Click here to access the updated Reaching the Nations country profile for Saint Vincent and the Grenadines - a nation in the Lesser Antilles inhabited by approximately 100,000 people. The Church has experienced slow, albeit steady, growth during the past 15 years as the number of branches has increased from one to three. Here is the Future Prospects section of this article:
The Church in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines has reported slow, but steady, growth since the late 2000s. The number of branches tripling from one to three and the opening of two additional cities to missionary activity since 2007 stand as the greatest accomplishment of the Church in recent memory. Furthermore, there have also appeared to be good progress with local leadership development. These trends have been sustained for several years and offer a promising outlook for long-term church growth if sustained. Continued growth in the Kingstown Branch may necessitate the creation of a fourth branch. Prospects for the formation of a district will depend on the creation of additional congregations and increases in the number of qualified local leaders. Member-missionary activity appears the only feasible method to expand national outreach into rural areas due to the small population and limited missionary resources available regionally and internationally.
75 comments:
Great report as always, Matt! Thanks for all you and David Stewart do to keep us informed of the latest Church growth milestones, trends, and future prospects. Although the Church is in its' infancy in many places, as described in relation to Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, we are truly seeing the Lord's promise that He will "hasten [His] work in its' time." And the developments reported on this blog help me to put that promise into perspective and to view the Church with both a more global and better-honed individual view of each nation. Keep up the great work, and thanks again for all you do.
The first prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, when it gained semi-autonomy, Ebenezer Joshua, later joined the Church.
On another note the new mission presidents and companions biographies have started to be published.
There are a total of 16 biographies printed, which is about twice what has been princted at once in the past few years, and about 3 times what was printed at once normally before 2013. They have dropped listing employment for the men, which was also true last year.
Yjr first 16 have 12 couples from the US, and one each from Nigeria, El Salvador, the Philippines and Brazil. The couple from El Salvador will preside over a mission in Honduras. This is maybe below average in non-US couples for the last few years. Most interesting to me is the couple sent to head the mission in Mongolia. The husband served his mission in Mongolia and is a native of American Fork and currently lives in Alpine, Utah. His wife is a native of Mongolia who served her mission in the Utah Salt Lake City Temple Square Mission.
Dave and Chimka Hansen were in my stake (Wilmington Delaware) for several years, and he was stake clerk for some of them. (I was one of his assistants.)
I understand some of why they do not share their employment anymore, but I also miss it and don't like it. I thought it helped provide knowledge and ideas on how to be successful.
What did Brother Hansen do?
Interestingly enough, in my parent's stake (American Fork East), there is also a Dave Hansen, who was in the stake presidency for a period of a year. Not sure if there is any relation there or not, but, if nothing more, it is a fascinating coincidence. That list of mission presidents also includes one current area seventy (Aley K. Auna Jr.). And 16 is a high number in terms of new mission leadership biographies released at once. That said, it is on par with the announcement of 16 new temple presidents that we have seen at one time last year and the year before that. The Church News has, overall, been more on top of such information in recent years.
Dave Hansen is a lawyer.
Hong Kong Temple to close July 8th for renovation.
https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/asia-temple-will-close
I wonder why they need to renovate it now, instead of waiting for at least the Bangkok temple and maybe even the Bengaluru and Phnom Penh temples to be finished and spare the members in the temple district a substantial amount of cost and inconvenience. It's only twenty-three years old. Not complaining, just wondering.
I'm not sure about the Hong Kong Temple renovation either. Maybe it's a "just in case" scenario. I was kinda surprised at the renovations for Raleigh, Oklahoma City, and Memphis being that those are barely 20 years old. Washington DC Temple not surprising especially from the damage it took during the 2013 Richmond Virginia Earthquake. (And I felt that quake all the way in Baltimore). St. George is over a 100 years old with its last renovations over 40 years ago. President Nelson did say that pioneer temples would be renovated, so I'm gonna assume that also means Logan, Manti, and Salt Lake City. I'm pretty those in the Hong Kong District will either go to one of the 2 temples open in Japan Fukuoaka (forgive me if I don't get the spelling right) and Sapporo Japan or Seoul South Korea. Also for the St. George Temple District people will eithee go to Cedar City Utah or Las Vegas Nevada.
Hong Kong was announced in 1992 and finished as noted in 1996, fast for one of its size and unique type. Was done to be in place when Hong Kong was handed over to China the next year.
Likely will be to firm up previous construction as good as that may have been, so we will have an even better, more well-constructed temple than before.
Maybe they just want the Chinese government to get used to the church building temples in China? Here's hoping
Perhaps this is a big reason:
"The temple was originally constructed in the 1990s as a multipurpose Church facility housing a temple, a meetinghouse, a small mission office, and apartments for the temple and mission presidents with access provided by different elevators that go only to certain floors. The Church has since constructed a beautiful meetinghouse, housing facilities, mission office, and distribution center across the street, reclaiming many of the functions that were once housed in the temple."
