Talk:President of the Church (Latter Day Saints)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Contents

[edit] Table the Presidents

I was wikifying the dates for the Presidents of the Church section when I noticed that:

  1. There is a lot of redundant information on each line, and
  2. Some of the information might be better presented and digested if presented in a table.

Here's a brief idea for table-izing the information. I've tabled just a few presidents as a test for discussion. I think this:

# President Life Served Length Ordination
1 Joseph Smith, Jr. December 23, 1805 - June 27, 1844 1830-1844 14 years April 6, 1830
2 Brigham Young June 1, 1801 - August 29, 1877 1847-1877 33 years December 27, 1847
3 John Taylor November 1, 1808 - July 25, 1887 1808-1887 10 years October 10, 1880
4 Wilford Woodruff March 1, 1807 - September 2, 1898 1889-1898 9 years April 7, 1889

is easier to digest than this:

  1. Joseph Smith, Jr. (1805-1844), served 1830-1844 (14 years). Born December 23, 1805; died June 27, 1844. Ordained President of the Church on April 6, 1830.
  2. Brigham Young (1801-1877), served 1847-1877 (33 years). Born June 1, 1801; died August 29, 1877. Ordained President of the Church on December 27, 1847.
  3. John Taylor (1808-1887), served 1880-1887 (10 years). Born November 1, 1808; died July 25, 1887. Ordained President of the Church on October 10, 1880.
  4. Wilford Woodruff (1807-1898), served 1889-1898 (9 years). Born March 1, 1807; died September 2, 1898. Ordained President of the Church on April 7, 1889.

It also eliminates the redundant information. What does everyone else think? — Frecklefoot | Talk 16:31, Sep 7, 2004 (UTC)

By all means, I think it would be a nice improvement. Everyking 19:28, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)
I agree. The table is much better. COGDEN 02:41, Sep 8, 2004 (UTC)

I'm glad everyone liked the idea. Done. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 20:30, Sep 8, 2004 (UTC)

Man, I really screwed that up, didn't I? Had to do it all by hand, so it isn't surprising some errors slipped in. Sorry! I usually don't screw up so bad! — Frecklefoot | Talk 21:47, Sep 8, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Moving article to President of the Church (Mormonism)

On the [Latter Day Saint movement project], it was decided to combine articles that contain the joint early history of the movement with articles about specific denominations. Thus, rather than have President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and President of the Community of Christ, etc., that these articles should be combined under the title "(Mormonism)". Following this directive, I combined this original LDS article with the Community of Christ article. Information on other denominations still needs to be added. --John Hamer 19:35, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Bold titles

A general 'rule of thumb' on titles is to use italics when typeset, and double quotes when not typeset. Bold is usually reserved for special emphasis in headings. Since the use of bold for the many titles in the article here is quite distracting, I reduced the excessive emphasis to italics here, which is what one would normally expect. --Blainster 23:30, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Succession, doctrine

I don't believe it is necessary to point out that the traditional succession is not 'doctrine' or 'scriptural'. There are hundreds of church policies that are not scriptural or doctrine, and I don't think we should point this out every time a policy comes up.

According to every official statement by the church, Succession works by automatically making the senior Apostle the next prophet... IF you can find any General authority saying this is not doctrine, then I would agree with putting that qualifier in. Otherwise, tell me why we should keep it in? --Measure July 1, 2005 19:11 (UTC)

Maybe it is just a matter of semantics. As I understand it, after the death of the prophet, the senior member of the Quorum of the Twelve becomes the "acting" prophet of the church (until a new prophet is appointed and ordained to that office/position). As has always happenned, this senior member then is then chosen to be the next prophet by a unanimous vote of the members of the Quorum of the Twelve. But as far as I know, there would be nothing doctrinally preventing them from receiving revelation to appoint someone else, again requiring a unanimous vote for that person. Val42 July 1, 2005 23:15 (UTC)

There would be nothing Doctrinally preventing us from ordaining 10-year old boys as preists in the Aaronic preisthood, but if I were to state "The office of priest is obtained by worthy 16 year olds", I don't expect anyone would put "although not doctrinally necessary" in front of it.

