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LDS to download copy of blessings

These are both great initiatives. I noticed when I went to download some sound files from conference that the Priesthood session only has the text and the ASL files--anyone know if there's a particular reason for this?

i think is wonderfull Enter comment

This is way cool.

Wonderful. Great to have such access. I lose everything and to have my PB easy to retrieve is great. Glad the Church is doing such forward thinking. I will also say as I approach 60 I am overwhelmed at times as I read my blessing at how specific, detailed and precise the blessing is and how perfectly it has given me insights beyond human understanding. Looking back it has been a specific roadmap for my life. A very grateful recipient. PTL.

How I love to see technology at its finest, doing good in the world! It's great that the Church wants to make life easier for us and the web-based activities from genealogy to magazine subscriptions, lesson planning, and so much more help so much.

Conference over the internet is a great thing. But... I'd be more interested in the number of people, like our family, that weren't able to view conference over the internet this October because the servers, or bandwidth, were overwhelmed. We had to settle for the audio stream for three of the sessions. (only Saturday AM worked) I'm hoping that the Church is aware of this problem, even if a fix isn't reasonnable or affordable.

Wow, welcome to the Screen Age, Saints.

I wish the church would provide a web-based way of tracking progress on Duty to God and Young Women goals... something that would allow parents, youth and leaders to collaborate.

And a better physical facility scheduler would be nice as well.

To MarkS -- it was always been church policy (for as long as I can remember at least) to get Priesthood holders out to the live Priesthood session at their Stake Centers. Because of this, Priesthood session is not broadcast on television or streamed on the Internet. If however you are unable to attend the Priesthood session, you can either read the talks online or in the Ensign, or you can purchase the DVD set and watch the session (video and all) a few months after conference is over. Yes, the only place to get video of the Priesthood session is via the conference DVD set.

Just last month I had requested a copy of my PB and it was such a joy to get it after not having it for years. It was such an easy process at the time, but this new way is even better!

ditto: cool

@Screen Age

I agree there is a lot of potential for scheduling/tracking that the church could implement. I think there is a fine line that should be watched to make sure there is still accountability and personal contact for some things, but for building scheduling and the other things you mentioned it would work well. One thing I would love to be able to do is update/change home teaching companionships online because it is often hard to get on the ward computer to do so.

It will be interesting to read some of the PB blessing given to our pioneer ancestors. I'm truly looking forward to this.

Mark:

Because the Priesthood Session is broadcast only over the church satellite system (which I believe is still analog), it usually takes a little longer for the video to be made available on LDS.org. Check again in a few more weeks.

This is an excellent development.

In regard to local, ie, Ward or Stake scheduling, that can be done locally with very little effort and a modicum of willingness and know-how.

I should think it is well nigh impossible to find any unit of the church anywhere in the world without someone that could establish these programmes for local unit or stake use.

There has been exponential growth in websites dedicate to Wards, Branches, and Stakes' schedulinmg, tracking, etc.

Caution must be exercised when posting personal data online in order not to infringe any part of the Data Protection Act, or put such information online that can be accessed - legally or illegally - by evil men and seducers as they wax worse and worse.

Sensitive material such as is spoken of in earlier posts can be maintained on a leader's personal PC, provided that safeguards are in place to prevent unauthorised access to sensitive information.

Ronnie

I too, am excited to read my deceased ancestors' blessings. Especially my grandparents' blessings! :D

I can foresee huge problems with this. How long will it take for some anti-Mormon to hack the system and download thousands of Patriarchal Blessings to mock and publish to the world. My PB is personal. I will not be submitting it to the database and I hope the church will not put it on the site without asking permission.

TO ScreenAge:

For a system to track YM/YW programs, do a Google search for "YM YW Tracking". Even though the Church doesn't provide a web-based system, there already is a good way to track, collaborate, and report on progress towards Duty to God, Scouting, Personal Progress, Faith in God, etc.

I'm just curious, total honest question here...aren't those blessings supposed to be private unless you want to inform others of them? Being able to access past and present pb's of your family seems somewhat invasive...

I am glad to have access PBs online, however I am not pleased with the fact that other can access my PBs. My PB is my own. Who I choose to share that with should be entirely up to me.

Re Foreseeable Problems:

While I think it would be great to read my progenitors' blessings, I agree that there are potential problems with this. Being in the web business, and having been involoved with church-provided software over the years makes me even more concerned. The church needs to have absolutely top-notch security experts involved with this project, or they need to immediately reconsider its implementation.