Family history helps bring people together. It literally bridges all kinds of different nationalities and times and places. There's just this yearning. People have a yearning to know who they are, where they came from. The Church makes all these wonderful family history records available because of our belief in the importance of families. We do this because we love families. And we know that the peoples of the world love their families too, and that connecting is a rich and significant experience.

We are here at the Family History Center, Cape Coast, Ghana. We have over 4,500 family history centers that are around the world. They are in remarkable places. We're here at the family history center in Hong Kong, and this is one of many thousands that the Church has built around the world for use by those who are members of the Church, and for those who are not members of the Church, so that folks can come here and complete their family tree. Coming in this centers is I'm so excited. Actually, it's very hard to find my grandfather because when I was born my grandfather was already dead. When I click to my mother's name, and then suddenly it appear, my grandfather's name. It's really amazing. I think it's a miracle. It's the same name? Yeah, the same name. Same day. Wow, yes. The same place. As they for that very first time see a document what their family's name on it, there's just immediate connection. And it's a worldwide thing. Family history and genealogy work is everywhere. Over 50 percent of our collection, actually, is international type records that we've been gathering-- going out into parishes, churches and filming these records, digitizing these records to make them available for anyone that wants to look at them to use them.

These are my family history.

It contains 31 generations, more than 100,000 names inside. I'm so happy to leave this family history to the family history center. We have the largest collection of genealogical records anywhere in the world that we've been gathering for over 100 years. The library is the core of the family history collection here. But through digitization and microfilming, the library's collections are being made increasingly available on the internet through the familysearch.org websites, so that you can literally do research from home. Our effort in Family Search, everything that we are trying to do is to extend the services that we give in our facilities out to people everywhere in the world. Family history is about home. It's about family. And what a better place to be doing it than in your home with your family? I'm not a member of the Church, but I appreciate the ability to use this library. It's open to everyone. And I have been here 31 years, and have always felt welcome in this library. I'm a Christian, and I come from Scotland, but I'm not a member of the Mormon church. But I'm very impressed with what's been provided free, and the quality of the whole setup. We get individuals from all backgrounds, from all denominations, from all upbringings. And the Church offers all this for free. It's an outreach effort that we do because we want to be able to see people have success in this, so that we can learn who we are.

For someone like me who-- my mom died when I was 16. I never knew my biological father. So I grew up not knowing very much about myself and where I came from. This site has allowed me to discover who my family is, to hear my grandfather's name, my grandmother's name, my great grandparents' name and where they came from. I cried. It makes me feel excited. It makes me feel like I'm a part of something so much greater. It makes me feel stronger. And it makes me feel stronger as a woman. My grandma and my great grandma, they were all really strong women. And now I can share with my kids the information that I have. And it's really exciting to be able to share that with them. This is who you are, this is who you come from. And just last year I couldn't tell them that. I didn't know anything. To me, what's really exciting about family history is that sense of belonging.

It's tender to me, to feel I belong to other people. [MUSIC PLAYING]