PROVO — Some of the missionaries who arrived Wednesday at the Provo Missionary Training Center found themselves on an unusual emotional roller coaster when news broke that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was going to ask missionaries to train from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We live a couple of hours north, and we were already on our way to drop off our daughter when we started getting all these texts from people saying the MTC was closed to new missionaries,” said Olivia Moore Brower, of West Point. “I got excited that we might have her home with us an extra week or two.”

Sister Charity Brower, 19, didn’t like that idea at all. She was scheduled to start her training for a mission in Cincinnati, Ohio, and she is a hands-on learner, so she wanted to be in the MTC.

When the Browers pulled up to the gate, the first person who leaned in to talk to them through the car window asked if any of them had been sick at all recently.

“We told them our younger daughter was but she had different symptoms and had been tested for strep and mono and the tests came back negative,” Olivia Brower said. “We wondered if we hadn’t taken her to the doctor last week if they would have let Charity in.”

She made it, but she was among the last who will enter the church’s missionary training centers in Provo or Preston, England, for the foreseeable future.

Grid View Missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints walk between buildings at the Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. The church announced Wednesday that April’s general conference sessions will be held virtually, some incoming missionaries will train remotely, and gatherings of multiple congregations in some areas will be postponed due to the spread of COVID-19. Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News

A missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is dropped off by his family at the Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. The church announced Wednesday that April’s general conference sessions will be held virtually, some incoming missionaries will train remotely, and gatherings of multiple congregations in some areas will be postponed due to the spread of COVID-19. Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News

Missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints walk between buildings at the Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. The church announced Wednesday that April’s general conference sessions will be held virtually, some incoming missionaries will train remotely, and gatherings of multiple congregations in some areas will be postponed due to the spread of COVID-19. Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News

Missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are dropped off at the Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. The church announced Wednesday that April’s general conference sessions will be held virtually, some incoming missionaries will train remotely, and gatherings of multiple congregations in some areas will be postponed due to the spread of COVID-19. Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News

Elder Brayden Beckstead, a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, second from left, poses for a photo with his family, Brian, Shanae and Carsen, near the Provo Temple and the Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. The church announced Wednesday that April’s general conference sessions will be held virtually, some incoming missionaries will train remotely, and gatherings of multiple congregations in some areas will be postponed due to the spread of COVID-19. Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News

Missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are dropped off at the Missionary Training Center in Provo on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. The church announced Wednesday that April’s general conference sessions will be held virtually, some incoming missionaries will train remotely, and gatherings of multiple congregations in some areas will be postponed due to the spread of COVID-19. Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News

Those whose mission calls instructed them to report to Provo or Preston now will train six hours a day by remote video conference, the First Presidency, Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and Missionary Department said in letters issued Wednesday.

They still will be set apart as missionaries before their assigned start date, and their training will begin on that start date, but they will train from home or another suitable location.

“This will be a unique experience for you and all who are affected by the precautionary measures taken to protect against the spread of the COVID-19 virus,” according to a letter sent Wednesday afternoon by the Missionary Department to all missionaries with callings to report to Provo or Preston.

The Provo MTC has about 1,100 missionaries on its campus now. The Preston MTC has about 60, according to church spokesman Daniel Woodruff.

One of the 60 in Preston, Sister Megan Unbedacht, 19, is a former Utah State University soccer player from Lindon who arrived in England today.

“We put her on a plane by herself,” her mother, Valerie Unbedacht said. “She met up with other missionaries in New York and landed in Manchester early this morning.”

Her mother was OK with her daughter traveling and serving a mission during a pandemic.

“As long as she takes the necessary precautions, she’ll be OK,” she said. “We’re all facing it, right? And the church is pretty cautious and looks after their missionaries and will take the necessary steps to protect her and the other missionaries.”

This is the fourth missionary the Unbedachts have sent into the mission field. The other three trained in Provo.

“This is the first one I’ve sent off from an airport,” she said. “It was a little bit different, a little bit more emotional.”

Missionaries called to report to the church’s other nine MTCs around the world still continue do so.

However, missionaries from a region experiencing government restrictions also will train online.

Online MTC missionaries will be assigned a remote mission companion and receive their missionary badge and ministerial certificate by mail. They also will take part in additional activities on evenings and weekends. They still will hold personal study and join in remote companionship study.

Families of missionaries who now will train from home quickly began to readjust.

“Our daughter is scheduled to enter the MTC on April 15, a month after the virtual MTC is scheduled to start,” said Dennis West, of Provo. “Not sure if the change will still be in effect at that point, but we are talking about how we can make our home more MTC-like during that time if she needs to do virtual as well.”

Olivia Brower said her nervousness about her daughter serving during the pandemic was eased by seeing the precautions at the MTC entrance and by the church’s other actions.

She had asked her daughter to delay her mission start date until after spring break so the family could go on another vacation together, but Charity Brower, who spent four months working at a fishing lodge in Alaska to save money for her mission, felt strongly she should not delay.

“Today felt like an answer to that,” her mother said. “It was inspiring, comforting, easier letting her go knowing it was imprinted on my mind that she is meant to be there now.”

Read the missionary department’s letter to new missionaries in full below, as shared from the church: