Stake Leadership Meeting—Bahrain

Today I went with the Young Women’s president and other ward leaders to our Stake Leadership Training in Bahrain. Bahrain is a small island country just to the north of Qatar. (Some of you may know it as where Michael Jackson has made his new home.) It is a little less than an hour flight from Doha. (There were 8 of us—we flew there in the morning and back to Doha in the evening.) The picture above is of the ward building in Bahrain. It is unique in this region because it can put "LDS" on the gate.

About 90 people attended the training session. Some statistics about the Arabian Peninsula Stake (as of 4 May 2006): 1157 members (plus 50 military groups in Iraq and surrounding area that our stake is ecclesiastically responsible for), 7 countries (United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and Iraq), and 8 buildings.

I had been feeling like we were failing in our Young Women’s program just because it didn’t feel as organized or successful as the ward I grew up in. However, I realized at this meeting that we were actually doing really well. I had to remember that the YW program (and the whole church) was really new in the area and still was figuring out how to function in the Middle East. I also discovered that we have the largest youth group in the stake (10 young women and about 20 young men) and that we were the only ward holding mutual every week. I also learned a lot about how the program should be run. I have a whole new respect for the amazing Young Women leaders I had growing up. To those of you reading this—THANK YOU! I had no idea what a sacrifice you made for us.

This is a picture I took of a beautiful mosque in Bahrain.