Christopher, it appears that the building needs to be updated seismically and systemically. Also, it was originally built as a multi-purpose building housing Church offices, meeting space for several wards, and mission and area offices. It appears that since the other offices and facilities have since relocated to their own building that the floor plan may be downsized to something still big enough to serve the Saints in Asia as a temple, but perhaps not as massive in size as it is currently, since it will only need to serve as a temple once it reopens. Either way, we will be finding out more specifics on that process later, as noted in the announcement.
We have mentioned before on this blog that many temples dedicated during the Hinckley-era have been, are being, or will yet be renovated, and the exterior designs are being given an overhaul. That could be the case for Hong Kong as well. But also, one of the Executive or Assistant Executive Directors of the Temple Department noted that temples need to be renovated and refreshed roughly every 30-40 years. That period of time can be and has been lowered as need be, such as when an overhaul of the temple is seen as practical and necessary.
Bryan, since the first four temples dedicated in this dispensation (at least those the Church still uses today in their original forms) were dedicated during the pioneer-era, there are at least those four. But that list could expand to temples built in the pioneer-era of the Church in specific lands. The pioneer era in Utah is considered to encompass roughly the 1840s-1870s. In other lands, that period of time might be regarded as being the 1900s or more recently. I compiled a list (which can be found on my blog) sharing which temples I feel might be renovated in the near future based on what my research showed in that regard.
James Anderson, the interesting thing about the announcement and construction of the Hong Kong temple is that the process thereof started in 1992. At that time, President Ezra Taft Benson's health was failing, and he had authorized his counselors to do what they felt needed to be done with his blessing. Having received that authorization, President Hinckley, right-hand man to President Benson as his First Counselor (who could be considered the Acting President of the Church in that scenario) therefore had the necessary authority to seek for and receive inspiration on the design for that temple. It may have been during President Hinckley's own administration when the separate office and housing facility was added to the temple grounds.
Downtownchrisbrown, though Hong Kong technically belongs to China, the Church is thriving more in that part of China than it ever has on the mainland. It has been mentioned before on this blog that President Nelson's fluency in Mandarin Chinese and his status as a "Friend of China" may be the catalysts whereby the Church can begin to expand a bit more into the mainland part of China. If that can occur, a whole score of missionaries will be needed, and several temples could dot that nation in time. How long that might take may be hard to gauge, but it is possible that could occur. In the meantime, I am sure President Nelson's Chinese connections have enabled/will yet enable the renovation process on Hong Kong to move quickly and with minimal difficulty. If nothing else, that is at least my hope.
Hope these comments are helpful to all who read them, and not just those to whom they were directed.
Very well explicated, James. I wish you had the right degree to work for the Church. You have the ability, certainly.
I have been wondering how Church members in Venezuela are dealing with the problems there. Rarely does a place with so many members have so many problems of such dire degrees, like huge financial crises and food shortages.
Are Bishops able to get food orders to their struggling membership?
Usually bad nationwide or regional political and economic struggles occur in places with Muslim or Communist majorities, precluding Saints in significant numbers. Or before the missionaries arrived, like Rwanda or Dem. Rep. Of Congo 20 and 30 years ago.
I wonder if non-member Venezolanos observe our members receiving food and aid, and if less active Saints are atrending church more.
I bet a whole book could be written about Venezuelan members the last couple years.
I can't recall: have all missions been stopped there, or missionaries sequestered? Crazy times.
Thanks for the responses.
I've read recently that China is cracking down on Christianity, confiscating Bibles and demolishing churches and stuff. No word about how it's affecting our church. I hope it's one of those things that freaks people out but then lets God show his power by overcoming it against all odds. President Nelson did say that if we follow his counsel in using the correct name of the Church, the Lord will bless us in reaching "every nation, kindred, tongue, people", etc. Now technically we've already reached China, but since most of China's 1.4 billion inhabitants still have no chance to ever hear about the gospel, I don't think it counts. In addition to President Nelson, it intrigues me that we now have an ethnically Chinese apostle... The Church infrastructure that's already in place, along with the harsh lessons learned, should make any future missionary efforts far more successful than they've been in Russia.
I believe all the Venezuelan missions are still going. They've entirely been staffed by native Venezuelans for several years, of course. I read somewhere that when Americans were withdrawn the Church was going to close one or two of the missions, but a leader in Venezuela (no idea who) promised that if they left all the missions open, he would make sure there were enough local missionaries to fill them. And he did.
The Chinese thing is mainly about those groups that have gone in through the backdoor, as the Chinese government just signed an agreement with the Catholic church that may be similar to how they did things with us but I never heard the details. This happened two months or so ago.
There has been at times stories come out of China about things some do like Bible 'bombing' where someone just goes and leaves a bible at every doorstep like one would leave a newspaper. It is things like this that have led to problems for some there.
Rick's site posted that since 1997, the Church was able to get land across the road from the Hong Kong Temple, and they have built facilities to house what has been between the baptistry and upper floors, so the renovations will make those two middle floors a part of the temple and what was there will be across the road.
