Strong neighborhood communities called “wards” are a very nice thing to have. The one where I grew up was full of nice people who would watch out for each other, help elderly people with yard maintenance, etc. IIRC Cities in Utah county have some of the lowest crime rates in the USA, despite having a moderate (~600k within 5,550 sq.km) population. Not all Mormon neighborhoods are equal, but the good ones are excellent places to live. I definitely miss the instant community connection that (good) wards have. (They don’t exclude non-members from neighborhood events, but a lot of the ‘structural’ social interaction happens at church and church-related activities)
100% this. While some of the wards I grew up in were not great, some of them were essentially family, and I would still go to enormous lengths to help anybody from the Vail ward. I wish dearly there were some sort of secular ward system.
Strong neighborhood communities called “wards” are a very nice thing to have. The one where I grew up was full of nice people who would watch out for each other, help elderly people with yard maintenance, etc. IIRC Cities in Utah county have some of the lowest crime rates in the USA, despite having a moderate (~600k within 5,550 sq.km) population.
Not all Mormon neighborhoods are equal, but the good ones are excellent places to live. I definitely miss the instant community connection that (good) wards have. (They don’t exclude non-members from neighborhood events, but a lot of the ‘structural’ social interaction happens at church and church-related activities)
100% this. While some of the wards I grew up in were not great, some of them were essentially family, and I would still go to enormous lengths to help anybody from the Vail ward. I wish dearly there were some sort of secular ward system.