New Self-Reliance Initiative Introduced in Canada
 

Ottawa — Leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have introduced a new self-reliance initiative that is gaining traction throughout Canada. This initiative assists Church members to plan and prepare to meet the temporal needs of life.

Church members who want to become more self-reliant — find a job or a better job, get out of debt, start their own business or go back to school for a more exciting or more lucrative career — can receive help through self-reliance groups. These groups meet weekly to give information, inspiration and motivation to help make participants’ dreams a reality.

Participants meet in small groups that counsel together over a 12-week period. They learn the essentials of success, practice those essentials and then form new habits as they study, discuss, make commitments and report back on their successes. The group mentoring process is the key to accelerating their progress toward becoming more prosperous and self-reliant.

“I love the [self-reliance] lessons because they help me to be more organized, be proactive and set goals in the short and long term. I also love the portions of the lesson where we read scriptures. I’m doing the things that the manual outlines because I think it is inspired,” stated a participant in the program.

Self-Reliance Services addresses more than just the temporal side of life. One tenet of Church belief is that the foundation of self-reliance is spiritual self-reliance. A portion of each week’s self-reliance curriculum is devoted to strengthening participants spiritually, such as in faith, prayer, obedience to spiritual laws and developing Christlike attributes of compassion for and service to others.

Canadian resident Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, once said, “A man, as a general rule, owes very little to what he is born with — a man is what he makes of himself.”

The leadership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has prepared the self-reliance initiative to help its members put into practice principles of faith, education, hard work and trust in Jesus Christ. Mormon leaders believe that those who accept and live these principles will be better enabled to receive the temporal and spiritual blessings promised by Jesus Christ.

President Thomas S. Monson has taught that self-reliance — “the ability, commitment, and effort to provide the necessities of life for self and family” (“Providing in the Lord’s Way: Summary of a Leader’s Guide to Welfare” [2009]) — is an essential element of our temporal and spiritual well-being.