Virginia EFY serves East Coast youths at Southern Virginia University

BUENA VISTA, Va. — Nearly 1,500 Latter-day Saint youths gathered at Southern Virginia University in the Shenandoah Valley this summer for one of five weeklong sessions of Especially for Youth.Used to being in the minority at their schools, the participants, ages 14-18, enjoyed the bonds of friendship they formed while focusing on this year's theme, \"Be Thou an Example\" (1 Tim. 4:12).\"EFY provides a refuge from the world where youth can participate in the things that draw them closer to their Heavenly Father and their savior Jesus Christ,\" said Greg Tanner, director of Youth and Family Programs for Brigham Young University.\"If we can have places of refuge for the youth of the church closer to where they and their families live, the sacrifice will not be as great and they won't have to travel as far to experience the blessings of this program.\"Similar to the way the church gathers in stakes and congregations, Tanner said that it is important to have EFY in locations that are easy to reach for Mormon youths outside of Utah.With hundreds of participants from Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina and other East Coast states, he said that Southern Virginia University provides an enriching and LDS-friendly atmosphere.\"It is such a blessing to have a gospel-based program in an environment where the spirit is already present,\" said Bethany Anderson, one of two field coordinators for EFY at Southern Virginia this summer and a 2007 graduate of Southern Virginia. Anderson recently returned from serving a mission in Provo, Utah.Of the 1,500 participants attending EFY at Southern Virginia this year, more than one-third are from Virginia, 349 from North Carolina, 155 from Maryland and about 200 from New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and West Virginia combined. Some came from Texas, Utah and California, and seven came from international locations like England, Korea and Qatar.