A quick check through my Aaronic Preisthood manuals reveals precious little matching this lesson in content or power.

This year’s course (Manual 1) has lessons on “Respecting Women” with a promising subtitle “We Can Learn From the Example of Christlike Men” On closer inspection, however, it consists entirely of the story of S.W. Kimball helping the single mother at the airport. Manual 2 has nothing related, and Manual 3 has the “Body is a Temple” lesson. This last one focuses exclusively on the Word of Wisdom.

So, to answer the question posed in the first paragraph of the post: No, I don’t think the young men are getting this in their Sunday lessons. It is, however, covered in the “For the Strength of Youth” pamphlet, which has sections on modesty, cleanliness, piercing and tattoos, etc.

FWIW, I prefer this usage of ‘modesty,’ (i.e. restraint in speech, dress, and conduct) rather than the proscriptive and somewhat pharisaic hemline-focused definition now in vogue.

Having taught the YM just a couple of years ago, I find very little in this that seems to have changed in the intervening years. If anything, perhaps the message has been watered down a bit. Part of it is that by emphasizing ideals, it is less proscriptive (“Don’t do A, B, or C) and is more proactive. I liked this lesson.

Yeah, and I snickered too, manly gentleman that I am.

I’ll have to keep that in mind, Hunter, that just because the vocabulary has changed doesn’t mean that boys and men aren’t being taught the same principles. And once again you and I had similar reactions to something: I actually felt more motivated, more desirous of making necessary changes to care for my body, while typing this lesson than in ANY “your body is a temple” lesson in recent years. I haven’t analyzed how this lesson created that effect, but it did.

There were two minor exceptions:
1) I don’t see the word “modesty” applied much to the young men these days. Maybe the principles behind it, yes, but not the word itself. We see “virtue” and “moral cleanliness” and also attention to “dress and grooming,” but it’s not called “modesty.”
2) It’s a minor point, but I don’t recall seeing this emphasis on the body as “also an integral and necessary part of the eternal future of man.” That emphasis on the eternal implications of the body are important, I just don’t recall seeing it taught this way recently.

(I liked that phrase: “a manly gentleman.” I’ve never heard it expressed that way.)