I had a new missionary comp for 24 hours

Several weeks ago Philip W. contacted us for a favor–to pick up his son, Benjamin, who had a mission call, at the SL airport on this past Tuesday and keep him overnight and take him to the MTC Wednesday.  Philip is a family history contact that I made a year or so ago.  Shortly after beginning to research the family of Theophilus Lewis, probable brother of our ancestor John Lewis, and document the descendants Theophilus’ oldest daughter, Nancy Caroline Lewis, I discovered that someone had submitted names of some of her descendants for temple work.  Philip W. is her descendant.  He was a convert to the Church in his early 20s, served a mission in Washington State, the came to Utah to finish his schooling, graduating from the U of U and finding a convert to the Church from TX to marry (they met at the SL family history library), works at Duke University in the admission office giving computer support, and lives in from Wake Forest, NC, a suburb of Raleigh, in an area that we are quite familiar with from our mission.

We made a connection.  I just love to find Church members among the distant relatives that I am trying to identify in my family history work, and to have the NC experience in common also was a nice bonus.

They have three children, and the oldest, Benjamin has a mission call to Arizona Tempe.  He has just finished a year at BYU-I.  They have no family connections in Utah (other than us).  I talked to Elder W. on the phone and we worked up a plan.  Wendy and I picked him up at the SL airport Tuesday at about 11 am.  We drove to downtown SL, had lunch at Crownburger, then spent a couple of hours at Temple Square, which he had never visited before.  We helped him find a Distribution Center and a Mr. Mac’s, to exchange some clothes that were the wrong size (they had shopped by internet), to buy an alarm clock at Wal-Mart, and brought him home to get over his jet lag and 4 am flight start.  On Wednesday morning we took in an endowment session with him at the Provo temple (it was only his second time), went to lunch at Brick Oven, and did the drop-off routine at the MTC.

Elder W. was a pleasant companion for a day (he needed one–missionary rules, you know).  We enjoyed this experience a lot.  We got well acquainted with sister W. by phone to report on the visit and get her son to the MTC.  She was pretty emotional.  Wendy assured her that she had cried in her behalf at the MTC drop-off.

VOA presentation to leaders of 11 stakes

I had a very pleasing experience last Tuesday in the early morning.  The commissioner for our scouting district had invited me to make a 45 minute presentation on our stake Venturing Officers Association (VOA) to representatives from the 11 stakes that are in our scouting district (members of Stake Presidencies and stake YM Presidencies).  VOAs are a significant feature of Venturing and opportunity for giving young men growth opportunities, but are not used very often.  I think we are the only stake in our district that has been successful in getting a VOA off the ground.  A VOA is an organization covering a group of Venturing Crews. It is made up of 1) a presidency and 2) representatives of crews in its jurisdiction or representatives coming from lower level VOAs if organized at a broader level.  One of my assignments from our stake presidency when I was called into the stake YM Presidency a little over a year ago was to make Venturing work better in our stake, and creating a stake VOA was an important part of that strategy.

With lots of support from President Christensen (stake President) and his 2nd Counselor, President Blair, we got our first VOA going by last fall.  We are now in the process of calling a new Presidency for the coming year (June-May).  The current VOA accomplished several things, including getting trained so as to be able to present on 8 hour course in leadership skills to the rest of the Priests of the stake.

After receiving this invitation, I in turn extended an invitation to key members of our VOA to help make this presentation.  I worked up an outline which they agree to, and prepared a handout.  I met with these young men twice in preparation, and they ended up making almost the entire presentation.  I sure was proud of them.  I think it showed off very well our stake’s accomplishments with our VOA and what great things youth can do if the adults will get out of the way.

Presenting were Dallin B, our current VOA President, Zach V, our current program VP, and Nathan C, who will be the President for the coming year.

Side note: About everywhere I go, it seems to be my destiny to organize a VOA.  This is my fourth VOA.  I established a Stake VOA (then an EPA–Explorer Presidents Association) while Stake YM President in Taylorsville Central Stake.  I worked with a district EPA for the Olde English Fort District for several years.  When we moved to SF, I organized a VOA in the Palmyra District and was adviser for 3 years until we went on our mission.  (Our president the third year was a girl, Jennifer Lowe, who went on to become the Council VOA, Area VOA, and then National Venturing President.)  After the mission, I thought I was retired from the VOA adviser calling, but our stake leaders called me out of retirement and here I am again.  It sure is fun to keep associating with outstanding young people and to see them grow.

What is a real man, II?

Here is a question that I got from (somewhere I can’t remember): You are a man, married and have one child.  You are almost out of money and can’t get any more.  You have just enough money to buy two hamburgers.  Who gets the hamburgers?  You, your wife, or your child?
Answer: Your wife and child, because as a man you have a commitment to serve others’ needs before our own.

Why did a number of men on the Willie-Martin handcart companies die before other members of their families?  Answer: Because they were real men who, when the company became short of food, gave up their share of the rations so that their wives and children could have more to eat.

When I was a boy, Perfect Circle piston rings advertised its products using a very muscular, tough-looking, grizzled man tenderly holding a baby chick or something like that, with the caption “So tough, but oh so gentle.”  It somehow reminded me of my Dad, who was big and muscular, and who always took on the hardest job when I was working with him, but also could recite poetry and play tender songs on the mandolin, a sort of “strong and sensitive” or “strong and giving” combination.  Hence the statement, “Ideal manhood is strong, but uses that strength first to help others.”

Who is the ideal man?  Christ.  He had all power, yet submitted to the suffering in Gethsemene and Calvary in order to benefit others.  He was strong, including strength to endure unbelievable pain and suffering.  He was strong and perfect in many ways including his altruism.  And he absolutely restrained from any sin.  Yet he had a tender love for sinners.

