Sunday, June 29, 2014

MOVIN' ON UP, TO THE EAST SIDE

June gloom is how the locals describe the weather in June. Like gray May, it is a bit overcast in the mornings. But it is usually sunny by afternoon, yet never too hot. We are still waiting for Spring. And now its Summer. We like it.

Earlier this month we attended the taping of the Prairie Home Companion radio program held at the Greek Theatre in Griffith Park. It was very entertaining. Garrison Keillor and his cast are very talented and can be very funny.
Garrison Keillor at the Greek Theatre
The next week we took a road trip for our P-day. We drove through Ventura County (and bought a case of fresh strawberries), through Santa Barbara, and then to Solvang, a small town with a Danish flavor that caters to tourists. We walked around the town, had lunch in the a cafe, and did a bit of shopping. It felt good to be in a small town, where the pace is slower and parking is plentiful and free. We also visited an ostrich ranch in the nearby town of Goleta. We took the back roads, through the mountains, on the return trip to Santa Barbara. It was a beautiful and uncrowded drive. Then we stopped at the ocean-front town of Carpenteria for a walk on the beach.
Mary at the Summit Vista on our mountain drive

The ostrich ranch




Our big event for the month was our move, finally, from our cozy studio apartment on the second floor to our one bedroom apartment on the third floor. The kitchen seems larger because we don't have the table there. We have a large desk for our computer and a credenza for our files and a larger and nicer dining room table. We also have about three times the usable closet space. And a room just for the bed. What a novelty! We started moving on Thursday morning before our afternoon shift at the library and finished Friday, our P-day.
Our one bedroom apartment
We still like to take walks around the Temple grounds and around the neighborhood. There are many beautiful, well-landscaped homes, and some unusual trees. We've include a photo of one of them. The Jacaranda tree has violet blossoms that fall to the ground and cover the streets and sidewalks. They are all around the neighborhood and grow in the median on Santa Monica Boulevard.
A Jacaranda tree in our neighborhood
Last Friday we went with three other senior missionary couples to the LA Dodgers game against the St. Louis Cardinals. The Dodgers lost, 3-1, but it was a good game and fun to be in this historic stadium.
Our greeter. He is about seven feet tall
Now it is summer, at the library, we are receiving groups of young people for Youth Conferences.  Wards are bringing over high-priest groups now that President Monson and others have spoken out about family history in the Ensign.  And last Saturday, we had two large Primary groups touring the library with their parents and leaders.  Mary capitalized on their theme about families, temples and family history work. She had some power point slides to show family pictures and temples, inside and out.  Then she had the children fill out a family tree with the names of themselves, their parents, and grandparents along with the names of their siblings and the places they were born.  Then they looked up those places on  maps of the United States and the World from our extensive map collection.

Keep doing your family history.  As seen on a bumper sticker :  "Genealogy; it's how we raise our spirits"

 Love, Elder and Sister Evans

Sunday, June 1, 2014

JUNE IS BUSTIN' OUT ALL OVER

        Today there was a wonderful Mission Conference with Elder Ballard of the Twelve Apostles and Elder Schweitzer of the Second Quorum of Seventy speaking to us.  Before the meeting, Elder Ballard shook the hand of every single missionary there, which were about 300.  They totally filled the chapel and the overflow.  He had such a great spirit and made us feel like we can make a difference here.  We can nurture good feelings in our hearts and face each day with energy and enthusiasm.  We can become familiar with the scriptures so that the Holy Ghost will help us recall the right one to use when we are talking with investigators.  Elder Ballard served a mission in England 65 years ago; he knew Mary's parents there when they were in a little branch in Nottingham where her mother was taught the gospel and was baptized.
        A few Saturdays ago, 4 of us ( Our director:  Richard McBride, Jackie Ireland, Max and Mary) drove out to Ventura to help teach sessions at their family history fair.  We had to take our own computers and projectors along with thumb drives that had the power point lessons on them. There were about 14 people in each class.  It was a good day, but a long one.  Then, the next day, Sunday, it was the Jewish Celebration of Israel's Independence.  Public Affairs wanted us to go represent the church there.  I know this might seem very secular, especially since the Jewish Sabbath is on Saturday and everyone on this day was casually dressed for a fair.  We were able to go to our Sacrament meeting and then went to Rancho Park Golf Course where we were to man a booth.  Max had arranged to have some beautiful posters made which really caught people's attention.  Then we had flyers printed up about Jewish family history sites as well as some CDs on the Tabernacle Choir.  There was considerable interest.  One lady in particular wanted to know why Mormons do family history; Mary explained how we believe everyone should have the opportunity to hear the message of the Gospel, even our ancestors who have died.  She also wanted to know why we have temples.  Mary said we baptize people who didn't have an opportunity when they were on the earth.  This woman then told how the Jewish people similarly believe in washing:  men have a place to cleanse themselves before they participate in prayers and there is a washing area for women to use in their synagogues.  
        Last Monday, there was a family home evening for the full-time missionaries which Max and Mary were in charge of.  There were about 24 there, including the mission president and his wife; President Weidman brought a cake he had been given for his birthday. It is a potluck dinner; we brought sweet-and-sour chicken over rice.  After the meal which is in the back room of the library, there is always an activity.  We had invited the head gardener, Kyneston Butchart to take us on a tour of the gardens and trees on the temple grounds which was a great thing to do in the evening.  Everybody enjoyed themselves.  Here are some pictures using Mary's new iPhone:
Note reflecting pool in background




