Wednesday, August 8, 2018

Updated Country Profile - Morocco

Click here to access our updated Reaching the Nations country profile for Morocco. The Church has held private worship meetings for decades and even operates a branch with 86 members in Rabat. However, very few, if any Moroccans have joined the Church in Morocco or abroad and membership is comprised of foreign members who temporarily live in the country. Unlike other North African countries, Morocco has a significant Berber-speaking population who may be more receptive to prospective LDS outreach one day in comparison to the Arab population. The millions of Moroccans in Europe present the greatest opportunities for outreach in Morocco within the foreseeable future given proselytism restrictions and cultural intolerance for Muslims converting to other religions in Morocco.

18 comments:

John Pack Lambert said...

How clear is the division between Arabs and Berbers? Is it start ethnic division of long pronounced different lines, or is it a more cultural division, where many people have mixed ancestry, but are identified as one or the other by culture. For that matter, is being Arab or Berber even a clear division, or do many people embrace both ethnuicities?

Eduardo said...

I have had Moroccan professors of Arabic who debated on their respective Berber words for "monkey", in a specific example. I believe that there are 3 main Berber tribes of Morocco, but probably many sub-sets. At my Arabic school we had representatives of at least two of them. One guy was from Agadir, a somewhat secular Americanized gentleman. Others I knew tended to be more devout.

Eduardo said...

I also had a Jordanian Arabic teacher that had a hard time returning to the airport in Rabat, I think, because he could not communicate effectively with the local Moroccan taxi driver.
My wife served part of her mission in Ceuta, Spain. Very Moroccan and Muslim, as a Euro-enclave in Africa. Lots of sub-Saharan Africans there back then, like refugees from Niger.

Christopher Nicholson said...

Through Facebook I encountered a young Muslim in Morocco who heard about the Church from a documentary and was asking how to join. I tried to help him the best I could but it was apparently impossible for anything to be done. That was in 2012 I believe. We're still Facebook friends but since then he's become an atheist.

Eduardo said...

There's hope for all. Hit him up again and tell him hr needs to "yiqraa el Kitab el Mormon."

Gnesileah said...

Cote d'Ivoire Yamoussoukro Mission
- Zoukougbeu Branch created

Tarkwa Ghana District
- Tarkwa Ghana District Branch discontinued

Bogotá Colombia La Libertad Stake
- Piamonte Ward discontinued
- Bosa Ward renamed Laureles Ward
- Casablanca Ward renamed Chicala Ward

Toa Baja Puerto Rico Stake
- Bayamon Ward discontinued
- Caparra Ward renamed San Souci Ward

Maracaibo Venezuela West Stake
- San Miguel Ward discontinued

Tempe Arizona Stake
- Tempe SA Ward created

Poway California Stake
- Ramona Oaks Ward discontinued

Henderson Nevada Anthem Hills Stake
- Sloan Canyon Ward created

Alliance Texas Stake
- Avondale Ward created

Richmond Utah Stake
- High Creek Ward created

Santa Clara Utah Stake
- Santa Clara 17th Ward created

John Pack Lambert said...

Is that the first post-Hurricane unit discontinuation in Puerto Rico?

I always wonder why they are not more creative with ward names in places like Santa Clara Utah. Also any new stakes in the St George area soon?

Nephi said...

John Lambert, I am going to take a shot at answering your question. On Jan 1, 2018 the Stake I live in reorganized 9 boundaries out of 12 units and created a new branch. We now have 13 units in my Stake. The reorganization of ward boundaries had been in the works for over a year. During that process several people were tasked with renaming the wards. My understanding for naming wards is that it had to be specific to the area and have some kind of meaning. In a large city with many members it is easier to create a ward in a subdivision and name the ward the same as the subdivision. In other areas it is harder. I live in Bunkerville, NV and next door is Mesquite, NV. There are not enough members in any one geographical area of Bunkerville or Mesquite to create unique names. Some of the suggestions for some of the wards were the names of mountains, rivers and land marks but those names could have applied to any of the wards. When it was all said and done the names of all the units stayed the same. That is my understanding and I could be sorely mistaken so if anyone has more or better knowledge than I do please post!

Gnesileah said...

Yes, this is the first unit discontinuation in Puerto Rico since the hurricane. Previous to now, the last unit to be discontinued was the Arroyo Branch in the Caguas Stake in 2016.

I also wish that we found more creative unit names when we have multiple units in the same city sharing basically the same name. Many stakes have transitioned away from the numbering format in recent years, in favor of unique names. My stakes in Arizona and Montana have done so. The Centennial Arizona and Draper Utah Meadows Stakes did the opposite in 2017, changing to a numbering format.

