Temple Recommend for member of different stake

Hi,

Our stake has a joint YSA branch with a neighboring stake, but the branch is under our stake's jurisdiction. The current branch president is a member of the neighboring stake, but his current unit is listed as the YSA branch. Our stake president can't seem to renew the branch president's temple recommend on LCR. Is there a way for us to do this, or will the branch president need to go to the stake president of the neighboring stake to renew his temple recommend?

Thanks!

Mike

The question is where is his membership record? Unless something has changed, his record should have stayed in his home unit and the YSA branch has a "out of unit" leader.

Whoever is stake president over his actual membership record would need to handle his temple recommend.

mikepick84 wrote:Our stake has a joint YSA branch with a neighboring stake, but the branch is under our stake's jurisdiction. The current branch president is a member of the neighboring stake, but his current unit is listed as the YSA branch. Our stake president can't seem to renew the branch president's temple recommend on LCR. Is there a way for us to do this, or will the branch president need to go to the stake president of the neighboring stake to renew his temple recommend?

The branch president needs to meet with his home ward bishop and stake president to get a temple recommend. Since their membership records stay in their home wards, the branch president should not be issuing recommends to himself, any other members of the branch presidency, the branch clerk, or any of their spouses. They should meet with the bishopric and stake presidency of the wards with their membership records when it is time to renew their temple recommends.

His membership record is in the correct place (his home ward) and he has been added as an out-of-unit member of the YSA branch, so everything is correct.

Thank you! That is very helpful.

@scgallafent Without further handbook guidance, as a YSA Bishop, I've issued recommends to YSA Bishopric members and at least one YSA Bishopric spouse. You indicate "Since their membership records stay in their home wards, the branch president should not be issuing recommends to himself, any other members of the branch presidency, the branch clerk, or any of their spouses. " Curious, do you also suggest this quote is true for YSA Bishops? If so, can you please point me to a reference in the handbook? (After reading your quote, I couldn't find it in 26.2 or 33.6)

General Handbook 26.2.1:

The bishop, his counselors as authorized by him, or the branch president interviews ward or branch members and issues temple recommends to those who are worthy.

Simply put, it wouldn't be a "house of order" if any leader could issue a recommend for anyone. Holding the membership record and being required to consult the prior ward if they haven't had it for a year is one of the requirements. (See 26.3.4)

General Handbook 33.6.5.2

Other Church Assignments
If members have Church assignments outside of their home ward, their membership and financial records are kept in the home ward. If assignments require members to move from their home ward for three months or more and if their children accompany them, their membership records are moved to the new ward

I think there's a difference between "move" and "attend".

chambem wrote:Curious, do you also suggest this quote is true for YSA Bishops? If so, can you please point me to a reference in the handbook? (After reading your quote, I couldn't find it in 26.2 or 33.6)

I am not scgallafent, but as I understand it, General Handbook 33.6.5.2 indicates that the membership record of someone serving outside of their home ward is kept in the home ward. And GH 26.2.1, paragraph 3 indicates that the bishop carefully reviews the membership record before issuing a recommend. It follows, then, that the bishop with the membership record is the one who should be issuing the temple recommend.

What scgallafent said was not actually a quote from the Handbook. It was just an acknowledgement that the membership record of the YSA branch president should have been (and was) in his home ward, and that his home ward bishop and stake president (or counselors) would be the ones who would conduct his temple recommend interviews. He happened to be a branch president, but the same would be true for a bishop who was serving in a YSA ward away from home.

My interpretation of the instructions is that this would also apply to a YSA bishopric. russellhltn and lajackson covered the handbook details. There isn't anything special about the YSA unit being a ward instead of a branch. The issue is not bishop vs. branch president but instead it is that the YSA unit leader does not have the membership records of those leaders.

To step on my soap box a little: A "home ward" bishop (who is technically the parents' bishop and not a "home ward" bishop) shouldn't be issuing recommends to the young single adults in your ward. Likewise, you shouldn't be issuing recommends to adult leaders whose membership records are still in their home wards.

russellhltn points out that there is a difference between "move" and "attend" when reading section 33.6.5.2. When my wife and I were assigned to a student stake (before YSA wards replaced student wards), our children went with us to the YSA stake but our records stayed in our home ward. Even though we rarely attended our home ward, we didn't move from our home so our records were left in that ward.