Hollywood Juniper tree 
Canary Island Fan Palm


multi-colored rose bush in front of Temple President's home
        In the family history library this week, Max was helping a man who was coming for the first time.  After getting in the Family Tree, Max spent about an hour with him and as he left, he wanted Mary to take a photo of the two of them.  Many people come to get family name cards so they can do baptisms for the youth that they have brought to the temple.  Most don't realize how easy it is for us to get the cards printed after they have put the names of their ancestors on their pedigree charts.   There are still some people who have difficulty signing in to the tree; the number they need is on their temple recommend or they can bring a printout of their membership record number from their ward clerk. 
        We are enjoying having a free membership to 3 genealogy sites:  ancestry.com, find my past and my heritage.  All church members can now have access to these.  We need to put the ancestral information in the various sites so other people working on our lines can contact us. It's also a great way to organize your family history.
CareyEngraving.jpg
William Carey

        The ancestor who we will focus on today is William Carey.  He is not in our direct line, but he is the famous brother of one of Mary's ancestors, Ann Carey. William Carey (August 17, 1761 - June 9, 1834) was an English missionary and Baptist minister, known as the "father of modern missions." Carey was one of the founders of the Baptist Missionary Society. As a missionary in Serampore, India, he translated the Bible into Bengali, Sanskrit, and numerous other languages and dialects.

Carey, the eldest of five children, was born to Edmund and Elizabeth Carey, who were weavers by trade in the village of Paulerspury in Northampton. William was raised in the Church of England; when he was six, his father was appointed the parish clerk and village schoolmaster. As a child he was naturally inquisitive and keenly interested in the natural sciences, particularly botany. He possessed a natural gift for language, teaching himself Latin.

At the age of 16, Carey’s father apprenticed him to a shoemaker in the nearby village of Hackleton. His master, Clarke Nichols, was a churchman like himself, but another apprentice, John Warr, was a Dissenter. Through his influence Carey would eventually leave the Church of England and join with other Dissenters to form a small Congregational church in Hackleton. While apprenticed to Nichols, he also taught himself Greek with the help of a local villager who had a college education.

When Nichols died in 1779, Carey went to work for another local shoemaker, Thomas Old; he married Old’s sister-in-law Dorothy Plackett in 1781. Unlike William, Dorothy was illiterate; her signature in the marriage register is a crude cross. William and Dorothy Carey had six children, four sons and two daughters; both girls died in infancy. Olds himself died soon afterward, and Carey took over his business, during which time he taught himself Hebrew, Italian, Dutch, and French, often reading while working on his shoes.

Carey became involved with a local association of Particular Baptists that had recently formed, where he became acquainted with men such as John Ryland, John Sutcliff, and Andrew Fuller, who would become his close friends in later years. They invited him to preach in their church in the nearby village of Barton every other Sunday. On October 5, 1783, William Carey was baptized by Ryland and committed himself to the Baptist denomination.

In 1785, Carey was appointed the schoolmaster for the town of Moulton. He was also invited to pastor the local Baptist church. During this time he read Jonathan Edwards' Account of the Life of the Late Rev. David Brainerd and the journals of the explorer James Cook, and became deeply concerned with propagating the Christian Gospel throughout the world. His friend Andrew Fuller had previously written an influential pamphlet in 1781 titled The Gospel Worthy of All Acceptation, answering the hyper-Calvinist belief then prevalent in the Baptist churches, that all men were not responsible to believe the Gospel. At a ministers' meeting in 1786, Carey raised the question of whether it was the duty of all Christians to spread the Gospel throughout the world. J. R. Ryland, the father of John Ryland, is said to have retorted: "Young man, sit down; when God pleases to convert the heathen, he will do it without your aid or mine."

