Mission Update - Baptists at the Roundabout

Non-conformist Chapel in Aberaman, Wales briefly used by the LDS Church in 1851.

Last week, I arrived. They gave me administrator access to our Early Missionaries Database and I flew my wings.

Well, there's one more missionary added. So don't get too excited.

It is a challenge keeping up with the Joneses. I mean, sorting out all the Joneses which is the most common surname in Wales if don't you know already. It also helps explain why David Bevan Jones (1807-1863) preferred to use his bardic name - the Welsh version of a nom de plume - of Dewi Elfed. I knew his story and wondered why he was missing from our database and didn't seem to show up on any Church record in Utah.

Christmas Eve 1841, Llanfoist, Wales

It isn't much, but another missionary journal from my 4th Great-Grandmother, Elinor Vaughan's era in Llanfoist tells us:

“My next appointment was at Llanfoist where I found a steady and attentive congregation. This is a dark and sootey place owing to the vast amount of coal and iron works here.” 

James Palmer Reminiscences, circa 1884-1898 LDS CHL MS 1752_f0001_00071. 

This source must be based on a contemporaneous journal as there are dates that would not be remembered unless recorded somehow. James Palmer occasionally traveled with Elder John Needham who baptized Elinor Jenkins Vaughan on 17 December 1841, just one week before the Christmas Eve meeting in Llanfoist. Elder Palmer also helped establish the Branch at Llanthony in the Black Mountains and was the first missionary to preach in Abersychan in June 1841, apparently without much success.

Elder Palmer is credited with the first recorded baptism in South Wales. His Reminiscences records that on either the 23rd or 30th of November, 1840, he baptized John Preece and William Williams in the River Monnow at Skenfrith, Monmouthshire. It just so happens that I took pics there on my visit last Good Friday, not knowing about this history (even though it's recorded in Truth Will Prevail: the Rise of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the British Isles 1837-1987 (University Press, Cambridge, UK 1987), p. 240, as well as the Reminiscences at p. 13.)

The River Monnow at Skenfrith, Monmouthshire, Wales. First baptisms in South Wales near here.

Baptism for the Dead: Getting to Know You

Volume 7 of Documents in the Joseph Smith Papers is out. (I seem to have skipped a few so my collection is not yet complete.) My purpose is acquiring this volume was to learn as much as I could about Joseph Smith's first teachings on Baptism for the Dead. (See Doctrine and Covenants, Section 128 for a fuller, scriptural background.)

Joseph first mentioned baptism for the dead at a funeral for Seymour Brunson on August 15, 1840, but there is not much recorded from that discourse. He then addressed it at the General Church Conference in Nauvoo in early October 1840 when hearers were so motivated they immediately left for the Mississippi to perform baptisms for their dearly departed. And, once again, some of his teachings were not fully recorded. Still, there are footnotes to contemporaneous reports such as a letter from Vilate Kimball to Heber C. who was on a mission in England. This would be how the British Saints and missionaries such as Richard Steele would have heard about the new doctrine so early.

And there is a very important aspect of what Vilate tells Heber. Here is the section of her October 11, 1840 letter from online, digital sources at the LDS Church History Library:

Cymru, March 2018 III, Blorenge Rhymes with Snow Range

Cold is colder in a humid climate. Oh, yeah. And the wind helps cool it down. And an old house heated by radiators too.

It only got just below freezing and there wasn't much snow except for wet little clumps. The mountains were pure and white.

The Blorenge from Abergavenny, out my back garden.

The excitement of visiting Grandma Elinor's likely baptism site on the Brecon & Monmouthshire Canal motivated me to go out in the cold. I wore my wool socks over some Nike comfort socks.

How to Read a Welsh Mormon Church Membership Record from the 1850s

It appears that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormon) in Wales first began using a standard ledger book form for membership records in 1849-50. I have seen them from the Branches in Merthyr Tydful, Tredegar (Bedwellty Parish), and Risca, Wales. The format covered two, long pages lengthwise. When the register book was open, the two pages formed continuous lines across the two pages. Fortunately, a few of them have translation in English. An example follows with some of the columns translated into English. I will attempt to translate and explain the rest. The first page:

"Cofres-LLyfr" means "Register-Book" and that's an interesting, gothic double "L" in "LLyfr."

