Initiative 3: Invite Members and Friends to Participate
S&I Annual Training Broadcast 2026
Friday, January 23, 2026
Brother Chad H Webb: We have a focus on inviting those who have not yet enrolled. With the expanding reach of Seminaries and Institutes being one of our top priorities, we want to continue our focus on inviting more youth and young adults to join our classes.
Our “Invite a Friend” initiative in the spring of 2025, which was a collaborative effort with the Missionary Department, has been highly successful. Thank you all so much! Last year, we had more than 72,000 friends of the Church enrolled in seminary and institute across the world.
We know by experience that students are key missionaries in inviting others. Peer-to-peer invitations are often the most effective. When a young person personally invites a friend to join an institute class or activity, it carries special power. Their authentic testimonies and friendships are essential in welcoming all to attend. Many of our friends who enroll in seminary and institute classes also choose to be baptized.
We have also seen that the students are our best gatherers when it comes to inviting seminary- and institute-age potential students who are not yet enrolled but could be. As teachers and leaders in S&I, we have access to tools and reports that help us identify students who are not yet enrolled. Another effective way to help more youth and young adults attend is to partner with priesthood leaders to extend invitations to members of their wards and stakes.
We will now learn from a couple of areas where their inspired efforts are making a real difference. We will first hear from the Brazil Area, followed by the Africa South Area.
Brazil Area Video: Invite a Friend
Cláudio Campo: We are witnessing with great gratitude that the lives of many young people are being changed through seminary and institute missionary “Invite a Friend” initiative. It all started in 2019 with the simple idea of inviting a friend to attend seminary and institute classes. The idea grew and spread to seminary and institute classes throughout Brazil.
Igor Leonardo: Everyone did their best to bring people. And our real goal is to connect them to Christ. I invited 4 friends, and those 4 turned into 18, then exploded to 42 and kept growing!
Charles Freitas: Through the “Invite a Friend” initiative and the Missionary Seminary Program, we have already been able to help more than 50 young people be baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ. This is just the beginning. By the end of the year, we will have many more.
Rodrigo Chagas: This year alone we’ve had several young people who were invited. Countless baptisms have taken place because of this simple act of invitation. Each young person invited is a soul drawing closer to the Savior, Jesus Christ.
Lara Sophia: When I share what I learn in seminary, I realize that I am strengthening my own faith in Jesus Christ. I feel very happy to be able to help share the gospel with others through seminary. It’s a way for us to express more of our feelings about Jesus Christ through the classes.
Ednice Batista: Seminary and institute are not just classes—they are opportunities to make friends and strengthen testimonies of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Felipe Cardoso: We have seen the hand of the Lord in the “Invite a Friend” initiative. It has had an incredible impact on the lives of young people and on the work of the seminaries and institutes here in the Brazil Area. The invitation is simple, but the impact on the lives of these young people is eternal.
Africa South Area Video: Invite a Member Not Enrolled
Tasara Makasi: Hi! My name is Tasara Makasi from Africa South Area. After realizing that safety was a big concern for our seminary students, we counseled with our priesthood leaders, resulting in the creation of multiple classes in each unit. The classes were very small, so we asked our students about how we could grow our classes. The students said they would invite their friends, and to make the invitations more effective, they literally went door to door and talked not only to their friends but the parents of their friends as well. Wilfred Sithole, our coordinator in Harare, spearheaded this initiative.
Wilfred Sithole: Our parents with children in seminary were concerned about the safety of their children. Some had to walk long distances to get to classes. We came up with the idea of having multiple classes which were closer to where the children lived, and these two teachers here have a wonderful story to tell from the Maganga branch.
Female Teacher: I taught the original class, and it had about 18 students. However, it started growing because of students that were coming from Maganga, and sometimes they would have to travel in the rain, so we had to form another class in Maganga.
Male Teacher: I started the class with 2 students, Tsitsi and Maria, and I agreed to invite others to join us in seminary class, and the numbers started to grow from 2 to 22 students.
Maria Derere: My name is Maria Derere. I am from Maganga branch. So I was the first student to join seminary, and I invited my sister Tsitsi Derere.
Tsitsi Derere: We started just the two of us, and then we invited others to join us, and the number grew to 22.
Male Student: I’m grateful for these two sisters. They invited me to seminary, and I know seminary is ordained of God.
Entire Class: We love Seminary!
Brother Chad H Webb: We have Sister Alice Cooper Felippini from Brazil joining us for this discussion about this initiative. Thank you for being here. Brother Tasara Makasi from South Africa is unable to join us in person, but we will be able to hear from him through a video he shared with us.
Sister Cooper, what your area has been doing is truly remarkable and inspiring. Thank you. What did you do to help your students be so enthusiastic about inviting their friends?
