Missionary Training Center - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Missionary Training Centers (or "MTCs") are centers devoted to training missionaries

Mormon missionary

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is one of the most active modern practitioners of missionary work, with over 52,000 full-time missionaries worldwide, as of the end of 2010...

for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The flagship MTC is located in Provo

Provo, Utah

Provo is the third largest city in the U.S. state of Utah, located about south of Salt Lake City along the Wasatch Front. Provo is the county seat of Utah County and lies between the cities of Orem to the north and Springville to the south...

, Utah

Utah

Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...

, USA

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, adjacent to the campus of Brigham Young University

Brigham Young University

Brigham Young University is a private university located in Provo, Utah. It is owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , and is the United States' largest religious university and third-largest private university.Approximately 98% of the university's 34,000 students...

At the beginning of their service, LDS missionaries usually spend 3-12 weeks at an MTC where they receive training in doctrine, conduct, proselyting methods, and when required, a foreign language. There are 17 MTCs located in nations throughout the world including Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

, Colombia

Colombia

Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

, Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

, Dominican Republic

Dominican Republic

The Dominican Republic is a nation on the island of La Hispaniola, part of the Greater Antilles archipelago in the Caribbean region. The western third of the island is occupied by the nation of Haiti, making Hispaniola one of two Caribbean islands that are shared by two countries...

, Ghana

Ghana

Ghana , officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country located in West Africa. It is bordered by Côte d'Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, Togo to the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the south...

, Guatemala

Guatemala

Guatemala is a country in Central America bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, and Honduras and El Salvador to the southeast...

, Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

, Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

, New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

, South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

, South Korea

South Korea

The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...

, Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

, Peru

Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

, Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

, and the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

.

New missionaries assigned to the Provo MTC arrive Monday-Wednesday (Couple missionaries on Monday, International arrivals on Tuesday, US & Canada on Wednesday), at which point they begin using their titles of "Elder" (for the young men) and "Sister" (for the young women). They are also assigned companions and are organized into districts and branches. During their training, the elders and sisters will spend the majority of their time in class, with breaks for meals, church services, temple attendance, fitness activities, service projects, and personal preparation time (for laundry, letter writing, etc.).

All missionaries are given at least three weeks of training in proselyting methods. This includes lessons on church doctrine and teaching, mission rules, and proper interactions with the people they will serve, teach, and work with in their assigned missions. Missionaries are also encouraged to use their time outside class to actively study Church doctrine and a language if necessary.

In many cases, missionaries who already speak the language of their assigned area are sent to their mission after just three weeks. Other missionaries may spend as many as nine additional weeks in language training. The Missionary Training Center language programs encourage a full immersion experience with the motto "SYL" for "Speak Your Language". In some cases, missionaries learning foreign languages go directly to the MTC in the country where they are called to serve. This depends on the capacity of the MTC in the area.

Each MTC is directed by a mission president

Mission president

Mission president is a priesthood leadership position in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints . A mission president presides over a mission and the missionaries serving in the mission...

, just like any of the 345 missions

Mission (LDS Church)

A mission of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a geographical administrative area to which church missionaries are assigned. Almost all areas of the world are within the boundaries of an LDS Church mission, whether or not Mormon missionaries live or proselytize in the area...

worldwide (this number constantly fluctuates). Classes in the MTC are typically taught by returned (former) missionaries. The missionaries are also assigned to small congregations called branches, which are led by local church members called to serve in the MTC.

History of the MTC

The Missionary Training Center was originally started by the LDS Church after some of its missionaries were stranded in the United States due to difficulties in obtaining passport visas to other countries. Diplomatic relations between the United States and other countries where LDS missionaries served became strained, limiting the number of missionaries serving in those areas. Often these missionaries would simply be reassigned to another area, but as the number of missionaries grew this became more of a problem.

