Comment

After 40 Years!

I found out about Nadir Kamran when he wrote a beautiful letter asking for contact with members of the Church. I forwarded the letter to the proper authority, and a few weeks later received the following letter from him:

“It was one of those exhilarating days in Istanbul, Turkey, in 1982 when our house phone rang and I heard a warm voice pronounce my name. In a few seconds I knew that my prayers had been answered. The person on the line was a Mormon, and I hadn’t seen or talked to one for nearly forty years.

“Back in 1945, after my basic training, I was sent to Ogden, Utah, to repair and classify huge searchlights used in the Pacific theater. During my stay in Ogden, which was more than a year, I felt that the people of that region were totally different from people I had met elsewhere. I hadn’t the slightest idea what a Mormon was, and being young and foolish I didn’t dwell on this phenomenon.

“I now realize, after forty years, that something must have been imbedded in my mind and heart. I know that Almighty God must have sent me to that distant land to see that there exists in this world a flock of people who really and truly love him, and who really live a righteous life.

“Mind you, choosing a virtuous life is not easy, but probably it is the very heart of the matter. For the majority of human beings, pleasures and power and riches are the important things in life; but Mormons were an exception, a wonderful, miraculous exception.

“The day after the phone call, while we were enjoying the company of our Mormon friends, I suddenly felt a seed burst open in my mind—a divine seed that must have been planted there forty years ago and was lying dormant all this time. Planted maybe in an Ogden street corner, maybe in a Salt Lake City shop, or maybe in the beautiful Tabernacle. A seed that may blossom in due time into humility, righteousness, and pure love. Nadir, Kamran”

2nd Lt. Paul McKean
APO New York

Puerto Rican Road Show

When I wrote the drama for our roadshow to be presented in the Ponce Stake roadshows, the perpetual smiles of our Puerto Rican youth told us they were in solid agreement about participating. No, they did not know what a roadshow was, but they wanted our rama (branch) of Santa Isabel to be represented. I wrote the drama in Spanish on a large chart to be hung on our chapel wall so the youth could learn their parts. We rehearsed and prepared, finding it a challenge to speak slowly and clearly. We were all pleased when our youth performed so well that they were given first place in the music division of the stake, and two were given acting awards. What a tremendous blessing for the youth of our little rama!

Elder and Sister Robert J. Cox
Puerto Rico San Juan Mission

October Cover

I just received my October Ensign with the Wyoming photograph by Anselm Spring on the cover. I am thrilled. I have wanted to write and tell you of the excellence you show in each of your issues. I refer mainly to the art work and graphic skills that make the Ensign such a delight to an artist as myself. The paintings and photography are the best I see in the marketplace today in visual journalism.

Richard Bigler
Del Rey, California

From an Eskimo Village

We live in a remote Eskimo village on Alaska’s northern slope. There are three families of us that meet for Sunday sacrament meeting, but other than one another, our Church publications are our only regular contact with the Church. We need them and read them and love them.

udy M. Miller
Barrow, Alaska

87 and Still Reading

From time to time I visit one of our dear old sisters in the ward. She is 87 years old, living alone in a small flat, and confined to a wheelchair because she has only one leg.

But she receives the Ensign. What a blessing! She really loves the magazine and tells me that she reads every word of it. All the back copies she gives to me, and I let members in the ward, especially new converts, have them. Truly, everything in it is for our good and well-being.

J. Vernon
Rawtenstall, Lancs. England

The Doctoral Candidates

I was thrilled with President Hinckley’s mention of the role of Don C. Wood in converting Dr. Kim of Korea while they were Ph.D. students at Cornell University (August 1982 issue, p. 5).

President Wood was my mission president in the old Northwestern States Mission from 1962 to 1964. He told us that when he entered his doctoral program at Cornell, there were several other married LDS students who entered at the same time. To their great surprise they were all called on stake missions. Some rejected the call because they felt it would make it impossible for them to obtain their degrees on schedule.

Yet when the date of graduation arrived, President Wood and the other stake missionaries all received their degrees while the students who had refused the call had been unable to complete the work. The Lord truly blesses those who serve others.

John Melvin Dodd
Gilmer, Texas

My Choice to Stay Home

Thank you for the article “Quantity and Quality Time” by Beppie Harrison (July 1982). Since I’ve dropped out of the career world to raise my children, I have struggled with a fear of inadequate training to teach my young ones. I too have felt the need to explain to the world my choice to stay home. The article brought me new ideas and put my feelings into words.

Wreatha Stephens
Tooele, Utah