Stephen K. Heiss
Acquisitions Coordinator
Historical Department
Church Headquarters
Salt Lake City, Utah
Dear Brother Heiss:
Thank you for your letter of December 20. It was exciting to be in Spain during the introduction of the Religious Liberty Law, to be a participant in getting the Church registered, and then to preside over the first independent Spanish Branch. I was pleased to receive your confirmation that my notes on these happenings, written at the request of the District President at the time, have found lodging in the Church Archives. I was equally pleased that the name of Jose Oliveria Aldamiz who was my counselor (and afterwards first local Branch President -- though not first President of a local branch, as your entry seems to have it -- a slight but important distinction) is also in the records. Jose is currently my next door neighbor in Salt Lake (when we are there between assignments).
Yes, I am interested in history. I've also written histories of the first days of the Church in Morocco and Iceland. These were submitted to the Church News some months ago in response to a notice requesting first hand knowledge of the establishment of the Church in less well known locations. Would it be an imposition to ask you to confirm that these, too, have been archived?
In response to your request, I'm enclosing a "Letter From China" which I wrote for my grown children to tell them a little about the Church in this country. We do have a branch in Beijing (and another in Shanghai) with as many as seventy in attendance on a given Sunday, depending on the number of business visitors. You'll be interested in hearing that in a day when G.A.'s visit stakes only once every two years, we recently had General Authorities in our meetings two Sundays running.
Elder Neal Maxwell is our "first contact", and our regional presidency is located in Hong Kong. Our local B.P. is a Harvard Law graduate Tim Stratford who is Minister Counselor for Commercial Affairs at the American Embassy. Tim is concurrently District President for China, which gives him ecclesiastical authority to visit Shanghai and scattered local members who have joined the Church while living or studying abroad. You'll see how peculiar our situation is with regard to contact with our Chinese brothers and sisters in reading my "Letter from China". I'm Melchizedek Priesthood Group Leader.
We've each of us come to China under a series of events which can only be characterized as remarkable. And as several of us said in Testimony Meeting last week, we're waiting to see how the Lord will use us for His purposes. Having seen what transpired in Iceland and Spain while there, and looking at the incredible things which have been happening in Russia and Eastern Europe, I can't help but believe some remarkable events are in store for China.
You asked about journals. Sorry, I gave up journal keeping many years ago. Lola and I do an annual Christmas letter which puts the year's events in focus. And I'm up to volume three of my personal history. One day soon I'm going to sit down and write the next volume which will carry me through my third tour in France, and Mexico (and China).
Awaiting your response with regard to my questions about my scripts on Iceland and Morocco, I remain,
Very truly yours,
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