President Boyd K. Packer, President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, will speak at a broadcast on the 100-year anniversary of the Church’s seminary program, where high school age students learn about the Holy Scriptures.
The event will be held in Salt Lake City at the Conference Center 22 January 2012 at 6:00 p.m. mountain standard time and broadcast to Church meetinghouses worldwide. A rebroadcast is scheduled on 29 January. The fireside will also be streamed live on seminary.lds.org.
For many, the word seminary connotes an institution or program where individuals train for the priesthood or ministry. But for young people in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, seminary provides a firm understanding of the scriptures early in life and a foundation of Church teachings that complement academic pursuits.
Seminary is open to young people of all faiths ages 14 to 18. Classes are taught by both full-time instructors and volunteers. Students spend an entire school year together studying an individual book of scripture. Over the course of four years a student will have studied the Old Testament, New Testament, Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants.
In most parts of the world, students attend either before school starts or after school. In some cases where distance is an issue or there are not many Latter-day Saint teenagers, students may complete the four-year curriculum in a home study program. In communities with a large Latter-day Saint population, students attend seminary during “released time” during their normal school day. There are approximately 370,000 seminary students worldwide.
Read more on the commemoration of the seminary program (downloadable b-roll and SOTs also available)