For the past few weeks I enjoyed working in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saint’s latest web endeavor, Helping in The Vineyard.

The Church has no paid clergy.  The members of each congregation volunteer their time and talents in the lay ministry.  From those running the children’s church (called Primary) to those that lead the congregation itself (Bishops and their two counselors), everyone has a life outside of church including family, hobbies, and employment.

The Church itself began in New York and now bases itself out of Utah, but the 14 million members live across the globe. Preparing resources for an ever-growing population of non-English speakers means a lot of work.

Since serving in the Church is no strange thought to the faithful Latter-Day Saints, otherwise known as Mormons, the idea behind the Vineyard should come as no surprise.

Members may log in to the website and aid in the various digital media conversion that would take years without a large group of people working towards the same goal of worldwide distribution of resources.

The opportunities range between continuing the indexing of names for Family Search, providing and or tagging photographs, aiding in translation of materials, viewing videos to slice and tag, and preparing Church content for distribution to the world.

One of my favourite activities falls on the last of those, preparing Church content for distribution. I can compare paragraphs to ensure that the printed version matches the digital version as well as identifying page breaks. This is easy and quick work, and fits into even the busiest of schedules with the most active of kids. That’s the kind of service opportunities I need!

Originally the Vineyard team set a goal to complete 3,000  tasks and volunteers not only reached that but completed 8,000 tasks in a mere two weeks.

The site says it is in beta, but Church members with an LDS.org login can sign in and begin working within minutes.

–Lady O