The closure and renovation of the Hong Kong China Temple does not surprise me. As some of the previous comments have noted, this was the Church's first "urban" temple and therefore I am sure there are some changes that are likely needed to help make the temple more functional (such as removing all non-temple offices and meeting places since these have been relocated elsewhere). Also, most members in Asia do not attend the temple in Hong Kong, but instead go to the Manila Philippines Temple even if they are not officially assigned to that temple district, so the impact on members in the Asia Area as a whole appears minor. For example, there are regular temple trips from Vietnam to the Manila Philippines Temple. Keep in mind that the MTC for the Asia Area is either Provo or Manila. Also, I believe that the renovation of the temple will better service the rapidly growing Church in mainland China where there are at least 12 districts (8 for native members, 4 for foreigners) and at least one of these districts appears very close to becoming a stake (Guangzhou). As these members have to travel long distances to reach the temple, renovating the building to provide for more space to accommodate larger groups would likely be helpful for members who have to travel from places like Manchuria, Beijing, and Chengdu.
My Brazilian sister in law informed me that Brazil is having a similar border crisis with Venezuela as the US is having with Mexico. Many Venezuelan immigrants also are crossing over into Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and Chile. I wonder how many of them are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/world-latin-america-45254368
Eduardo, I wish I had a degree too, especially the right one which would qualify me for a position with the Church. Perhaps at some point, that can occur, but in the meantime, even though it is a bit difficult at times, I do trust that the Lord knows what needs to happen in my current situation, and that He will lead me to the right opportunity at the right time. Is it difficult to wait on Him? Of course. It's in our human nature to be impatient when our lives aren't going as well as we'd hoped. But I get the feeling that someday we will all understand just how much the Lord, moving in His majesty and power, has orchestrated each of our lives according to His greater knowledge about what's ahead for each of us.
As I understand it, the Church has moved the practice of administering food orders to be done online. Relief Society presidencies fill out the forms electronically according to those members' needs, they submit those orders to the bishop for his e-signature, and the form in its' digital version is sent on to the storehouses. In this way, all the members getting one have to worry about is connecting with their local leaders, then receiving notifications by a pre-selected method once the Storehouse has received their orders. The pickup date and time is then left up to the members and when it would be convenient for them.
I also know that the Church has moved missionaries recently out of areas due to either political or religious turmoil or unfavorable climatic conditions. Maybe the times are crazy in certain areas of the world, but they are also changing in many areas to be more favorable to an atmosphere within which the Church can progress. One merely has to look at South America and Africa to see clear evidence of that occurring. The Philippines and states within the "Mormon corridor" fall within those parameters as well.
It is great to see the Church doing more to enhance the safety and security of missionaries. Earlier today, the Church announced a new tool for prospective missionaries which might help them more fully plan for the ideal time in which to serve their missions. More on that is available on the Newsroom website.
Christopher, I know that China is cracking down on the spread of Christianity, but AFAIK, President Nelson's status as an "old friend of China" has never been revoked up to this point, and it likely never will. Are there obstacles to the spreading of the gospel in mainland China? Of course, but perhaps one of the reasons President Nelson has been called as our prophet at this time is to at least lay the foundation of the work in China through some means. Could those doors remain closed to the Church for the foreseeable future? Of course, but the Lord knows how to open those doors, and will move His prophet to act accordingly.
As to the renovation of the Hong Kong China Temple, it would not shock me to see the Church eliminating unnecessary floor space for that temple, while at the same time increasing the space available in the floor plan for temple ordinances. That would be less cramped for the members in the district, but much more easy and perhaps a lot less expensive for the Church to continue to maintain. As I understand it, advances in electrical, mechanical, structural, and seismic procedures will allow this temple to be brought up to code in such a way as to save the Church money on its' maintenance and cleaning. How exactly that might occur is yet to be revealed, of course, but it will be good to see those plans detailed more fully later on this year.
I have mixed feelings about any border crisis, so what it comes down to for me is whether or not things are being accomplished that will provide assurance of ongoing stability in government. I also know that a lot of people seem to only see one side of any issue. It is easy for us to advance our own opinions as correct when our perspective has molded them, but if governments in the US and elsewhere would put aside politics, stop the bickering, and work together to get things resolved, that would be a far better approach than recent strategies we have seen which are, by comparison, far less effective in that regard.
As far as I know, the 10 members of the Church currently serving in the United States Congress are working as hard as they can to reason with their colleagues about the best solutions for all issues in this nation. But if others fail to be reasonable or come to the table willing to be flexible in their desires, then the issue of border security and several other unrelated issues have been and could be blown out of proportion. That said, Latter-day Saints around the world are setting a good example of being good neighbors, and various parts of the world (including many political and governmental leaders) recognize and appreciate that.
I think we would all be wise to pray (as invited by Presidents Nelson and Monson) that the doors of nations will be open to the work, and that reasonable measures would be taken by governments everywhere to ensure that the needs of the people they serve are not cast aside in favor of "scoring points" in a situation where political strategy is used as leverage to get their own ways. The world is messed up enough as it is in so many ways. When cooler heads and reason prevail, the Lord will open the doors that are now closed, and can inspire such leaders to act in good faith for the good of their citizenry. At least, that's my opinion, FWIW.
I wonder, with the coming temple and adjacent offices/chapel building, if Bangkok could be a new center "hub" of the Church in Asia (particularly South and Southeast Asia). Perhaps an MTC one day? The size of the temple could certainly help to accommodate larger groups that come from other countries both within and outside whatever the temple district will be. Of course, that would depend on what the cost and accessibility of travel is to Bangkok rather than Hong Kong or Manila. Just a thought. We also temples coming to both India and Cambodia, so that will provide another option as well. Exciting to see what the future holds for that part of the world.