Christ was also the Son of Man.  Man of Holiness was one of the names for his Father, our Heavenly Father.  Capitalizing this word seems to portray that Christ had a model of an ideal Man as his father.  As do we.

Memorial Day gathering at the Spanish Fork Cemetery

Here are some close-ups for persons not able to be here.

Valerie's family

Alison's family with 2 grandchildren

David's family

Angela's family

Thanks to Kimberly for her work to keep these flowers growing to cover new family members. 
We were accidentally one flower short, and so, for this day, we used a placeholder flower for Miguel (see it right behind the Staci flower).  We'll fix that for next year.

After our time at the cemetery, we went to our place and grilled some hamburgers and also had a productive family meeting making plans for the 20th anniversary Lewis Legacy camp in July.

Myron-Pearl 70th anniversary

We got to Ammon ID where Dorothy's son Scott and wife and 5 kids live and went out to dinner with them.  Then got a motel.  In the morning we did a temple session at the Idaho Falls temple (It was interesting, as it was a Spanish language session.  I wore earphones).  Then we attended the family open house for Myron's and Pearl's 70 wedding anniversary.

Myron and Pearl

Their daughter Becky, Phyllis (d. of Dorothy Davenport Hall), her daughter, Leilani, and her son 

Their sons Brian, and Ron (Myron) Jr., with some of Brian's family

Their children Ron Jr. and Luanne

Their son Stanley

Family Gravesites

Wendy and I took a Friday-Saturday trip to Idaho, starting after our Temple shift on May 24th.  We first placed flowers on graves belonging to Wendy's parents and grandparents in Larkin Sunset Lawn and Salt Lake City Cemeteries.  Then we met Dorothy and went out to my parents graves in North Ogden. 

I laughed and laughed at something Wendy did.  We had a little trouble locating Annette's grave. Finally Wendy called out in a loud and plaintive voice, "Mother, where are you?"  People who were decorating nearby graves turned and stared.  Then we found the grave.

It was interesting that Wendy's mother's grave is located no more than 100 feet from where Frances Monson was buried this past week. 

  

Trip to Boston

We had a great visit with David’s and Rebecca’s family last week, May 7-14.  It was especially fun that the boys all seemed excited to see us.  They warmed up to us immediately and stay super friendly the whole visit.  Other highlights were:
*Wednesday: We visited a dairy farm which featured a pond to catch frogs and tadpoles, farm animals, ice cream parlor, and a most amazing thing to this old dairy farmer’s son--a totally automated milking process.  The cows decide when they want to be milked, no kidding!  (If they go too long, the farmer gets an alerting phone call from the milking system; otherwise, no human action is required).  They get in line, and when the milking robot is free they enter the milking stall.  They are tracked by 3D cameras and motion detectors.  First they get a thorough wash job; then the robot locates the udder with a ‘teat detection system’(aka the TDS), attaches the 4 cups to the spigots, and extracts the milk.  Then the cow leaves the milking stall and gets some attractive feed (cow candy??).
*Thursday: We visited the end of the Freedom Trail that we hadn’t seen before, Bunker Hill and the USS Constitution (“Old Ironsides”).  These are on what was once a small peninsula on the north side of the Charles River across from the City of Boston.  Being reminded of the historic importance to our country of the battle was enjoyable.  The ship is docked just a couple of blocks away at a small naval base.  I was surprised that the U S Navy still maintains a 200 year old sailing ship in its active fleet.  Navy servicemen were on board as guides.  They said that they take it out to sea for a few hours once each year to keep its commission current.
*Friday.  We got in a session at the Boston temple, and then attended a grandparents’ “tea” at Isaac’s school.
*Saturday: David, Isaac, Wendy, and I went to a Red Sox game.  We rode the MBDT (or “T”, formerly called the MTA, as in the Kingston Trio recording) from an outer terminal station to Fenway Park and back.  It was heavily packed.  We learned that you don’t pay in coins now.  You get a Charlie card (you know, like “get poor Charlie off the MTA”), and put credit onto it using your credit card before you get on.  The Park was full, and it was like being at a big party of 45,000 people.  An awful lot of beer, at $8 a cup, may have increased the party mood as the game progressed.  The Sox fell behind early and made a mediocre pitcher look like a Cy Young winner until the 8th inning when they got a little rally going and tied the score at 2-2.  However, the Red Sox reliever promptly gave up a homer to the lead-off hitter in the top of the 9th and that was that. The ball landed on a some black plastic covering a small section of seats in dead center field.
*Sunday: Went to church in the morning and were a part of an FHE lesson in the afternoon.
*Monday: The weather was sunny but cool and windy.  We all went to a park and flew kites.  That evening we drove to a restaurant named Bugaboo Creek, which features a Canadian Rockies theme and a talking Buffalo.
*Tuesday: We returned home on an uneventful flight.  Hilary and kids picked us up and we got home about 9 pm.

What is a real man?

I am in the midst of reading two books on the status of boys and men in our society, that are polar opposites but in many ways have similar messages.  Matthew gave me the first, “Legacy of Honor” by Alvin Thornley, which is a tribute to values and influence of Eagle Scouts in American life.  Through stories of the adult lives of men who achieved the rank of Eagle as youths, manly virtues of strength, civility, altruism, service, and self-discipline are portrayed.

