Miscellaneous Temple and Church News

Hello again, everyone! Today, I was able to learn that the construction status for the Lisbon Portugal Temple has been slightly updated. While the process of cladding the adjoining meetinghouse continues, the work of pouring the steeple base walls has progressed to the pouring of its mid-section. It is wonderful indeed to have learned of this update.

In the meantime, I wanted to return to a subject I have previously referenced, and that is assignments given under one Church president that are honored by his successor following the reorganization of the First Presidency. President and Sister Nelson recently indicated that they would honor the assignment given to them with President Monson's approval, which was to address the youth of the Church in a Face-to-Face event, but in view of President Monson's passing, that event (which would have coincided with the 10th anniversary of President Monson's presidency, as it was planned for February 3 of this year) has been postponed and will be rescheduled later on. I appreciate the Nelsons' willingness to honor that assignment but also to be sensitive about the subsequent need to reschedule that event.

Additionally, in case I haven't mentioned this before now, the featured speaker has been announced for the annual CES broadcast for seminary and institute personnel. Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles will fill that assignment. The broadcast is scheduled for January 26, will be held just two days following his 73rd birthday. And you can be sure, as has been the case in the last couple of years, that I will be doing a post on this blog on January 24 in honor of his birthday.

That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

Additional Church News Resources Regarding the New First Presidency

Hello again, everyone! After a very long day yesterday, I am back to share some additional Church news resources about the new First Presidency. First, it is worth noting that the Church's leadership lists were updated with the changes yesterday evening.

With that said, the new First Presidency recorded these thoughts on social media in response to their newly announced assignments. The Church News also republished biographies of the new First Presidency that were featured in Church resources as a result of their original calls to general Church service.

For Presidents Nelson and Oaks, those appeared in the May 1984 Ensign, in the report of the conference where both were sustained to the apostleship. For President Eyring, the reproduction is pulled from resources the Church put out at the time of his April 1985 call to general Church service (which at the time was to the presiding bishopric; since he subsequently went on to serve in the Seventy, the Twelve, and the First Presidency, he is the only man in Church history to have filled all of those assignments.

Click here for President Nelson's biography, here for the one on President Oaks, and here for that of President Eyring. It was wonderful to read these words that were written about each of these men around the time their full-time service commenced. We now have the obligation and duty to sustain and support each of them individually but also collectively, as the First Presidency is the presiding Quorum of the Church.

That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

Church News Articles Feature Responses to New First Presidency/Some Thoughts about Elder Uchtdorf

Hello again, everyone! It has been a busy day indeed in terms of my posting content on this blog, I just became aware of two additional articles the Church News has published about the reconstitution of the First Presidency. This article shares reactions to their new assignments from Presidents Oaks and Eyring. It is plain that President Eyring does not see serving as Second Counselor to the successor of President Monson, under whose inspired leadership he served as First Counselor, as any sort of demotion.

The same can be said for Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf, who returned to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles because he was not retained in the First Presidency after having served alongside Presidents Monson and Eyring. The Church News also featured his reaction to the change in this article, in addition to some thoughts expressed by his seatmate in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Elder David A. Bednar, who warmly reminisced in a tribute to President Monson in which he went on to share his support for the new First Presidency.

Many people have picked up on President Nelson's statement made earlier today in which he said that Elder Uchtdorf has already been given assignments which his service as an apostle since October 2004 and in the First Presidency for the last decade have been uniquely tailored to him.

While time may be needed to learn more about the nature and specifics of those assignments, it is obvious that President Nelson recognizes his administrative capabilities, and trusts him a great deal. It is also obvious that Elder Uchtdorf is unequivocally supportive of President Nelson's decision to have him return to the membership of that Quorum, and that it will not be a problem for him to do so.

In that regard, I also wanted to note a few things I found interesting, which I hope you will as well: The last time Elder Uchtdorf was listed and sustained among the membership of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (in the October 2007 General Conference), only two other members of that Quorum (Elders Bednar and Cook, who was called during that same conference).

With his return to the membership of that Quorum now, he ranks as the third most senior member of that body . He has come a long way in the apostleship in the last 10 years, and that is reflected by the assignments, whatever they may be, with which President Nelson has entrusted him.