"o Aelodau" is "of members."

"Eglwys Jesu Crist Saint y Dyddiau Liweddaf" should be obvious as "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints." And remarkably for Welsh, in shorter form than most languages with Roman script. 'Saint" is in a singular form as there are nouns like "plant" for "child" that are often used to mean a plural group ("children") but remain grammatically singular in form.

Temple Service

Bountiful, Utah Temple at night. (although we're still missing our spire under repair and the scaffolding is still up.)

Last evening I did my regular service as a Veil Worker in the Bountiful Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is one of the great blessings of my life. 

I have no intention of discussing sacred ordinances. They are sacred to me in a covenant with God sort of way. There are many scholarly and not-so-scholarly writings on the various subjects and that's not what this is about.

What I want to say, with some caution so as not to unnecessarily trivialize Temple service, is how amazing it is to work in the Temple. 

Universal Salvation by Christ's Grace After All We Can Do Together

LDS Temple Baptistry with Window "into the World of Light"

My eyes are opening to a new concept of religious faith that is wonderful!

I'm no theologian and certainly no official spokesman for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. However, my deep dives into family history work and temple ordinances and sealings for those beyond the grave who have gone into the world of light are opening my eyes to that light.

It is a unique form of Universalism that the Prophet Joseph Smith preached for it required hard work on our part, not for our own salvation so much as for the benefit of others and all of humanity as a family.

Miracles Great and Small

The back entrance to Mueller Park Jr. High that my wife uses the morning after the shotgun blast.
My wife heard that the neighboring LDS Stake President initiated this effort.

There have been a series of bruises to this liberal heart since returning from the Land of my Fathers (Cymru) last summer. First, the Malheur Armed Occupiers were found not guilty. Then, somehow, America elected the most despicable woman-abusing, self-aggrandizing, klepto-capitalist to be President. And finally, a troubled kid with a shotgun blasted a hole in the ceiling of a classroom in the school where my wife teaches.

The first miracle is that in spite of significant emotional trauma to that school community (yours truly included), no blood was shed. The Washington Post noted this is in a fairly accurate article revealing some of the difficult details of he incident that I wasn't going to share, but that 's the press for you. Locally, KSL also had good coverage of the aftermath. Those details do, however, reveal how close this was to becoming a horrific tragedy. Thank Heavens and all involved who acted with good training, smarts, and compassion. No one had to shoot the poor kid down and he was unsuccessful in whatever he was attempting except that first blast.

Not Live-Blogging LDS General Conference, Sorry

I haven't left the church. I'll be watching conference to the extent I stay awake. But I'm still in recovery from walking pneumonia and tire easily. Also, I am working on a project of scanning family photos that I can work on at my own pace as I listen.

For real-time and post-time internet access, you can watch conference now from pretty much any where in the world at: LDS.org.

I will be blogging later on some themes. I expect we'll here more about aiding refugees as we've already heard in the first session last week, traditionally Women's Conference, and as recently as yesterday from Mormon Newsroom on refugees in Italy.

Thomas Vaughan and the "Magic" of Adam

You can find this online here.

We're going a little Nibleyesque here as I was startled by some passages I read in the writings of my distant cousin, Thomas Vaughan, the 17th Century Alchemist. The point is, Cousin Thomas draws some very interesting conjectures about the first man, Adam, and his knowledge of the Second Adam, Jesus Christ.

First, I must explain that Thomas Vaughan was a very religious man and his study of Alchemy, while a bit unorthodox, fit within his religious faith as he defined Magic in this manner:

Magic is nothing else but the wisdom the the Creator revealed and planted in the creature. . . . Magicians were the first attendants our Savior met withal in this world, and the only philosophers who acknowledged him in the flesh before that he himself discovered it. I find God conversant with them, as he was formerly with the patriarchs; he directs them in their travels with a star, as did the Israelites with a a pillar of fire; he informs them of future dangers in their dreams, that having first seen his Son, they might in the next place see his salvation.*

Basic Principles of the Gospel -- in Japan

My Son, A-5, gave a talk in another ward as a "traveling elder" with the Stake High Counselor last Sunday. He shared the text with me so I could post it here:

Minasan konnichiwa!

