Orson Scott Card on

[Archaea]

stuff.

Some will agree and some will not.

http://mormontimes.com/ME_blogs.php?bID=3

On the one hand, it's an absurd, even offensive, question. We believe that it's God, not men, who calls apostles. They have no constituency except Jesus Christ and the whole membership of the church, and the ethnicity, race or native language of an apostle should mean nothing.

And yet ... let's admit it, my fellow Saints, there are more than a few of us who felt a little thrill when Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf was called as the first apostle in the restored church whose native language was not English.

Further down:

Eventually, in a worldwide church, English will have no special precedence. Unlike Muslims, who will not translate the Quran because Arabic is the true language of the revelation, we Latter-day Saints eagerly translate the scriptures so that, ultimately, they can be read in every person's native language.

Non-English speakers listen to general conference through interpreters, teams of bilingual and polyglot Saints who have already translated the prepared remarks of the Brethren and then listen carefully for any variation so they can speak their words, as nearly as possible, into the ears of those who do not understand English.

There is no reason why Anglophone Latter-day Saints cannot also, occasionally, have the same experience. Someday we will be accustomed to having the occasional conference talk spoken in a language that some of us Americans learned only on our missions, and many Americans don't speak at all.

And a different argument why it's good NOT to pluck leaders from other regions.

But I have also seen how men and women of great heart, great faith and great wisdom serve in the humblest callings of ward and branch and mission. The church is blessed, not harmed, when the Lord leaves many of the most talented in the congregations of the Saints instead of putting them all in airplanes and flying them to Salt Lake City.

It is also true that the First Presidency is likely to call to the apostleship someone they have actually met and come to know.

[MikeWaters]

t is also true that the First Presidency is likely to call to the apostleship someone they have actually met and come to know.

OSC went out on a limb on this one. As in every single apostle in the history of the church.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

OSC went out on a limb on this one. As in every single apostle in the history of the church.

Well I think he catered too much to the mullahs in this article, but given the editorship, I suppose he knew his real audience.

[MikeWaters]

OSC is a mullah. Not all mullahs are bad people. I don't think he's a bad person. I just don't agree with him a heckuva lot.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

OSC went out on a limb on this one. As in every single apostle in the history of the church.

It's an interesting complaint you have here, given the other discussion on whether and how God intervenes.

You would prefer, I assume, the Lord appear in his glory to the prophet each time a new apostle is to be called, and designate him as someone the prophet has never met? It seems easier (not to mention more common) for the Lord to bring his prophet into touch with future apostles naturally, as he does in guiding our daily lives.

A pattern for all of us, to be sure.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

OSC is a mullah. Not all mullahs are bad people. I don't think he's a bad person. I just don't agree with him a heckuva lot.

He spoke and wrote as one, but one can listen to his arguments as he presents them coherently.

The main argument that intrigued me is the benefit the local congregations receive by retaining the talented members instead of shipping them off to SLC. In a way, I kinda agree.

What good are those guys in SLC doing any way? They have almost no impact upon our daily lives, but the local leaders have some.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by Archaea

He spoke and wrote as one, but one can listen to his arguments as he presents them coherently.

The main argument that intrigued me is the benefit the local congregations receive by retaining the talented members instead of shipping them off to SLC. In a way, I kinda agree.

What good are those guys in SLC doing any way? They have almost no impact upon our daily lives, but the local leaders have some.

He is an apologist. He would have us believe the entire international non-USA Mormon community can't spare one leader. He makes it sound like it is out of great love and regard for the international Mormon community that no one is called to be an apostle.

Come on.

I don't know why they haven't called an intl apostle outside of the German guy. Probably because they don't know too many very intimately, so they don't get thrown into the pot of candidates that they pray about.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

He is an apologist. He would have us believe the entire international non-USA Mormon community can't spare one leader. He makes it sound like it is out of great love and regard for the international Mormon community that no one is called to be an apostle.

Come on.

I don't know why they haven't called an intl apostle outside of the German guy. Probably because they don't know too many very intimately, so they don't get thrown into the pot of candidates that they pray about.

Well I agree they probably haven't looked beyond their inner circle, but why do we even want somebody else in leadership?

Let's let the inner circle have their thing, we can ignore them as they make themselves irrelevant in our daily lives and the larger, outside Church can grow despite their idiosyncrasies.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by Adam

Regarding English:

I once told a good friend from Bolivia that I looked forward to the day a general conference address was given in the native tongue of the speaker and translated into English for me.

He laughed and said that Conference is translated from English to nearly every language on the planet. If a speaker suddenly went up and spoke in Spanish the guy translating conference into Indonesian and the gal translating conference into Russian and so forth would be frozen as they don't know Spanish.

To give a conference talk in another language you would have to duplicate the entire translation effort for each language spoken in conference. So, he concluded, it would not be cost effective or prudent to do so.

Interesting perspective.

I think you are your friend are misinformed. The conference talks are translated in advance of the broadcast, not on the fly. I actually know someone who is a translator/broadcaster.

So it would simply be a matter of translating the spanish talk to English, and then distributing the English talks to the other translators.

[Indy Coug]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

I think you are your friend are misinformed. The conference talks are translated in advance of the broadcast, not on the fly. I actually know someone who is a translator/broadcaster.

So it would simply be a matter of translating the spanish talk to English, and then distributing the English talks to the other translators.

Not all talks stick to the script, so the translators still have to be able to do real-time translation. This was told to me by a guy in my branch that did English to Bislama translation in the past for General Conference.