LDS Missionaries Teach About Jesus in Syracuse, New York

Three Women Give Up 18 Months of Their Lives (without Pay) to Preach the Gospel

It's 10 a.m. and the women have just finished preparing to leave their one-bedroom apartment. There are three women, one bathroom and two mirrors. Also present in this small apartment, as these missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) explain, is a lot of faith in Jesus Christ - and a desire to spread the message of His redeeming power.

It's mid-morning now, but the three sisters, as they're called, have been up since 6:30 this morning. Colette Duffin, a 22-year-old from Boise, Idaho, awakened her companions by singing a cheerful song called "Way Up In The Sky."

"She wakes us up that way every morning," says Corrie Rindlisbacher, 23, from Grantsville, Utah, with a laugh. "Every morning."

This is a time of life when many women are just finishing college and looking to start a career or go to graduate school. These women decided to serve missions for the LDS church. Not only do LDS missionaries choose to take a substantial chunk of time out of their lives to serve Jesus, they also pay for it themselves. While the church does help missionaries whose families are in distressed circumstances, all missionaries are required to pay some for portion of their missions. This attitude to true sacrifice is a move that is at odds with the general trend of young adults in America.

A Gallup poll found that 43 percent of people in the18-29 age group say religion is important to them, but only 23 percent of them actually attend services regularly. Additionally, 70 percent of those surveyed in this age group feel that religion is becoming less important in daily American life. However, for Duffin, Rindlisbacher, and their companion Rhonda Mayo, 25, Mesa, Ariz., religion is a fixture of daily life.