LDS Scene

President Marion G. Romney, First Counselor in the First Presidency, celebrated his eighty-eighth birthday September 19. He marked the occasion at a celebration with members of his family. He was born in Colonia Juarez, Mexico, in 1897. President Romney has been a General Authority for more than half his life, since 6 April 1941, when he was called as the first Assistant to the Twelve. He was ordained to the Council of the Twelve 11 October 1951 and called as Second Counselor to President Harold B. Lee 7 July 1972.

Elder Russell M. Nelson of the Council of the Twelve has been named an honorary professor by Shandong Medical College of Jinan, Shandong Province, People’s Republic of China. The honor came because of his previous work at the college. Elder Nelson, a cardiovascular surgeon, served as a visiting professor at the college in 1981 and again in 1984, shortly after receiving his current calling to the Twelve. Dr. Li Shouxian, one of four physicians from the Chinese college who are working at LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City as part of a professional exchange, represented the school’s president in bestowing the honor on Elder Nelson during a luncheon in Salt Lake City September 27. It is the first honorary professorship ever bestowed by the Chinese school.

The first LDS-built meetinghouse in Ghana was dedicated August 18 at Cape Coast by Elder Neal A. Maxwell of the Council of the Twelve. Elder Russell C. Taylor of the First Quorum of the Seventy, First Counselor in the Europe Area Presidency, spoke at the meeting, along with Ghana Accra Mission President Miles Cunningham. The new meetinghouse will house three branches. While there are 800 members in the mission’s Cape Coast District, approximately 1,300 people attended the dedication, including community leaders and village chiefs.

A statue of the angel Moroni was hoisted into place atop the Sydney Australia Temple September 3, after an Australian court overruled a local government decision that had prohibited the statue. The court ruling allowed the statue to be put in place immediately. The statue was hoisted to the top of the tallest spire on the temple by a crane the next day.

The government of South Korea recently honored Brigham Young University professor Spencer J. Palmer for his three decades of research in Korean history, culture, and religion. Brother Palmer, a professor of Church history and doctrine at BYU, is also associate director for BYU’s David M. Kennedy Center for International Studies.

Gladys Dickey of the Omaha Third Ward, Omaha Nebraska Stake, and her four sons were among families given the Great American Family Award by Nancy Reagan, wife of the United States president. They are the only single-parent family ever to win the award, sponsored by the American Family Society.