What is the purpose of PEC?

[silus99]

I have been in several units where you could not tell one meeting from the next apart from who was in the room. This year we made a change and have Ward Council on the first and third Sunday and have PEC right after Ward council on the third Sunday. This PEC meeting is no more than 20-30 minutes and is entirely focused on priesthood topics such as:

- Home Teaching (not the families they serve, but the home teachers and their assignments)
- Priesthood Ordinances like sacrament and others and how we are doing
- Priesthood advancement including prospective Elders
- Aaronic Priesthood members and their duties and progression
- Any other Priesthood related concerns.

So far it has worked out well and I think fulfills the purpose of the meeting. This change was brought about after listening to several of the Worldwide Leadership broadcasts from 2008 forward and the manuals. So far so good!

[jasonhowardsmith]

I think the following agenda items should justify the need for a monthly PEC meeting. However, Handbook 2 leaves out everything except home teaching, which is not very helpful.

1) Home teaching reports from elders quorum and high priests. This should also include any relevant issues arising out of PPI.

2) Review of home teaching assignments by EQP & HPGL. The bishop should also regularly meet up with the Relief Society President in order to ensure that both home teaching and visiting teachings assignments are properly balanced and coordinated.

3) Report by Young Mens President on Aaronic priesthood holders' duties and progression, as outlined in the Duty to God handbook and Doctrine & Covenants.

4) Ensure sacrament ordinance is being adequately covered and training provided. Young Mens President should occasionally invite new converts into Young Mens for sacrament training. This training should be led by the Young Men, but supervised by the Young Mens President.

5) Coordinate priesthood training, every three months for all other ordinances, on the the first Sunday of the month.

6) Ward Mission Leader leads discussion on prospective Elders

7) Bishop announces upcoming Aaronic priesthood advancements.

[johnshaw]

I think the following agenda items should justify the need for a monthly PEC meeting. However, Handbook 2 leaves out everything except home teaching, which is not very helpful.

1) Home teaching reports from elders quorum and high priests. This should also include any relevant issues arising out of PPI.

I don't know any value this has to be reported without the entire Ward Council being involved - Certainly Visiting Teaching should be considered ALONG-SIDE and not independent of Home Teaching.

2) Review of home teaching assignments by EQP & HPGL. The bishop should also regularly meet up with the Relief Society President in order to ensure that both home teaching and visiting teachings assignments are properly balanced and coordinated.

I don't see value in considering Home Teaching Assignments without also including Visiting Teaching Assignments and reviews again, jointly, together in council, not independent of each other- Ward Council material.

3) Report by Young Mens President on Aaronic priesthood holders' duties and progression, as outlined in the Duty to God handbook and Doctrine & Covenants.

Ya maybe, but why wouldn't a Young Women's President provide a similar report on Personal Progress. If we do one, we should do the others - Ward Council again.

4) Ensure sacrament ordinance is being adequately covered and training provided. Young Mens President should occasionally invite new converts into Young Mens for sacrament training. This training should be led by the Young Men, but supervised by the Young Mens President.

Not sure how this one applies, it sounds like a task assigned to the Young Men's President that would be reported on through his PPI with the Bishop.

5) Coordinate priesthood training, every three months for all other ordinances, on the the first Sunday of the month.

Again assignments given and reported on seem to be PPI areas

6) Ward Mission Leader leads discussion on prospective Elders

This doesn't seem very valuable to me without the input of Relief Society, Primary, or Young Womens Presidents also sitting in council as we've been asked by our leaders.

7) Bishop announces upcoming Aaronic priesthood advancements.

I have no idea why this is necessary in a meeting. The Young Men's president has these lists and really only needs to know when an advancement isn't going to happen.

Look, I don't think that what I've said above is explicit for each scenario. I believe that there is always room for an ad-hoc meeting to discussion certain items related to Priesthood assignments and/or issues with men/boys in a ward. I just don't understand, in light of what we're being asked to explicitly concentrate on as Wards and Stakes, not including the Women Presidencies in the items above. The Training we receive from the Q15 and Q70s is to include their voices, not only on matters related to their auxiliary orgs, but as a council, taking their counsel seriously.

[jasonhowardsmith]

The priesthood need a separate meeting, otherwise you end up just saturating ward council with the minutiae of priesthood matters, which is both inappropriate and disrespectful towards the sisters, who can have no input into these matters. It also serves to strengthen the priesthood brethren in developing a deeper testimony of the gospel and in building up Zion through the proper lines of authority. Nothing you have said and suggested detracts from that necessity or justifies funnelling all these priesthood matters through ward council.