OCR Text |
Show PRESIDENT BRINGS MESSAGE OE PEACE HEAD OF CHURCH DECLARES CHURCH IS AT PEACE WITH ALL THE WORLD. Cpening Session of Annual Conference Confer-ence of Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is Held on Easter Sunday. ,v Salt Lake City. With the presence of. nearly--' all the general authorities of the church, and a large and enthusiastic en-thusiastic crowd,' the opening session of the eighty-fifth annual conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was held on Easter Sunday,- the' first time, in twenty-ight twenty-ight years that the opening day of -conference "has fell on Easter Sunday. President Joseph F. Smith, although he has not been entirely well for jome time, presided ; and made the opening address. His message ws one of peace; "Everything seemi u joint out," he said, "that the church is pursuing its way peacefully. It is-.at is-.at peace with Itself and with all the world, for it carries a message of life, peaceful salvation and redemption from sin. Our work is to make peace .and to establish good-will." Following-the principal part of his address, President Smith announced that he would take a-liberty that, he aid, was rather ' unusual, because of the many false, wicked things that ;had been charged against him and his .brethren. He then gave a summary of the tithes received during the ;year of 1914 and of the uses to which this money had been put. The total amount received from tithes during the year he said was $1,887,920. ,s . In addition to the amount paid out -of the tithes to the ' poor, $116,238, there has been collected and paid to the poor by the relief society $74,290, and there has been paid to the poor ly bishops from the fast offerings and other ward charity ' funds $76,000, imaking a total paid to the poor for .1914 of $266,528. There has been collected for the war sufferers, which is being expended ex-pended jinder the direction of Presi- dent Hyrum M. ; Smith of the European Euro-pean mission, $33,000. Our records show that 73 per cent of all the Latter-day Saint families residing in all the stakes of Zion own their own homes. The birth rate of the church for : the year 1914 is 39.5 to the thousand. The death rate fq the year 1914 is 8.3 to the thousand. Marriage rate for the year 1914 is 17 to the thousand. During the year there were 14,717 children blessed. There are 1,316 elders and 115 women wo-men laboring in the missions as missionaries. mis-sionaries. There has been a net increase in the membership of the church in the stakes of Zion from the year 1901 to 1914 of 129,943 souls. There are now 739 wards and thirty-three thirty-three independent branches. There .are sixty-eight stakes of Zion and twenty-one missions. During the year .1914 twenty-one new wards have been organized and two stakes of Zion. There have been performed in the temples during the past year 166,-909 166,-909 baptisms for the living and dead, and 72,952 endowments for the living and dead. Altogether 326,264 ordinances ordi-nances have been performed in the iour temples. This is a very considerable consid-erable increase over any previous .year. The speakers at the opening session ses-sion were President Joseph F. Smith and his counselors, Anton H. Lund -and Charles W. Penrose. At the afternoon session 25,000 people peo-ple attended the three meetings held, the speakers at the tabernacle being Slder Charles W. Penrose and Elder .Francis M. Lyman. The great organ was not used, be-cause be-cause it is undergoing repairs. The floor of the tabernacle has been entirely en-tirely replaced; the seats have been repainted and revarnished and the building put in excellent condition. Nine thousand persons sat or stood in the tabernacle Sunday night in attendance at-tendance at what the program denominated denom-inated "the biggest Sunday school in the world," the meeting being under the auspices of the Deseret Sunday School union and a part of the spring conference of the Mormon church. Speakers included President Joseph F. Smith, who by virtue of his office as head of the church is also general superintendent of the Sunday School union, and other workers prominent in Sunday school activities. A feature of the services was singing sing-ing by a chorus of 1,000 voices, most of them children from the Salt Lake stake of the church. The report of , George D. Pyper, general secretary of , the Sunday School association, showed a total Sunday school enrollment enroll-ment of 195,416, a gain of 8,465 over ' last rear. President Joseph F. Smith presided i at both sessions of the conference on Monday, April 5. The speakers at the morning session were Apostle Heber J. Grant, Apostle Rudger Clawson ' and Apostle Reed Smoot. ' "I believe," declared Apostle Grant, r "that I never saw the people of the & church so devoted as they now are. ii Recently a wave of unusual zeal and faith seems to have swept over all the church and Its people. Work is its own reward and the satisfaction of working for the church aud the spreading of God's word is greater than can be imagined. "There is but one safe course for Latter-day Saints to pursue and that is the path of righteousness. No Latter-day Saint can remain in the faith who does not do his duty as he sees it in regard to the work of the Lord." Apostle Grant closed his address with an appeal to the brethren to continue con-tinue staunch in the faith. Apostle Clawson told of the inspiration inspira-tion to Joseph Smith. In beginning his address