Additionally, while his time as a member of the First Presidency allowed him to give addresses in the Saturday Morning, Priesthood, and Sunday Morning Sessions, and while he led the Sustaining of Church Officers every April between 2008 and 2017 during the Saturday Afternoon Session, the last time he spoke as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (which again was in the October 2007 General Conference), he spoke during the Sunday Afternoon Session. And since that time, his assignments in the First Presidency did not present him another opportunity to speak in that session.

If, as I have theorized, the call of the two new members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles results in two veteran apostles speaking in the final session of the April 2018 General Conference, it would not surprise me if Elder Uchtdorf was one of those two. If you have any thoughts in that regard, please take your turn to "sound off" in the comments below to let me know. Your comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated.

That does it for this post. 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.

The Unique Connection Between President Nelson and President Oaks/Verifying the Truth of Something I Previously Stated

Hello again, everyone! KSL aired a special tonight dedicated to President Nelson. In the course of that special, I learned about the unique personal connection that Presidents Nelson and Oaks have. Back when President Nelson was a practicing heart surgeon, President Oaks, a professor at the University of Chicago in the Law School Department was tasked with trying to convince President Nelson, a well respected surgeon, to relocate to Chicago and join that College's medical faculty. President Nelson was impressed by President Oaks's persuasion on the matter, but ultimately decided not to take that path. Several years later, when both were interviewed for the position of BYU President, President Oaks was appointed.

So by the time the two were both called to the apostleship at the April 1984 General Conference, they had known each other for years. They have been seatmates during the entire time they have served in the Quorum of the Twelve, and that personal affinity and camaraderie is no doubt what led to President Nelson picking President Oaks as his First Counselor.

Additionally, I wanted to confirm something I noted previously in a blog post: President Nelson looked haggard at President Monson's funeral because he had all the weight of being the senior apostle and not the mantle of Church leadership. But in watching the coverage of today, that mantle has clearly settled on him, and if he has anything to say about it, he'll be well enough to lead the Church for the next several years.

He will mark his 94th birthday on September 9 of this year, but I'm sure if the Lord wills it to be so, he could stick around not only to pass President Hinckley as the oldest living prophet and Elder Haight as the oldest living apostle in Church history, but we could even see him become the first centenarian prophet in the Church's history. And as previously mentioned, President Oaks has likely been praying for a while that his apostolic and now First Presidency colleague will outlive him.

Whatever might happen in that regard, you can depend on my ongoing reports here. That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

Renovation Process Formally Begins For the Raleigh North Carolina Temple

Hello again, everyone! While I don't want to unduly detract from what occurred today with the reorganization of the First Presidency, at the same time, I wanted to note that formal efforts have reportedly begun for the Raleigh North Carolina Temple, where site clearing is underway, construction trailers are on-site, and a construction barrier has been put up before the process of  disassembling it occurs. Other than that, there have been no other developments in temple progress to report, so that does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

First New Stake Creation Reported for 2018

Hello again, everyone! This will be just a quick post to let you know that the Church has reported the creation of the first new stake in 2018, the Queen Creek Arizona Ocotillo Stake (unless I'm mistaken, the name is likely pronounced o-co-tee-o; correct me if I am wrong; I'm assuming it's Spanish). With as careful as I try to be not to step on the expert analysis of others on such subjects, I will not detail the affected units. You can catch analysis in that regard on the LDS Church Growth Blog in the coming days from Church growth expert Matthew Martinich. That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

More Coverage & Thoughts on Today's Events (Including a Historical Perspective)

Hello again, everyone! Continuing my coverage of today's events, if I have not already shared this (the last 8 hours have been somewhat of a blur, so I'm honestly not sure), the Church News has shared this article which has provided a summary of the questions that were asked and answered during the press conference held earlier today.

I also wanted to put into perspective some data about President Nelson. During the process of researching content I posted today, I was reminded that while President Nelson ranks as the least tenured Church president thus far (it will be interesting to see how long he serves given his announced intention to live for at least the next several years), he is also the 16th in birth chronology (since President Monson was born roughly three years after he was), and his age makes him the second oldest man in Church history to ascend to the presidency (the oldest ever Church President at the time of his ordination was Joseph Fielding Smith, who took the mantle of Church President when he was 93 years, 6 months, and 4 days old (which occurred on January 23, 1970), meaning that President Smith was at that time just 2 months and 1 day older than President Nelson was when he was ordained and set apart as the 17th Church President on Sunday.