In my study of this issue, however, it seems to me that it is -almost- doctrinal that the senior apostle becomes the next president. Looking at the ensign article I linked to seems to solidify the position. Are there any official church statements even saying there is a -possibility- that the senior apostle would not become the new Prophet? --Measure July 1, 2005 23:54 (UTC)

[edit] Three counselors

I was just looking at the article again and noticed a minor issue. Benson and Hunter both had three counselors, including Hinckley in the presidency. I am unaware of any other cases where there were three counselors. But I don't know how to put it in to the article; the ways that I've thought up so far don't work. Val42 July 1, 2005 23:20 (UTC)

The counselors to Benson and Hunter were Hinckley and Monson, and neither president had more than two. The last to have more than two was Kimball, who added Hinckley as third counselor behind Tanner and Romney. David O. McKay had four counselors during the late 1960s.
I added some detail on this point. --MrWhipple 23:04, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
There were three cases where Presidents of the Church had three or more counselors. Joseph Smith had several additional counselors. David O. McKay had four additional counselors, and President Spencer W. Kimball had three. Presidents Hinckley and Monson served with Presidents Benson and Hunter for the entire duration of their Presidencies. There were no additional counselors at that time. A Fellow Church Member 20:44, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Table structure for lists

The current table headings mean that two pieces of information are in every row twice: the death date and the ordination date. I propose changing the headings to:

  Picture President Birth Ordination Death Length

This would make the following change to the CJC LDS table:

  Picture President Birth Ordination Death Length
2 Brigham Young June 1, 1801 December 27, 1847 August 29, 1877 29 years
...
15 Gordon B. Hinckley June 23 1910 March 12, 1995 living currently serving

and the following change to the CoC table - note the use of references for resignations as president resulting in change in presidency at time other than death:

  President Birth Ordination Death Length
2 Joseph Smith III November 6, 1832 April 6, 1860 December 10, 1914 54 years
...
6 Wallace B. Smith July 29, 1929 April 5, 1978 living 18 years[1]
  1. ^ In 1995, Wallace B. Smith named his successor and retired to emeritus status in 1996

Rational I think this makes the table easier to understand - looking at a range of dates in a single column is counterintuitive for me. Additionally, compairing years, and other information is much easier to do between non-adjacent presidents. It also eliminates the inconsistency in describing the "served" column between the different churches. Trödel•talk 23:25, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Succession

This phrase "The tradition of waiting for 2-3 years before confirming a new president continued until the death of the fourth President, Wilford Woodruff, in 1898." (emphasis added) just strikes me as not being exactly right. Tradition is not really the right word here - as there are different reasons for the delay between the death of JS and the calling of BY, the death of BY and the calling of John Taylor, and the death of JT and the calling of WW. It wasn't really an established tradition but more a result of necessity. However, I am not sure how to word it differently - I tried several options but wasn't really happy with any of them. Trödel 06:02, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge with Mormonism

Why does Wiki have so many pages on Mormonism. Catholocism is older and has more members why does it have so few pages and Mormonism have a page for every slight difference. I do not want more Catholic pages but would rather see Mormon pages consolodated.

Why are there so many articles on Mormonism? Probably because their are a lot of Mormon editors on the 'pedia. That being said, I don't think this article should be merged with Mormonism. There are a lot of articles that link to this one and this topic is too big to fit into the Mormonism article. I think it should stay as it is. We have a whole article on the Popes don't we? — Frecklefoot | Talk 14:03, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Not only do we have an an article on the office of Pope, we have an article on every Pope who ever lived (just as we have an article on every President of the Church who ever lived). This topic is, of course, notable enough to keep its own separate article. Kafziel Talk 19:04, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../p/r/e/Talk%7EPresident_of_the_Church_%28Latter_Day_Saints%29_854a.html"