David introduced me to the second, “Boys Adrift, the five factors driving the growing epidemic of unmotivated boys and underachieving young men,” by Leonard Sax.  This book reveals toxic elements in our societal environment that hinder many boys and young men from achieving their potential.  These factors are:
1) An education system that is increasingly unresponsive to the learning styles and maturational levels of boys, harming their motivation and interest in learning. An especial concern is the creating of a failure experience for many boys through the recent pushing of first grade academics down to kindergarten, which many boys at age five do not yet have the brain development to handle adequately.  Other problems for boys are de-emphasizing experiential learning and group competition.
2) Excessive use of video games, at the expense of real-world interactions, real outdoor exercise, book reading, and study time.  If this behavior continues into young adulthood, it may contribute to the “failure to launch” phenomena (see #5).
3) The over-prescribing of stimulant medications used for ADHD for boys who are exhibiting what are normal activity levels in a classroom that is not “boy-friendly.” There is evidence that the use of many of these medications may cause undesirable brain and personality changes.
4) Exposure to endocrine disrupters which leach out of plastic drink containers (for such things as bottled water/soda) or from pesticides, which have an estrogenic effect on males, and delay puberty and reduce the drive to achieve and compete.
5) Not teaching boys how to be men, the lack of good male role models, societal devaluation of the role of fathers, the “failure to launch” phenomenon where adult males live with their parents, stay single, lack drive to work, spend inordinate time on self-centered pursuits, etc.

Both of these authors seem to have similar notions of what ideal manhood is: strong, but using that strength to help others.

His YM leaders would be proud

I enjoy a lot reading Elder Ryan’s letter each week. 
They are so Duty to God; so learn-act-share.

I say, Elder, I hope that you will continue preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ to us all, as you are coming to understand and love it, when you write home.

Myron and Pearl milestone

My favorite uncle.  He lived with us the summer he was about 17 and I was 4.  He worked in the haying for some Glenwood farmers.  He played with me.  I recall him lying on his back on the floor and letting me jump on him, or putting his knees up and when I would sit on them he would spread his legs and dump me on the floor.  What great fun!

That December the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and he soon volunteered for the U.S. Navy.  While in training in California he went to a dance for servicemen, and met Pearl Ricks, a little LDS girl from Idaho.  As I got the story, she had gone to California from her home to help the war effort by cheering up our servicemen at dances, etc.  How a 17 year old girl got permission from her parents to go off by herself for this purpose, I don’t quite understand.  Anyway, here were two lonely LDS teenagers, first time away from home, meeting in a far-away state at a dance for servicemen.  They stayed in contact and were married in the Idaho Falls temple while he was on leave, 70 years ago, May 24, 1943.  And their love for each other still shows.  A wonderful love story.

May 5 bullets

• Lunch with Alyssa. Wendy and I joined Matthew’s family for lunch at Winger’s in the Town Centre mall an hour before she was dropped off at the MTC.  Such a sweet girl.  One highlight of this time was watching Brianna and Joshua attack their endless wings.  Brianna sure needed “endless napkins.”

• Heidi’s wedding. Heidi and Steven’s wedding on Friday, May 3rd, was one of those near-perfect family experiences.  I had the chance to get better acquainted with Steven the week before as he borrowed our truck to haul furnishings to their new apartment.  We spent some quality minutes and I learned to appreciate what he is bringing to our family. Wendy and I enjoyed the entire day.  The time at the Bountiful temple was special, and it was a great blessing to have Elder Perry of the Quorum of the Twelve perform the ceremony.  He was warm and friendly and made us feel like we were all one family.  His instructions to the bride and groom were interesting.  He applied the D&C 88/109 instructions about building the Kirtland temple to building an ideal home, “establish a house, even a house of prayer, a house of fasting, a house of faith, a house of learning, a house of glory, a house of order, a house of God.”  He gave some specifics about how our own homes should be houses of prayer, fasting, faith, etc. We filled the largest sealing room in the temple to over-capacity.  In the sealing room from our family side were Matthew and Kim, Scott and Emilie, Angela and Bruce, Nathan and Gloria, Alison and Quin, Troy and Katrina, Andrew and Britain, Aunt Dorothy, Quin’s mother and Aunt Greta, sister Shari Lynn and husband, nephew Austin and his wife, niece Ellen.   And there were lots of younger people waiting to join us for pictures, on a beautiful day.  We were in South Weber at the chapel just a few blocks south of Soderquist’s for luncheon, and play a game remembering specific happenings in Heidi’s and Steven’s lives.  Staci and Miguel arrived in the middle of the day.  The reception had a steady stream of people for 2 and ½ hours.  Blaine and Linda and Teresa and Chad came.

• Temple schedule. I have been working on a fun assignment from the mens shift coordinators for our Thursday shift to redesign the assignment sheet for our shift, in order to reduce the length of initiatory assignments from 40 minutes to 30.  Initiatory assignments are quite exhausting for older men, involving constant standing and speaking, and shortening the time for one assignment will make this part of the temple worker experience more pleasant. All these sheets will be in an Excel file.  I am doing additional cleanup and will add some other helps for the coordinators, including setting up an initiatory schedule sheet where the report is populated automatically from the master line sheet.  Currently, the coordinator has to prepare this second sheet by hand.

•  Family history. I continue to pick away at research on the Theophilus Lewis family as I get time.  I am working on the 9th of 10 children. 

• Venturing. Our stake Venturing Officers Association (VOA) for which I am an advisor in keeping with my role in the Stake YM Presidency, completed its presentation of the Venturing Leadership Skills Course on April 20th to other young men in the stake.  We are now in the process of establishing a new VOA presidency to be installed in June.  We are beginning preparations for another activity that we will be mostly in charge of in August called the President’s Challenge.  Our Stake President will use this to issue a specific challenge to the Priests/Venturers in our stake.  He came to our VOA meeting on April 28th and we did some preliminary planning with him for this event.

• 11 year old scouting. I have been 11 year old scout leader in our ward  for 16 months now.  With my assistant, Don B, we keep plugging away to try to build a scouting foundation for our boys.  The numbers are very small, 2 or 3 at a time.  We have mostly been able to get the boys to First Class before they turn 12.  The most exciting thing that is happening right now is that Joshua is going to join our patrol for a few months.  He will be the only 11 year old in their ward.  Matthew and Kim have decided that it would be better for him to be with 11 year olds rather than Matthew’s troop, although the Bishop was willing to make that decision.  I will have 2 kids from our ward, so it will be fun to have a third and especially to have Josh.

