LDS President Thomas S. Monson addressing the LDS faithful

Less than an hour ago the LDS church completed its October 2012 General Conference. For those of us who believe, it was great stuff.

The outstanding memory from this conference was President Monson’s Saturday announcement that the minimum age for missionary service has dropped to 18 for young men and 19 for young women. While this change is only intended to provide increased flexibility for LDS youth to fit missionary service into their post-high school plans, it will almost certainly swell the ranks of LDS missionaries during the next couple of years.

In my own family (sisters, daughters), I am aware of four women who would have served missions under the 19 year old rule who did not serve missions under the old 21 year old rule.

I predict this rule change will increase the number of male missionaries by 25-50%. I expect it will increase the number of female missionaries by 50-100%. I don’t know what impact it will have on the number of older missionaries, although it may become even more obvious to those of us mature and able to serve how much we are needed (lest the future of the church be shaped wholly by “kids” fresh out of high school).

My son-in-law posed a thought-provoking question. He wondered about the origin of the previous age limits. In the distant past anyone who wanted to serve could go out. Joseph Smith was only 14 when he had a vision of God and Jesus in the spring of 1830. Joseph Smith’s cousin, George Albert Smith, was only sixteen when he set out with other faithful men making up Zion’s Camp, a 1834 military mission to relieve the persecution of Saints in Missouri. Joseph Smith’s nephew, Joseph F. Smith, was only fifteen when he was sent on a mission to Hawaii in 1854.

I suspect the age restriction was put in place in the days when you had to be 21 to vote and be considered an adult. The voting age in the United States was not dropped to 18 until 1971. At that time, the voting age reduction was due to student protests against the Vietnam war, with the objection that it was wrong to draft individuals into military service when those individuals were unable to participate in the democratic process that elected the leaders committing the youth to war.

The age for male LDS missionaries had been 20 as recently as 1960. In 1960 the age restriction for male missionaries was reduced to 19, and current apostle Jeffrey R. Holland was one of the first 19-year-olds to be sent on a mission in the 20th century.

Female LDS missionaries had served in increasing numbers since 1898, when the first female missionaries were formally sent out with the same calling as male missionaries. When World War II reduced the ranks of males able to perform missions, LDS women signed up for missions in such numbers that roughly 40% of all missionaries serving during World War II were women. In 1951 the Church increased the minimum age requirement to 23. In 1964, several years after the male age requirement was reduced to 19, the female age restriction was dropped to 21. For more information, see Sarah Jensen’s 2006 article in Segullah.

With the current age restriction changes, Salt Lake has retained a minimal age difference between the youngest men and women serving. There is some cultural bias against relationships between older women and younger men, and this age difference, though minor, may help keep missionaries focused more on their mission than on the cute opposite-gender missionary serving in the same congregation. Even under the previous policy, mission crushes were frequent. I remember at least two serious crushes I had during my mission, for example. I would not be surprised if the onslaught of new, young missionaries brings with it an increase in temptations. But then again, this is the modern world we are talking about, where temptation hovers thick around, and young women are being propositioned by classmates as early as middle school.

An ironic possible outcome of this age change may be an increase in the number of couples who marry shortly after missionary service. Under the previous policy, there was occasionally a engaged couple where both partners were the same age and both partners chose to go on missions. In this case, the policies of the Church postponed the couples’ marriages by as much as four years. Whether or not young people embark on missions with a future spouse already identified, there’s nothing like 18-24 months of non-dating to make dating super amazing.

I remember a college classmate who confided one Thursday that her son was coming home from his mission. The following Tuesday I asked about the young man, and was told about his marriage. “Was he engaged to her before his mission?” I asked. No, in fact he hadn’t even met the young lady until after he arrived home that weekend.

As a returned missionary myself, and having been married to two returned missionaries, the shared experience of having been a missionary is wonderful common ground to hold. The mission experience also means there is a large additional cadre of colleagues and friends each partner has going into a marriage.

In fifty years social scientists studying Mormonism will be able to tell us the impact and legacy of today’s policy change. I suspect the legacy will include an increased number of baptisms per missionary, but the most important legacy may well be in the lives of the missionaries themselves, and their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

In the meantime, I really ought to go start figuring out my finances – my younger two daughters will be age-eligible to serve missions in less than five years. Time to get serious preparing for the financial burden this opportunity will allow us to take on…