To rename a ward, the Stake President submits an application to the Area Presidency. If they endorse the proposed name change, they forward the application to the Boundary and Leadership Change Committee for review. The First Presidency gives final approval for name changes.

The official policy states, "The name of a ward or branch should uniquely identify it so people in the community can recognize and locate it. The name should be chosen carefully so it will not need to be changed later. Generally, the names of existing wards and branches should not be changed.

"The ward or branch should be named after a city, subdivision, neighborhood, street, or geographical feature that is within or adjacent to unit boundaries. The name of only one city, subdivision, neighborhood, street, or geographical features is used in the unit name. If there is more than one ward or branch with the same name, a number is added as part of the name, such as Montevideo 1st Ward, Montevideo 2nd Ward, and Montevideo 3rd Ward. The name of the ward or branch should be in the language of the area. If the language does not use the Roman alphabet, a translation using Roman characters should be included. Compass directions (such as East or Northwest), names of people, and segregating terms (such as Spanish or Hearing Impaired) are not included in the name."

John Pack Lambert said...

At one time including direction in ward names was very common.

It is also interesting that direction names are discouraged in ward names, but are very common in stake names.

Also the only one city, state etc. is a new rule. At one time more than one was allowed in a ward. My stake had a ward called East Shores that was the result of combining parts of two city names. Marriott-Slaterville Utah exists because at one point the Marriott and Slaterville Wards were combined, and the resulting resulting wards name was eventually applied to the whole area.

The general trend over the last 30 years has been moving away from large numbered units. However a few places, such as Lehi, Utah, have seen numbers rise. In both Brooklyn and I believe also San Francisco ward numbers have been reinstituted.

One thing I have noticed is that in some places, such as one of the stakes in the Chicago suburbs, and the New York New York stake, most wards are essentially named by the building they meet at. On the other hand, in other places each ward has a name reflecting the area it covers.

On my mission in Las Vegas I got the sense that the naming of wards often seemed a bit abitrary to members. They did not always connect to clearly identified places.

James Anderson said...

Gilbert Arizona all wards and stakes are named for streets, one is named for a freeway, the same one that runs b the temple, and one of the streets the name was taken from itself was named for a mall that it went into off another freeway

James G. Stokes said...

Ward naming conventions are an interesting subject. During my years living in Payson Utah, I was a member of the Mountain View 4th Ward Payson Utah Mountain View Stake. We had the name of the city in which we resided in our stake, but our stake was named for nearby Mount Nebo, which also provided the name of the district in which my siblings and I attended school.

My current stake (Orem Utah Geneva Heights) was apparently named for a development that occurred here in Orem in the 1940s and 1950s. Interestingly, while I would have to ask around, I believe the first president of my current stake may have gone on to have some role in establishing American Fork, as the family name coincides with that of classmates I had in various American Fork Schools. I certainly understand the appeal of giving wards numerical names (which makes sense here in the US) but perhaps unique names have greater appeal for the Church outside North America, where there may be more unique landmarks and features to use for naming wards and stakes.

With all of that said, I wanted to pass along some personal news: I have finally finished the process of compiling and annotating the list of temple prospects which I have felt could be announced in the near future, and that information has been published on my blog very recently. With my thanks to Matt for this post, for allowing us to continue to have wide-ranging discussions on the comment threads of this blog, and for continuing to graciously allow me to share such things, I wanted to conclude this comment by passing along the address at which my updated list of those locations can be found, for which I will be welcoming comment for the next 6.5 weeks or so before I fine-tune it for the October 2018 General Conference. I would appreciate any comments any of you have on that list, or any other post on my blog, for that matter. Thanks again to you all.

http://stokessoundsoff.blogspot.com/2018/08/updated-list-of-potential-locations.html

John Pack Lambert said...

Here in my city of Detroit we have enough neighborhoods, landmarks and such to give all wards and branches unique, non-neumerical names for ages to come.

Unknown said...

Check your facts dude.
Morocco is a berber country, the people who speak moroccan arabic (darija) are arabized berbers(amazighs), morocco has an arab population but it is very small.
I copied this from wikipedia :
"Recent studies make clear no significant genetic differences exists between Arabic-speaking Moroccan populations and non-Arabic speaking Moroccan populations. The human leukocyte antigen HLA DNA data suggest that most Moroccans, both those of non-Arab ethnolinguistic identity and those of Arab ethnolinguistic identity, are of Berber origin, and that the genealogical true Arabs from Arabia who invaded not only Morocco, but the rest of North Africa plus Spain in the 7th century, did not substantially contribute to the gene pool"
"In fact, according to a 2000 article in European Journal of Human Genetics, Moroccans from North-Western Africa were genetically closer to Iberians than to either Sub-Saharan Africans of Bantu ethnicity and Middle Easterners."