Salt Lake Mission Home

The missionary experience prior to the establishment of the MTC was in some ways quite different from what would happen later on. In 1925, a small building adjacent to Temple Square

Temple Square

Temple Square is a ten acre complex located in the center of Salt Lake City, Utah, owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints . In recent years, the usage of the name has gradually changed to include several other church facilities immediately adjacent to Temple Square...

in downtown Salt Lake City had a dormitory for brand new missionaries. Missionaries arriving here would then be set apart

Setting apart

Setting apart is an ordinance or ritual in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints whereby a person is formally chosen and blessed to carry out a specific calling or responsibility in the church....

to their missionary service by a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles is one of the governing bodies in the church hierarchy...

. Often they would even be interviewed by these Apostles during this time and attend a service in the Salt Lake Temple

Salt Lake Temple

The Salt Lake Temple is the largest and best-known of more than 130 temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is the sixth temple built by the church, requiring 40 years to complete, and the fourth operating temple built since the Mormon exodus from Nauvoo,...

, staying just a day or two before leaving to their assigned areas. Missionaries who had difficulty trying to get to their assigned areas would then either serve as tour guides on Temple Square or do clerical tasks at the LDS Church headquarters.

In 1971 the old Lafayette School at 75 East North Temple was converted into the new Salt Lake Mission Home, and English-speaking missionaries would arrive on a Saturday and leave the following Wednesday or Thursday. The MTC in Provo replaced this in the fall of 1978 for English-speaking missionaries.

Brigham Young University

In part to keep the missionaries occupied while they were waiting for their visas, many of these missionaries were enrolled in courses at the Church-owned Brigham Young University

Brigham Young University

in Provo, Utah. As language instruction was considered essential, most of these missionaries were enrolled in courses to learn the languages of the areas where they would be serving.

This proved to be problematic, however, as missionaries would arrive and depart at random intervals throughout the year as they accepted missionary assignments or as the visa

Visa (document)

A visa is a document showing that a person is authorized to enter the territory for which it was issued, subject to permission of an immigration official at the time of actual entry. The authorization may be a document, but more commonly it is a stamp endorsed in the applicant's passport...

paperwork was completed and approved by the country they were trying to get into. This certainly didn't fit well within the semester system for the rest of the BYU students, and eventually required professors that were dedicated strictly to teaching missionaries instead of the traditional university students.

A permanent organization was needed to cope with the needs of these missionaries.

Language Training Mission

By November 1961, missionaries gathered at the Hotel Roberts

Hotel Roberts

Hotel Roberts was a historic hotel, built in 1882 on University Avenue in Provo, Utah. This Mission-style hotel was a famous landmark and a center of Provo social activity for much of the early 20th century...

in downtown Provo under the direction of Ernest J. Wilkins, a professor of Spanish in the BYU Languages department. In 1968, the activities were moved to Amanda Knight Hall and (Knight-Mangum Hall), buildings on the lower campus of BYU, which were reserved exclusively for the training of missionaries. A new LDS mission, the Language Training Mission (LTM), was created with its own mission presidency and mission organization, with the geographic extent of the mission to be the perimeter of the building. This building included dormitories as well as classrooms for the missionaries. Eventually, other buildings on the campus of BYU were also used for missionary training activities.

The Church constructed and operated a large LTM in Laie, Hawaii

Hawaii

Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

. Through the 1970s, the Hawaiian LTM received missionaries from around the world who were preparing to serve as missionaries in the Asia Pacific regions, including Taiwan

Taiwan

Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...

, Hong Kong

Hong Kong

Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...

, and Polynesia

Polynesia

Polynesia is a subregion of Oceania, made up of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are termed Polynesians and they share many similar traits including language, culture and beliefs...

.

Instructors for the LTM were employed by Brigham Young University. Sometimes these were full-time professors from the university, but more often they were teaching assistants or simply university students who had skills in the languages being taught. In many cases, instructors were former missionaries who had just returned from the areas where the missionaries in the LTM were to be sent. Curriculum was still planned directly by the Foreign Language departments at BYU, in coordination with the LTM mission presidency.

