Update on Church News

Major Church news items have crossed my radar recently, but with all that's been going on in our personal lives, I haven't had the chance to report it. So, here goes!

First of all, a Portuguese edition of the Bible has recently been released by the Church. It is a major milestone for the Portuguese population. For more details on that, click here. Second, Clark Gilbert has been officially installed as the next president of BYU-Idaho. In attendance at the inauguration were President Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Second Counselor in the First Presidency and Second Vice Chairman of the CES, Elders Dallin H. Oaks, Jeffrey R. Holland and David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (Elder Oaks and Elder Holland served as presidents of BYU-Provo and are currently on the CES Board of Education and Board of Trustees, and Elder Bednar was in attendance as a former BYU-Idaho President); Elder Kim B. Clark of the First Quorum of the Seventy (and Commissioner of Church Education), and Sister Linda K. Burton (Relief Society General President) and Sister Bonnie G. Oscarson (Young Women General President), both of whom serve on the CES Board as well. For a summary of what was said at the inauguration, please see this link.

Thirdly, Elder Ronald A. Rasband, Senior President of the Seventy, spoke recently about religious freedom at a BYU-Provo Devotional. For a summary of that devotional, please see this article. The Mexico City Mexico Temple was rededicated last Sunday, September 13. President Henry B. Eyring, First Counselor in the First Presidency, presided. He was accompanied at the dedication by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, Elder Kent F. Richards of the Second Quorum of the Seventy, who serves as Executive Director of the Temple Department, and the Mexico Area Presidency (Benjamin De Hoyos, Paul B. Pieper, and Arnulfo Valenzuela, all of the First Quorum of the Seventy). Church leaders will return to Mexico in December to dedicate the Tijuana Mexico Temple, though it is unclear who all will be there. For a more detailed report on the dedication, please see this link.

President Dieter F. Uchtdorf dedicated a new addition to the Polynesian Cultural Center. For more details on that, please see this link. President Russell M. Nelson, President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, made his first overseas trip as Quorum President to the Central America Area. For more on what he did on that trip, please see this link. Elder L. Whitney Clayton of the Presidency of the Seventy spoke to young adults of the Church on Sunday evening in the Worldwide Devotional for Young Adults that will be the last one this year. He spoke of developing deep spiritual roots, calling Jesus Christ the key to living an abundant life. For more on that devotional, including what his wife spoke about in her remarks during the devotional, please see this link.

Elder M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles spoke to saints in the Utah South Area Regional Conference on the subject of maintaining habits that keep us connected to Christ. Also speaking at the conference were Elder Donald L. Hallstrom of the Presidency of the Seventy (who spoke about hastening the work of salvation), Bishop Dean M. Davies, Second Counselor in the Presiding Bishopric (who spoke about patterns found in and the importance of studying the Book of Mormon), and Linda K. Burton, Relief Society General President (who spoke on the importance of and blessings that come from proper Sabbath Day observance). For more details on this conference, please see this link.

Finally, in temple news, the Fort Collins Colorado Temple site was vandalized but work keeps progressing there. In fact, the temple recently saw the installation of the majestic figure of the angel Moroni. Other temple highlights in addition to those already noted are that progress is being made on temples worldwide, and particularly that the temple to be built in Port-au-Prince Haiti is in the design phase. Other temple milestones will be focused on in future blog posts. Hope you enjoyed this one.

We've found a place!

Hello, readers! Just wanted to let you know that we have found a new place to live--and it's not even a rental. We have, just this week, signed the papers to buy a trailer in a trailer park in Orem (right next door to the Dollar Tree store). It's at least twice as big as our current place, with twice as many bedrooms and bathrooms. For a first home, it's wonderful. We will have access to a pool and be close to many different stores and restaurants. It breaks my heart to be leaving the stake and people I have come to love so much in the 16 1/2 years I've known them. But Amy and I are agreed: we want to come back to the AF East Stake to raise our family. How and when that will happen, I'm not sure. But we will be back. We will be moving out of here and into there at the end of this month. And we will be continuing to attend our current ward and stake until we are replaced in our callings and, in my case, until I have trained someone to take over as the Ward Media Specialist. The ward we will be in starts at 9:00 am, which we are not crazy about, but the good news is that we will only have a couple of months on that schedule until we switch to a later time. Whether that will be 11:00, 11:30, 1 or 2 remains to be seen. Anyways, just wanted to post this exciting development. Thanks for your interest, friends!

