KATHRYN L. GAGLIONE, SCOTT GULLEDGE & MICHELLE HOFFMAN / Scroll photo illustration

Religion department develops classes to make ‘practical religion’ accessible for all students

by Brad Jackman Kathryn Gaglione & Leslie Bardsley GAG01001@BYUI.EDU BAR04015@BYUI.EDU Scroll Staff

BYU-Idaho has added three new classes to its religion program geared towards teaching students how to better apply the principles they learn in the classroom to real life experiences.

The courses include a new set of Missionary Preparation courses, a Fundamental Scripture Study course and Provident Living, a course created as part of the Church Educational System.

Provident Living, Religion 150, will focus on making students more self-reliant. It will be taught in conjunction with a series of labs ranging from home and automotive maintenance to stress management and basic mending skills.

Student volunteers are needed to help teach the labs and can contact the Religion Department secretary for more information.

Those involved with the class will be required to participate in seven of the ten labs offered, but students not registered for Provident Living are also welcome to sign up and attend.

“The labs are designed to provide a little bit of practical experience so that students can become more self-reliant than they could from just a class,” said Larry Thurgood, Department of Religious Education chair. “It’s kind of a preparation for the future. We’ll always need [help], that is what the church is about. But more often than not, the people who struggle the most are not self-reliant.”

The Provident Living class will be utilizing The Gospel and Productive Life, a new manual published by CES, which explains that the course was designed to help students understand the relationship between the spiritual and the temporal.

CES has also introduced a reformatted version of the Missionary Preparation course. Religion 130 will now present students with the Preach My Gospel manual along with a Missionary Preparation student manual which explains, “Each chapter in this student manual is organized to assist the prospective missionary, in developing Christlike attributes and in teaching doctrines and principles of the restored gospel with power and authority of God (see Alma 17:3).”

Prospective missionaries will then be encouraged take Missionary Book of Mormon, Religion 221. This course studies the entire Book of Mormon in one semester and places an emphasis on missionary perspectives.

“It’s our best one-two punch to prepare missionaries,” Thurgood said. “We are really emphasizing that this is the top course for young people who want to go on missions.”

Fundamental Scripture Study, Religion 215, will be offered for its second semester at BYU-I. This course is intended to help students gain confidence in their understanding of the scriptures. It teaches students how to have effective personal scripture study and what ancient and modern prophets have taught about the importance of the scriptures.

“This class should be a prerequisite for every religion class that we have here because it teaches you how to study the scriptures,” Thurgood said.

With the development of these new classes, the Department of Religion is joining the school-wide effort in rethinking education to give students a well-rounded educational experience.

This semester, the Department of Religion is offering two sections of Provident Living, five sections of Mission Preparation, five sections of Missionary Book of Mormon and three sections of Fundamentals of Scripture study. All but the Provident Living classes and the block section of Missionary Preparation are full.