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Tuesday, December 18, 2018

BREAKING TEMPLE NEWS: Open House and Rededication Dates Announced for Oakland California Temple; Other Temple Developments Reported

Hello again, everyone! I have some breaking temple news to report, which must have just been posted a few minutes ago. The First Presidency today announced the open house and rededication dates for the Oakland California Temple. The open house will be held for a 4-week period between Saturday May 11 and Saturday June 1, with the exception of the Sundays of May 12, 19, and 26. A youth devotional will be held on Saturday June 15, with the rededication of the temple the next day (Sunday June 16) in three sessions. This marks the first of up to 7 rededications which the Church may hold next year.

In other temple news, at the Arequipa Peru Temple, the monument sign has been installed, while the guardhouse has been completed, and much progress has been made on the plaza landscaping. For temples undergoing renovation, at the Oklahoma City Oklahoma Temple, driveways and walkways are being poured, and stone cladding is nearing completion. There has also been a report on the Memphis Tennessee Temple, where stained-glass windows are currently being installed. I imagine those two temples will similarly have a rededication set within the next 2-3 months.

I am a little surprised that we heard about the Oakland rededication before a dedication was set for the Fortaleza Brazil Temple, but am confident we may see something announced in that regard before the end of this year. I continue to monitor all of these developments and will bring you word of them as I receive it.

That does it 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. If you enjoyed what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly added content, please feel free to subscribe. 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.

Sunday, December 16, 2018

Current Apostolic Statistics: Part Two—Updated Ages, Averages & Apostolic Nonagenarians

Hello again, everyone! I am back again now with the second part of this apostolic update, in which we will move on to talk specifics regarding the long-form and decimal ages of our current apostles, which will also include updated information on the average ages of the First Presidency, Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and the 15 apostles as a group, and current and future nonagenarians
So let’s get right into all of that. Again, all data is current as of today (Sunday December 16, 2018). Since my last update, Elders Uchtdorf and Holland have both turned 78, and Elder Renlund has observed his 66th birthday. There is one more apostolic birthday before the end of this year, as already noted, since Elder Gong will be celebrating his 65th birthday one week from today

As mentioned in my previous post, I plan to maintain the tradition of bringing these updates to you every 6 weeks, which means my next update will be posted here on Sunday January 27. Three days prior to that, Elder Christofferson will be celebrating his 74th birthday. Elder Rasband’s 68th birthday will be marked 10 days after my next update is posted, and the next apostolic birthday won’t occur until the end of May.

With that noted, we now move on to some exact figures about the ages (and average ages) of the First Presidency, Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and all 15 apostles as a group. In the Church’s leading Quorum, President Nelson is, as noted towards the end of my previous post, 94 years, 3 month, and 7 days old, which results in a decimal age of 94.27 years. His First Counselor, President Oaks, is now 86 years, 4 months, and 4 days old, or 86.35 years. President Eyring remains 0.8 years younger, with a long-form age of 85 years, 6 months, and 16 days, putting his decimal age at 85.55 years.

The First Presidency has a combined 266.17 years of life experience, which results in an average age for each man of 88.72 years. President Oaks, still at 2.37 years younger than that average, is closest to it, with President Nelson being 5.55 years older and President Eyring sitting at 3.17 years below that average. Unless there is something of which we are not aware in relation to the health of any of these Brethren, they will continue to set new records for the oldest-serving First Presidency in Church history for the foreseeable future.

Next, let’s turn our attention to the members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. President Ballard is now 90 years, 2 months, and 8 days, or 90.19 years. Elder Holland, who just marked his birthday on December 3, has a long-form age of 78 years 0 months, and 13 days, with a resulting 78.04 decimal years. Elder Uchtdorf’s age now stands at 78 years, 1 month, and 10 days old, which works out to 78.11 years

Elder Bednar’s full age is 66 years, 6 months, and 1 day, or 66.50 years
Elder Cook is 78 years, 3 months, and 8 days old, with a decimal age of 78.16 years. Elder Christofferson (whose birthday is now just 1.5 months away) has a long-form age of 73 years, 10 months, and 22 days old, which results in a decimal age of 73.89 years

Elder Andersen now has a long-form age of 67 years, 4 months, and 7 days, and his decimal age is 67.35 years. Elder Rasband, who will also observe his birthday in less than two months, is now 67 years, 10 months, and 10 days, or 67.86 years. Elder Stevenson, at 4.5 years younger to the day than Elder Rasband, has a long-form age of 63 years, 4 months, and 10 days old, which is 63.36 decimal years

That brings us to the final 3 apostles. Elder Renlund (whose birthday occurred just over a month ago) is now 66 years, 1 months, and 3 days old, with a resulting decimal age of 66.09 years. With Elder Gong’s birthday coming up next Sunday, his long-form age is 64 years, 11 months, and 23 days old, putting his decimal age at 64.98 years. As for Elder Soares, he is now 60 years, 2 months, and 14 days old, putting his decimal age at 60.21 years.

Having noted those figures, the 12 Quorum members have a combined 854.85 years of life experience, which averages out to 71.24 years per member. Elders Christofferson and Rasband are respectively above and below that average, with the former again being 2.65 years older, and the latter still 3.38 years younger. Based on the information I provided earlier about the members of the First Presidency, the entire body of apostles now have a combined 1,121.02 years of life experience, which is an average of 74.73 years. Elders Holland and Christofferson are respectively older (by 3.31 years) and younger (by 0.84 years) than that average.