Big News

Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later. But this is sooner. I wanted to let my readers know that we have a month or less left in our current apartment (our first dwelling place as a married couple). Here's what happened. Amy noticed a short while ago that some of the wood we had acquired for our own personal purposes and use alone had been taken without our permission by our landlord and used in his garden. Amy asked him a couple of days ago to return what he had stolen. Once our landlord thought about her request, he decided to be offended by the implication that he had been less than honest in this dealing with us. He informed me today that because what Amy said was hurtful, he felt it was time for us to move. He will give us until the end of October to find another place.

This made us sad in a way. You never forget your first place, and it has been a nice first place while it lasted. But then we thought about the things we wouldn't miss: the landlord's grandchildren thumping about above us, the barking dog at all hours of the day and night; the nasty-tasting water that even a new filter couldn't improve; the small kitchen sink; the temperature controls in the bath and shower being reversed, a bathroom that, while it served its purpose, only a lunatic would have put together the way it is; the influx of insects; the small cupboards; having to think hard about how to find a place for everything, and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

We don't know where we will go from here as of yet. While I still feel my work in this stake is not done yet, now we have no choice but to relocate. And since there aren't a lot of affordable options nearby for either renting or buying, we may have to leave town to find a place. Amy has found a trailer park in Orem with a particular trailer that looks promising: 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a decent kitchen, lots of cupboard space and room to store stuff. It might be the perfect place to go from here. If we decide to do that, we will probably move out sooner than the end of October, especially since the place is available now.

It breaks my heart to think of leaving the town to which I came as a newly ordained deacon and which I will leave as a man married 5 years and well seasoned in experience. This move would even put us in a new temple district, as all the stakes in Orem have been transferred to the Provo Utah Temple. So we would even be leaving the town where we met and the temple where we got married. But a temple would still be close, which is good. I don't even want to think about changing banks and pharmacies and grocery stores. I would hope there would still be everything we need there. Though there would not be a Fresh Market, so I'd have to determine which pharmacy I would want my information transferred to. I would be joining my sisters who no longer reside in American Fork. It would mean leaving behind a stake and people I have loved almost since the moment I met them all those 16 years ago. But I'm not too worried about that part of it.

I seem to have the knack of making friends wherever I go, and I'm bound to recognize someone. I can never go anywhere without running into someone who knows me and/or my family. And it's not like we'd be totally friendless. My dad's brother Lynn and his wife Claudia live in Orem with some of their children, as does Amy's brother Gary and his wife Janeal. So I'm sure we'd be fine and soon able to make other friends. We will be finding out more about this trailer Amy found ASAP, probably sometime tomorrow.

And we will be praying about it and I at least will also be fasting about it on Sunday, even if Amy can't join me due to her health. We should have a decision soon. I will let you know as soon as everything falls into place. Btw, when we prepare to leave this apartment for the last time, Amy has told me we will be taking pictures so we can remember our first abode and look back on it with satisfaction knowing that it served its purpose and that we can move on and maybe thus have more luck starting our family. I will keep you posted.

In other news, I saw my muscle doctor last week, and he recommended a neurosurgeon that works in the same clinic as that jerk I refuse to go back to under any circumstances. I called them to see if I could get an appointment with that doctor. I was told, much to my frustration, that if I started with one doctor in this clinic, I could only see him. So we will have to find another clinic at another location with another neurosurgeon. But right now the whole situation with the landlord and the resultant need to leave trumps anything else.

On the better side of news, I saw my neurologist today. Dr. Sharon Weinstein listened to my concerns carefully and gave me suggestions about dealing with them. She particularly recommended music therapy and Tai Chi. She suggested using the cane as needed for my on-and-off vertigo, but to try not to overuse it or overcompensate with it.  She also said that once we see my gastroenterologist in follow-up to my endoscopy and colonoscopy that she (Dr. Weinstein) would make further recommendations based on what Adrienne Shaver, my gastroenterologist identifies as the possible reason for the stomach cramps and additional nausea. More on that as time and circumstances allow.

Amy and I will be praying that the Lord will compensate us for our landlord's overreaction to being called on what he was doing wrong, and that the Lord will let him live to see a day when he regrets having kicked us out. Until I write again, dear readers, all the best!