Alice Cooper Felippini: So that is a great question. And we do a couple of things. One of them is training our seminary teachers to really love and include and accept those who visit us so they feel loved in the class. The students, through the class presidency, they are trained too so they can meet with the other students and they can invite their friends from school, from neighborhood, or the less active youth. And they can love them. Really love them inside the class. Build community by sports, by sometimes food, and fun inside the classes. They want to be there. They really want to be there. They want to bring their friends. So they are so happy to be with their friends in the class of the seminary sharing the gospel. And yes, some of the things.
Elder Clark G. Gilbert: It’s so beautiful. I love how this vision of making the seminary class a place of belonging where friends of the Church, friends of our students, would want to be. And what a beautiful description.
Now we’ve asked Brother Makasi the following question: Brother Makasi, in your story, an obstacle was identified that was keeping students from attending. What were the steps you took to find the right solution to this obstacle? Let’s watch his response here together.
Tasara Makasi: The first thing we did was to reach out to the leaders and discuss the challenge that we were facing. From that discussion with the leaders, it was agreed that there was need to create more classes. And the leaders went on ahead to call more teachers, and we trained those teachers—we oriented them and gave them all the resources they needed.
And then when the classes started, we realized that they were too small. Then we consulted with the students, and the students came back and said, “You know what? We can invite our friends.” So they went out and talked to their friends. But what was inspiring about the students’ reaction was they also committed to talk to the parents of those friends. And so they went from house to house visiting the parents as well and talked to them about seminary. And as a result, we ended up having those small classes growing into big classes.
Elder Clark G. Gilbert: So powerful. And you know what really impresses me about Brother Makasi’s response is that they identified the problem and counseled together with students, parents, and leaders to find a solution that worked for them.
The obstacles you have to increasing participation in seminary and institute might be different than theirs, but there is a principle in their example that will benefit all of us. When we first strive to understand the obstacles and then counsel together to seek inspiration and find solutions, the Lord will provide answers.
Brother Chad H Webb: This is really wonderful. Thank you for this inspiring discussion.
Is there anything else you’d like to add? I just was thrilled to see those students and how excited they were to be together. My guess is it also blessed the students that are already there to have been the ones to extend the invitation and see how it blesses their friends. It creates a spirit of missionary work. How else does it bless your classes?
Alice Cooper Felippini: Yes, it is great to see the students creating this missionary pattern since seminary. So some seminary teachers invite the missionaries to talk with them about how they can make the simple invitations to their friends and their training to the missionary field. So it’s great to see their joy to have friends with them in seminary and this new youth that is coming. They are engaged with Christ. This is beautiful to see.
Brother Chad H Webb: It was obvious in the video that they love to be together. There’s this sense of belonging, and they want to be there. And just imagine how much that’s blessing them as future missionaries and throughout their lives as they lead in the Church. So well done. Thank you. That’s really exciting.
We will now take a question for Sister Cooper that was sent in from the North America Northeast Area.
Justin Wilkins: Justin Wilkins, United States Northeast Area. How did S&I personnel work effectively with local priesthood leaders and the full-time missionaries in your efforts to invite friends to participate?
Alice Cooper Felippini: That is a great question. So we have to work with the leadership and we train them to stay with us in this program, in this Missionary Seminary Program, and support this program. And they see the results in their wards, in their seminary classes, and in their stakes with more families, more youth engaged. So as they see the results, they support more and more. We show them the numbers and the youth, the experiences, and they want to be part of it. So it’s great to work with them and the missionaries too. As I said, sometimes some seminary teachers, they invite the missionaries into the classes so they can do like a minute missionary, little messages with the students and little ideas for the simple invitations. It’s very simple invitations that bring the youth. It’s not like big or it’s like, “Hi, I love my class. Do you want to come with me? We will have sports. My teacher is great.” So they go. They love it.
Elder Clark G. Gilbert: Beautiful.
Brother Chad H Webb: There’s something you referenced that somebody else mentioned as well, and that’s working with leaders. And if that’s bishops or Young Women leaders, stake presidents, mission leaders, they want the same thing for our youth that we want for them. We’re not going and asking them to do something for us. We’re going and asking if we can assist them in their efforts to deepen the conversion of the youth, to prepare them for missions, to bless them in so many ways. They love these youth. They’re trying to serve them. And if they see us as a resource to what they’re trying to accomplish, that partnership can be wonderful. And you’ve shown that. So thank you. Thank you.
Well, we appreciate all you’re doing to encourage especially your students to invite their friends. Those are such powerful invitations. They’re simple. They’re effective. And we’re just so grateful to see what’s happening. We invite all of you to please prayerfully continue with your efforts to invite more to participate. As we are consistent in those efforts, we will continue to see the Lord performing miracles in the lives of these youth and young adults.
Elder Clark G. Gilbert: Thank you, Brother Webb.