LDS Humanitarian Services
Charitable services within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Latter-day Saint Charities (formerly known as LDS Humanitarian Services) is a branch of the welfare department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). The organization's stated mission is to relieve suffering, to foster self-reliance for people of all nationalities and religions, and to provide opportunities for service.
Overview
The LDS Church considers humanitarian work to be an essential part of its mission to bless humanity. In 1842, Joseph Smith, founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, organized the Women's Relief Society, with a primary focus to provide "relief" to suffering members and ultimately to all people. During the Great Depression the LDS Church organized a welfare program, now administered by the church's welfare services department, to help provide for the needs of its members.
LDS Humanitarian Services was created to coordinate these efforts in partnership with government, and other nonprofit agencies around the world. The church's humanitarian work primarily helps those in need who are not members of the church. Key humanitarian initiatives include clean water, vision treatment, wheelchair provision, neonatal resuscitation, and disaster relief. Other initiatives include immunizations, family enrichment programs, and family food production. In 2008, LDS Humanitarian Services provided aid to 3.3 million people in 122 countries, and since 1985 help has been given to 23 million people in 189 nations.
“LDS Humanitarian Services” enters the record as charitable services within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Humanitarian, Services and Charitable can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 10, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q3029275. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1842, 2008 and 1985.
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This entry incorporates text from “LDS Humanitarian Services” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.