We also *have*
Sorry for omitting a word there.
This is a call to action. Peter Meurs a general authority seventy had multiple articles in Australia cover his call as a general authority seventy. In a sign of the moving gosl post deletion efforts of NorthAmerica1000 he has now mixed multiple rules to concoct a deletion attempt. The main thrust is to call for deletion because the articles we have came in the Aistralian press when he retired to veckme a geberal authority seventy. This ignores how many arguments have essentially been this person got an NYT obituary th ut s they are notable. It is not the event of leaving office that makes Mmj eurs notabke, it is his long role as a business leader. This is not a one event but concentrated coverage. I have been blocked from editing Wikipedia for a week because I felt compelled to nominate more than one article on a person perpetually on practuce teams for deletion in a day. NorthAmerica1000 was an editor moving to keep the block in place hoping to use Wikipedia processes to c lo ear the field for his new novel approach to deletion nominations in the Neurs case. We need people to boldly move to stop this travesty which aims at remiving a very broadly and well sourved article on a general authority seventy.
I forgot in the last post to give notice this is John Pack Lambert.
One possible reason to scrap the employment was it only was included for men. I would have sort have liked to see it included for women. Anot buggg er reason is seen in the case of Brother Franco whose wife is now in the primary general presidency. It said he was some sort of insurance salesman which was immediately true. However he spent most of his career as a jeweler and horologist. So immediate job is not always that illustrative.
Ice know two David Hansebs. One was a chemist who would mention his classes with professor Henry Eyring the other is a political science professor at BYU.
At least Memphis seems to be caused by mold issues in the building. I have no clue what issues exist for the Hong Kong Temple.
One factor in how often temples need revamps is how much use they go through. Some of this cane be met by new carpets each year but some wear and tear varried by number of users issues go deeper.
Does this mean the new temple will be bigger?
In the case of the Manilla MTC it is the city with by far the most Church members in Asia. You need a large critical mass of members to adequately staff an MTC.
This is a little bit off topic but I am trying to get some help. I have 1,400 names that need the Endowment completed and another 1,400 that need the Sealing completed. I do not want to force my names on anyone and if you have your own names I absolutely want those to be your priority but I would love any help any of you are willing to give. If any of you are interested in helping I can either share them with you electronically or mail the actual cards to you. Just send me an email and we can coordinate getting you the names. My email address is croftpayne@gmail.com. Thank you!
If you share them with the temple system, those using the Ordinance Ready option on Family Search who don't have an ancestor needing ordinances gets names that have been shared with the system. You could try that.
Even with Ordinance Ready, it's still slow. I have male baptisms that have been in the system for over 6 months... And those are generally faster than other ordinances. Hence why people would still ask for help :)
I don't get to go to the temple that often (I think I even mentioned that above somewhere), but if it wasn't for that, I definitely would love some names.
Endowments don't take that long to go through the system, in my experience, since they are probably still the most "common" ordinance performed in the temple. Sealings is a different story. But then again, how long have those people waited, and what real difference does it make in terms of the time they receive those ordinances? I would rather have those people in queue being "worked on" by the first person ready to be in the temple, instead of them laying around in another member's home, waiting for them specifically to perform the ordinance. But maybe that is just my supply chain way of thinking through the world. :-)
The first phase of Ordinances Ready was what we got in September and October, there are four more phases planned, and all of it should come out by the end of this year or early next.
From what I have heard, starting as early as February 1st, whatever is in the temple system noe, instead of going just to your temple, will be available to all temples. When you share the names with the temple they will have a couple months for the one in your district to do the name. After that short period, whether it be 30 or 90 days, it will go to the general pool. The names will be queued up based on when they were submitted.
The Utah temples do about 60 percent of the work, along with a few others, so that will actually even out the backlog wait. Currently in Utah, a name will wait about three years for males and one for females to receive the endowment. Stories are told however that in other areas it can take as long as eight years to do the endowment for some names so this rework of the system will help.
Since 2016, they also have not had to rely on extracted names to get names for the temple pool. It used to be that 80 percent of the names performed in the temples, and this was when there were far fewer temples, wee from extraction.
Ordinances Ready pulls names for you in this order:
1. Your reservation list
2. Your family tree. (if you find some this way check for duplicates, I heard a report from St. George that a number of names have turned out to be duplicates of names where the work was already done.
3. If none are found in the above two categories, then it pulls names from the temple pool.
When you use Ordinances Ready, it gives you enough to do in a typical visit to the temple for most members:
5 baptisms/confirmations, ditto for initiatory
1 endowment,
10 sealings.
This all will even things out a bit.
I have had real issues with duplicates in the past. Fortunately I know to look for them, but many people probably dont. It is a sad day when you check for duplicates and see that a name has already had its work done 5+ times.
This is why for the past several years I only do names I find myself anymore. It is much easier to confirm that they have adequate sources and no existing duplicates before I feel ready to do the work.
