The Reform of the Church under Russell M. Nelson

It is a bit hard to yet assess the Nelsonian reforms.

Some of this is a result of the Church being run be commitee, in a deliberate way in which no changes are made without consultation.

One thing that is clear, is that the Nelsonian reforms connect to those under Thomas S. Monson.

It is hard to figure exactly where to start tracking the current changes. Another related issue is that many changes are minor, incremental, and sometime hard for Church members let alone those not in the Church to figure out.

The start of the current system can largely be traced to the publication of the current Church Handbook of Instructions. The changes in there are at times complex. The main thrust was to try to shift some responsibilities from the bishop and the bishopric to the ward council. At the same time the ward acativities committee was scapped. In part this was because the committee often would create activities for its own purposes and neither consider the overall needs of the ward nor incoprate the ward into these activities. There are probably other changes, but those are the ones I can explain easiest.

The next big change I think is the introduction of the new curriclum for the youth sunday school classes and seminary and young men/young women. Although I only think this pre-dates the major shift in the age for missionaries.

The new curriculums emphasize more collaborative work and less the teacher just imparting information. On the other hand to some it can tend towards being more repetative than the old curriculum.

The missionary age change is very, very big. For elders not so much, though some. It makes it easier for many to go, and it gives more flexability in when to go. For sisters it is a huge plus. It makes it possible to finish a mission much younger, and makes it possible for many more to go. Weather its net effect is to make it so women in the Church are younger or older when they get married is hard to impossible to track. Since the marriage age has in general been rising for various factors, even if the marriage age in the Church has risen since the missionary age change, that would not show causation.

At this point we get a few other changes. First the church began to have women give prayers in general conference. However I am not sure if any of the prayers in the most recent conference were given by women. Although, what this most emphsizes is that while the talks are written and published, the prayers are not. This is part of why I think this issue has been over publizied by many.

The next set of changes largely result from the missionary age change and the connected rise in the number of sister missionaries. First, the role of the companion (wife) of the mission president was given a more formal setting in the way the mission works. At the same time the zone leaders council was replaced by the mission council. This council involved the mission presidents companion having a formal role. Also, the role of coordinating sister was created.

Next came the revision of the institute curriculum. The move from having the scriptures themselves to a new set up as the main curriculum was unpopular with some. However it generally increased understanding of the way the Church is run.

At this point I think we can start with the 2017 changes. Some of these point to why I cannot easily see a major break from Monsonian to Nelsonian reforms.

The first 2017 reform I can think of is the ending of sponsoring of explorer and varsity programs for the 14-17 year old young men. I have to admit that I do not understand exactly how much the programs for 14-17 year olds have changed, but it was the first step to leaving the scouts.

Other changes in 2017 included the announcment of allowing priests to officiate in baptisms for the dead, the change of the priesthood preview program for 11-year-old boys to priesthood and temple preview for 11-year-old boys and girls. Then of course there was the reformating of the melchizedke priesthood/relief society curriculum. This is a major set of cahgnes. Also there was the announcment that priesthood meeting and the general women's meeting would alternate April and October.

2018 has already seen many changes. The new letters on abuse make it clear that no Church leader should ever encourage anyone to stay in anabusive relationship or discourage reporting abuse. They also say those who report abuse should be believed. What is less clear is how much this is really a change from anti-abuse policies dating back at least to 1994 and stringent rules against those with sexual abuse of children on their record ever working with children.

There were some big changes though. The multiple adults working with youth was extended to all females and not just males. Policies for youth and women to interview not alone were put in place, but it is less clear how much this was a change and how much this was publicizing.

General Conference has major changes. The calling of an Asian-American and a Latin American apostle were the most hyped, but not the biggest changes.

The first major change was the end of high priest groups. In my branch the actual affect is less than clear. However it is a big change and move toward unity in most of the Church. Next, the replacement of home and visiting teaching with ministering is very, very big. It will take a while to understand, but it moves from focused reporting to braod goals.

Next in May we have the announcment of the end of the Church's relationship with the Boy Scouts of America. If there is a misunderstood change, it is this. The goal here is two fold. 1-to make a unified international program. 2-to make the programs for boys and girls more unform.

