Mormon Lingo

Below is a list of common lingo from members of my church...the link I found this at is http://minorproblems.wordpress.com/mormon-the-minors-terminology/

Mormon Lingo

So I realized that there are a lot of things in my blog that you may not understand if you are not Mormon. Ergo, I am creating this page to be filled with terms, concepts, and their definitions to keep things clear. This is going to be a big work in progress…

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints: This is the formal title of the Mormon church, but so many people know us as Mormons they think they are two separate churches. Also sometimes we may go by “LDS” as an abbreviated version of the Church name.

Active: This is a term for someone who is Mormon and regularly attends church meeting and activities. Now this doesn’t mean the person is completely awesome or anything, but that they’re at least committed enough to wake up on time for church.

Inactive: A Mormon that doesn’t go to church or follow any of the rules… like drinking or R-rated movie…

Institute: This is like a Bible study class for college age people in church, except we have a wide range of classes like gospel principles, old testament, book of mormon, history of the church.

R.M: This is an acronym for Returned Missionary, meaning a person who has served and completed a full-time mission (you know the ones with the name tags who go knocking on doors teaching about Christ). Many men in the church go and serve one when they turn 19 and when they come back at 21 they are a lot more mature and better looking.

Premie: Pre-Mission, meaning you can date the person but soon they’ll be off limits because missionaries aren’t suppose to date while on a mission.

Ward: this is just our term for congregation, except you go to a ward depending on where you live, much like school districts. They also have wards for single adults (also known as student wards because you normally don’t go to those until you are in college), spanish-speaking wards, deaf wards, and regular family wards.

DTR: This is an acronym for “Defining The Relationship.” It is that awkward talk where you and that other person you’ve been dating a while decide if you are an exclusive couple or just dating…

Elder: This is an official title of a man who is serving a mission or is a higher up in the church

Bishop: Same thing as a Pastor in other churches, except he isn’t paid and does not give a sermon every week. It is actually members of the congregation that speak and teach during our services.

Bishopric: Every bishop has two counselors to help him out and they are known as being in the bishopric.

EQP: So the men’s group in the church is called Elder’s Quorum, and EQP stands for Elder’s Quorum President. Think like a leader of the men’s association in a church and Elder’s Quorum is the name of that men’s association.

Relief Society: This is what we call the women’s association in our church; we are known for our mad cooking skills and having more fun than the guys.

General Conference: This a conference held twice a year where the President of the church and his counselors, apostales, and other church leaders give an address to all the members of the church about what they feel we need to be instructed on.

Singles Ward, Singles Ward II, The R.M: These are all Mormon movies; they are hilarious with much better acting than most Christian movies.

FHE: This is an acronym for Family Home Evening; it is a time set aside on Monday nights for families to share a gospel message and have a family activity together. Since I’m in a singles ward and we’re not living with our families we do it all together- and my calling is to put it together ever week for my ward.

Mormon.org: So you may have seen ads for this site, good. There are a lot of misconceptions about the church (like it being a cult or something) so these ads have been created so people know where to go to clear up these misconceptions. I’ve got a profile you can check out listed on my blogroll

Member: This means you were once baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. This doesn’t mean you are active, but once a Mormon always a Mormon.

Non-Member: So this means you aren’t Mormon, usually this is how we classify how much of our lingo we’ll have to explain if we’re talking church stuff in front of someone who isn’t LDS.

Nicmo: This stands for non-committal make-out, or the Mormon version of hooking up.

Jack Mormon: Someone who only acts like a Mormon on Sundays. Basically the Mormon equivalent to a “Sunday Christian”

This is a great list! and will help others like me who converted, and just anyone reading that may be confused by what I say. I hope this helps!!