Some Thoughts on General Conference

So the October conference has ended, and turns out I was wrong in my predictions regarding the new appointee’s to the First Presidency and the Twelve. Elder Bednar was not named Second Councilor despite where he was sitting at Women’s Conference. Instead another Hinckley appointee to the Twelve was chosen to fill the position opened by Presidents Faust’s recent passing. Apostle Henry B. Eyring, a Fmr. President of Rick’s college and two time Church Commissionaire of Education, was called to that post. Eyring had been President Hinckley’s first appointment to the Twelve following the latter’s ascendancy to the Church presidency in 1995, and filling the vacancy occasioned by the death of Church President Howard W. Hunter, following a mear nine months in that office. Eyring is the son of famed Chemist Henry Eyring, who wrote the book ‘Faith of a Scientist’. President Eyring’s formative years where spent in Princeton, New Jersey where his father taught, and where a small branch of Mormons meet in his family’s home.

The vacancy in the Twelve was filled by Quentin L. Cook of the Seventy, who is not to be confused with the more well known (until yesterday) Gene R. Cook. The appointment of Elder Cook took me by surprise because I don’t know anything about him, I mean I’d heard the name but that was about all. In fact Elder Cook was obscure enough not to have had a Wikipedia entry on Saturday morning, by Saturday evening however he had one. It turns out Elder Cook was born in Logan Utah in 1940, served a mission to England during the early 1960's, and his business career was spent as a corporate attorney in California, where he also served 14 years as a volunteer city attorney in the San Francisco area. Elder Cook doesn’t have an overwhelming presence and thus his initial address didn’t leave me with any strong impressions, other then that he seems like a throughly decent man. He’ll doubtless grow in the office.

As far as other themes go this conference a number of the talks seemed address perhaps more to the media and non-Mormons then to the membership at large. This was alluded to several times when speakers in their remarks made statements along the lines of: ‘There has been a recent increase in media interest in the Church do to the presence of prominent members on the national stage’ (read Mitt Romney, and maybe Harry Reid), or ‘It is important that we define ourselves and not allow others to do so’ (alluding to common mis-characterizations about the faith by non-believers). Elder M. Russell Ballerd gave a talk concerning some basic information about the Church non-members frequently want to know. Elder Jeffery R. Holland defended the Christianity of the Church’s non Trinitarian conception of the Godhead. While Elder Russell M. Nelson gave a sermon on the Biblical justification for some distinctive Mormon doctrines.
In fact Elder Nelson was also involved in one of the more memorable events to occur at this conference. Ninety year old Apostle Joseph B. Wurthlin started to have a spastic shaking fit about five minutes into his sermon, this kind of thing sometimes happens when very elderly people stand for atypically long periods of time. In response Elder Nelson got up from his seat and steaded Elder Wurthlin so he could complete his talk. It was very sweet, and reminded me of a few other incidents from earlier conferences, including Howard W. Hunter’s famed stumble at the pulpit, and the time Elder David. B. Haight couldn’t think of the term ‘mustered seed’ until President Hinckley prompted him from behind (Elder Haights memorably good humored response to this aid was: "Thank you President. I keep the President around for occasions such as these."). I mean the top councils of the Church may seem to many like just a lot of old men administering a large bureaucracy (which they in fact largely are), but there’s a great sense of brotherhood about them that is inescapable if you watch there interaction for any protracted period of time. They really love one another.

Finally there were several talks that included stories about members of the Church who helped non-members in some important way, but that aid did not result in the conversion of the persons helped (or at least such a conversion was not explicitly mentioned). One was a talk by President Monson, the First Councilar in the First Presidency, who told the story of a non-Mormon childhood friend of his who was killed in World War II. Shortly after learning of his friends death Bro. Monson went to visit the deceased mother to offer some comfort, he assured her that her son continued to live on in the next world. Years later at the April 1969 General Conference, Elder Monson (by that time an Apostle) gave a sermon entitled "Mrs. Patten, Arthur Lives", in which he addressed the dear women, whom he hadn’t seen in decades, and reiterated what he had said before. Through a perhaps unlikely series of events, the non-Mormon Mrs. Patten heard the broadcast at the home of some LDS neighbors in California where she then lived. Shortly there after she wrote Elder Monson a letter expressing her gratitude for the talk, and how his words had brought her some real comfort and peace about the issue of her son’s eternal state. Had she joined the Church President Monson would most likely have mentioned this in his story, but he did not. Likewise another sermon contained a story of how Church founder Joseph Smith had once taken a poor boy into his home and helped him to find the lost brother he was seeking. Again no ‘conversion ending’ is given to this story, just a Church member doing good for someone regardless of faith, and that being a virtue in an of its self. Of course that should all be simple Christian logic, but with the emphasis on conversion in the outreach efforts of Church members, its important that we be reminded that doing good is its own reward, the recipients of our good deeds don’t need to join our Church for our efforts to have been worthwhile. I’m thankful that important message was relayed to us through this recent conference.

I quite enjoyed Conference this year, it was the first time since my mission that I have been able to catch all five sessions (I’ve typically worked on Saturday’s). I felt a real positive energy and tried to keep some rudimentary notes. I actually look forward for the Conference issue of the ‘Ensign’ (official Church magazine) and a chance to examine some of these sermons in more detail. I may include greater analysis of some of these sermons in future blog posts.