My bishop and both his counselors are convinced that if a member's temple recommend is expired for longer than 3 months, the bishop must personally interview the member for a new recommend. The counselors cannot do it.
I cannot find any instructions that support this, in the Handbook or the temple recommend books. Has anyone else heard of such a thing?
Temple recommend interviews
- williamjackson
- Member
- Posts: 114
- Joined: Thu Apr 22, 2010 8:20 pm
- Location: Austin, TX, USA
- Contact:
-
- Community Administrator
- Posts: 34499
- Joined: Sat Jan 20, 2007 2:53 pm
- Location: U.S.
Re: Temple recommend interviews
I'm not finding anything either. This might have been a past instruction. Updated instructions rarely indicate the change - it's up to the reader to note any omission and realize there's been a change.
I did see in Handbook 1 where the bishop authorizes his councilors, but doesn't indicate if this is a blanket authorization or person by person. It seems reasonable that the bishop might be aware of something developing and would want to authorize "by individual". So there may be wiggle room for a local practice of automatically referring those whose recommends have expired for more than 3 months to the bishop.
I did see in Handbook 1 where the bishop authorizes his councilors, but doesn't indicate if this is a blanket authorization or person by person. It seems reasonable that the bishop might be aware of something developing and would want to authorize "by individual". So there may be wiggle room for a local practice of automatically referring those whose recommends have expired for more than 3 months to the bishop.
Have you searched the Help Center? Try doing a Google search and adding "site:churchofjesuschrist.org/help" to the search criteria.
So we can better help you, please edit your Profile to include your general location.
So we can better help you, please edit your Profile to include your general location.
-
- Community Moderators
- Posts: 11477
- Joined: Mon Mar 17, 2008 10:27 pm
- Location: US
Re: Temple recommend interviews
There is nothing in the Handbook or interview instructions about this. It may be a stake policy.
The bishop authorizes his counselors to conduct interviews anyway, so it is an easy thing to do. Our stake president used to reserve the right to interview anyone whose recommend had been expired more than 90 days, but it really depended on the circumstances.
The bishop authorizes his counselors to conduct interviews anyway, so it is an easy thing to do. Our stake president used to reserve the right to interview anyone whose recommend had been expired more than 90 days, but it really depended on the circumstances.
-
- New Member
- Posts: 2
- Joined: Mon Dec 02, 2013 10:49 pm
Re: Temple recommend interviews
The counselors can do it, providing the member is not a first-time recommend and has lived in the ward at least a year. That is the policy.
-
- New Member
- Posts: 1
- Joined: Thu Jan 26, 2023 9:00 am
Re: Temple recommend interviews
This is the policy in our stake/ward also.
-
- Senior Member
- Posts: 1096
- Joined: Sun Oct 30, 2016 10:42 pm
- Location: Michigan
Re: Temple recommend interviews
As this thread has been resurrected, just a point of clarification about recommend interviews for members who haven't lived in a ward for at least a year. Currently GHB 26.5.4 states that for this case the Bishop reviews the member's record, but a counselor can be authorized to do the interview according to the instructions in that section. It may be that in 2016 only a Bishop could do the recommend interviews for "newly-arrived members", but that's not the policy now.