If anyone watched the BYU football game last night approximately half of U. Of Phoenix Stadium were dressed in white or blue as BYU supporters. Arizona is such a strong area for LDS; my group of 8 elders going to Chile in 1990 had two from Mesa and another from Phoenix. The 2 from Mesa knew people in common but amazing the #s around there, even not counting LDS. The three temples of greater Phoenix are unusual because only Utah has communities where there ate two or more temples strung together. Lima Peru will become the third. Mexico City should become like that, and I guess if Campinas is considered a part of greater Sao Paulo then that city also counts. Maybe now Meridian also counts with Bosie as well. Not bad.
Some of those supporters include my former mission president from serving in Phoenix they are having a reunion down there this weekend, and ones in rexburg and Provo later this month. Arizona is not that far away to do things like that.
Here's a surprising find. Hopefully these gross fabrications about the LDS Church don't cause lasting damage:
"Gülen movement ‘founded by CIA like the Mormons and Scientologists,’ says Turkish prosecutor."
"A Turkish prosecutor probing the financial links of the Fethullah Gülen movement has said the organizational structure of the group is the same as the Mormon Church and the Church of Scientology in the United States, claiming that all three groups were founded by U.S. intelligence.
"The CIA organizes these sects as non-governmental organizations in order “to make changes to society,” read the indictment prepared Zafer Dur, a prosecutor in the Aegean province of İzmir.
"The system that the Gülenists have built over years up in the education, heath, political, technology and culture sectors aims at the same thing as these churches, Dur said."
"SALT LAKE CITY, Utah — The LDS Church responded Monday to Russia's new law that forbids public missionary work by changing the assignments of 30 of the 77 volunteers who had been learning Russian at the MTC.
""The church has reassigned 30 volunteers in the Provo Missionary Training Center who were originally called to serve in Russia," said Eric Hawkins, spokesman for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "These volunteers were reassigned to serve in different missions in Russia or to other Russian-speaking missions in Eastern Europe. The remaining 47 volunteers currently in the MTC will proceed to their originally assigned missions in Russia."
"Hawkins said the new anti-terrorism law decreased the need for Mormon volunteers in the country. The law, passed in June, requires any proselytizing to happen within houses of worship, effective July 20. In mid-July, the LDS Church changed the roles of those serving missions in Russia. It also instructed mission presidents and families of missionaries who had been or would be serving in Russia to refer to them as volunteers instead of missionaries."
The absurdity of the link between the Mormon Church and the CIA based on the Mormon church predating the CIA by more than 100 years was used in arguments filed with the government by faithful Church members in Ghana during the dark days of the freeze in 1990, if I remember one such brother named John Mensah and living in Kumasi, having been a faithful follower of the Book of Mormon since long before he was able to be baptized, and I believe maybe even one of the original incorporators of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints back in 1968, 10 years before anyone in the country was actually baptized in the Church.
These presenting of arguments to the government by Mensah and others were all the more daring since some people were sent to prison during the dark days of the freeze for identifying with the LDS Church. Fortunately the Freeze only last 18 months, still 18 months without not being able to meet as branches, only having family services to take the sacrament, was a trying and disruptive time.
Today to use a Ghanaian phrase the Church in Ghana is "Walking in the sand", the two stakes created in 1991, on the same day, making Ghana one of only two countries where the first two stakes were organized on the same day. Today there are 17 stakes and 11 districts. The two stakes in Kumasi are the largest by number of units of any in the entire world. Gospel literature is available in at least two of the local languages of Ghana, although there are languages with essentially 1 million speakers that the Church does not even have a branch in the home land of. North-central Ghana has only been reached by the Church in the last 3 years, and the north-west and north-east still remain unreached, at least they still lack any branches.
Will Brazil get 2 million members of the church? And when?
ReplyDeleteIf anyone watched the BYU football game last night approximately half of U. Of Phoenix Stadium were dressed in white or blue as BYU supporters. Arizona is such a strong area for LDS; my group of 8 elders going to Chile in 1990 had two from Mesa and another from Phoenix. The 2 from Mesa knew people in common but amazing the #s around there, even not counting LDS.
