have to say about public policy, immigration, teaching quant, etc.

On 7/30/2024 at 9:27 PM, Stargazer said:

I believe the Church is using the British Isles as a convenient training ground for non-US/Canada missionaries.

You mean in a sort of lifelong-training sort of dealio? Taking missionaries from areas of the world without many long-term members and exposing them to the more established Church? It's a compelling case.

On 7/30/2024 at 9:27 PM, Stargazer said:

What Soros-funded ivory tower are you associated with, by the way? <- I don't expect an answer, but since you put it in your Location, for the fun of it I thought I'd ask.

LSE. And funny you should mention, because it's entirely possible I'll get some funding from OSF for an experiment I'm hoping to run on the US Welcome Corps based on one I'm running in the UK atm.

[halconero]

On 7/30/2024 at 10:51 PM, Calm said:

When did you move to London?

2022, so going on two years now. We're at that stage where we're debating how permanent or temporary this is going to be.

[Stargazer]

2 hours ago, halconero said:

LSE.

London School of Economics?! Wow, cool! I've heard good things about it. 

And here's a Yes, Minister clip that mentions it...

2 hours ago, halconero said:

And funny you should mention, because it's entirely possible I'll get some funding from OSF for an experiment I'm hoping to run on the US Welcome Corps based on one I'm running in the UK atm.

The letters OSF could stand for a few things (e.g. Open Software Foundation, Open Science Framework, etc), but given your mentioning Soros, I'm betting on the Open Society Foundations.

Just for the fun of it, I'll mention that I hold the same church calling that you do. In the Worthing ward.

Edited August 2 by Stargazer
fix formatting and syntax

[Tony uk]

On 7/24/2024 at 3:09 PM, ZealouslyStriving said:

Very Cool Story:

https://www.thechurchnews.com/living-faith/2024/07/23/preston-ward-branch-longest-continually-running-unit-church/?utm_campaign=churchnews-en&utm_content=entry&utm_medium=social_share

 

The Preston ward mentioned in this article. It is in the same region of England that I live. When on the motorway heading to the coast. The spire is certainly noticeable.