We are pleased to present a special issue of the Religious Educator with presentations that were part of the newly formed Church Educational System Religious Educators Conference on June 19, 2024. This event combines the goodness that has flowed from the “Evening with a General Authority” and the past Church Educational System Conference that was held on Brigham Young University’s campus that was focused on the needs of Seminaries and Institutes of Religion.

As Elder Clark G. Gilbert explained in his Commissioner’s update included in this issue: “This year’s event represents the first time we have assembled across the entire Church Educational System (CES) to learn from each other, share insights, and discuss efforts to teach more effectively, linking religious educators from Seminaries and Institutes of Religion, BYU, BYU–Idaho, BYU–Hawaii, Ensign College, and BYU–Pathway Worldwide. In total, these religious educators teach roughly half a million young adults across CES.”

Besides the wonderful contributions of several of our fellow religious educators, this issue also contains the keynote address given by Elder Dale G. Renlund of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles and instruction by Elder Clark G. Gilbert, a member of the First Quorum of Seventy and the Commissioner of the Church Educational System, and Chad H Webb, administrator of Seminaries and Institutes of Religion and Church Primary and Secondary Schools and first counselor in the General Sunday School Presidency. Whether you teach the gospel formally for the Church Educational System or within your own wards and stakes, I am sure you find much to value in this issue.

Michael A. Goodman
Editor in chief