Missionary Training Center

 On Monday, May 20, we entered the Missionary Training Center (MTC) in Provo, Utah. There were approximately ninety new senior missionaries in our group, and we joined the thousands of junior (18 to 26 years old) missionaries who were already there. Most junior missionaries stay at the MTC for several weeks while they learn a foreign language, whereas most senior missionaries (couples and single sisters) only stay for two weeks since we are not normally expected to learn a foreign language.

The MTC is a beautiful campus, as large as many junior colleges. There are residential buildings, classroom facilities, computer labs, recreation facilities, a laundry, a nice cafeteria, and lots of open areas, both indoors and outdoors. We spent our two weeks in classroom settings, learning how to teach the Gospel of Jesus Christ and about the software applications we'll use as office specialists. Vickie focused on administrative functions such as managing inbound and outbound communications, managing referrals from interested families or individuals, and other office tasks. I focused on the financial applications used to manage the mission funds and on the housing applications used to manage the dozens of apartments and houses required to support the 180 or so missionaries in the Philippines Cebu Mission, where we were called to serve.

As a point of interest, there are twenty-five other missions in the Philippines of comparable size and 450 total missions worldwide, supporting over 72,000 missionaries.

Most of the teachers at the MTC are young, returned missionaries attending college at nearby Brigham Young University or Utah Valley University. It's a part-time job for them, but their previous experience as missionaries is invaluable to their teaching abilities. We thoroughly enjoyed our classes and our time there, although there were days that Vickie felt frustrated due to her somewhat rusty computer skills.

As senior missionaries, the MTC organized us into districts, with four couples per district. Here is picture of our district, along with two of the teachers who were assigned to us. From left to right is Julia Maslich, Tony and Alicia Courville (going to Florida), me and Vickie, Dick and Jeanne Douglas (going to Las Vegas), Terry and Linda Morrison (going to Madagascar), and Luke Armstong.

We met lots of great people at the MTC. In addition to the couples in our district, we met three other couples going to the Philippines, including the Millards, who are going to our mission and who we met earlier on Zoom sessions.

Just before entering the MTC, we had a short visit with Dean and Debra Condie of Rupert, Idaho, who were just finishing their MTC training and are headed to California for their mission. Vickie (Jones) and Debra (Ward) are long-time friends who both grew up in Almo, Idaho.

In the MTC we met and got to know Robert and Marla Lunt. He is a retired rancher and farmer from Arizona, so he and Vickie have lots in common. They are going to Virginia and will be a real blessing to everyone they meet. Like other couples who are serving in the United States, they are probably on the road right now, driving to their mission assignment. Our flight to Cebu leaves tomorrow afternoon. Our route takes us from Salt Lake City to San Francisco, then fourteen hours non-stop to Manila, then another 90 minutes to Cebu. We'll post again once we're there!