Missionary Handbook and Basketball


PolarVortex
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I'm fairly sure that the missionaries will be coming to my house in 2015 to visit, so I've been sniffing around the Internet lately and reading random things about LDS missionaries.  I came across a 2006 on-line edition of the Missionary Handbook today and read it out of curiosity.  (I converted to the Church as a thirtysomething and never served a mission, but I've always been interested in what it's like to serve a mission.)

 

Most of the instructions seem reasonable, such as "do not handle explosives" and "do not tamper with your mission vehicle's odometer" and even "notify your mission president if your companion leaves you."  The carrying of guns is also prohibited.

 

But this edition of the Handbook has one curious instruction: "If you play basketball, play only half court."  Why is the playing area of any significance?  Is this to prevent missionaries from developing unhealthy passions for competitive sports activities that might distract them from their Gospel duties?  

 

 

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Not sure,  I remember this instruction from my mission,  I didn't pay much attention to it since I loathe basketball. A supposition would be that playing full court can get faster with long shots and fast breaks. There may be a demonstrable greater risk of injury for full court as opposed to half court. I don't know this for sure, but it might have something to do with it.  A great many of the mission rules aren't imposed by revelation, but by the insurance company people, and by lawyers.  Just one of those little facts of modern life in an insanely litigious society.

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Thanks, that makes sense.  Many of the other rules, such as not being alone with a child, carried stern warnings about legal implications and the difficulty of proving your innocence in foreign cultures if accusations arise.  Yet in some cultures, such as Albania's, it's an insult to evade babies in a visited household, at least from what I have read.

 

I wonder if the next edition of the Handbook will contain rules for iWatches.  A missionary could wear one all the time, and his/her pulse could be constantly reported to nervous parents who tend to worry.  Mission presidents could generate detailed wall charts from pulse readings to make sure the missionaries aren't visiting inappropriate web sites, too.

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While serving in England I was in a town called Scarborough and my companion was 6ft 8in. While we were out working a guy stopped us and asked us to come and try out for this basketball game. He knew we were Americans and knew the game of basketball and my companion was very tall. Should have seen the look on his face when we told him we couldn't play basketball. Wow....the look of death. Lol

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I've never been so ruffed up, bruised, tripped, received a sprained ankle and argued over stupid fouls than during church ball.  Been over 10 years since playing church basketball and don't regret it. 

I hate church Basketball.....

 

 

It's Church sponsored fight club....that's all it is..

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My husband is a church baller... and yeah, it is intense... most of his ER trips are from church ball... I don't know why, but they all play like they're fighting for the Superbowl - on every game!

 

But, he goes.  He loves it complete with all the fighting and injuries and competition.  It's his way to just be his aggressive guy self and conquer the world... er, court... away from his wife.

 

Last ER trip was on Thanksgiving day.  It was not basketball but flag football... they're just as crazy in flag football as they are in basketball.  But what I really find amazing... they're enemies on the court and right when they walk off of it, they're all BFFs again.

Edited by anatess
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Of all the things that an elder does on a mission, basketball would be the scariest for me.  I could tract, cold call, and argue with bad-breathed atheists until the cows come home, but the thought of playing basketball genuinely terrifies me.  

 

Basketball is something an Elder can do on his mission, there is no doctrine or rule requiring they play basketball. 

Edited by Dravin
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Basketball is something an Elder can do on his mission, there is no doctrine or rule requiring they play basketball. 

 

They're not allowed to do so in our mission... dunno why.  But, interestingly, they can ice skate... in Florida.

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Basketball is something an Elder can do on his mission, there is no doctrine or rule requiring they play basketball. 

 

That's very comforting, but another part of the Handbook talks about companions being within sight and sound of each other at all times (with reasonable exceptions for bathroom use and interviews with mission presidents).  What happens if one comp wants to go running in the morning and the other doesn't?  Or one wants to play basketball and the other doesn't?  Obviously these aren't very important questions, but I've always been curious about the missionary lifestyle.

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What happens if one comp wants to go running in the morning and the other doesn't?  

 

Either some sort of compromised is reached or they don't go. If it's a one off thing on P-Day you might be able to get a temporary companionship swap approved (for the duration of the activity) if there is another Elder nearby who likes to run as well, but if you're talking morning exercise you can't exactly physically drag someone running with you. It can be kinda rocky, some missionaries are only learning interpersonal relationships skills where you are effectively tethered to an equal so not all of them are particularly good at compromise, all part of the learning experience. 

 

I had a companion who wanted to run in the morning, but there was no physical way I could have kept up (he was in shape, I was not). I did exercises at the end of the driveway while he basically did laps in the cul-de-sac we lived on. *shrug* For P-Day activities, on my mission, leadership was generally liberal with allowing P-Day companionship swaps so that people could do what they wanted to do. They were also okay with having odd-numbered groups for P-day activities, So if you had 3 companionships with 3 missionaries who wanted to bike and 3 who wanted to run you'd just end up with two groups of three missionaries while they did their thing. If leadership was less liberal about changing up companionships temporarily or if missionaries had been further spread out then you're back to learning to compromise.

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