My understanding with the Hong Kong Temple is that the entire building will be remodeled and used as a temple.
The same thing happened in Manhattan where they took over one of the floors after the dedication from the chapels that were there.
Speaking of duplicates and other online record mistakes -- don't make the online tree your only record because others can change it. Whatever you do in family history keep it in your own records, such as free tree building software. Otherwise, three years down the line you won't recognize your online work; your Mary will be erased and replaced with some other Mary, and every other inconceivable combination of children older than their parents will exist in your family. My children are descendants of Parley P. Pratt and I always want the permanent editing freeze that his Family Search record has for all of my people. Because not everyone is skilled in research and record keeping. But, the answer isn't locking other people out; it's keeping your own pristine copy of your family history research. You can "follow" people in your tree to be notified when someone changes their records; but I can't keep up with that day-to-day, there are too many. I can only periodically review and make sure people haven't been erased or a family line highjacked. You might think you don't have the time to do it twice. You need to consider the online record as erasable, just necessary for ordinance handling.
Emily - Good Point. To that end I've been working on Familypedia.wikia.com for about 10 years now as an alternative / backup / shared family history database.
I can remember going to the temple as a youth and being baptized for Parley P Pratt. That's how I learned about the importance of checking for duplicates. I felt I was wasting my time and could have been receiving ordinances for someone else who needed them.
For backing up your personal database for family history, among other places, FamilySearch has a place for that.
Go to FamilySearch, then click on Search at the top, then click on Genealogies, which you will find just below Family Tree. No one can edit that except you can replace it with a later upload with newer data, never done that but it may be possible. Many do not look in there for things.
That is also where they are placing the African oral genealogies they are gathering, several other unique databases are there, along with the old database we used to check against for temple work, looking for names there regularly finds duplicates before you submit them anew.
The war on general authority articles has ramped into high gear. Even Jack N. Gerard's wikipedia article has had a notice questioning his notability put up. Considering how much coverage there was when he was CEO of the American Petroleum Institute and how many articles speculated he would have a key position in a Mitt Romney administration, this is clearly not a justified approach. I would work to remove the notice but as mentioned earlier I am currently under a seven day block from editing.
Emily, I had never considered that before and I really appreciate the advice! I have seen situations where I find an ancestral line only to come back a few months later with everything jumbled up and I have to spend even more time fixing it all. I wi'll try to back up everything from now on!
I found stuff about Wikipedia's problems, the outline box has an item, section 3.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliability_of_Wikipedia
Also found various contact points for Wikimedia Foundation, the parent of Wikipedia
https://wikimediafoundation.org/about/contact/
There is no limit on posting encyclopedic content about GA's at Mormon.Wikia.com.
I recommend posting data there as backup or sandbox for building articles on Wikipedia. The list of Stakes is complete now.
The sandbox method will also be useful in showing Wikipedia what the article, with all relevant info and sources, should look like if it does not have bias.
Pocatello and Guam groundbreakings! I'm hearing an announcement for Cape Verde may not be far off either.
https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/temple-groundbreakings-announced--pocatello-guam
Pocatello Idaho Temple now has a date for it's groundbreaking, and Yigo Guam also has its groundbreaking, same design with some slight exterior distances to San Juan PR temple.
https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/temple-groundbreakings-announced--pocatello-guam?fbclid=IwAR2VDx9lC1GP75u9Af19hVgs7T7fUb2uQZJEINvUeIshB1Bz2HKzf5MMzjg
It seems like some of these temples are advancing very quickly. That's great. I am still waiting on Quito other 2016 and 17 announced temples to comencec.
I noticed the Pocatello Temple will be on Satterfield Drive. Any relation, TempleRick?
Also, Did anyone notice this article published earlier today, about a recent Ministry Tour b¿y Elder Anderson to the UK, France and VIENNA AUSTRIA.
Elder Andersen calls European Latter-day Saints 'defenders of the faith' after visit to UK, France and Austria.
https://www.thechurchnews.com/leaders-and-ministry/2019-02-01/elder-andersen-calls-european-latter-day-saints-defenders-of-the-faith-after-visit-to-uk-france-and-austria-48919
I know from following both Matts' Cumorah Foundation - Proposed Future Temple sites list, + James Stokes blogsite Proposed Temple Sites list..that both coincide with one of next probable sites selected in Europe Area would be : Vienna Austria.
Any thoughts about possibility of Elder Andersen visiting Vienna in search of possible locations?
You mean a fake border crisis developed to pander to a conservative base?
Yes, my family developed the area where the stake center is located.
It is horrible that the mass deletions of articles about the Church, its' leaders, and its' doctrine continues to occur on Wikipedia. When I last checked in there (earlier today to edit the list of temples of the Church), I was surprised to see so many deleted articles reported on my watchlist. Since it seems that appealing for more time to fix the issues with the articles as they now stand won't do any good, the one other ace in the sleeve that I know of is to appeal to the powers-that-be on either the admin noticeboard or the Wikimedia foundation's page. That approach may be a good route to pursue. If those of us who still edit Wikipedia can use the recent deletion discussions as an example of clear bias on the part of those nominating such articles for deletion, we might be able to prove such deletions were done with prejudice, and without any attempts at good-faith dialogue that would enable the articles to be kept as the "problems" with them are in the process of being repaired. That is what I would suggest trying next.
