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Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square, new YouTube channel highlight LDS Semiannual General Conference

By Genelle Pugmire - | Sep 29, 2021

Family gathers to watch LDS Semiannual General Conference now on "General Conference" YouTube.com channel. (Courtesy Intellectual Reserves)

On Saturday, the 191st Semiannual General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will open with the regular morning session — and things will look different.

For the past three conferences, beginning in April of 2020, the conference center has been closed to the public and leaders of the church have spoken from the smaller conference theater. The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square performances have been previously recorded music from earlier conferences.

The COVID-19 pandemic was the cause — and it continues to be why general membership is not allowed in the center.

While families and individuals will gather around televisions, computers and radios to hear messages from prophets and apostles, there will be some noticeable changes.

The choir will be back, or portions of the choir, live from the Conference Center. Half of the them will sing on Saturday and half on Sunday. The will continue to follow spacing protocol for COVID-19.

The refocusing of the Saturday evening session of conference is also new this fall. In the past, these sessions have been particularly focused on women in October and on men in April.

The refocus is now planned for the entire body of the church. It won’t have a specific theme, but it will allow for more gospel topics to be taught and permit more general leaders to address the conference.

Also new this October is the ability to live stream the conference on YouTube.

Beginning with this conference, the church is moving all general conference live streaming to a new General Conference YouTube channel. This conference-specific channel houses over 50 years of conference archives and makes finding and sharing conference videos easier. The archives can be found by searching “general conference” on YouTube.

The church also recently started publishing short video segments of Apostles’ conference talks on the General Conference YouTube channel to extend the reach of these messages. These segments contain a portion of the Apostles’ messages, enhanced with background music and visual depictions of Jesus Christ and modern-day followers.

“We hope these powerful short video segments of conference talks by the First Presidency and members of the Twelve on the General Conference YouTube channel will be enjoyed and shared,” said Elder Randy D. Funk, a General Authority Seventy who advises on LDS Church publishing efforts. “They serve as a helpful reminder of the teachings of the First Presidency and the Twelve, which may inspire us to study their full messages or simply prompt us to share them with a friend.”

Twenty segment videos are now available in the General Conference Segments playlist.

To be notified each time a new segment and latest conference videos are published, people can click on the “Subscribe” button, then click on the bell icon and select the “All” notification setting.

Many members of the church not only watch conference, but typically have a notebook or paper with pen or pencil in hand to take notes from the speaker’s comments.

The church would like to remind members about the note-taking feature in the Gospel Library app that has been available in previous conferences. Conference notes is a way to record questions before, and impressions during, conference sessions right in the Gospel Library.

The Gospel Library now contains the October 2021 general conference publication which has a chapter set up for each session. This means that before conference even begins, you can record the questions you are seeking answers for as notes. These notes will be saved for accessing and answering during the live conference sessions, available for later searches, and retained right next to the published conference audio and video session recordings when they are added a few days after conference.

Evan Cobb, Daily Herald file photo From left, First Counselor Dallin H. Oaks, President Russell M. Nelson, and Second Counselor Henry B. Eyring, smile towards the crowd before the press conference at the lobby of the LDS Church Office Building on Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2018, in Salt Lake City.

“Many Latter-day Saints are used to writing their questions, answers and impressions in a conference journal or notebook,” said Rob Jex, the product manager of the Gospel Library app. “We are simply providing Gospel Library users with a similar digital experience, so they can easily access their inspiration from their phones for years to come.”

The Semiannual General Conference will be held Saturday and Sunday at the following times.

  • Saturday, October 2, at 10 a.m. MDT.
  • Saturday, October 2, at 2 p.m. MDT.
  • Saturday, October 2, at 6 p.m. MDT.
  • Sunday, October 3, at 10 a.m. MDT.
  • Sunday, October 3, at 2 p.m. MDT.

All sessions will be streamed live on http://broadcasts.ChurchofJesusChrist.org. You can also watch and listen on Gospel Library, YouTube, radio, television, satellite, and other channels. For a detailed list visit the church website at http://churchofjesuschrist.org, and look for “ways to watch General Conference.”

Following the broadcast, the messages will be available in text, audio, and video formats on multiple channels for on-demand viewing and studying. These channels include Gospel Library, YouTube and the Church magazines.

According to a church statement, LDS General Conference provides an opportunity to receive personal revelation as living prophets give counsel and direction.

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