A-5 on the left

My name is Aaron Vaughn. Recently, I've returned from serving a mission in Nagoya Japan. I grew up down the street in the Centerville 3^rd Ward. This summer, I've just been working with the Bountiful City Parks and Rec, and I will be going down to BYU this next week to play trumpet in the marching band and to study Physics and Japanese.

 

I'm grateful for this opportunity to speak and share some of the experiences I had on my mission regarding how the gospel changes lives.

 

First, I want to ask, what is the Gospel of Jesus Christ? The first answer that often comes to mind is the 4^th Article of Faith. “The first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are: first, Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; second, Repentance; third, Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; fourth, Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost.” While those are all very important parts of the Gospel, in True to the Faith, we can find a more compact definition. It reads, “The gospel is our Heavenly Father's plan of happiness. The central doctrine of the gospel is the Atonement of Jesus Christ.” In Japanese, the word for Gospel, 福音, is made from two characters. “福”which means happiness, and “音”which means sound. So literally, the gospel is a sound of happiness.

Sam Brown's Basic Principles and the Temple - The Body of Christ

There is an excellent review of Dr. Brown's book by George Handley at Patheos. I'm right there with George in his interpretation and recommendation. This is not so much a book review of Samuel Morris Brown's First Principles and Ordinances: The Fourth Article of Faith in Light of the Temple (Maxwell Institute, BYU, Provo, 2014), as it is a thematic introspection taking off from his ideas. Hopefully with the Holy Spirit, and a sharing with you, the reader.

The basic principles of the Gospel - Faith, Repentance, Baptism and other ordinances, and the Holy Ghost - all enduring to the end are very important to me. I think they are a process of a lifetime. And here we have Sam taking those basic principle pretty deep in his linking to the Temple and the idea I hadn't really thought about so profoundly how those principles and ordinances are not accomplished just individually but as a people. We need each other. And that stretches over families, generations, congregations, priesthoods, and a living Faith evidenced through our choices and actions in Hope that our meager efforts will accomplish good and affirm the Faith we strive for.

Crime and Preachment

This is such a great newspaper find with Mormon Missionaries and possible family both referenced even if not directly connected.

Monmouthshire Merlin & Silurian, 21 June 1856

First the missionaries. There wasn't much information easily to find about Abednego Spencer Williams (1827-1896) born in Blaenau, Monmouthshire, except that he came to Utah in the 1880s, and is buried in Ogden City Cemetery.

There's a bit more for Israel Evans (1828-1896). His story reads like an overview of westward expansion. Born in Ohio, his parents joined the LDS Church and moved to Missouri when he was only five. They relocated to Nauvoo, Illinois after the expulsion from Missouri and then left Nauvoo ahead of the mobs to follow Brigham Young. Israel marched with the Mormon Battalion in the War with Mexico and was present for the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill. Instead of becoming a rich Californian, he went to Utah. He served a four and a half year mission to Wales and led a successful handcart company (only two deaths) to the Valley in the turbulent year of 1857.

The year before, 1856, when Elinor, Jane, John and family left for Utah, Israel helped the Welsh Saints who took the train from Abergavenny and provided a moving account in his journal. He helped the Saints load onto the S. Curling at Liverpool. Elinor had gone a few weeks earlier and sailed on the Enoch Train. John and Jane Vaughan Lewis were likely on that train heading out from Abergavenny and who knows which Vaughans left behind were there to bid farewell:

The Day I Needed a Blessing

It was just a couple of years ago. One of those days where I was as close to the edge as I ever didn't want to be. With my dad far away, I asked my father-in-law, a real good guy, if he could give me a blessing of comfort and guidance. We planned to go there that Sunday evening.

My wife, our ward Relief Society President, got a call about a family in our neighborhood. Our friends were out of town and their son's step-daughter, playing with her twin sister, had collapsed in outdoor play, stopped breathing, and turned blue. The twin went running for help, found her step-dad and he, having been a Boy Scout, commenced CPR. The girl was breathing when the paramedics arrived but remained unconscious to the hospital and after while the doctors scrambled to figure what was wrong. My wife suggested that we stop by the hospital on the way to her parents' so she could visit with them.