June sees a few changes, although some are more hype than real. Plans for a new hymnbook and children's songbook are announced. However this involved a 2019 deadline for new hymn submissions, and plans for a unified hymnbook in each language. Although this somewhat existed, for example "israel, Israel, God is Calling" and its French equivalent are both hymn 6 at present.

The Church announced new adult and primary curriculm. I have to admit that I have not yet understood that much. As a Sunday School president, I need to soon.

The new mission presidents seminary was renamed the new mission leaders seminar. This emphasized the key role of the mission presidents compaions (wife). I am not sure if this is more than a symantic change. The seminar was also shortened, and the role of the aposltes and first presidency in running it seems to have increased.

The Church also made much more public the questions asked of youth in limited use temple recomends and other questions, although I have not discerned any actual policy changes there.

Our Great Leader: Russell M. Nelson

I feel like we have not had enough coverage of Russell M. Nelson. I also have a sense of not understanding him very well.

I read the biography of President Nelson by Spencer J. Condie back about when it came about in 2003 or so. That means it has been 15 years.

President Nelson was a very important person in the rise of modern heart surgery. I am not sure anyone who can express this issue eloquently has done it enough coverage.

President Nelson was the moving force behind the expansion of the Church into eastern Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s. He has also made many, many visits to countries such as Kenya, Mozambique, Ghana and on and on.

Unlike most other current members of the quorum of the 12, President Nelson was never resident outside the US as a general authority. He was stationed in Korea and Japan while working in Army medical during the Korean War, although that was a investigative and moving assignment. He is also fluent in Mandarin. I am not sure what other languages he is fluent in.

The real internationalization of Church leadership

 some would argue that the Church first went global no later the 1970s when Neal A. Maxwell and the Church Board of Education decided instead of having Americans run the Church Educational System worldwide, they would proactively recruit people from various countries and as much as possible have the Church Educational System run by locals. This is why Elder uceda, Elder Taylor Godoy, Elder De Hoyos and Elder Dube among LDS general authroties from outside the US all spent their careers running the Church's supplemental weekday religious education programs (seminaries and institutes) in their various countries, or at least as full-time Church employees running it. Elder De Hoyos may have never run it for more than Mexico. Elder Uceda I am not 100% sure on what the area he oversaw was exactly. Elder Godoy was last running the Church Educational System in his native Peru, plus Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela. Elder Dube ran it in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi. The data on this issue is hard to find, but I have the impression that basically all international areas had locals running the Church Educational System at all levels, at a time when the Presiding Bishopric which oversees properties of the Church and distribution of funds and other physical operational activities was often relying more on Americans sent abroad. Thus the person who recruited Elder Soares into working as a fulltime employee of the LDS Church as Brazil South Area auditor in the 1990s was an American working as the head of temproal affairs in the Brazil Area at a time when the CES had been run by Brazilians for over 20 years. Elder Michael J. Teh, the only current general authority seventy from the Philippines, spent his career working for the Church. He was head of member and statistical records for the Philluipines Area and before that had worked as temple recorder. So less focused on fiancial issues than Soares, but not in a position where he worked directly with the teaching of Church doctrines, as were Dube, De Hoyos, Uceda and Godoy (plus Elder Paul Johnson from the US, not to mention Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the 12, although Holland since he was a religion professor at BYU came up from a slightly more acdemic pathway than some of the others), Elder Tanuiel B. Wakolothe only general authority seventy to date from Fiji, spent his early career as a police officer. However he was head of the Church's Fiji Service Center before becoming a mission president (in Arkansas, but that is another story). I have not yet figured out if this service center was involved in tracking land records, distributing lesson materials, or a place where employment and other services were given, or maybe even both.

Why the New York Times obituary for Thomas S. Monson was a travesty

The New York Times obituary for Thomas S. Monson missed the fact that he was a man known as a speaker, a great speaker, and a man who loved the poor, the elderly, the widow and reached out to the one.

Beyond this the article contained downright falsehoods.

This might not be so bad if all New York Times obituaries were hatchet jobs against the subject. Most are not. Here https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/sports/baseball/05harwell.html is an example of what the New York Times normally produces. Long obituaries with lots of details.

However with the rise of Kellerism do not hold your breath to see a balanced and humanizing obituary of any conservative religious leader anytime soon.