In the beginning, the LTM was intended to be a temporary place for those missionaries who were having visa difficulties. However, mission presidents who received visa-delayed missionaries started to notice a significant improvement in their proselytizing skills over similar missionaries who were able to get their visas almost immediately. It was estimated that even a few weeks of intensive language training at the beginning could save almost a full year's worth of effort trying to learn the language "on the streets." Mission presidents soon asked the church headquarters to have all the missionaries who were going to their areas, regardless of their visa status, to attend language training before their departure.

During this expansion of the LTM's role, additional types of instruction were also added to the curriculum, including leadership training and basic instructor training. After several years of language and general missionary skills training, the mission presidents serving in English-speaking areas were requesting that their missionaries have this same opportunity to take some of the additional classes taught at the LTM. As there were an increasing number of missionaries serving overall, as well as a large number of missionaries who would be attending the LTM due to program changes, plans were made to move the whole mission to another location.

Provo Campus of the MTC

At about the same time the Provo Temple

Provo Utah Temple

The Provo Utah Temple is the 17th constructed and 15th operating temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...

was built, the church acquired some nearby land which was originally slated for expansion of the BYU Provo campus. This land was used to build four dormitories, a gymnasium and a language training building. The name of the LTM was changed to the Missionary Training Center in 1978, to note that it was for more than just language training, although language training would continue to be a significant feature of this facility. The Salt Lake Mission Home was shut down permanently as well, and all remaining functions of that facility were merged into the MTC, including administrative functions that were not otherwise handled directly by LDS Church headquarters.

Due to the growth of the church, the number of buildings and the size of the main administrative building were expanded to cope with the increased activity at the Provo MTC campus. Ultimately, even this growth could no longer be accommodated and it became apparent the church would need to build training centers in places other than Provo.

MTC campuses around the world

With the growth of the LDS Church outside the United States, it soon became almost impossible for LDS missionaries living outside the USA to be able to come to Provo and attend the MTC, both for financial reasons as well as for visa difficulties. Just as it had been a problem for American LDS missionaries to obtain visas to go abroad, it became difficult for foreign church members without American citizenship to come to Utah, often for the same reasons.

After the development of the Area Presidencies as a level of administration in the church ecclesiastical hierarchy, Area Presidents outside of North America were authorized to establish independent Missionary Training Centers for the members living within their area

Area (LDS Church)

An area is an administrative unit of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which typically is composed of multiple stakes and missions...

. This removed most international travel requirements for many missionaries, especially for missionaries who spoke the language of their own country as a native speaker and were able to serve on a local mission.

One of the first of these missionary training centers was established in 1977 at São Paulo

São Paulo

São Paulo is the largest city in Brazil, the largest city in the southern hemisphere and South America, and the world's seventh largest city by population. The metropolis is anchor to the São Paulo metropolitan area, ranked as the second-most populous metropolitan area in the Americas and among...

, Brazil

Brazil

, adjacent to the newly dedicated São Paulo LDS Temple

São Paulo Brazil Temple

The São Paulo Brazil Temple is the 19th constructed and 17th operating temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Located in the Brazilian city of São Paulo, it was the first LDS temple built in South America, and also the first temple to use the single story, single spire design...

. The Church has constructed a new building in the Casa Verde neighborhood of São Paulo

São Paulo

. The building is the largest Church-owned facility outside the United States and is home to the world's second largest MTC with a maximum occupancy level of 800.

As the number of missionaries coming from North America grew, it was decided to send many of the missionaries directly to areas where they would soon be serving, if there was a local MTC capable of servicing them. This has allowed the growth of these MTCs outside of the USA instead of building another MTC campus in North America. Missionaries from North America who have visa difficulties still attend the Provo MTC first, and temporarily serve in areas of the United States while they get their visas. Missionaries from countries outside the US where there is not a Missionary Training Center in their own country, attend the MTC of the country closest to them.

The London, England MTC was transferred to Preston with the building of the new temple site in 1998. The former London MTC buildings are now used for other Church purposes.

