Though I consider myself a rational humanist, I am a currently practicing member of the Church for practical and social reasons. I have participated in perhaps a dozen wards across three countries, several states, and the aforementioned YSA type of congregation.
From my perspective, I think you undersell the standardization aspect. I believe that even within a single Ward, the idea that every person is actively trying to pursue the exact same set of ideals and outcomes has a strong unifying effect. It helps that many of the behavioral ideals of the church are truly pro-social and pro-health, in that the ideals can be appealing independent of conforming to the faith-centric standards of belief.
Another major unifying factor for the church is the common narratives of persecution and “apartness”. It is quite common for a member of the church to have a story of how they were excluded from non-church social groups on account of their faith, particularly when they were young. The church overall also emphasizes the narrative of historical persecution during the initial founding of the church (culminating in the departure for the West). These two combine to create an atmosphere where church members feel that they need the social structure of the church, as other options are felt to be unavailable.
I’d like to think that there is a persecution-free (perceived or otherwise) method to build that type of “apartness”, but I don’t think we can list the reasons for the strength of LDS communities without mentioning it.
My guess is that standardization has been more important for you than for the typical member of the church. It sounds like you move a lot more than most members, and so you spend a lot more of your time having just moved somewhere new. Standardization is helpful to build community when you’re traveling or just moved somewhere new, but most people aren’t in those situations all that often.
I also claim that standardization by itself does not build community. There is not a particularly strong community in McDonalds or in airports—despite these being very standardized situations. What standardization does is it reminds you of the similar situations you previously have been in. This allows the sense of community to travel with you between wards. But if your home ward does not feel like a community, going to something that looks similar doesn’t make you suddenly feel at one with them.
I didn’t mention narratives about persecution, and maybe I should have. They don’t feel like a strong contributor to feelings of community for me personally—but I might be unusual here.[1] I’m also not sure how to disentangle narratives of persecution from actual experiences of people treating them differently because they are Mormon. Either way, I don’t think that this is something other groups trying to build community should want to copy.
I think you’re probably right on the topic of standardization—I hadn’t disentangled how important if was to me personally from how generally critical it would be for local community-building.
It may be of value to qualify or Taboo the term “community” here. I understood the question to be “What unique aspects of LDS practice and culture at both the ward, stake, and Church-wide levels have contributed to the formation and maintenance of enduring local and global social structures”. I think your emphasis is on the local community, and my comment had emphasized the more global aspects (likely a consequence of my unique experience, as you point out).
If the question is, instead, “What unique aspects of LDS practice and culture at the ward level have contributed to the formation and maintenance of enduring local social structures, and are recommended for other groups to emulate”, I think you’ve identified all of the prime candidates.
Though I consider myself a rational humanist, I am a currently practicing member of the Church for practical and social reasons. I have participated in perhaps a dozen wards across three countries, several states, and the aforementioned YSA type of congregation.
From my perspective, I think you undersell the standardization aspect. I believe that even within a single Ward, the idea that every person is actively trying to pursue the exact same set of ideals and outcomes has a strong unifying effect. It helps that many of the behavioral ideals of the church are truly pro-social and pro-health, in that the ideals can be appealing independent of conforming to the faith-centric standards of belief.
Another major unifying factor for the church is the common narratives of persecution and “apartness”. It is quite common for a member of the church to have a story of how they were excluded from non-church social groups on account of their faith, particularly when they were young. The church overall also emphasizes the narrative of historical persecution during the initial founding of the church (culminating in the departure for the West). These two combine to create an atmosphere where church members feel that they need the social structure of the church, as other options are felt to be unavailable.
I’d like to think that there is a persecution-free (perceived or otherwise) method to build that type of “apartness”, but I don’t think we can list the reasons for the strength of LDS communities without mentioning it.
My guess is that standardization has been more important for you than for the typical member of the church. It sounds like you move a lot more than most members, and so you spend a lot more of your time having just moved somewhere new. Standardization is helpful to build community when you’re traveling or just moved somewhere new, but most people aren’t in those situations all that often.
I also claim that standardization by itself does not build community. There is not a particularly strong community in McDonalds or in airports—despite these being very standardized situations. What standardization does is it reminds you of the similar situations you previously have been in. This allows the sense of community to travel with you between wards. But if your home ward does not feel like a community, going to something that looks similar doesn’t make you suddenly feel at one with them.
I didn’t mention narratives about persecution, and maybe I should have. They don’t feel like a strong contributor to feelings of community for me personally—but I might be unusual here.[1] I’m also not sure how to disentangle narratives of persecution from actual experiences of people treating them differently because they are Mormon. Either way, I don’t think that this is something other groups trying to build community should want to copy.
The fact that I post on LessWrong is some evidence that I’m not near the center of the distribution.
I think you’re probably right on the topic of standardization—I hadn’t disentangled how important if was to me personally from how generally critical it would be for local community-building.
It may be of value to qualify or Taboo the term “community” here. I understood the question to be “What unique aspects of LDS practice and culture at both the ward, stake, and Church-wide levels have contributed to the formation and maintenance of enduring local and global social structures”. I think your emphasis is on the local community, and my comment had emphasized the more global aspects (likely a consequence of my unique experience, as you point out).
If the question is, instead, “What unique aspects of LDS practice and culture at the ward level have contributed to the formation and maintenance of enduring local social structures, and are recommended for other groups to emulate”, I think you’ve identified all of the prime candidates.