Rusell M. Nelson: A witness to the world

It is hard to quantify, but President Nelson is possibly the most heavily traveled president of the Church to date. He has clearly spent more time in the nations of Eastern Euriope and Africa than President Hinckley did. although with how much President Hinckley traveled to Asia during his early time as a general authority and everywhere as President of the Church, President Nelson may not have yet traveled as much.

On the other hand, President Nelson did spent significant time in both Japan and Korea in the early 1950s. He visited every MASH location in Korea, and many other locations as well. As a medical doctor he traveled and made presentations all around the world.

Even back in 1974 President Nelson as general president of the Sunday School traveled to what was then Rhodesia on a Church assignment. His visit to Harare, Zimbabwe yesterday as part of his golbal ministry tour was at least his third visit to that city. He also went there in 2004 when he spoke at a stake conference, where the then stake president Edward Dube lamented that only 75% of his stake members showed up. Most stakes wish that 75% of the members entered a Church building even once a year.

In 1992 President Nelson dedicated Zambia for the preaching of the gospel. Weather he also was in Zimbabwe at all during that trip I do not know. It appears that this is the 3rd or 4th trip on the part of President Nelson to Zimbabwe.

Interestingly enough, no president of the Church has ever traveled to Francophone Africa while President.

Why the fall of Joseph L. Bishop does not worry me

The simple answer is of course, my faith is in Jesus Christ, I know men fail.

However the bigger answer is that God gives people agency, and allows them to misues it, to lie and to decieve. The gift of discernment does not mean false brethren and wolves in sheep clothing never have appointments in the Church. Otherwise Joseph Smith would have never put so much trusts in John C. Bennett, and Brigham Young would not have had to send Lorenzo Snow, Ezra T. Benson and Joseph F. Smith to Hawaii to remove Walter Gibson after he received communication from Jonathan Napela and probably other faithful Hawaiian brethren who reazlized that Gibson's actions, such as selling the priesthood, were not only out of line from the message they had learned from missionaries such as George Q. Cannon, but clearly violated the teachings of the Book of Mormon and New Testament. If there was ever a man who engaged in priestcraft in the Mormon Church it was Gibson, and Napela as the co-translator of the Book of Mormon into the Hawaiian langauge would clearly have realized that Gidson was guilty of this great evil.

Beyond this, the exact nature of Joseph L. Bishop's crimes are not clear. What he confessed to Robert E. Wells is less than clear. It seems alleged that while a missionary, presumably in the 1950s, Joseph Bishop confessed to his mission president inapropriate relations with females. To what extent these would fall under abuse of power and sexual harrassment is very hard to say, and what exactly he confessed, let alone what exatly he did is less than clear.

Some indications, such as one Deseret News article, suggest that while mission president in Argentina Bishop had some sort of connection with a woman that was not fully in line with the law of chastity especially for a married man. The exact nature of this relation is not clear, nor why it did not lead to his being released and excommunicated. The fact it didn't makes me think that at least the way he conveyed it to Elder Wells did not rise to the level of adultery.

The suit also attacks Bishop for his time as president of Weber State College (now University). I read the whole Ogden Standard-Examiner report on those accusations. It involves saying he was unethical, a bad example of a Church member, and some people felt he was dismissive of female employees, well one, and claims he tried to hound out lesbian students or something along those lines. It is not very clear at all. Two major problems with including that in the law suit. Trying to protray those actions as in any way a red flag that Bishop was likely to abuse power, sexually harrass and allegedly rape is a major stretch, and only vaguely works by 2018 definitions, not 1978 definitions. Beyond this, the suit avoids admitting that especially in Utah state educational institutions and hyper intent on showing distance from the LDS Church, so it is not clear the LDS Church could have obtained any direct information from Weber State.

When and how Bishop's accuser shared her claims is also a major point of contention. A man who apparently was her bishop in the 1980s only states that she told him the MTC president took her and her companion to a basement room in the MTC and showed them pornographic videos. His dismissal of this as a non-believable story is not the right reaction. However, that as a single incident as it seems to have been described would not constitute sexual harrassment per say, although it is clearly a violation of the rules and norms of the LDS Church, especially for mission leadership. Now if the woman had included other allegations of what Bishop did during this time, either sexually explicit actions or statements, or even how he looked at them, it might rise to sexual harrassment, but showing a pornographic video on one occasion does not in and of itself constitute sexual harrassment, especially as the term was understood in the 1980s.

