3 Apostles Featured in Recent Church News Articles

Hello, everyone! This is the first of the two posts with which I am starting my day. I wanted to let you all know that three of our apostles have been in the news recently, all for very inspiring reasons. Here are the details:

First of all, in the third and final Worldwide Devotional for the Church's Young Adults, the featured speaker, Elder David A. Bednar, encouraged those within the sound of his voice to be a welding link in their families. This encouragement and invitation is a continuation of the Church's ongoing efforts to get Latter-day Saints of all ages involved in Family History work. As one who was heavily involved with the extraction program, which was the precursor to indexing, I know just how much of a difference a few minutes can make in people's lives if they use those few minutes here and there to do family history. The prophecy of Malachi that Elijah would return to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers has been fulfilled, and, as modern revelation so eloquently and simply tells us, the welding link between fathers and children in any phase or location of the world is family history. During my six-year tenure as a temple worker, I observed so many people coming faithfully to the temple every week with the family names they had discovered and processed in the time since I had last seen them come in. It has well been said that we without our dead cannot be made perfect. I would encourage all of us to get involved with family history and temple work. In the meantime, you can find a more complete summary of Elder Bednar's inspiring message here. That was published on Sunday.

Also on Sunday, the United States English language Mormon Newsroom shared the story from the Mormon Newsroom in the Philippines about how Elder Neil L. Andersen came to that island nation to establish the 100th stake in the region, which was the Mandaluyong Stake and which was created from a division of the Makati, Makati East, and Manila Philippines Stakes. I found it quite intriguing to read that some of the units that will comprise this new stake come from the first stake that was ever created in the Philippines. It is also significant to know that the Philippines now becomes only the 5th nation to have 100 stakes.The other four are Brazil, Mexico, the United States, and Peru.

Other than what I have said here about this amazing milestone, I will not be going into specifics about the historical significance of this milestone, nor about the units that comprise this new stake. I feel extremely sensitive about the matter of infringing on the territory of others. I have before mentioned sites that I admire that inspire me which do such analysis and share such data far better than I could ever do. Since there are experts in that regard, I will not be trying to fill that role in this case. If you would like to read that report from the Philippines Newsroom on this milestone, click here/

Before I conclude by sharing the last apostolic news story for which I am writing this post, there was one thing I did want to note, and that is connected in a way to the milestone of 100 stakes in the Philippines. Anyone who has followed this blog to any extent whatsoever knows how much I love watching out for and rpeorting temple-related developments. Anyone who has followed temple developments within the last 1.5 years knows that when the second temple was announced for the Peruvian capital city of Lima, an official name for that temple followed in just under three weeks.

We likewise know that, up until now, it has been anyone's guess when an official name will be announced for the second temple for the Philippines capital city. I was therefore pleased and somewhat intrigued to read this article about the creation of this 100th stake for that nation. In referencing the temples in the Philippines, the article lists those in operation in Manila and Cebu City, then mentions the Urdaneta temple as being planned. And then, in reference to the second Manila temple, the article doesn't just call it "greater Manila area". It makes specific reference to Alabang, which is the name of the region in Muntinlupa City where  the second Philippines Temple will rise. This makes me wonder if the Church is looking to call this temple the Alabang Manila Temple, much the same way that the second Provo Utah Temple is known as the Provo City Center Temple, with no mention whatsoever of its state. I welcome thoughts on this.

In the meantime, the last story I want to post about features a favorite apostle of mine, Elder Holland, whose talks always touch me the most out of any other addresses. As I have recently observed, the Church is coming out more in fsvor of religious freedom, but also is addressing more fully the refugee crisis with initiatives and extensive plans and public apppearances and addresses. Elder Holland, joined by Sister Sharon Eubank, who became the First Counselor in the Relief Society General Presidency last April, spoke at Windsor Conference about helping Yazidis, who are an Iraqi minority religion who have, in view of their faith, been abused and targeted by ISIS. The extent of that abuse has been labeled genocide. In their current plight, they are oppressed and not regarded as free to practice their own religious beliefs or even live normal day-to-day lives. In Elder Holland's address on the subject of the Yazidis, he observed that their current plight is no different than the horrors and atrocities which the early Saints had to endure for the first 15-20 years after the Church was reestablished upon the earth. The purpose of Elder Holland's address was to demonstrate that the history of the persecution of these early Saints should not have to be repeated with those Yazidis that are (or at least, should be) considered our brothers and sisters. He urged those in attendance who could use their influence to help this group to do so. To read a summary of his inspiring message, click here. From what I have been able to ascertain, the idea is to have similar conferences in the future focusing on issues like this, all with a view of affecting real change.

That does it for this post. Sorry it was more lengthy than I meant it to be. Your comments are always welcome and appreciated. In the meantime, thank you for the privilege of your time, and may the Lord bless you all until my next post.