• I am excited for Nathan who has started to work for Wendy’s, the one up by BYU campus and Provo High School.

• BYU teams in national championships. I have been avidly following BYU mens volleyball, with many of the games being broadcast on BTYtv. What a fast-paced power game volley ball is now.  They had a great season, won their league and league tournment, but last in three straight sets of Cal Irvine in the NCAA championships game.  All three games were oh-so-close and were decided by key blocks late in the sets.  I played volleyball while in college (called m-men, for young adults "mutual men"), but the game has changed a lot.  I played on a BYU ward team that won its league, placed high in a regional tournament, and then went to All-Church and played several games before losing out.  All-Church was a big deal in those days both for basketball and for volleyball. On the internet, I also caught a part of the NCAA championship game for rugby, BYU playing Cal.  Those sure are Big Boys who play that game.  BYU won this championship, 27-24.

• Lawns and garden. Alison and I pruned the 5 fruit trees in our back yard a few weeks ago.  The apricot trees bloomed shortly after and now the peach and nectarine trees are finishing their bloom.  They were very pretty.  We had storms and cold intermittently while the blooms were on and it appears that we have lost almost all of our apricot crop.  The peaches and nectarine appear to be OK. I put a heavy dose of fertilizer and dormant weed killler on the lawn and it has responded by growing fast and very dark green.  When I went to mow it, I could not get the lawnmower to start.  As a matter of fact, all three pieces of our lawn equipment won’t run, the mower, the edger and the weed-whacker.  I have borrowed the Blake’s lawn mower twice now, the lawn needs another cut tomorrow.  We decided rather than fuss with a 12 or 15 year old mower we would get a new one.  We looked at mowers at Sears, but the one we wanted was back-ordered and has still not come in after a week, so we ordered the model on the internet.  It should be delivered this week. Wendy planted some peas in our garden and we have some tomato plants to set out tomorrow.  I turned on the pressurized irrigation this week and tested all the lines and heads.  I need to replace a couple of small drip heads that water plants in the SW corner of our lot including the three Bradford Pear trees.  Otherwise everything seems OK.
   

Two leadership principles

I share a couple of leadership/management/supervisory principles that I have come to believe in deeply and find them to have constant applications in living:

First, effective leaders must constantly pay attention to two objectives:
1) Getting the job done, and
2) Assuring the growth and satisfaction of their people.
Sometimes there is tension between the two, but a good leader must respond to both needs, and find an appropriate balance for the environment in which they are functioning.  I suggest in the working world that to really succeed a leader needs to devote at least 10 to 20 % of their effort to the latter.  In the Church the percentage may be about 50-50.  So much of the work of the Church has to do with personal progress. For example, lots of callings are more for an individual’s growth rather than who can do the best job.

Second, effective leaders vary the way they approach different situations.  One leadership style is not adequate (authoritarian, democratic, etc.).  Good leaders make assessments: How knowledgeable or motivated is the other person?  Is there risk if no action is taken?  Or not taken quickly?  Then they decide how heavily they must become involved in promoting or guaranteeing the task result and also how deeply they must invest in relational behavior in order to succeed in this situation.  And, as above, ultimate success involves both task results and growth of the people involved.

"Make good happen"

I connected with Elder Chandler’s letter of 4/16/13 which included a personal “mission” statement, because of my work with the Priests/Venturers in our stake where we have been considering mission/purpose/vision statements.  Just yesterday, our Stake Venturing Officers Association (which I am adviser, etc.,  to) presented the Venturing Leadership Skill Course (VLSC) to a number of Priests from our stake and their leaders.  The VLSC is a course on basic leadership skills created for Venturing age young people, a part of Venturing’s “Nature of Leadership” training program.  We have been preparing for this event for some time.  In February we took VOA leaders up to the family cabin and presented this course to them, and since have been preparing them to be able to present the same lessons to a broader group in the stake.  We have helped them get support for this from stake and ward leaders, to plan and carry out a publicity campaign to get attendance, to plan other details of this specific event, and to prepare to present the actual lesson materials. 

Yesterday we held the event, with 19 young men and 9 of their leaders present.  We started with a breakfast at 7:30 am and finished about 2 pm.  Wendy, bless her heart, created the meals (breakfast burritos and hoagies) with a little help from a couple of VOA mothers.

Regarding mission statements, the very first session in the VLSC is on “Vision,” a topic which we understand is of very much current interest with managers and leaders in business, government, and elsewhere.  This is the creation of mission/purpose/vision statements which describe in a succinct way an organization’s reason for existence and energize and unify persons serving in organization around its purpose.  I have obtained some insights on this subject from Greg, whom I consider something of an expert on this subject since he was a part of the team that created Wal-Mart’s “Spend less, live better” statement and shared with me a book by a management consultant, Roy Spence, who had worked with them on this project.

Our VOA has agreed upon this statement which defines for them the purpose of Aaronic Priesthood Venturing:

“Preparing the next generation of incredible leaders, in the Church, and in the world.”

I like this statement very much and  find myself energized by it.  It makes me want to use all my mind and strength to improve the use of the Venturing program in our stake and scouting district.  It seems to me that it well describes the unique contribution that Venturing can make to the preparations of our Priest-age young men for missionary service and for life.  When fully used, Venturing provides young men with both formal training and opportunities to practice and experience leadership, in ways not duplicated by the other tools that the Church gives us for developing our young men-- Duty to God, Come Follow Me curriculum, Seminary, etc.

