14 DAY TRIAL // Have you heard of the "Church of Apple"? All those jokes will now become reality. The Mormon church is getting ready to buy all their missionaries an iPad Mini. The disciples won't have to carry large bags filled with books and getting online to spread the Bible on the Social Networks will be much easier.
And Apple will earn a good chunk of Church money too!
A Press Release by "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" explains the whole story.
Apparently, since last fall there has been a pilot program involving over 6500 missionaries from United States and Japan. They were equipped with a specially configured iPad mini to study the gospel.
Church leaders will be responsible to implement the program in the United States, Canada, Japan and western Europe. Sister missionaries in some of the Church's visitors' centers will also use digital devices in their daily routine.
The Mormon church representatives appreciate that in the next six months more than 32,000 missionaries will be using an iDevice. Buy them for $400 each and Apple is over a million dollars richer.
Apparently, the church will get into app development. The iPads will have a preinstalled app called "Area Book Planner" which will replace the current notebooks and paper maps. The Gospel Library will include scriptures, manuals, magazines and other teaching resources.
Elder David F. Evans, one of the high officials of the church says there are currently almost 90,000 missionaries around the world. I guess Apple will sell a lot of iPads next year.
Elder Evans tells mormonnewsroom.org believes that backpack of a missionary can be successfully replaced by an iPad Mini.
"We've learned that most missionaries are very comfortable and very capable with using digital technology. We found that missionaries love studying using digital devices, they read mode, they study more. It's a wonderful toll to encourage learning. We've learned that they are very effective tools for planing, communicating with local leaders and their local president", Evans said.
It is obvious this is a good way to attract young people to the church. Having an iPad that the young adults already know and love to show them movies and read them books would make it easier to expand their knowledge for the Mormon Church. On the other hand, apps like FaceTime make it easier to stay in touch from afar and Facebook and Twitter will get the word "Follower" a new meaning.
Hit the following video at the 6:18 mark.