What if anything the woman ever told Carlos E. Asay is not knowable, since he is dead and if he met with her he never made any report of it to any other person with the Church leadership.

On the other hand, in 2010 the Church reported the issue to police. Due to various factors the police only focused on the current threat, not the then 26 year old rape allegations. In 2017 a report was given to the BYU police, who then forwarded it to the Utah County Prosecutor's office. In this case it was seen as a criminal probe against Bishop. However although at least these people felt the accusations were credible, they did not pursue criminal charges due to the statute of limitations on rape in the 1980s.

What Bishop ever admitted to is still contested. Bishop's son says the only thing Bishop admits to is that the woman exposed her breasts to him at a meeting they had after her service as a missionary. What is not clear from this is weather anyone has followed up on this admission with intensive questions of Bishop to see if he touched her at all in any way during this exchange. If she voluntarily exposed herself after she was a missionary, with no prompting from him, and he responded by touching her exposed breats, would this count as a sex crime. If a man and woman are standing in close proximity and the women trears open her shirt in a suggestive way, is consent to touch assumed, at least in a tentative way, or is there a need for clear consent.

Now there is a claim by BYU police that Bishop told them he asked the woman to expose her breasts. The woman claims rape. What did actually happen is one big question.

The other issue is her suit seems to be proceeding on the grounds that the LDS Church not excommunicating Bishop is somehow an actionable tort for the woman. The very reasoning of the logic, that you can sue to financially punish a Church for not imposing excomunication on someone, is highly questionable.

A non-white apostle

Elder Garret W. Gong is by almost no definition white. On the other hand, as an American of Chinese descent, he is excluded from most definitions of "underserved" and "underrepresented" minorities, and would be discrimanted against by most quota and affirmative action programs.

Elder Gong is clearly an American. Both of his parents were born in the US, so he is more American than David O. McKay and Joseph F. Smith and well as John Taylor, just to list presidents of the Church he exceeds in Americaness. If we look at apostles, his most recent immigrant ancestor may or may not have come more recently than David A. Bednar's. He is clearly more American than Dale E. Rendlund, both of whose parents were immigrants.

Also, President Eyring's father was born in Mexico, whith Mexican citizenship, and his great-grandfather, the one who met his Swiss great-grandmother in the company moving west when he was sick after a long mission in the realm of the Cherokee, was known as Enrique Eyring at the time of his death.

While Elder Gong's mother was not born in a state, that is because Hawaii was not yet a state at the time of her birth. His father was born in Merced where Elder Gong's grandparents, like many other Chinese-Americans, were small business owners, I can't remember for sure if it was a dry cleaners or restaurant they ran. On his father's side his ancestors came from China in the 19th-century. When his ancestors came to Hawaii on his mother's side is less clear.

Elder Gong's wife, Sister Susan Lindsay Gong, is the daughter of Richard P. Lindsay who was managing director of the Church's public affairs department for much of the 1980s and later a general authority sevcenty. Elder Lindsay has since died.

Elder Gong served his mission in Taiwan, was a Rhodes Schoolar after graduating from BYU, dated his wife while visiting Provo on a summer off from Oxford while his father, a professor at San Jose State University was a visiting professor at BYU. Walter Gong gave courses to faculty that influenced Stephen R. Covery enough that he quotes Walter Gong in 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Elder Gong was on the factulty at Johns Hopkins, then worked for the US government both with an assignment to the embassy in Beijing and as an outside consultant with a think tank connected with George Washington University.

Elder Gong thus becomes the second apostle born in California, second only to Elder Bednar. Both were born in California, went to BYU, and spent their adult life first as a professor/government consultant in the US east of the Rocky mountains, and then came to the intermountain west with an assignment with a Church institution of higher education. Elder Bednar was a business professor and then president of Ricks. His career involves much more understandable roles.

Elder Gong was involved in foriegn policy development circles, and his Wikipedia article lists several papers he wrote. What he actually did is not always easy to understand, partly because of the sensitive nature of some foriegn policy discussion. If I understood what he said at a forum on the pros and cons of going to war in Iraq I went to in 2003 that he spoke at at BYU, he was involved with some government bodies that analized the appropriate response to the actions of North Korea.

Where Elder Bednar was president of Ricks College and then BYU-Idaho, Elder Gong was assistant to the President of BYU for planning and assessment. He served as such with both President Bateman and President Samuelson.