Chris, as you are probably aware, the UK is comprised of the nations of Great Britain, Scotland, and Ireland. I have mentioned previously that Vienna Austria and Edinburgh Scotland are on my list of temples that could be announced next April. Budapest Hungary could fit that category as well, according to my research. But additionally, just prior to both the April and October General Conferences held last year, members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles were on assignment in lands where some of the 19 temples were later announced. So it would not surprise me in any way to learn that, while in Europe, President Nelson might have asked Elder Andersen to scout out potential sites for future temples in Edinburgh and Vienna.
We may never find out whether or not that is the case. But what I do know is that for two temples announced during any General Conference to have a site identified, approval granted, and a groundbreaking scheduled within less than 8 months is almost unheard of. We also know that both the Yigo Guam and San Juan Puerto Rico Temples will be on the smaller side of the temple-building spectrum, and that the construction of each is anticipated to take roughly two years. So it appears President Nelson is attacking the queue of announced temples from both sides in a very methodical way. And while we have seen 5 groundbreakings that have occurred/are scheduled to occur thus far in 2019, my research shows that there may possibly be 1 or 2 additional temple groundbreakings at minimum, which are likely to be held by or before the end of June, and if the other half of the year is that outstanding or moreso, then the queue will be much clearer before the end of this year, even if (as I anticipate) several other temples are announced both in April and October of this year.
For those interested, I have provided more personal insight and analysis into the ongoing temple developments over the course of 3 of the 4 blog posts I composed and published on my blog during this afternoon and evening. With my thanks to Matt for continuing to allow me to share the address of my blog in my comments here on these threads, my thanks to Eric for referring you to my blog in his earlier comments, and my apologies to any of you who may be offended or bothered when I share the address of my blog, that address follows below.
http://stokessoundsoff.blogspot.com/
My thanks again to you all for continuing to provide insight and context into topics discussed here, and to Matt for his efforts to keep us all informed of the latest Church growth developments, while he also has been willing to allow the conversations on these threads to be so wide-ranging in their scope and breadth. Hope you know, Matt, how much your efforts have impacted me personally, and shaped my views of Church growth topics you have covered here.
Very excited to hear about the temple groundbreakings! That is now 5 temples which have had or are planned for groundbreakings this year. Add on Abidjan last November and that is 6 six since last conference. If Cape Verde is possibly expecting a groundbreaking announcement soon, I wouldn't be surprised if the design is similar to both Yigo and San Juan, but with a little exterior differences.
Chris, I think it is certainly possible that Elder Andersen may have been scouting some potential location for a temple in Vienna. Several of the cities that had temples announced recently were visited by President Nelson or another one of the Apostles some months prior to the temple announcements.
Unknown, I share the sentiment you voiced about the border crisis. Unlike many who are all-too-willing to buy into anything the US president says or does, I think that the particular "crisis" in relation to our border security was made moot by the fact that several government workers have shared their belief that being held hostage by the government over border security was not worth the pain and financial hardship it caused them and their families. I will leave my comments on this at that.
Rick, I have said before and will say again that it is awesome that the land for the Pocatello Idaho Temple plot was owned by your family. I know there are several pieces of land around the world which have been held in reserve by the Church for periods of various years before a temple is announced for such areas. But perhaps a combination of having land set aside for that purpose and the fact that the Church has a good relationship with most governmental leaders will enable many other temples to have the construction process begin in less than a year for many of the locations that have had/will have a temple announced. And that is exciting to see.
As I mentioned in another comment on this thread or elsewhere on this blog, if many of the Nelson-era temples are planned to be on the smaller side of the sliding scale for temple sizes, that opens a very real prospect that we may be in for at least another unprecedented increase in the number of operating temples within a very short period of time, which, from all that I've heard, is almost definitely going to occur. I am hoping and I fully believe that President Nelson may use one of his talks during either the April or October General Conference to detail his plans more fully, and that, whether he does that or not, we are sure to see many more temples announced during those two General Conferences. I look forward to seeing how all of that unfolds. Thanks again, everyone!
@Unknown: Certainly wish I could help with your 1400 names. However, I currently have about 300+ of my own that I'm working on. At least it'll keep us busy doing Temple work until the Millenium, right? ;)
But seriously folks, I appreciate James Andersen clarifying the rework of the Ordinances Ready program, as I hadn't known they were going to update the system so soon. I've seen a few of my names go through for baptisms and initiatories in the last few months, with a few more being printed each week. None of the endowments I've submitted to the temple system have been done yet, but I only started submitting last year.
I'm actually picking up where my mother left off. She was a career genealogist who submitted names up to the day she died (which I discovered by researching my grandmother's line on familysearch). Several of the names she submitted to the temple system have been completed in the last few years (she passed away 5 years ago), and I'm following up with the ones that are still incomplete - doing several of the sealings myself already.