Apostle Smoot referred to the opening prayer of the conference, which was an appeal ap-peal for light aud inspiration. He discussed inspiration and declared that no one who had been baptized by the authorities and blessed in the church doubted that God had revealed Himself to him. The speaker then referred to Joseph Smith and told how he had, ninety-five years ago, been impressed by a great revival held near his home. He told of the boy reading that passage from James, in which those seeking knowledge are urged to ask God. And then he told of his going into the woods to pray. "From then on," declared the speaker, "the heavens were not closed to the children of man. Revelation Reve-lation is a fundamental principle in the gospel of Jesus Christ. We cannot can-not deny revelation unless we deny Mormonism. If Joseph Smith did not receive revelation, then Mormonism is a failure. But I shall never tire of testifying that God did appear to Joseph Smith and establish His church here, never to be torn down." At the afternoon session Apostle H. J. Grant read the report of the special auditing committee which had been appointed to check up the accounts ac-counts of the presidency of the church as trustee in trust for the people peo-ple of the church. The report stated that the accounts had been found correct cor-rect and he also complimented the first presidency of the church on the system of accounting used. George Albert Smith of the quorum of twelve apostles was the first speaker. speak-er. He devoted his attention largely large-ly to the growing evidence of desire for amusement instead of more attention atten-tion to religious duties. He was followed fol-lowed by Apostle Orson F. Whitney, Apostle David O. McKay and Charles A. Callis, president of the Southern States mission. Apostle Whitney declared: "Surely the Saints who leave their homes to come here in so doing are preaching the gospel as eloquently as it could be done. Some day Mormonism will be popular. All will clamor for it. But now is the vital time." "We live in an age of miracles," declared President Callis, "but unfortunately unfor-tunately the people do not see or understand un-derstand them. Isaiah predicted the life and work of Joseph Smith as well as he predicted that of Christ. The Book of Mormon was predicted, as was the gathering of Israel, which is yet to come. Moses appeared to Joseph Smith and gave him the keys to the Book of Mormon and we have this great work sustained by the surety of God's promise." "Our people are efficient, prosperous prosper-ous and happy, because we aid one another in the productive life," said Apostle MoKay. "We truly are such a people," said Apostle McKay, "for we aid one another an-other spiritually and temporarily. But mistakes are sometimes made and opportunities to aid sometimes are overlooked. We should help our children in healthful amuesments." . The music has been a feature of the conference, as always, in spite of the fact that the great organ has been silent, repairs not having been made in time for the conference. Reunions of missionaries was one of the most pleasing features of the conference, many members meeting old friends and fellow workers at these meetings. With the announcement by President Presi-dent Joseph F. Smith -that he advocates advo-cates and believes in abstinence from strong drink and intemperance and prohibition wherever prohibition can be effected, the eighty-fifth annual conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints came to a close on April 6. President Smith in his closing address ad-dress declared that he believed the time was near when Utah would join in the procession of other states and adopt a law of state-wide prohibition. April 6 was the eighty-fifth anniversary anni-versary of the beginning of the Mormon Mor-mon church, and several of the speakers told of the early history of the church. President Smith presided at both sessions, as he had at each general session of the conference. The speakers speak-ers in the morning were Anthony W. Ivins, George F. Richards, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., and James E. Talmage, all of the quorum of twelve apostles. The afternoon speakers were Sey mour B. Young, Brigham H. Roberts, J. Golden Kimball and Rulon S. Wells, all being members of the first seven presidents of seventies. General authorities of the church were unanimously sustained at the business session of the conference in the afternoon. The names were read to the congregation by Apostle Heber J. Grant and those present, according to custom, voted by the raising of hands. No vacancies had occurred in this list since the October conference confer-ence and no changes were made or proposed. Payment of tithes and preparation for missionary work were urged in every address, as also were more attention at-tention to church duties and especially espe-cially the attendance at worship each Sunday. At the closing session of the conference. con-ference. President Smith said: "I started out in this ministry in 1854, at 15 years of age. From that hour i until now I have never relented nor relaxed for one moment in my advocacy advo-cacy of abstinence from strong drink, and my advocacy of temperance and prohibition wherever prohibition can be effected. I believe in it, and believe the time will come, and that it is close at hand, when the people of this state will have to join in the procession of other states and adopt a law of state-wide prohibition." |