In the VLSC session on vision the young men are also challenged to define their personal vision or mission statement.  I think of my personal vision statement, developed and refined over a number of years, which I share (with a little hesitation, because it is personal) :

“Make good happen.”

It tells me that it is not sufficient for me to know and understand what is right and true and good.  I am obligated to see that these things are implemented.  It helps me to wake up from the nap, set down the book, get up from the computer, and undertake actions to accomplish things that will bless the lives of others.

89 letters

Yuch!  I have an awful taste in my mouth!  I just licked 89 envelopes which contain invite letters to each Priest in our stake.  This is all a part of publicizing our Stake Venturing Officers Association-sponsored training “How to be a leader” (Venturing Leadership Skills Course), to be held a week from Saturday.  As adviser to the VOA, I get to do lots of things in the background to facilitate our work.

One of our earliest (and most important) VOA objective was to introduce and promote the Venturing leadership training resources in our stake.  A year ago when I was called to the stake YM Presidency, these training tools were totally unknown or ignored by all the crews in our stake, and their emphasis seemed consistent with my charge to strengthen the use of the Venturing program and also to be an important way in which better Venturing could contribute to better prepared missionaries.  We trained five members of the VOA at a retreat held at our cabin mid-February and are preparing them to be the primary presenters on April 20th.  The letters are a part of an ambitious publicity plan we developed with the group.  Someone had taught the principle of Seven Touches as a key to successful advertising or publicity.  Therefore, we brainstormed seven ways that we could communicate with the Priests and their leaders about this event.  We wrote a letter about to Bishops and Advisers for the Stake Presidency’s signature.  We prepared a flyer which was passed out in quorum meetings.  VOA members made a personal visit to each quorum. We caused the event to be announced in several places.  Now were are sending out this letter to each Priest and their parents.

Its taken about 10 days to get the letter ready to go.  Dallin, our VOA President, and I visited a week ago Sunday to outline the content.  Because he had a busy schedule, I made notes of his ideas for wording and wrote a draft.  I sent this draft back to him and the VPs, and revised the letter from their suggestions.  At the same time I started working with the stake clerk, at the Stake Presidency’s direction, to draft an endorsement note to go at the bottom of the page, to get names and addresses of all Priest age young men, letterhead stationery and envelopes, to access the Stake Presidency’s electronic signatures, etc.  He got approval from them for the letter’s wording, and I prepared a final master copy, got signatures from the three key members of the VOA presidency, ran copies of the latter, created labels for each envelope, hand wrote each young man’s name on a copy of the letter, folded , stuffed the letter and ,as above, licked and sealed 89 envelopes.  I hope the glue was safe and sanitary.  And, I would prefer a less eclectic flavor, like, maybe, raspberry, rather than Old Horse Hoof.

Now, off to the post office!

General Priesthood Meeting group expanding

I felt pleased at the expanding size of the Utah County family group that we had together to attend the Conference General Priesthood Meeting.  It was great to have a BYU contingent of Soderquists and also to have Ethan with us for the first time as a new Deacon.

This year we gathered at the Spanish Fork East stake center.  This used to be our ward house and stake center but now belongs to Scott's and Emilie's stake.  After the meeting we went to Scott's and Emilie's place for BYU Creamery ice cream.  In behalf of Ethan and Justin, I will note that they both wore ties to the meeting.

More Lewis family connections

As I get time, I continue to work on Lewis family history.  For about the last year, I have been researching the descendants of Theophilus Lewis who was probably the brother of our ancestor John Lewis. Theophilus was the direct ancestor of Guy Lewis.  Guy had planned to publish a book on that family when he died unexpectedly around 1990 and there are quite a few materials about Theophilus' descendants in the records Wendy and I copied while in NC.  My tentative plans have been to add some more volumes to The Lewis Family books that I was able to publish in 2011 covering Theophilus’ descendants.  Theophilus had 10 children, 8 of whom lived to maturity and I have just completed my research on the 6th of the 8, whose name was Robert Pinckney Lewis.  When I find out as much as I can about a family, I then run the names of those born 110 years of more ago for temple work.  I have been getting 20 or so names for each of these families.

It was fun to make contact with a descendant of Robert P. Lewis.  Her name is Kathie Pagan Shanno.  She is a direct descendant of Kate Lewis Cahill, who wrote the letter in 1935 that I quoted from recently in a blog about the early Lewis's in Rockignham NC.  Kathie was born in 1943, and is married to a retired Rudgers U professor.  She had submitted a bunch of information on her immediate ancestors to Ancestry.com.  We have talked on the phone and are in the process of sending each other details of what we know about tha part of the family.