We now move on to the nonagenarians. President Nelson remains the seventh oldest apostle in Church history, and is set to move up to the seventh spot on July 5 of next year. In the meantime, President Ballard has now lived longer than President J. Reuben Clark. President Ballard’s next nonagenarian milestone will not be observed until after my next update. The exact date on which that will occur is Wednesday February 20, 2019. For the other apostles, President Oaks will join that list 3 years, 7 months, and 27 days from today. Elder Soares will do so in 29 years, 9 months, and 16 days, with the other apostles doing so at other various intervals, which will be detailed more fully as they approach

I hope that many of you found this information to be interesting, informative, and accurate. That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated, on any post at any time, as long as such feedback is in accordance with the established guidelines. Thank you for the privilege of your time. If you enjoyed what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly-added content, please feel free to subscribe. 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.

Current Apostolic Statistics: Part One—Updated Data for President Oaks, President Nelson, and Longest-Serving Apostolic Groups

Hello again, everyone! I continue to welcome comments on any previous posts (particularly any feedback any of you have on my April 2019 General Conference predictions), but I have a promise to keep. It is time once again to bring you all updated information on the latest apostolic statistics. This data will again be published in two posts. While I hope most of you will find this information interesting and enlightening, there may be some of you who are not interested in the data I will present. Consequently, I will not in any way be offended or bothered if any of you skip over this post and the next one.

The last time I provided such an update was 6 weeks ago, on Sunday November 4. Given that today is Sunday December 16, this will be my last such update for this year. Just a quick side-note here: Sharing these updates every 6 weeks has become somewhat of a tradition on this blog, one which I hope to continue for the foreseeable future. With that in mind, I will plan to post my next update (which will be the first such update of 2019) relating to this data on Sunday January 26. As usual, all data is current as of today. That said, there have been some very significant changes relating to such information since my last such update, so let’s get right into all of that.

I wanted to interject a personal note here in relation to the data in these updates, which I may or may not have previously mentioned. For most of the time within which I have shared the information I track in posts like this, the relevant dates I mentioned previously, on which the lifespan or tenure length of the current apostles or Church Presidents would move up to the next spot on those lists, was determined by when such lifespans or tenure lengths exceeded that of the individuals or groups they would be passing.

But not long ago, I realized that the Church Presidents or apostles whose ages or tenure lengths exceeded those of our current apostles would not be moving up on that list (since their lifespans or tenure lengths ended with a death or due to other factors), while the life-span or tenure length of our currently-serving Church President and other apostles continues. Therefore, the determining factor needed to be the date on which lifespans or tenure lengths were equal to that of the Church Presidents or apostles in the next spot up on such lists. I apologize if that seems confusing, but hope you will see what I mean as this update continues.

We will first look at President Dallin H. Oaks’ tenure as President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, then turn our attention to where Church President Russell M. Nelson stands among the 16 previous Church Presidents in terms of his age and tenure length. That will be followed by some observations about the tenure lengths of our current First Presidency, Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and all currently-living ordained apostles as a group. The more specific data about upcoming apostolic birthdays and the long-form and decimal ages of our 15 current apostles will then follow in a second post.

President Oaks has now served as President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for 11 months and 2 days, and he has not moved up among the other Quorum Presidents since my last update. As noted previously, he will only be observing his next milestone on that list in April 2019. To put that into perspective in terms of these updates, if I continue to provide them every six weeks, there will be two more updates of this kind before that milestone is reached. He will then observe two additional milestones two days apart in July, followed by one each in November and December of next year. More specific details on those milestones will be forthcoming closer to the time.

As mentioned previously, the length of President Oaks’ service will depend not only on his health and life length, but, of course, the health and life length of President Nelson will factor into that as well. Insofar as I am aware, not one of our 15 current apostles is having any health-related issues at the present time. That said, the health of our apostles is something else I am monitoring, and I will be sure to bring updates about that to you all as I become aware of them.

Shifting our focus now to President Nelson, since he was ordained and set apart as Church President on the same day he set apart President Oaks as Quorum President, his tenure has spanned 11 months and 2 days as well. He is now 94 years, 3 months, and 7 days old. He will observe both his second tenure-length and his first age-length milestone two days apart in July of 2019, with subsequent milestones more spread out in the years following that. And again, I will be detailing those more specifically closer to the time when they will be reached.

In the meantime, as also noted previously, the current First Presidency will only be joining the list of longest continuously serving First Presidencies in Church history on Saturday April 20, 2024, so I will be outlining their future milestones on that list closer to the time. As for the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, the current members will mark 3 years together on March 31, 2021, at which point they will join the list of the longest-serving Quorums of the Twelve Apostles in Church history. I will likewise be providing updates on those future milestones closer to that time.

Interestingly enough, less than two months prior to that, the 15 apostles will make the list of the longest-serving such group (the exact date is February 8, 2021). With that said, I want to conclude this portion of the update. That does it 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 in accordance with the established guidelines. Thank you for the privilege of your time.

If you enjoyed what you read here and would like to stay informed of newly-added content, please feel free to subscribe. Until my next post (which will be the second half of this update that published here within the next few minutes), I wish each one of you all the best and pray that the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.