The most exciting development with new general authorities is the first African-American general authority, Peter Matthew Johnson. Elder Johnson is not the first black general authority. That was Elder Helvicio Martins from Brazil. Elder Martins however is dead. Elder Johnson is not even the only current black general authority. Elder Joseph W. Sitati from Kenya and Elder Edward Dube from Zimbabwe are both black. Elder Johnson grew up in the borough of Queens in New York City. I believe he is the first gneral authority to have grown up there since Elder Hales. That is where similarities end. Elder Johnson and his brother were in a rap group. They would perform at weddings, high school dances and block parties. When he was 14 a violent event happened at a rap gathering he was at. In this talk https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/peter-m-johnson_faith-family-friendship/ he does not go into it. Shortly after that he moved to live with his mother in Hawaii. In Hawaii Elder Johns...
This time I promise to actually provide the promised article instead of talk of Akwa Ibom and Benin City. The Church may seem to the quick observer to be run by bishoprcis and branch presidencies and a level up by stake presidencies. While these groups have a role, they are not the only group and maybe not even the main group. I remember a talk when I was about 10 that explained who ran the church at a functional local level. The talk is outdated, but why is key to Monsonian and Nelsonian reforms. The former of course were in some part incluenced by President Nelson since he was a member of the 12 during all the time President Monson was President of the Church. In fact President Nelson was a member of the 12 the whole time President Monson was in the first presidency and then some time. So in about 1989 I was told the church at the local level was largely moved forward by the weekly meetings of the Priesthood Executive Council. This was in many ways true at the time, although in...
Here https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2019/10/14/stuart-c-reid-oaks-does/ is a well balanced article written for the Salt Lake Tribune defending the teachings of President Dallin H. Oaks, specifically his well thought-out talk to the General Women's Meeting in General Conference. Reid presents a well reasoned argument. What he never deals with is the reasons behind Riess's hateful attacks on President Oaks for his talk. To understand what is fully going on one has to realize in the past Riess has attacked President Packer for his comments on LGBT issues in general conference. The best theory is that Riess is not in accord with or agreement with the teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on sexuality. She should stop pretending, as she did with her earlier reactions to President Packer, and just admit that she does not view the leaders of the Church as inspired men, clearly does not believe the Book of Mormon is the revealed word of God in a...
Comments
Post a Comment