Not too far distant in the family of Robert P. Lewis from the Shannos is Peggy Ann Rayburn (born 1939) , who is married to a scholarly Chinese National named Te-Hsui Ma (born 1924).  I found a some fascinating things about him on the web.  He escaped from China on the last boat to Taiwan (about 1949-50) just ahead of the take-over by the Communist army, and eventually was able to come to America, earned his doctorate at the U of Virginia in biology and has become an internationally known expert on pollution monitoring.  Here are write-ups about him, first, his own account of his early life and then a bio on of his scholarly attainments:
     Note about his escape from mainland China ahead of the Communist army--http://www.ntueg.com/Memoir/PDF/AMa.pdf
The most memorable events in the journey to National Taiwan University during the retreat of the government of the Republic of China were:  Taking the last boat from Tian Jin sea port to Taiwan island, the danger in a poorly equipped small freight vessel converted into a passenger boat, the broken engine incidence at sea, the lack of living facilities in the newly repossessed National Taiwan University campus, depreciation of new currency and potential starvation during the period of revolt at the first anniversary of ROC invasion, taking a part-time teaching job to survive during the graduate study.  Luckily I got a highly paid job as a Research Assistant in the Taiwan Sugar Company for me to save enough money to buy a one-way ticket to the University of Virginia.
     Biography, Te-Hsiu  Ma, accessed 13 Mar 2013   http://www.ntueg.com/Memoir/PDF/BMa1.pdf 
Te-Hsiu Ma was born in suburbs of Tianjin and Beijing.  After elementary school, he attended “Jefferson Academy” in Tong Hsian city and completed high school in Beijing.  He received BS degree from The Catholic University of Peking (Fu-Jen University) and went to National Taiwan University with a Scholarship in the Research Institute of Botany and graduated with a MS degree in Genetics and Ecology.  He worked in Taiwan Sugar Experiment Station (5 years) as Research Assistant.  He received scholarship from the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA and completed Ph D in Biology.  He taught at Emory and Henry College, Emory, VA (5 years), Western Illinois University, Macomb, IL (33 years) with a three-year leave to work at Radiation Biology Laboratory of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC.  During his teaching years, he carried out collaborative research works with Oak Ridge (ORNL), Argonne (ANL) and Brookhaven National Laboratories (BNL) in environmental science and radiation biology.  He developed an environmental monitoring system, using germ cells of Tradescantia plant while working at BNL, and established an International Environmental Monitoring Organization to carry out global environmental monitoring project with the support of World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), and NATO/Environment Science and Technology (EST) Programs to detect pollution in the air, water and soil around the world.  Currently, more than 40 countries are partners of this global environmental protection network.  This global environmental protection work is continuing during his retirement years.  
     Article on his work as a Bio-med researcher, regarding Environmental Pollutant Detection
Co-chair of conference July 7, 2004
MACOMB, IL - - More than 30 scientists from 14 world nations gathered July 6 at Western Illinois University for the opening ceremonies of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Advanced Study Institute (ASI) on Plant Bioassay on the Genotoxicity of Contaminated Water, Air and Soil.
The institute, which runs through July 16, deals with the detection of genetic damage from common pollutants, radioactive pollutants and the contaminants from warfare in water, air and soil through biological tests on onion (Allium) and spiderwort (Tradescantia) plants. Participants receive hands-on learning through daily laboratory sessions, tutorial instruction and experimentations.
"Genetic materials in plant cells are more sensitive to pollutants than those of animal cells because there is less protection in plant tissues from the impact of pollutants," said Te-Hsiu Ma, Western Illinois University biological sciences professor emeritus, who serves as co-director of the institute along with Professor Rouben Aroutiounian from Armenia, under the directorship of Dr. Alain Jubier, NATO Science Affairs Division.
"These genetic tests which are highly sensitive, simple and economical have been used in more than 40 countries across five continents for more than 30 years."
"Special emphasis for the Institute will be aimed at radioactive and warfare contaminants in the environment in the eastern European area, and reports of the follow-up studies will be published to show the status of pollution level in these countries and the potential genetic damage to the ecosystem and human health," Ma said. "In the long run, this monitoring program could contribute to homeland security of this area."
Eight international scientists are joining Ma in presenting specialized evening lectures which highlight collaborative studies including chemassay (chemical analysis), bio-indicators (tangible data), ecology (ecosystem and human health), epidemiology (human disease), meteorology (ozone depletion, UV-B radiation, cosmic rays and solar flare), pharmacology (genotoxicity of drugs), agricultural sciences (soil contamination) and homeland security (in situ monitoring to provide first alert of hazards).

Article on marital success #2: Lower marital conflict in 21 minutes a month

In this article published in the Deseret News 9 Mar 2013, Lois Collins reports on a study of marital satisfaction by researchers at Northwestern and Villanova Universities.  In this study, married persons were asked to individually spend seven minutes, three times a month, writing about the most recent conflict with their spouse, from a neutral perspective.  This meant not just listing grievances or venting, but trying to think about the spat from both sides, as if one were an observer who simply wanted the best for everyone.

It did not appear from that article that these persons were necessarily required to share their conclusions directly with their partner.

When this procedure was implemented, the researchers saw significant differences in marital satisfaction for these persons.  While the couples fought as often as before, they did not seem to become as distressed as before and a number of other indicators of marital satisfaction showed improvement.

These positive effects were present no matter whether the couples had been married one month or 50 years.  According to one of the authors, “there is nothing magical about seven minutes– except it is long enough to really engage someone in the activity of doing an appraisal and not so long it’s cumbersome.”

Article on marital success #1: Forgiveness in Marriage

I call your attention to a significant article in the Church News of March 3, 2013 on “Forgiveness in Marriage: Researcher shares tools to create healthier relationships,” a Marjorie Pay Hinckley lecture at BYU given by Dr. Frank Fincham of Florida State University’s Family Institute.  He stated, “A happy marriage is a union of two good forgivers.”  (These ideas would seem to me to have implications, in addition to our marriages, for all of our relationships as we try to implement Christ’s commandment to be forgiving to all, including our enemies.)

Here are some of his conclusions:
– Forgiveness is a process, not an event.  We should develop forgiveness as a way of life.
– One the top five attributes of long-term happy marriages is the ability to grant and receive forgiveness.
– According to Dr. Fincham, forgiveness
     1) Is NOT forgetting (“forgetting is just a passive removal of the offense from your consciousness” and may continue to bother you and cause a destructive response at some time when you least expect it.).
     2) Does NOT include a lack of consequences for the perpetrator.
     3) Is NOT about pretending that unacceptable behavior is acceptable.
     4) Does NOT necessarily require that you have to be reconciled to the person.
– Rather, forgiveness is “more like giving up the perceived right to get even...a response to being wronged that entails a change in which justified anger and resentment are freely given up...  It’s not something that just happens easily, because you have to overcome the negative feelings engendered by the transgression...  In forgiveness the transgressor receives an undeserved gift [from you]... forgivenss [is] an altruistic act.”

