Stokes Sounds Off: Tribute to President Henry B. Eyring on His 86th Birthday

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Friday, May 31, 2019

Tribute to President Henry B. Eyring on His 86th Birthday

Hello again, everyone! I am back now to pay tribute to President Henry B. Eyring, who is celebrating his 86th birthday today. There is a lot to discuss about his life, so let's get right into it. Henry Bennion Eyring was born on May 31, 1933, in Princeton New Jersey, to well-known physicist Henry Eyring and Mildred Bennion. As I previously noted, his father's sister, Camilla Eyring, married Spencer W. Kimball, while his father's first cousin was Marion G. Romney. Young "Hal", as he was known, was a very good student.

At one point, his father was explaining a scientific concept to him when he noted that Hal seemed to not be interested in it. He asked his son what he thought about when he had nothing else to consider, and told him that he should pursue that subject. This led young Hal to an eventual career as an educator and academic administrator. His family would later relocate from New Jersey to Salt Lake City, Utah.

Although he did not serve a full-time mission, he was an active member of the U. S. Air Force, and was stationed in New Mexico, where he served as a liaison between military officers and scientists, where he was responsible for analyzing data from tests done on nuclear weapons. Prior to his military service, he had earned a degree in physics from the University of Utah. He also studied at Harvard, where he eventually earned both a masters' and doctoral degrees in Business Administration.

While he was highly sought after by business owners who admired his analytical work, he chose to continue to pursue his education. In the meantime, it was not until 1960 (when Hal was 26 or 27 and serving in a district presidency) that he met Kathleen Johnson at a YSA meeting in New Hampshire. She was born in Palo Alto California, and had studied at Stanford before coming to Harvard. She also spent some time studying at the Universities of Vienna and Paris.

Because Hal was serving as a counselor in the district presidency, his district president (Wilbur Cox) adjusted his assignments to accommodate his desire to date Kathleen. They dated over that summer, and continued their courtship long-distance, with Kathleen making several cross-country trips prior to their engagement in the early months of 1961.They continued their courtship for the next year or so, until they were married in the Logan Utah Temple on July 27, 1962, by which time Hal was 29 years old.


Their marriage was solemnized by his uncle, then-Elder Spencer W. Kimball of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.  Their family would eventually include six children (four sons and two daughters). Two of their sons are Henry J. Eyring (who current serves as president of BYU-Idaho and as an area seventy) and Matthew J. Eyring (who is a Chief Strategy Innovation Officer with Vivint, a company specializing in home automation, and he also served previously as an area seventy.).

Hal eventually became a professor at Stanford University. He continued his career as an associate professor at the Stanford School of Business for 9 years (between 1972 and 1981), and went on to be a Sloan Visiting Faculty Fellow at MIT, during which time he also took courses in human behavior. Sometime between late 1970 and early 1971, his wife asked him if he shouldn't be studying with Neal A. Maxwell, who was serving at that time as Commissioner of Church Education.

After considering her question and following a lot of reflection, Hal accepted an offer to become president of Ricks College. Although other job offers came his way during his 6 year tenure at the college, he continued to serve until his release in 1977.. His previous Church callings included being a bishop, serving as a member of the Sunday School General Board, and as a regional representative.

In 1980, Hal was called to serve as the Commissioner of Church Education, succeeding Jeffrey R. Holland. He would continue to serve in that capacity until 1986. When the Church reorganized the Presiding Bishopric in April 1985, Robert D. Hales was called as the new Presiding Bishop, and he recommended that Hal serve as his First Counselor. After serving in that capacity for 7.5 years, he was called in October 1992 to serve as a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy. When he began his new assignment, he was called for a second time to seerve as the Commissioner of Church Education, an assignment in which he would continue until 2004.

Following the passing of Church president Howard W. Hunter and the subsequent reorganization of the First Presidency in March 1995, new Church president Gordon B. Hinckley called Elder Eyring to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. 12.5 years later, following the death of President James E. Faust, who had served as Second Counselor to President Hinckley, Elder Eyring was invited to join Presidents Hinckley and Thomas S. Monson in the First Presidency.

The way that came about is an interesting story. Elder Eyring had taken the phone call from President Hinckley and had heard his invitation to join the First Presidency, but because he had occasionally taken calls on the Church's phone system that were meant for some of his apostolic colleagues, he asked President Hinckley if he was sure he was talking to the right person. "This is Hal Eyring." he said. President Hinckley quickly responded, "I know who this is."