Provo MTC

The Missionary Training Center in Provo, Utah is still the largest such center and can accommodate up to 3,800 missionaries. The facility includes a large gymnasium, cafeterias, a medical clinic, a bookstore, a mail center, a call center, laundry facilities, classrooms, meetinghouses, and residence halls. Approximately 50 languages are taught at the Provo MTC.

Teaching Resource Center

The Teaching Resource Center (TRC) gives missionaries some experience teaching in their mission language, even if it is their native tongue. All missionaries visit the TRC each week. Volunteers who speak the language role play as investigators in these teaching situations. At the end, Missionaries watch a video tape of their teaching session to find ways to improve their language skills and teaching style.

Volunteers are usually returned missionaries and/or BYU students with language abilities. Members of other faiths are able to volunteer as well. All volunteers must present a temple recommend or BYU ID card to participate. As visitors to the MTC, volunteers must pick up a guest pass at the main desk before going to the TRC.

List of Missionary Training Centers

There are currently 17 missionary training centers throughout the world. The most recent addition was the Ghana MTC, which opened in 2002. In 2010, the New Zealand MTC moved from Hamilton

Hamilton, New Zealand

Hamilton is the centre of New Zealand's fourth largest urban area, and Hamilton City is the country's fourth largest territorial authority. Hamilton is in the Waikato Region of the North Island, approximately south of Auckland...

to Auckland

Auckland

The Auckland metropolitan area , in the North Island of New Zealand, is the largest and most populous urban area in the country with residents, percent of the country's population. Auckland also has the largest Polynesian population of any city in the world...

.

Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...

, Argentina

Argentina

São Paulo

, Brazil

Brazil

Santiago

Santiago, Chile

Santiago , also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile, and the center of its largest conurbation . It is located in the country's central valley, at an elevation of above mean sea level...

, Chile

Chile

Bogotá

Bogotá, Distrito Capital , from 1991 to 2000 called Santa Fé de Bogotá, is the capital, and largest city, of Colombia. It is also designated by the national constitution as the capital of the department of Cundinamarca, even though the city of Bogotá now comprises an independent Capital district...

, Colombia

Colombia

Santo Domingo

Santo Domingo, known officially as Santo Domingo de Guzmán, is the capital and largest city in the Dominican Republic. Its metropolitan population was 2,084,852 in 2003, and estimated at 3,294,385 in 2010. The city is located on the Caribbean Sea, at the mouth of the Ozama River...

, Dominican Republic

Dominican Republic

Preston, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, UK

United Kingdom

Accra

Accra is the capital and largest city of Ghana, with an urban population of 1,658,937 according to the 2000 census. Accra is also the capital of the Greater Accra Region and of the Accra Metropolitan District, with which it is coterminous...

, Ghana

Ghana

Guatemala City

Guatemala City , is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Guatemala and Central America...

, Guatemala

Guatemala

Tokyo

, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...

, Japan

Japan

Mexico City

Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...

, Mexico

Mexico

Auckland, New Zealand

New Zealand

Lima

Lima is the capital and the largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, in the central part of the country, on a desert coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Together with the seaport of Callao, it forms a contiguous urban area known as the Lima...

, Peru

Peru

Manila

Manila is the capital of the Philippines. It is one of the sixteen cities forming Metro Manila.Manila is located on the eastern shores of Manila Bay and is bordered by Navotas and Caloocan to the north, Quezon City to the northeast, San Juan and Mandaluyong to the east, Makati on the southeast,...

, Philippines

Philippines

Johannesburg

Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...

, South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

Seoul

Seoul , officially the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea. A megacity with a population of over 10 million, it is the largest city proper in the OECD developed world...

, South Korea

South Korea

Madrid

Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...

, Spain

Spain

Provo

Provo, Utah

, Utah

Utah

, USA

External links

Missionary Training Center - official site for the Provo MTC
Breanna Olaveson, "International MTCs Play Important Role", Ensign, Dec. 2010, pp. 74–76
Organizational and Administrative Church History - Has some historical notes related to the history section
BYU helps push language learning for missionaries - A detailed history of the MTC published by the BYU Newspaper, Daily Universe
MTC plays major role in the lives of instructors

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