With the passing of Thomas S. Monson, next in line Russell M. Nelson is set to become president of the LDS Church in the coming days or weeks. Nelson will be the first church president ordained to the apostleship in my life time (I was three) and his the first First Presidency sans Monson since 1985. A former president of the Society for Vascular Surgery and a director of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery, Nelson will be the first LDS church president to have had a career of national standing outside of church service since Ezra Taft Benson, who had been U.S. Secretary of Agriculture. At age 93 only Joseph Fielding Smith will have been older at the time of his ordination to the office (he was 94). Nelson will be the 8th church president born in Utah.