Thus it was that the first apostle appointed during President Hinckley's administration was called to serve in the First Presidency for an almost four-month period prior to President Hinckley's passing. When the First Presidency was reorganized, new Church president Thomas S. Monson called President Eyring to continue serving in the First Presidency, this time as his First Counselor. While in that capacity, President Eyring has dedicated 8 temples (San Salvador El Salvador, Gilbert Arizona, Payson Utah, Indianapolis Indiana, Philadelphia Pennsylvania (for which he had also presided at the groundbreaking), Hartford Connecticut, Paris France, and Cedar City Utah).

The dedication of the Gilbert Arizona Temple was an interesting anomaly. Although President Monson presided at all three sessions, he requested that President Eyring read the prayer during the first session, so that was one recent example of how the dedication duties were shared by two apostles. President Eyring also rededicated seven temples (Ogden Utah, Buenos Aires Argentina Mexico City Mexico, Montreal Quebec, Suva Fiji, Idaho Falls Idaho, and Jordan River Utah Temple). The Ogden Utah Temple rededication is another interesting case. President Eyring conducted all three sessions and presided at the final two sessions, in which he also offered the dedicatory prayer, with President Monson having presided at and offering the dedicatory prayer in the first session.

As we also know, around two years ago (on May 23, 2017), the Church announced that President Monson would be stepping back from an active role in the day-to-day administration of the Church. When that occurred, Presidents Eyring and Dieter F. Uchtdorf assumed oversight of all decisions except for those requiring the prophet's approval. Following President Monson's passing last year on January 2, the First Presidency was reorganized on January 14, at which time President Eyring was called to continue his service in the First Presidency, and is serving as Second Counselor a second time, working with Church President Russell M. Nelson and his First Counselor, President Dallin H. Oaks. For the last several years, President Eyring's wife has been in ill health, and he has done a wonderful job of balancing his responsibilities in the First Presidency with his role being his wife's caregiver.


Because President Eyring has a familial connection to both Presidents Spencer W. Kimball and Marion G. Romney, who were involved in the 1981 dedication of the Jordan River Utah Temple, President Nelson asked President Eyring to preside over its' recent rededication on May 20 of this year. As noted in an earlier post, President Eyring drew heavily on the original dedicatory prayer in composing the rededicatory prayer for that temple. He went on this year to preside over the one-session private rededication for the Oklahoma City Oklahoma Temple, since he has ancestral connections to that temple.

Although he is now 86 years old, by all accounts, he continues to be in good health. His lifelong legacy of education and service is an inspiration to all. I had the opportunity to attend a stake conference around 12 years or so ago, over which then-Elder Eyring presided. His message to us at that time focused on unity. It is a message he has since shared repeatedly in several General Conference addresses, a focus that has since been adopted by the current First Presidency, with multiple efforts underway to unify the Church on a global scale and to streamline and standardize policies and procedures.

That message of unity was particularly poignant during the October 2017 General Conference, when he was the presiding authority, his messages highlighted the important concept that the Lord is at the helm of His work, and that, regardless of the health of His chosen prophet, He continues to move the work forward. To date, President Eyring has given a total of 98 addresses in General Conference, all but 5 of which have been given since his call to the apostleship in April 1995. You can find and review any of those inspirational addresses here.

I am grateful for the life, ministry, and service of this amazing man, whom I sustain with all my heart, and for the opportunity I have had in this small way to pay tribute to him on this, his 86th birthday. That does if for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated, on any post at any time, as long as such comments are made in accordance with the established guidelines. Thank you for the privilege of your time. Until my next post, I wish each one of you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.

3 comments:

  1. Hello again, everyone! I have some additional Church news and temple updates to pass along here. The Church News paid tribute to President Eyring today for his birthday by sharing 9 photos from various parts of his life, accompanied by a recap of the major highlights of his apostolic ministry within the last year:

    https://www.thechurchnews.com/leaders-and-ministry/2019-05-31/president-henry-b-eyring-birthday-first-presidency-50035

    The Church News also shared the latest edition of their ongoing "This Week on Social", which, being more lengthy than in recent weeks, featured a wide variety of topics shared on social media by the following leaders: Church President Russell M. Nelson; Elders Ronald A. Rasband and Gerrit W. Gong of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles; Sister Jean B. Bingham, Relief Society General President, and her Second Counselor, Sister Reyna I. Aburto; Sisters Lisa L. Harkness and Cristina B. Franco, who respectively serve as First and Second Counselors in the Primary General Presidency; Sister Michelle D. Craig, First Counselor in the Young Women General Presidency.