ReplyDeleteThe three temples of greater Phoenix are unusual because only Utah has communities where there ate two or more temples strung together. Lima Peru will become the third. Mexico City should become like that, and I guess if Campinas is considered a part of greater Sao Paulo then that city also counts.
Maybe now Meridian also counts with Bosie as well. Not bad.
Some of those supporters include my former mission president from serving in Phoenix they are having a reunion down there this weekend, and ones in rexburg and Provo later this month. Arizona is not that far away to do things like that.
ReplyDeleteContinued Church growth in Ivory Coast is very encouraging.
ReplyDeleteIs there any indication if progress is being made on the building of the temple in Abijan?
At the BYU vs Arizona football game on September 3,2016, there were 30,000 BYU fans mainly from Arizona, but also about 5,000 from out of state.
ReplyDeleteHere's a surprising find. Hopefully these gross fabrications about the LDS Church don't cause lasting damage:
ReplyDelete"Gülen movement ‘founded by CIA like the Mormons and Scientologists,’ says Turkish prosecutor."
"A Turkish prosecutor probing the financial links of the Fethullah Gülen movement has said the organizational structure of the group is the same as the Mormon Church and the Church of Scientology in the United States, claiming that all three groups were founded by U.S. intelligence.
"The CIA organizes these sects as non-governmental organizations in order “to make changes to society,” read the indictment prepared Zafer Dur, a prosecutor in the Aegean province of İzmir.
"The system that the Gülenists have built over years up in the education, heath, political, technology and culture sectors aims at the same thing as these churches, Dur said."
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/Default.aspx?pageID=517&nID=103419&NewsCatID=341
Mormon Church established: 1830
ReplyDeleteCIA established: 1947
Right?? Neither the Turkish article nor the major publication that referenced it bothered to include that simple fact check.
ReplyDeleteFrom a Deseret News article:
ReplyDelete"SALT LAKE CITY, Utah — The LDS Church responded Monday to Russia's new law that forbids public missionary work by changing the assignments of 30 of the 77 volunteers who had been learning Russian at the MTC.
""The church has reassigned 30 volunteers in the Provo Missionary Training Center who were originally called to serve in Russia," said Eric Hawkins, spokesman for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "These volunteers were reassigned to serve in different missions in Russia or to other Russian-speaking missions in Eastern Europe. The remaining 47 volunteers currently in the MTC will proceed to their originally assigned missions in Russia."
"Hawkins said the new anti-terrorism law decreased the need for Mormon volunteers in the country. The law, passed in June, requires any proselytizing to happen within houses of worship, effective July 20. In mid-July, the LDS Church changed the roles of those serving missions in Russia. It also instructed mission presidents and families of missionaries who had been or would be serving in Russia to refer to them as volunteers instead of missionaries."
The absurdity of the link between the Mormon Church and the CIA based on the Mormon church predating the CIA by more than 100 years was used in arguments filed with the government by faithful Church members in Ghana during the dark days of the freeze in 1990, if I remember one such brother named John Mensah and living in Kumasi, having been a faithful follower of the Book of Mormon since long before he was able to be baptized, and I believe maybe even one of the original incorporators of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints back in 1968, 10 years before anyone in the country was actually baptized in the Church.
ReplyDeleteThese presenting of arguments to the government by Mensah and others were all the more daring since some people were sent to prison during the dark days of the freeze for identifying with the LDS Church. Fortunately the Freeze only last 18 months, still 18 months without not being able to meet as branches, only having family services to take the sacrament, was a trying and disruptive time.
Today to use a Ghanaian phrase the Church in Ghana is "Walking in the sand", the two stakes created in 1991, on the same day, making Ghana one of only two countries where the first two stakes were organized on the same day. Today there are 17 stakes and 11 districts. The two stakes in Kumasi are the largest by number of units of any in the entire world. Gospel literature is available in at least two of the local languages of Ghana, although there are languages with essentially 1 million speakers that the Church does not even have a branch in the home land of. North-central Ghana has only been reached by the Church in the last 3 years, and the north-west and north-east still remain unreached, at least they still lack any branches.