Online Donations Website Lets You Contribute to Missionaries in Your Ward and Around the World

One of the more frequent questions I’ve gotten over the years is how to contribute to the missionary fund of a friend or relative in another ward. The process is relatively similar to the process parents go through to pay for their children’s mission–you pay into the ward mission fund of the home ward of the missionary.

If you’re doing this offline, you fill out a tithing and offerings slip. The missionaries and/or their family donate the $400 a month to the ward mission fund, paying it in the same way members pay tithing, via the paper envelope. When you fill out the paper form, note the amount in the ward missionary fund area and make of note of which missionary the donation is for. This process works fine in you live in or near the missionary’s home ward, but if not, you would need to send money to the family and have them fill out the paperwork. However, with the roll out of online donation system a few years ago, both family and friends near and far can use the Church’s website to donate to the mission fund of any missionary.

The Church Online Donation website is easy to use, especially if the missionary you are donating to is in your same ward. There is a drop down list in the online form to select the missionary for whom you want to donate fund. The tricky part can be donating to missionaries who live in a different ward or branch–you need to know the ward unit number in order to contribute money to the missionary. There are a couple of ways to get the missionary’s home ward unit number: 1) you can contact the ward clerk of the missionary’s home ward or branch and he will give you this information. Many of you will have no way to get in contact with the missionary’s home ward clerk, so you’ll have to reach out to family or friends in that unit and they will have to get the unit number for you. 2) Another option is for any priesthood leader with access to the Church Directory of Organizations and Leaders (CDOL). Priesthood leaders can log into the CDOL website and look up the unit number for any ward in the world.

Once you know the ward or branch unit number of the missionary’s home ward or branch, to give money to a missionary…

1. Log in to LDS.org, under “My Account and Ward” select “Donations.”
2. On the “Make a Donation” tab, in the Ward Missionary Fund drop down menu, select “Missionary in Other Ward/Branch.”
3. Enter the ward or branch unit number, and click “Continue.”
4. A drop down menu will then appear with the names of missionaries serving from that unit.
5. Select the missionary and type in the amount and following the remaining steps and you’re all set.

Here is a link to a video the Church has made to explain more about the online donations process.

I hope many of you will take advantage of this new technology to donate to the missionary funds of your friends and family members. As you do so, I know the Lord will richly bless you.

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