What priesthood would MLS show for these general authorities?

RossEvans · #1

Would the Priesthood field in MLS say 'Apostle' or 'Seventy' if one of these general authorities happens to be a member of a local unit?

(This question is slightly hypothetical for me, because we have no such members. But I am working an an external application, and I would hate for it to break if some unit that did have such members tried to use it. Also, perhaps I need to update the documentation for the MLS export files in the Wiki.)

aebrown · #2

boomerbubba wrote:Would the Priesthood field in MLS say 'Apostle' or 'Seventy' if one of these general authorities happens to be a member of a local unit?

(This question is slightly hypothetical for me, because we have no such members. But I am working an an external application, and I would hate for it to break if some unit that did have such members tried to use it. Also, perhaps I need to update the documentation for the MLS export files in the Wiki.)

You are referring to the field that is called "Priesthood" in an export, but is called "Priesthood Office" in custom reports, to be precise. For an apostle, I'm pretty sure it would say "Apostle", but that's just a guess. I base my guess on the fact that in Custom Reports, you can filter based on Priesthood Office, and it would be pointless to allow such a filter if nothing could match.

For members of the quorums of the Seventy, I am certain that it would say "High Priest." That I can say with no doubt because we have members of our stake who hold that calling. As a priesthood office, "Seventy" refers only to those members who were ordained to that office long ago (when many brethren throughout the Church held that office), and have not subsequently been ordained High Priests.

RossEvans · #3

Thanks.

Is it possible that any brethren still ordained to the old 'Seventy' office still exist on the rolls of any units?

If so, I should probably leave it in my lookup table just to be safe. The way my application works, the 'Seventy' value will never be used unless that string actually shows up in the Membership.csv export.

#4

boomerbubba wrote:Is it possible that any brethren still ordained to the old 'Seventy' office still exist on the rolls of any units?

Yes. We still have at least two that I know of in our stake.