This last Sunday, President Nelson's ordination made him the 5th oldest Church President of the 17. It will be interesting to see what occurs in terms of how long he does live. All going well, I could see him at least passing President Hinckley as the oldest president in Church history, and if the Lord wills, I could also see him becoming the first ever centenarian prophet. What will be interesting to see is if he will outlive his current First Counselor, or whether President Oaks will succeed him. There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever that President Oaks would prefer the former over the latter, but time will tell what occurs in that regard.

Whatever the case might be, I will do my level best to bring the latest to you as it occurs. That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

Some Thoughts About Current and Future Apostles

Hello again, everyone! I am back as promised, with some thoughts about current and future apostles. Let's get right to that.

With Elder Uchtdorf's return to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, he rejoins the other two that, along with him, were born in 1940 (with Elder Cook on September 8, Elder Uchtdorf on November 6, and Elder Holland on December 3). It is also interesting to me that the three apostles born in 1940 were called in the reverse order, with Elder Holland in June 1994, Elder Uchtdorf in October 2004, and Elder Cook in October 2007.

We also, as you may be aware, have two apostles each that were born in 1951 (Elder Rasband on February 6, and his seatmate Elder Andersen roughly six months later on August 9) and 1952 (Elder Bednar on June 15 and Elder Renlund just under five months later on November 13).

The two born in 1951 were called in the opposite order, with Elder Andersen being called in April 2009 and Elder Rasband in October 2015. As for Elders Bednar and Renlund, the former was called in October 2004, and the latter in October 2015.

Now, if I may, I'd like to offer some thoughts about the ages at which our current apostles were called and at which future apostles may be called. As we know, President Monson, prior to his death, was the youngest apostle called of the group, having received his apostolic call at the age of 36. His death means that, of the current apostles, the oldest at the time of his call was Elder Cook at 67.1 years, with the new "youngest" apostle to be called being Elder Oaks, who was 51.7 years old at the time of his call.

In anticipation of the reorganization of the First Presidency that we saw today, I have begun the preliminary process of gathering some thoughts about who might be called to fill the two vacancies in the Quorum, the one resulting from the death of Elder Hales in October, the other from the reorganization process.

In doing so, I am looking at more recent apostles (primarily those called under President Monson's administration) for my guide on a rough target of ages to place my focus. There were five such appointments, which ranged in age from that of Elder Andersen (who was 57.7 years old at the time of his ordination) to his seatmate, Elder Christofferson, who was 63.3 years old when he was so ordained. For that reason, I will be centralizing my focus on those candidates who are in their early 50s-early 60s. There is a possibility that the two new apostles could be older or younger than that range, but it seems a safe assumption for now that that won't be the case.

I should also note that I liked the way the new First Presidency (who were all born in America) responded to the question about international outreach. The response was essentially an echo of what had previously been said by our three newest apostles at the October 2015 press conference held in which they addressed and took questions from the media: the three are called to represent the Lord to the people, not the other way around, and they are also called to minister worldwide, and not just to those within the US where they were all born.

Each has been tested by proven service and a ministry the scope of which has been worldwide. As President Nelson observed, he and his counselors have roughly (rounding up) 91 years of apostolic experience, in which they have traveled round the world quite extensively. With nearly a century's worth of worldwide ministry to Church members in their favor, no one should question their ability to relate to and receive revelation for all members.

By the same token, while it would be wonderful to see one (or both) new apostles being called from a foreign country, if those called are born in the US but have had international experiences either prior to or in conjunction with their calls as general authorities, and their subsequent assignment as apostles, no one can (or should) have reason to accuse those selected of being other American-born men.

Since President Nelson said he sees in the Church's future a day when there will be more diversity in terms of foreign apostles, until that time, it is our duty to gain a testimony that whomever will be called during any prophetic administration (whether born in the US or from a foreign country) are those the Lord would have come to those positions at those times.

Those regular readers of this blog will no doubt be aware that I am fiercely loyal to the leading Brethren of the Church, whomever they may be, and that I will not condone on the part of anyone within the scope of my influence any unjust criticism of such leaders or the process by which they are called. And I hope the same is true for each of you. If you do not have such a witness regarding the wonderful way such calls are issued and accepted (by both those receiving them and by those of us who should sustain them for the duration of that calling), I would implore such individuals to take the time to go through the necessary processes to obtain such a witness.