You've probably already done this, Unknown, but one thing that's helped me has been to casually shop some of the printed endowment names around to ward member friends every few months or so. When they give me back the finished temple card, I just ask if they'd like to do another one for me, and I give them a few months to do it before asking them about it again. That's been working pretty well. I've also begun to contact closer relatives and friends of mine and email them the names through the Ordinances Ready system itself, and I've had a few takers.
I'm guessing if you're contacting us through this blog to get the names done that you've already tried my suggestions, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
Hopefully, the update to the system will help get your and my names out there to the world to be finished more quickly. All the new temples being built should help, too. ;)
@TempleRick
That's pretty cool. It seems your family name will be inextricably connected with temples for multiple positive reasons.
@Unknown:
I wish to clarify my earlier statement when I used the term "border crisis."
First of all, I'm not a Trump supporter, and I definitely don't support a border wall. I'm not a member of the Alt-Right, if that's who you're referring to by the term, "conservative base."
I do have many conservative political leanings, and many liberal ones as well, and for the first time in my life, I didn't vote Republican in the most recent national presidential election.
I have many friends who are immigrants to this country. Relatives, too. As I said above, my sister-in-law is Brazilian. Also my cousin married a Nigerian, her brother married a Filipina, their sister married a Mexican, and their other sister married a Samoan (very multicultural family now). ;)
On my Spanish-speaking mission, I taught mostly immigrants and refugees from Mexico, Cuba, Central and South America, etc.
So, I don't wish to be misrepresented as having some sort of bias against immigrants (illegal, legal, refugee, asylum-seekers or otherwise) when I use the term "border crisis."
When I used the term "border crisis," I was referring to our nation's current situation with dealing how people immigrate across our southern border with Mexico. I was particularly referring to the recent caravans of asylum-seekers coming from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.
The situation, as I see it, is how to help these people be successfully naturalized somewhere, whether it's here in the U.S., or in Mexico, or back in their home countries, while at the same time protecting our own citizens.
The Trump point of view, as I see it, is to treat refugees, asylum-seekers, and illegal immigrants as invaders, and to try to turn this country into some sort of medieval fortress, hoping that will keep them out. I see that plan as another Great Wall of China - doomed to fail.
The situation with our border with Mexico (whether exaggerated or not) has also been one of the main disputation points leading to the recent government shutdown.
So, when I use the term "crisis," I'm using one of its dictionary definitions, as "a time when a difficult or important decision must be made."
The important decision, as I see it, is how to better respond to people wanting to come into our country, even if there is a larger number than we're used to. Wars, refugees, and economic crises are a fact of life, we can't pretend the U.S. is an island that's only for the people who are already here. Many of our ancestors were immigrants, too (except my Native American great grandmother, of course). ;)
Increased border security? Yes, but in ways that are effective. Not some cartoon answer like building a giant wall. Reevaluating our citizenship process? Yes. Offering more work or education visas? Probably. Definitely protecting children through programs like DACA. Better cooperation between us and our southern neighbors on how we all can take responsibility for the issue? Definitely.
Sorry about taking the topic away briefly from Church growth, but I thought I needed to at least clarify my point of view.
Regarding family temple work, I went through my own massive push back in 2009 to try and get thousands of family names through the temple. I eliminated many thousands of duplicates (many names that I was frankly surprised that had already been done by someone else), and after divvying out what I could to relatives and ward members, I submitted the rest to the temple system. I created spreadsheets to track each name and I followed up to see when and where the ordinances were completed. It was fun to track the 100+ temples that completed the work. The only temples that weren't used were those in Asia and Ukraine, presumably because my names used the Roman alphabet? I seem to recall it took about 3 months for baptisms, confirmations, initiatories, and spousal sealings (at that time, the temple system did not do sealings in order) and about 6 months for female endowments, and one year for male endowments, and another 6 months to a year for parental sealings. Later, circa 2012, everything really ground to a halt, as the ordinances were only performed in my assigned temple (which alternated between Mesa, Billings, Phoenix, Bismarck, and back to Billings). I still have names that have been waiting 3+ years to be completed, so these new changes of going back to using the entire temple network is exciting.
According to science, the Ancestors of the Native Americans were immigrants as well. They claim they immigrated across the Bering Strait. According to church doctrine the native ancestors were also living among the Lamonites and Nephites. I mostly vote conservative, but have some liberal leanings. My wife is also an immigrant and my extended family is like a mini United Nations, very multicultural.
Having names found that have already been done is due to two reasons. The old extraction program and other members, unknown to you, having those persons as common ancestors.
From about 1967 to 2016, extraction was used to provide names for members to do in the temples. At its peak until the late 90s the ratio was 80% extracted names to 29% member submitted names. After the late 90s that proportion evened out then tipped towards member names. After 2015 everything has been member names since although Provo had some backlog batches of extracted names come through on occasion but that may be cleared out by now.
Heard that St. George since the first of the year has seen nearly every session full. I went to Provo City Center roughly three weeks ago on a Tuesday and did the 2pm session which was half full. Took longer for the men to finish up due to the ongoing issue of finding workers.
Utah temples are busiest after about 4pm weekdays and all day Saturdays generally anyway.
Saw reports of other temples being packed to the gills but that only gave Saturday information. What is everyone else seeing at their temple or the one they may have to go to do to theirs being renovated?