SteveW said...

Casablanca, Morocco. I visited in February, 2009 while working for Huawei, a Chinese Telecom company. There were a number of issues, but the biggest one was starting a pilot to hire more local staff, to lower the 78% Huawei employees being Chinese nationals in Morocco. There was also a project to use solar and wind energy to power base stations (mobile towers) in much of the Kingdom.
I was asked by the #3 person at Maroc Telecom at the time if I would like to go to Marrakech on Friday. I went down with him and two Chinese direct reports to me from China. On the way back he asked if I was going to church tomorrow. I said that there was no church for me in Casablanca. He asked what church and I told him The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. He asked what I was going to do instead. I said I would read scriptures and pray in the morning and probably go for a walk on the beach close by. He asked if I had always been a member of this church. I told I grew up Jewish and was baptized into this church when I was going to university in California.
I said he would find a room at the hotel and would like to join me and learn about my religion. A Chinese associate said he wanted to join also. The next morning he came with 12 family members, including a brother, a sister-in-law and some of their older children. I talked about my joining the church by reading the Book of Mormon, pondering and fasting and prayer. They wanted to know about my Jewish origins. They asked about basic beliefs. I then read from the Book of Mormon with the leader from Maroc telecom translating into French.
We had lunch afterward on a wonderful restaurant on the beach with everyone.
The next day the project I had come for was approved, which meant that my two Chinese assistance would stay and I would come periodically over the next 15 to 18 months to review, provide resources and make decisions with Maroc Telecom.
I came back two months later and there were 30 people attending. They had gone to Marseilles (the brother) and to Paris (the leader) to attend church meetings and to gather Book of Mormons in French. They also asked for materials for teaching in Paris to be sent to them.
I came back three months later and there were 70 people in attendance. I answered more questions, they set up a branch with common consent with all church organizations. When I came back six months later there were over 90 people in attendance. I learned that they were working on emigrating to countries where they could get baptized and practice the restored gospel. I also learned most were Berber and 70% were part of an extended family.
I came back to finish up the work project 10 months later with great success including endowing to two chairs in telecom engineering at a Moroccan technical university. The branch was down to 70 people because a few families had already emigrated.
A few years later I met with the leader at Maroc Telecom who had got everything going in Casablanca forming the branch at a Telecom Conference in Barcelona in February, 2012. I asked about the branch. He said he had emigrated to France the prior year. He said the branch was down to about 25 people with over 70 people who had emigrated to United States, Canada, France, UK, Brazil, and Argentina. He felt that the branch may last another year or two before everyone emigrates or a few may fall away.
All through this experience the branch never made itself known or contact any church entity, nor was it known by any Moroccan government entities. I have waited for time to pass so all those involved would feel safe.
The Lord works in ways very different than men.

SteveW said...

No comments of Muslims (all Berber) in Morocco forming a branch in Arabic and French. This is one of the few large scale conversions of Muslim I have heard of in the history of the restored Gospel. Admittedly they had to emigrate to get baptized and receive the full benefits of the restored gospel. This is one of the biggest miracles I have heard of in my life or of the church.

SteveW said...

My mother's ancestry is Sephardic Jew from Morocco. She left with most of the 350,000 Moroccan Jews in the late 40s and 50s after they were kicked by the Moroccan government and the pull of the founding of Israel. All of our families olive groves and olive oil factory was confiscated.
My mother said that the Berber tribes were usually separate from the Arabs. You could tell the difference. Most of their dealings locally near Fez were with all people, but principally with Berbers. Of course, some of the people were mixed. My mother and her relatives there was more connection with Spain than Arabia. Like our family, many Berbers also left Spain in the 15-17th centuries.

SteveW said...

Unknown thanks for your note. As indicated my mother's family is from Fez, Morocco originally. Having been to Portugal, Spain, and Morocco these people and cultures are very close in many ways.
With my father's genealogy from England, Scotland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Sweden, France and Greece, the 18% of my DNA coming from the Iberian peninsula is from my mother's side. My mother's mother was Italian Jewish which accounts for the 12% of my genealogy from Italy. Another 8% from the Middle East/Turkey and 4% from North Africa. None from sub-Saharan Africa.