Juliet Toro—Fiji

Distance learning and temple ordinances bless the lives of a family in Fiji

A Path to Education

On the Pacific island of Fiji, Juliet Toro and her husband, Iliesa, had never had much interest in the Church. That changed when their older children, prodded by Juliet’s Latter-day Saint mother, began attending Sunday meetings and weekday seminary classes. Juliet decided it was time to invite the missionaries over to teach her. And when they did, she liked what she heard.

The Toro children joined the Church in March 1999, and Juliet followed two weeks later. Iliesa, however, continued to show little interest. Fearing her husband would be the only one in the family to not embrace the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, Juliet began praying earnestly that he too would join the Church.

At the time of Juliet’s baptism, the Church in Fiji had four stakes and around twelve thousand members. The Fijian Saints were eagerly awaiting the construction of a temple in Suva, the capital city where Juliet and her family lived. After the Church came to Fiji in the mid-1950s, members often made immense financial sacrifices to attend the house of the Lord in Hawaii or New Zealand. This burden was reduced in 1983, when the Church dedicated temples in Samoa, Tonga, and Tahiti. Still, traveling to the Nuku‘alofa Tonga Temple, the nearest of the three, remained expensive.

When President Gordon B. Hinckley had named Fiji as the site for one of the thirty new temples, the Fijian Saints rejoiced. Having a house of the Lord in Suva would allow them and the Saints in the island nations of Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu to attend the temple more regularly—and with much lower travel costs.

Temple construction began in May 1999, two months after Juliet’s baptism. Around that time, she learned that Brigham Young University was trying out a distance learning program at the Fiji LDS Technical College, a Church-owned secondary school in Suva. BYU’s slogan was “The World Is Our Campus,” and the school’s administrators were looking for affordable ways to bring educational opportunities to more Church members around the globe. The internet enabled professors in Provo to communicate with students in Fiji almost instantaneously.

The program enrolled secondary school graduates in several university-level classes. Knowledgeable student facilitators from BYU would administer the classes in person, while the BYU professors who created the courses would provide online support from six thousand miles away. For a small application fee, students could earn credit toward a university degree.

The program interested Juliet. She and Iliesa had been university students when they first met, but they had left school to work and eventually started a family. For over a decade, Juliet had been raising her children at home. She wanted to further her education, so she spoke with Iliesa about it. He agreed that she should enroll.

On the first day of class, Juliet and the other students introduced themselves. Many were young Church members, just out of secondary school or newly returned from full-time missions. Only a handful of students were in their early thirties, like Juliet.

As classes began, Juliet was worried that she was too old to go back to school. The classes focused primarily on developing practical business skills. Over the course of two semesters, she and her fifty-five classmates would take courses in accounting, business management, economics, English, organizational behavior, and the Doctrine and Covenants. Juliet didn’t think she knew as much as the younger students, and she was nervous that someone might find out how little she knew. The last thing she wanted was to look foolish in class.

On a Thursday evening, not long after school started, James Jacob, the director of the program, told Juliet that she needed to attend a meeting that night at a nearby Church building.

Confused, she followed James to the building. When they got there, she found half her ward waiting for her in the chapel. She then saw Iliesa, dressed in white baptismal clothes. He had been receiving the missionary discussions in secret. And now he was ready to join her and their children in the Church.

Tears of joy flooded Juliet’s eyes. She knew God had heard her prayers. Her family was finally united in faith. And one day, she hoped, they would be sealed in the house of the Lord.

See the full text in Gospel Library for notes and source citations.

Gathering Believers to the Cocoa-Shed Church

Juliet Toro found that BYU’s distance learning program was unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Growing up, she’d always been afraid to ask questions in school, worried her teachers would ridicule her for saying the wrong thing. But she soon found that the classroom facilitators encouraged questions and never made her feel foolish. She also felt the Lord’s Spirit in the classroom, guiding her learning.

Juliet’s first term was extremely challenging. Her hardest class was business management. Although she was already familiar with some basic business principles, Juliet was often overwhelmed by the many new terms and definitions she learned in class. At the end of the term, she felt like there was too much to review for the exam. But she scored well on the test and earned the highest final grade in the class.

Her religion and accounting classes posed other challenges. As a new Latter-day Saint, she was unfamiliar with the Doctrine and Covenants, so she got help from her fellow student Sera Balenagasau, a lifelong Church member who had served a full-time mission. For accounting, she turned to her husband, Iliesa. Until recently, he had worked at a bank, so he understood the subject well and could help her work out problems. At the end of the term, she had top marks in these classes as well.

Since Juliet’s house was across the street from the school, it became a place for the students to gather and study. Her classmates often helped prepare meals and tidy up the home. Juliet enjoyed having them as friends and was cheered by their willingness to serve her and her family. Watching them was like seeing the gospel in action.