Dr. Fincham suggested that forgiveness is a learned skill.  He  offered six ways for individuals to become more forgiving:
1) Pray for the other person.  (This is an interesting first suggestion, coming as it was from a non-LDS academic person.)
2) Have a structured plan (for yourself): See things through the other’s eyes. Accept that the other persons’s views and memory may differ from yours.  You don’t have agree on details to forgive.  See them as a whole person, more than just the offending behavior.
3) Be patient, both with yourself and the other person.
4) Set an agenda, to work on the issue with the other person.  This may not be a one-time discussion.
5) Apologize and ask for forgiveness.
6) Remember times when you were the offender.     

Some early Lewis history

Here are some excerpts from a letter written in 1937 by Kate Lewis Cahill (b. 1866 - d. 1955) who was a granddaughter of Theophilus Lewis, the latter probably a brother of our John Lewis who married Elizabeth Sams:
Lewis Family
Early Pioneers of North Carolina –
    Descending from ancestors of Wales England, the Forefathers of the Lewis Family of North Carolina came over from Wales to the States for Homes of freedom, Liberty and Social privileges – the right to education and religious beliefs – Arriving first at Charleston South Carolina, they naturally lifted their eyes to the Hills –  The Blue Ridge Mountains –This in the early part of 1700.  Loading their families and meager baggage in covered wagons, drawn by teams of horses, they journeyed to the State of North Carolina and when getting to one of the foothills of Carolina’s mountains in Rockingham Co., four miles from Madison in East– horses given out – some of the wagons broken down, they decided to go no further, here “the Lord seems to be in this place” was their cry.  So trees were felled, houses built, and from these sturdy Pioneers came my present day family of Lewises – Heads for the first to arrive was that of John and Thomas – my Great ancestors from which came my Grandfather – Theophilus Lewis – whose wife was Nancy PATSY Thomas – to them were borne 8 children – four boys – Robert Lewis was my father – Thomas, John and William and four daughters, Mary Lewis, Nancy Ray, Sally Baughn and Martha Laudenslager – these raised large families except Mary who never married, was an early teacher and mantuamaker and milliner of Madison.
    These Sturdy Lawabiding people took their places in various industries and trades – Serving their country in war as well as peace times.  The old cemetery in which these early Settlers are buried is located upon Baughn mountain, under the shadow of an old Poplar Tree which in time past might be seen like a Sentinel of History – just above the Home of the Late Lee Lauden on the Leaksville Road East of Madison about four miles – Some graves marked with Soapstone markers while others with granite dates and names, while some not marked at all – no other graveyards near as I know of except family plot near Stoneville NC at old Homestead of John Lewis of this family and the Stoneville Cemetery – served descendants buried there – none any nearer to Mayodan that I know.
    One branch of the Lewis family lived up near Sandy Ridge – Hugh JOHN Lewis, wife Sally Lewis whose sons and daughters lived and reared families which have spread out into Stokes and Forsyth Co.  Sons of this family Lafayette and “Poet” Powhaton both served in Confederate war.  “Fayette” carried a bayonet wound in his back as long as he lived – To their family Pleasant Webster first 3rd wife belonged called Susan Lewis Webster.
    Characteristics of Lewis –
Industry, Honesty and eminent piety – many preachers of the gospel –Tom and John licensed to preach – The late Dr. Calvin John Jones of Leaksville, prominent Baptist Theological Student and Pastor in State; and with an eager striving for education, many responsible Callings were theirs – One [OR Our] prominent Dr. Ray, MD, now living at Leaksville NC.  The finger of history points to many others even to Senator Hamilton Lewis of Ill.

More on guilt

In my book for my grandchildren on the Gospel ("Nearer to God: the Book of Mormon and the Good News of Christ–Scriptural studies on the experience of redemption"), in a chapter that addressed what I consider to be one of the most significant topics, I considered the matter of guilt:
“Guilt is both abstract and personal, or both fact and feeling, as suggested by this dictionary definition: 1) the fact of having committed a breach of conduct, esp. violating a law and involving a penalty, and 2) the feeling of culpability for offenses.” (pp. 143-144)

I described in some detail my understanding of the eternal sense of the first meaning and how the atonement of Christ addresses this problem.  Now I have found some interesting notions regarding the second meaning, that of how personal guilt is experienced, in the writings of the Givens (“A God Who Weeps”).

In discussing the moral awareness that we have as adults, the authors assert that “we sense we are responsible for our own choices.  And the reason we know we are is because we feel guilt when we do something wrong.” 

In defining guilt, they differentiate between “legitimate” guilt and the “oppressive, destructive self-loathing or self hatred that masquerades as conscience: by guilt we mean the inward call to be truer to our better selves.  Legitimate guilt is to the spirit what the sharp protest of a twisted ankle is to the foot: its purpose is to hurt enough to stop you from crippling yourself further.  Its function is to prevent more pain, not expand it.  This kind of guilt comes from the light and beckons us to follow; its counterfeit takes us only deeper into the darkness of despair.” (pp. 48-49)

They explain that there are modern notions that explain away legitimate feelings of guilt “but no rationalization can allay the insistent knowledge that we all confess in moments of secret honesty: we do wrong because we make a decision to do so, and we feel guilty because we know we could have acted differently.“ (p. 49)

“Sin...is a condition we assume when we place ourselves in opposition to those moral laws that undergird the structure of reality.  This condition is naturally one of alienation from God, from those we love, and from “the better angels” of our own nature. Sin is not an arbitrary category God imposes.  And it is not synonymous with simple error or misjudgment.  This is a truth, like others we are examining, that is best revealed in the searchlight of honest introspection.  We know the difference between regret and remorse.  We regret giving erroneous directions that get the stranger lost.  We feel remorse for the slander deliberately spoken.  We regret an action that leads to harm.  We feel remorse for choosing that action to inflict harm.  Legitimate guilt, the kind we cannot explain away or therapeutically resolve, involves more than bad judgment or human error.  The degree of guilt we experience is proportional to the deliberateness with which we cause hurt.” (pp. 79-80)

A sinful action is “a gesture of permanent self-definition.  What is always at stake in any decision we make is what that the choice turns us into.  We may suffer the unfortunate consequences of other peoples’ choices.  People may honor or abuse us, harm or nourish us.  But for the most part, it is our own choices that shape our identity.” (p. 81)

Therefore, real guilt is a spiritual warning that we have made a choice, if left uncorrected, that will make us less than we could be and should be.