In my case, the minute I got the news of the new leaders, it felt right to me in that very moment. So I know those changes have been inspired. I leave these thoughts with you, along with my unshakable witness that the Lord guides the process of selecting his leaders, from the President of the Church on down to the newest deacon's quorum president or Young Women's class president, and it is our right and duty to gain a witness of that process and to share it when we have received it, in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Interesting Tidbits About Newly Announced Leadership

Hello again, everyone! I thought I would post again now to share some things that I found interesting, and I hope you will as well, in terms of the newly announced leadership. First, the four oldest apostles of the Church now all bear the title of President. We have one nonagenarian (President Nelson) and one that will be a nonagenarian in October of this year (President Ballard). Additionally, the age difference between Presidents Oaks and Eyring (they were born 9 months and 19 days apart) is one of the closest differences between two First Presidency members that we have seen  in a while.

In fact, I was curious, so I looked it up. The last time the Church came anywhere close to having First Presidency members relatively close in age was at the time Presidents Kimball, Tanner, and Romney served together, from December 1973-July 1981 (at which time the considerably younger Elder Hinckley was brought into that presidency).

How close were the first three in age? President Kimball was born March 28, 1895, President Romney on September 19, 1897, and President Tanner on May 9, 1898. With more than two years passing between the births of Presidents Kimball and Romney, the period of time that passed between the births of Presidents Romney and Tanner was 7 months and 20 days.

It is significant to me that we have not had two (or more) First Presidency members as close in age as Presidents Oaks and Eyring are since the death of President Tanner concluded his service on November 27, 1982. Think of that for a minute. That was 35 years, 1 month, and 18 days ago, or 35.12 years ago the Church last had First Presidency members this close in age.

Additionally, it may interest some of you to know that President Eyring is the first man to go back to his previous position as Second Counselor after serving as First Counselor since that was the case for J. Reuben Clark. He and David O. McKay had served as First and Second Counselors respectively to Heber J. Grant and George Albert Smith. Since President McKay was the senior apostle to President Clark, when the First Presidency was reorganized, President McKay became the Church President. He selected Stephen L. Richards, a more senior member of the Quorum of the Twelve, as his First Counselor, and, in like manner to President Nelson and President Eyring, he asked his former senior in the First Presidency to become the junior member.

President Clark's response to that invitation, as recorded in General Conference (which took place around the events of the death of George Albert Smith and the reconstitution of the First Presidency, with the former Church President's funeral services held during the time that would otherwise have been reserved for the Saturday Afternoon Session) was similar in pattern to President Eyring's response to once again becoming the Second Counselor when President Nelson invited President Oaks to replace President Eyring as the First Counselor, and it echoes something that then-President now-Elder Uchtdorf said in General Conference on previous occasions (which KSL reported earlier today was his response to being reassigned to the Quorum), that calls are never sought for or declined, and that lifting where you stand is what all members of the Church, whatever their calling, should do. The more important thing is not where you serve, but how.

But in getting back to my point (sorry about the sidenote), the last time a First Counselor reverted to the Second Counselor position was (in President Clark's case) on April 9, 1951, which makes the difference between that date and the date of President Eyring's own revert (January 14, 2018) a period of 66 years, 9 months, and 5 days, or 66.77 years.

Additionally, the last time a member of the First Presidency under one prophet was not retained in that body by the next was when President Marion G. Romney, who served under President Kimball's administration but was not retained by President Benson, primarily in consideration for his failing health and old age. The date of that change was November 10, 1985, and the difference between that date and the date when President Uchtdorf reverted back to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (January 14, 2018) is 32 years, 2 months, and 4 days, or 32.18 years. That's significant, to be sure.

I was going to write more in this post, but I will save it for the next one, as this one has run a little longer than I intended it to. That does it for now. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.

LDS Church News Reports on Press Conference/Additional Resources from Mormon Newsroom

Hello again, everyone! You can find a summary of responses to the media questions at the press conference today here. That is an excellent article and I recommend it to all of you as well worth the read. In the meantime, you can find the Mormon Newsroom coverage of that press conference (including audio and video archives) here. And the news release about the new leaders (including Elder Ballard), can be found here. They already have a new picture of the First Presidency available on the web, but I need to look more fully into whether or not it is a problem if I post it here. I will be doing so later today, and if I find it is in the public domain under "fair use" regulations, I will be sure to pass that along, That does it for this post. Any and all comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. 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.