I attended a 10 AM endowment session yesterday at the Denver Colorado Temple. There was only one empty seat in the entire ordinance room. I was shocked since usually sessions are about half full (if that) on a weekday at mid-morning.
The Provo City Center Temple used to be my assigned temple and it really strugggles for workers because so many of the members in its district are students that only live there for a semester or two and then move into out of the district. That was the case for me. The sessions I attend at the Provo temple are almost always at least 3/4 full. I noticed that they were slightly more full in January after the statement from the first presidency about some changes- hopefully it stays that way.
Jordan River is my assigned temple. Since it has reopened, every time I have been (which usually a Friday morning or weekday evening) it is generally at least half to 3/4 full to almost entirely full. A couple months ago I went on an early Saturday morning and it was packed. I had to wait to attend the next session since the one I had planned on attending was completely full. The next session that I ended up being in was completely full as well and there were several people who had to wait, like I did, to attend the next session. That was before the recent changes when sessions were running every 30 minutes. Now, they are back to running every 20 minutes. I imagine with sessions that often, there are bound to be some that are busy and others that are less so. Depends on timing and when people get there.
Yesterday, I attended a session at the Oquirrh Mountain Temple with a friend in my ward and it was nearly full as well. This was in the mid-afternoon. By the time I finished and was preparing to leave, I overheard some people mentioning that the later afternoon sessions were filling up and people arriving were already planning for the evening sessions.
When my wife and I were living in the Mount Timpanogos Utah Temple district, that temple was desperate for additional ordinance workers to help with the degree of activity there. While weeknights and Saturdays were always very busy, the two shifts on which I worked (Thursday mid-day and Friday evening) provided two very different scenarios. For the former, the rooms were never very full, and my shift leaders, with the approval of the temple presidency, would periodically instruct us to wait on starting some of those sessions until there was a more significant number of people. But there were also times on Thursday when sessions were run with a smaller group. I remember a few that had 20 or less patrons, and there was also one particular session I can remember when there were less than 10 patrons.
By contrast, Friday evenings (and also Saturday) saw the Mount Timpanogos Utah Temple swamped more often than not. I have referenced previously how a couple of the busiest Friday evenings in that temple's history. Two different scenarios applied in such instances: the first and more favored approach was to have one or two extra sessions to deal with the amount of patrons. During such nights, my wife and I only returned home at around 11:00 or 11:30 PM. The second approach, which, if I recall correctly, we only used once or twice when it was deemed safe enough and more effective to do so, saw the final session of the night filled to overflowing. One particular session, which I have referenced before, went ahead with 115-120 patrons with the approval and sanction of the fire marshal, who instructed us on how to handle that while maintaining safety practices for all concerned.
But in addition to that, not only did the Mount Timpanogos Temple maintain activity at such a level that likely led to the announcement of the Saratoga Springs Utah Temple, but we often encountered patrons in attendance who had originally been in line at the Provo Utah Temple, but opted to leave that line and try our temple. And there were more than a few occasions I can remember where we had sufficient patrons waiting to the point where the chapel would be filled to capacity, and there were additional patrons waiting in the marriage waiting room, with the line continuing down both halls leading to the grand staircases, and, at the bottom of those sets of stairs, patrons were packed in from the dressing room entrances, on and up.
Every report I have seen seems to indicate that the Provo Utah Temple remains jam-packed, even with the 2016 dedication of the Provo City Center Temple. Once the Saratoga Springs Utah Temple is built and dedicated, that will ease some of the high activity levels at the Mount Timpanogos Teple, but given the redistricting that seems likely to happen, when that temple is dedicated, it is possible that many of the stakes here in Orem will be reassigned again to the Mount Timpanogos Utah Temple.
I hope these insights and this information is helpful to all who read it.
@Gnesileah
That's a good idea. I need to make a spreadsheet.
@James Anderson
The last time I attended the Ogden Temple in DecemberI did sealings. That was relatively full. There was another family already in there, and some others, so I stayed until we all had finished the stack of names we'd brought. Took about two hours but we got through 40 to 60 names.
As far as endowments, I haven't had a chance to go since the recent change, but my sister and brother in law have been, and they said the wait was one to two hours to get into the session in Ogden. They went the week after the announcement, though.
On the Wikipedia front I have taken up to looking for more information on past aposltes. I found a biography of Willard Richards. It was published in 1957 by the University of Utah press. One drawback though is the author though she used lots of sources, does not reference them super well. She also goes beyond the sources a little including some notes on the thoughts of Willard's father on what may be the day Willard was baptized in the local congregational church.
What would be nice is if someone could find some better sourcing for the article on Charles W. Penrose.
Yes, it was family's land.
Kenneth Godfrey wrote a book entitled ''Charles W. Penrose: His Life and Thought''. This is probably the best work, that would help us towards covering more of Penrose. He was one of the most prolific writers in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the late 19th cnetury, and a moving force in Utah politicis in the late 19th-century. Worldcat only lists two copies of this work by Godfrey, one at the BYU library, the other at the Utah State University library. It is not available on Amazon. I did find a BYU Studies article by Godfrey on Penrose's British mission years. I am trying to use it to improve the article.
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