The second term began on September 1, 1999. Some of the students who had not done well wanted to retake their exams to improve their grades, so summary courses were created for them. And since Juliet had done so well in the first term, she was brought on as a facilitator for the business management students.

For the next three months, Juliet juggled her studies with her other responsibilities as a facilitator and a mother. She treated the five young men in her business management summary course like they were her sons. As the term progressed, she could tell they were more comfortable around her than around their facilitators from BYU. They spoke freely in class and seemed less reluctant to ask her questions. At the end of the term, they all passed the exam.

One day, the program directors called Juliet and told her that she was the valedictorian.

“What’s that?” she asked.

To her surprise, it meant that she’d had the best academic performance of all her classmates that year. Her confidence swelled. “Yes,” she told herself. “I can do this.”

A short time later, the program held a graduation ceremony for the students and around four hundred family members and friends. The graduates, wearing blue caps and gowns from the Fiji LDS Technical College, received recognition for completing the program. Juliet and several others also received introductory business certificates from BYU–Hawaii. Juliet offered the valedictory speech.

Afterward, Iliesa expressed his and Juliet’s gratitude in a letter to Elder Henry B. Eyring, the commissioner of Church education. “My wife and I always wondered whether we would be able to further our education,” he wrote. “It seemed like our silent prayers have been answered. The Lord does work in mysterious ways.”

See the full text in Gospel Library for notes and source citations.

A Temple Dedication amid Turmoil

On May 19, 2000, six months after Juliet Toro’s graduation, armed militants forced their way into the Parliament of Fiji and took the nation’s prime minister and dozens of other government officials hostage. The crisis quickly developed into a full-scale coup d’état. Violence and lawlessness enveloped the country for several days.

Juliet was in tears as she watched reports of the coup on television. At first, everyone was put on lockdown. Businesses closed, schools shut down, and churches stopped meeting. Then the restrictions eased up, and Juliet’s two oldest children went to a movie with their cousins and a friend from church. But soon after they left, violence again erupted in Suva, throwing the city into chaos. Juliet was frantic when she heard the news. Three hours passed. When her children finally made it home, she held them tight.

The coup began after construction on the Suva Fiji Temple had finished, and the Saints were preparing for an open house and dedication in June. Now many Church members wondered if these events would be postponed until the upheaval was over.

On May 29, the president of Fiji resigned, and the military seized control of the government. Two days later, President Hinckley called Roy Bauer, the president of the Suva Fiji Mission, to ask about conditions there. President Bauer informed him that the country was relatively stable under the military, despite the ongoing hostage situation. The airport in Suva had reopened, and it was again possible to travel around the city.

President Hinckley was satisfied. “I will see you next month,” he said.

The Saints in Fiji held a small temple open house in early June, attracting more than sixteen thousand visitors.

One Saturday, three buses arrived at the open house with people from other faiths. As one woman stepped off her bus, she had a wonderful feeling that only grew more powerful as she approached the temple. In the past, she had spoken against the Church. Now she regretted her words, and she prayed for forgiveness before entering the temple.

“Today I know this is the Lord’s true church,” she told one of the Saints she met during the tour. “Please send the missionaries.”

Because of the coup, the First Presidency decided to hold only one dedicatory session instead of four, limiting the number of people who could attend the ceremony. Still, on June 18, the day of the dedication, Juliet and other Fijian Saints stood outside the temple along the main road.

The temple was situated at the top of a hill overlooking the Pacific Ocean. When the car carrying President Hinckley and his wife, Marjorie, drove slowly by, the Saints waved white handkerchiefs in the air and shouted hosanna. The prophet smiled and waved back at them. Seeing him lifted everyone’s spirits. The skies were sunny, and Juliet could feel excitement and emotion in the air.

In his remarks at the dedication, President Hinckley spoke about the significance of the new, modified temples. Already he had dedicated more than two dozen of them around the world. “It’s the house of the Lord,” he declared at a pulpit in the celestial room. “You can get the washings and the anointings and the endowments and come into this room, beautifully furnished, here having passed through the veil in symbolism of our passage from life into a new life.”

Juliet Toro (left) with her facilitator Betsy Fowler and her husband Iliesa at Juliet’s graduation from the distance learning program, Suva, Fiji, 1999. (Courtesy James Jacob.)

“Here are two sealing rooms with beautiful altars where you can look in the mirrors and sense the feeling of eternity,” he continued. “There’s nothing like it on all the face of the earth.”

The temple soon opened for ordinance work. And after preparing to enter the house of the Lord, the Toro family was sealed together for time and eternity.

See the full text in Gospel Library for notes and source citations.