VOA members at training retreat

VOA members at the Venturing Leadership Skills Course (VLSC) retreat.  Paper tower building for the planning session and the Potato City Council for the session on leadership styles. (the latter: Dallin, Jory, Zach, Dillon, and Max).  And we had three wonderful meals there, thanks to Wendy.

Cabin week

We had our first week at the Borg family cabin this past week.  We actually had the place from Monday morning Feb11th through Monday evening Feb 18th, due to a family rule that holiday Mondays attach to the prior week.  This is the first time we have had the 8-day week, because there are other couples who snatch these weeks up when the selection meeting is held.  We happened to take this particular week on our first turn because I had a Venturing training retreat planned for Friday and Saturday.

There were several pretty sunrises and we saw three deer early one morning that appeared to have spent the night under our overhang.

I or we made lots of trips back and forth.  We went there first on Monday by way of Salt Lake, because Wendy had a birthday lunch with her sisters.  I drove back and forth to Spanish Fork Tuesday evening for 11 year old scouts.  On Wednesday night Wendy and I returned to Spanish Fork to get ready for our temple assignments.  We were home Wednesday and Thursday nights and went back up to the cabin Friday afternoon after our temple shift (6 am to 11 am) and doing an endowment session.  There was a transportation mix-up that caused me to drive a couple of the VOA back to Spanish Fork early Saturday afternoon.  I went back to the cabin immediately but drove back to Spanish Fork after the BYU basketball game broadcast to be at a meeting of the Stake YM Presidency Sunday morning at 7:15 am that I conducted since the President was out of town.  I got back to Midway at about 10 am, and we went to a Church meeting at 11.

We had company most of the time we were there.  Michael was there from Monday through Wednesday.  We had 5 guys form our stake VOA there Friday evening through Saturday early afternoon plus Richard K my assistant advisor.  Hilary and kids came about the time the VOA was leaving and stayed until Sunday afternoon and then Sunday evening, Wendy’s long-time friends, Jill and Gavin, from her old SL ward came up Sunday evening and stayed until Monday afternoon.

We went to church Sunday at the Midway stake building.
(Pictures: Sunrise scenes, deer, VOA)

A God who weeps

Wendy and I have been reading together from a little book by Terryl and Fiona Givens, “A God Who Weeps” and are being touched by the insights there.  It is sort of a tract on Mormonism, but more than this, a remarkably sensitive and refined statement of why we choose to believe what we believe.  Here is part of a passage about our belief in God and what we believe about him, which raises my appreciation for Him and also gives some insights into the way He works:

"The most remarkable religious document published in the nineteenth century may well be the ascension narrative in which the prophet Enoch is taken into heaven and records his ensuing vision [in P of G P, Moses, chapter 7].  He sees Satan’s dominion over the earth, and God’s unanticipated response to a world veiled in darkness: “The God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept; and Enoch bore record of it, saying: How is it that the heavens weep, and shed forth their tears as the rain upon the mountains? And Enoch said unto the Lord: How is it that thou canst weep?
 
"The question here is not about the reasons behind God’s tears.  Enoch does not ask, why do you weep, but rather, how are your tears even possible, “seeing thou are holy, and from all eternity to eternity?”  Clearly, Enoch, who believed God to be “merciful and kind forever,” did not expect such a being could be moved to the point of distress by the sins of His children.  And so a third time he asks, “how is it thou canst weep?”
 
"The answer, it turns out, is that God is not exempt from emotional pain.  Exempt?  On the contrary, God’s pain is as infinite as his love.  He weeps because he feels compassion.  As the Lord explains to Enoch, “unto thy brethren I have said, and also given commandment, that they should love one another, and that they should choose me, their Father; but behold, they are without affection, and they hate their own blood . . . and misery shall be their doom; and the whole heavens shall weep over them, even all the workmanship of mine hands; wherefore should not the heavens weep, seeing these shall suffer?”

"It is not their wickedness, but their “misery,” not their disobedience, but their “suffering.” that elicits the God of Heaven’s tears.  Not until Gethsemane and Golgotha does the scriptural record reveal so unflinchingly the costly investment of God’s love in His people, the price at which He placed His heart upon them.  There could be nothing in this universe, or in any possible universe, more perfectly good, absolutely beautiful, worthy of adoration, and deserving of emulation, than this God of love and kindness and vulnerability.  This is why a gesture of belief in His direction, a decision to acknowledge His virtues as the paramount qualities of a divided universe, is a response to the best in us, the best and noblest of which the human soul is capable.  A God without body or parts is conceivable.  But a God without passions would engender in our hearts neither love nor interest.  In the vision of Enoch, we find ourselves drawn to a God who prevents all the pain He can, assumes all the suffering He can, and weeps over the misery He can neither prevent nor assume." 
(Terryl Givens and Fiona Givens, “The God who Weeps: How Mormons Make Sense of Life,” Ensign Peak, 2012, pp. 24-25)

I take it that we need to follow this example in order to grow in our ability to love, and be willing to experience both the joy and vulnerability of love.