    You can find a summary of those posts in the following article:
    https://www.thechurchnews.com/leaders-and-ministry/2019-05-31/social-media-president-nelson-harkness-bingham-50036

    A Latter-day Saint teen who survived a horrific car accident in which his mother and multiple siblings passed away has taken time to reflect on how that tragedy has shaped his future in the ensuing years:

    https://www.thechurchnews.com/members/2019-05-30/chris-williams-accident-mormon-hope-faith-50021

    And recently, Elder Renlund returned from a visit to the Philippines. His visit included stops in Bacolod, Iloilo, and Manila. And while I cannot say for certain that this is the case, it did occur to me to wonder if he might perhaps have spent some time in Manila ascertaining how soon ground could be broken for the second temple there, or if he could, at President Nelson's request, have stopped in Bacolod to assess its' merit as a prospective temple location, which is something we can discuss in the other thread for such prospects that may be announced during the next General Confrence.

    You can find the report on that visit in the following article:
    https://www.thechurchnews.com/leaders-and-ministry/2019-05-30/elder-renlund-philippines-asia-gospel-50023

    And the Church has announced that one of the keynote speakers at the first-ever international RootsTech event (which will be held in London Englad in late October) will be singer and entertainer Donny Osmond:

    https://www.lds.org/church/news/renowned-entertainer-donny-osmond-to-speak-at-rootstech-london?lang=eng

    The Church has also announced new scripture publications in Malagasy and Slovenian:
    https://www.lds.org/church/news/church-announces-availability-of-printed-scriptures-in-malagasy?lang=eng
    https://www.lds.org/church/news/church-announces-publication-of-new-scriptures-in-slovenian?lang=eng

    And FamilySearch will be offering free classes and webinars in June, as detailed in the following article:
    https://www.lds.org/church/news/free-family-history-library-classes-and-webinars-in-june-2019?lang=eng

    The temple updates will follow in a subsequent comment. In the meantime, my thanks once again to you all.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hello again, everyone! Due to some internet problems, i have not been able to get the temple updates published here until now. First of all, with the time in Fortaleza brazil being 3 hours ahead of Utah time, it is now roughly quarter past midnight Saturday there. Elder Soares has no doubt traveled to that city for the youth devotional, which may be held at around 7:00 PM local time, which would be 4:00 PM Saturday evening here. I will be bringing reports on that here to this blog (either through new posts or comments on existing posts) as I become aware of them.

    In the meantime, I have updated information on two new temples currently under costruction and two of the temples which have been closed for renovation. At the Lisbon Portugal Temple, while the note about the monument sign being installed still applies, additionally, entrance doors have been installed, trees are being planted across the temple grounds, and cladding is now underway on planter boxes and retaining walls.

    Meanwhile, at the Pocatello Idaho Temple, while work continues on the placing of concrete forms and rebar for the foundation, in addition to ongoing efforts to lay the sewer and water system lines, it has additionally been reported that the site is being prepared to have a web camera installed to take shots of the ongoing progress related to the temple's exterior.

    For the two temples under construction, given that it is now 8:30 PM in Oakland California, there is just around 22-26 hours remaining on the open house tours for the temple in that city, after which it will undergo a roughly 2-week final cleaning period before its' rededication on Sunday June 16. Still no word on who might preside over that temple's rededication, but the tip in another thread from a Church member living in Oakland notes that Elder Bednar will be in attendance, although it is likely that a more senior apostle will preside over that rededication. My theory is that perhaps it might be President Oaks who does so, but that is just a theory.

    In the meanwhile, the very next temple that will be rededicated is, of course, the Raleigh North Carolina Temple, and an update has been reported on that one as well. The latest information notes that entrance sconces have now been installed, and that progress is being made on the concrete work and landscaping. As a final note, I should mention that I am anticipating that a few additional updates will be reported on other temples at some point this weekend, in addition to coverage of the dedicatory services for the newest Brazilian temple, and I will do my best to pass word of those along to you all as I become aware of such reports. For now, I'd like to again thank you all for your ongoing interest and support.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hello again, everyone! Since it is now close to 4:00 PM Fortaleza Brazil time on this first Sunday in June, I can confirm that the temple in that city has been dedicated by Elder Soares, but Church coverage on that is still pending. I will keep my eyes open for that and pass along anything I hear. Stay tuned, and thanks for your continued interest & support.

    ReplyDelete

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