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Sunday, November 18, 2012

The Primary focus

Tis the season for the Primary program and joy spreads throughout Mormondom.
The children are singing. The congregations are swelling and all over the church, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are straining to see their child or grandchild or grandchildren. (Mine always sit behind a tall kid or the organ so I can barely see the top of their heads.)
It's a predictable scenario as normally rambunctious and noisy children are herded into the choir seats with their teachers to keep order and their parents and grandparents fill the pews.
The passing of the sacrament takes forever.
The format is fairly predictable and designed to give every child a speaking part if he or she is old enough to speak.
The littlest ones just sing with their class.
It's generally sweet and pleasant to watch if you're not one of the ones in charge. Then it's high stress trying to wrangle 100 kids or so into an orderly presentation.
And it's regarded as a big pain by the kids old enough to be almost graduated.
I know when I taught this age group the kids in my class were always trying to get out of it. 
This year, we've heard from more than one grandkid who is embarrassed to still be expected to sit on the stand with the rest of the primary. They're too big, they say.
Our grandson just has his ward split so he gets to do the program twice. Once last week in the old ward and again this week in the new ward. He can't believe his terrible luck.
One of our granddaughters had her 12th birthday just days before the program so she was welcomed into the Young Women program in the same meeting where she was expected to sit with her Primary class and sing. She's tall anyway so she feels a bit out of place under ordinary circumstances. Now she feels she has a legitimate right to defect.
So her mom gave her a guilt-free choice. She said, "OK, you can choose whether you sit with your class and say the part you've been practicing for weeks, the part the rest of the primary is depending on you to say or come down and sit with us. I know you'll make the right choice. It's up to you."
What do you think she chose to do?
What would you' a done?

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