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SALT LAKE CITY -- With the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints looking on, high school students gathered inside the Conference Center to commemorate 100 years of the church's seminary program.
The special program was broadcast throughout the world over the church's broadcast system and the Internet.
The anniversary is a major milestone, but so is the broadcast itself. In 1912 when the first LDS Seminary class was held, there were 70 students in attendance in Salt Lake City. Now, the program has 375,000 students in 143 countries, making the multi-platform broadcast necessary in order to reach the program's students.
The church program is set up as religious instruction for students starting in 9th grade throughout their high school career. In Utah, seminary takes place during release time, when students are allowed to leave campus for a class, but the majority of seminary classes take place before school hours, often in a church building and teachers are often volunteers from the congregation.
At the event, former seminary teacher and current President of the Quorum of the 12 Apostles Boyd K. Packer addressed the youth and a video commemorating the program's first class was played. Packer told students that seminary will help them prepare for their futures.
We invest much in our youth. We know of your worth and potential.
–- Boyd K. Packer
"The system of seminary is maintained at enormous expense given willingly by the brethren responsible for the funds of the church," Packer said. "We invest much in our youth. We know of your worth and potential."
It was a memorable night for the youth involved, too. Daniel Carter from Layton, a senior in high school and a seminary student was one of the actors in a dramatization of the first LDS Seminary next to Granite High School.
"Never going to forget it I don't think," Carter said. "It's implanted in their forever, and it's implanted in my heart as well."
According to the Commissioner of the Church Educational System, Elder Paul V. Johnson, Utah has 85,000 students enrolled in seminary, followed in concentration by Mexico, Brazil, with California and the Philippines tied for fourth.
