Member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Michigan

We just had stake conference in the Bloomfield Hills Michigan Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints this weekend. It was truly a day in Zion. I have been called to invite others to come and see and come and share and to take a name to the temple. The latter I will do with the name of one of my wife's relatives. I was so glad to hear from Elder Peter M. Johnson of the 70 who made mention of being from New York, and the trouble of moving to the dry climate of Utah including having to work extra hard on his 'fro. Elder Johnson is the only African-American general authority (not the only black one though, Elder Sitati and Elder Dube are clearly black, African, just not in any way shape means or form American). The most moving talk was by a girl who just turned 12 last month. I wish I had had the vision of temple envolvement when I was her age. The failure to find as many names is partly due to a harder process, little internet access (we didn't get intern...

Well, I have learned a little more on Elder Johnson. His wife is white. How did I learn this because ComeuntoChrist.org has this video  https://www.mormon.org/video-peter-johnson-on-prophets I also learned a little more of his children. A recent Deseret News article on Elder Johnson linked to this article  https://www.deseretnews.com/article/865673983/Two-sisters-at-SUU-a-walk-on-at-USU-and-other-returned-Mormon-missionaries-in-college-basketball.html  That article does mention "Peter Johnson" as the father of Whitney and Kiana Johnson on the SUU basketball team, and mentions both were returned missionaries, serving in Mexico and Cape Verde. The photos make it clear that the Johnson sisters are at least partly African-American. Still with Peter a marginally common name and Johnson being one of the three most common names in the US without the link from the other Deseret News article I would not have been positive there was a link.

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...