I hate hospitals. I much prefer funerals. My faith in the afterlife is so solid that I appreciate the sense of earthly finality and closure. Hospitals are full of pain, suffering, anxiety, and uncertainty.

Live-Blogging LDS General Conference Spring 2014 - Saturday PM

Watch it LIVE here: https://www.lds.org/general-conference/watch?lang=eng&cid=HPTU040114644

OK. I'm back. Had to get something I remembered on to Family Search/Family Tree. Then a few more groceries came.

Pres. Eyring Conducting and Pres. Uchtdorf is doing the sustainings.

Elder Ted Callister released from Presidency of the Seventy. Lynn Robins sustained. A bunch of 70s called with very few Anglo names. Sunday School General Presidency and Board released.

New Area Seventies. Much variety of names and languages. Ted R. Callister is Pres. of the Sunday School Pres. with Devin G. Durrant as second counselor (is that the basketball player? Son of George? I loved George Durrant.)

"It's a long walk." Every time.

Audits and Stats. 3, 050 Stakes. 83K full-time missionaries, etc.

Elder Russell M. Nelson of the Quorum of the Twelve:

Preacher of the Gospel

The extraordinary thing is that this is not extraordinary. It is so simple and familiar that it could have happened yesterday.

LDS missionaries were taught by the time of my mission not to engage in "Bible-bashing" with ministers of other faiths but simply to bear testimony and depart if the minister was unwilling to participate in a calm discussion. I did that a few times.

A missionary in 1841 England, a new convert himself, and only 20-years of age, recorded this exchange in his missionary journal after meeting with some ministers, one of whom he knew from before his Mormon baptism:

The Doctrine of the Temple

Vaughn Family about 1895. Thomas died in 1894 leaving a widow and 8 children.
My Great-Grandfather is at right front with half a smile.

In Stake Conference a few weeks ago, I was startled to attention when a speaker referenced "the Doctrine of the Temple." I have been looking for a straightforward way to explain it for some time. The speaker went on without such a definition, so maybe it isn't so simple.

Daniel's Stone

The Book of Mormon in many languages

The Book of Mormon has been translated from English into 106 languages! Nobody's seen the original Reformed Egyptian for a while, but at least twelve did (one + three + eight = 12. An interesting number).

This struck me yesterday when I went to the local Distribution Center, blessedly, just a couple of blocks away right here in Centerville. My wife asked me to pick up a paperback, standard blue copy of the Book of Mormon for my grandson's baptism. In the old days (about 3 years ago), it was traditional to buy a nice set of scriptures for an eight-year-old being baptized. But now in this digital age, my wife was trying to make a point about marking scriptures by having me show them on my smartphone while our grandson marked them in a more traditional way in the blue paperback.

Gone to Zion

Winter Quarters just got a bit more real for me.

Winter Quarters, Nebraska Territory. Winter of 1846-47.

The LDS Branch established by Elder John Needham in Llanfoist, Monmouthshire, just couldn't have ended in failure! Well, my ancestors joined the church forty years later up in Durham after the example of their grandmother, Elinor Jenkins Vaughan, baptized in Llanfoist in 1841.

Among the First of the Welsh Converts

Breakthrough.

My Welsh DNA is fairly sparse - but then, there is the issue of my surname. My Vaughns came to Zion in 1887 - on the train. Of course they married into some prominent pioneer families, myself inadvertently going perhaps the farthest with that by marrying a Kimball. At the time, her family name was the least thing on my mind. And I'm trying really hard not to be boastful or proud. But there seems to have been just something, maybe part of it self-imposed, that treated the Vaughns like second-class citizens in Zion.

The first Vaughn over died young and left a family in poverty. His son married and there were troubles in the family. His wife divorced him after the children were pretty well grown. Their oldest son, my grandfather, was never active in the church as an adult. It's a miracle my dad & siblings were. Grandma wasn't active either. She just made sure the children went. My dad and mom were married in the Temple and here I am.

There is a theme running here of faithful women propping up the Vaughns which brings me to . . .