“LDS Scene,” Ensign, Aug. 1981, 80
LDS Scene
President Kimball recently returned from Chile where he broke ground for the temple in Santiago. He was accompanied by Elder Robert E. Wells of the First Quorum of the Seventy, Elder W. Grant Bangerter, also of the First Quorum of the Seventy and executive administrator of the chile area, Carlos A. Cifuentes, Chilean Regional Representative, and President Kimball’s secretary, D. Arthur Haycock.
President Kimball and his party, including David M. Kennedy, special representative of the First Presidency, had earlier met with the president of Peru, Fernando Belaunde-Terry. While in Chile, the leaders met with Admiral Jose Toribio Merino Castro, senior member of the ruling junta and commander-in-chief of the Chilean Navy.
The University of Utah at its commencement exercises in June presented honorary doctor of humane letters degrees to President Spencer W. Kimball and his wife, Camilia Eyring Kimball.
Sister Belle Smith Spafford was honored in May by the National Council of Women, with whom she has been associated for over fifty years. At its regularly scheduled meeting in New York, the Council announced the establishment of the Belle S. Spafford Archival Fellowship at New York University. The fellowship is to help its recipient search out, protect, and make available archival records and materials relating to woman’s work.
In a separate ceremony, the council president, Louise McLaughlin, presented a written citation to Sister Spafford, former general president of the Relief Society, at the eighteenth annual Woman of Conscience meeting, honoring her as “a leader, teacher, humanitarian” for her “pioneer-to-present work on behalf of women.”
The first full-time missionary from the country of Sri Lanka has been called. Elder Minto Rasiah will serve in the Philippines where there is a sizeable community of Sri Lankans.
James B. Conkling, a member of the Church from Sherman Oaks, California, has been named director of Voice of America by President Ronald Reagan, an appointment that requires Senate confirmation. The Voice of America broadcasts news, commentaries, discussions, drama, and music to a worldwide audience in English and thirty-five other languages over more than a hundred transmitters.
The Pittsburgh Pirates sponsored its third annual “Mormon Family Day” recently. Among the events were the presentation of an inscribed silver tray to Brother Vernon Law, a team member for seventeen years; a family genealogy presented by Elder Paul H. Dunn of the First Quorum of the Seventy to Pirate manager Chuck Tanner.
Columbia space shuttle astronauts John Young and Robert Crippen were honored in May at a special program in the Salt Lake Tabernacle. The program featured several musical numbers by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and a large-screen film presentation of the space shuttle, with live narration by the two astronauts.