In 1789 Carey became the full-time pastor of a small Baptist church in Leicester. Two years later he published his groundbreaking missionary manifesto, An Enquiry into the Obligations of Christians to use Means for the Conversion of the Heathens. This short book consists of five parts. The first part is a theological justification for missionary activity, arguing that the command of Jesus to make disciples of all the world (Matthew 28:18-20) remains binding on Christians. The second part outlines a history of missionary activity, beginning with the early Church and ending with David Brainerd and John Wesley. Part 3 comprises 26 pages of tables, listing area, population, and religion statistics for every country in the world. Carey had compiled these figures during his years as a schoolteacher. The fourth part answers objections to sending missionaries, such as difficulty learning the language or danger to life. Finally, the fifth part calls for the formation by the Baptist denomination of a missionary society and describes the practical means by which it could be supported. Carey's seminal pamphlet outlines his basis for missions: Christian obligation, wise use of available resources, and accurate information.

Carey later preached a pro-missionary sermon, using Isaiah 54:2-3 as his text, in which he repeatedly used the epigram which has become his most famous quotation: "Attempt great things for God; expect great things from God." Carey finally overcame the resistance to missionary effort, and the Particular Baptist Society for Propagating the Gospel among the Heathen (now the Baptist Missionary Society) was founded in October 1791, including Carey, Andrew Fuller, John Ryland, and John Sutcliff as charter members. They then concerned themselves with practical matters such as raising funds, as well as deciding where they would direct their efforts. A medical missionary, Dr. John Thomas, had been in Calcutta and was currently in England raising funds; they agreed to support him and that Carey would accompany him to India.

Carey, his eldest son Felix, Thomas and his wife and daughter sailed from London aboard an English ship in April 1792. Dorothy Carey had refused to leave England, being pregnant with their fourth son and having never been more than a few miles from home. En route they were delayed at the Isle of Wight, at which time the captain of the ship received word that he endangered his command if he conveyed the missionaries to Calcutta, as their unauthorized journey violated the trade monopoly of the British East India Company. He decided to sail without them, and they were delayed until June when Thomas found a Danish captain willing to offer them passage. In the meantime, Carey's wife, who had by now given birth, agreed to accompany him provided her sister came as well. They landed at Calcutta in November.

During the first year in Calcutta, the missionaries sought means to support themselves and a place to establish their mission. They also began to learn the Bengali language to communicate with the natives. A friend of Thomas owned two indigo factories and needed managers, so Carey moved with his family north to Mudnabatty. During the six years that Carey managed the indigo plant, he completed the first revision of his Bengali New Testament and began formulating the principles upon which his missionary community would be formed, including communal living, financial self-reliance, and the training of indigenous ministers. His son Peter died of dysentery, causing Dorothy to suffer a nervous breakdown from which she never recovered.

Meanwhile, the missionary society had begun sending more missionaries to India. The first to arrive was John Fountain, who arrived in Mudnabatty and began teaching school. He was followed by William Ward, a printer; Joshua Marshman, a schoolteacher; David Brunsdon, one of Marshman's students; and William Grant, who died three weeks after his arrival. Because the East India Company was still hostile to missionaries, they settled in the Danish colony at Serampore and were joined there by Carey on January 10, 1800.

Once settled in Serampore, the mission bought a house large enough to accommodate all of their families and a school, which was to be their principal means of support. Ward set up a print shop with a secondhand press Carey had acquired and began the task of printing the Bible in Bengali. In August 1800 Fountain died of dystentery. By the end of that year, the mission had their first convert, a Hindu named Krishna Pal. They had also earned the goodwill of the local Danish government and Richard Wellesley, then Governor-General of India.

The conversion of Hindus to Christianity posed a new question for the missionaries concerning whether it was appropriate for converts to retain their caste. In 1802, the daughter of Krishna Pal, a Sudra, married a Brahmin. This wedding was a public demonstration that the church repudiated the caste distinctions.

Brunsdon and Thomas died in 1801. The same year, the Governor-General founded Fort William, a college intended to educate civil servants. He offered Carey the position of professor of Bengali. Carey's colleagues at the college included pundits, whom he could consult to correct his Bengali testament. He also wrote grammars of Bengali and Sanskrit, and began a translation of the Bible into Sanskrit. He also used his influence with the Governor-General to help put a stop to the practices of infant sacrifice and suttee, after consulting with the pundits and determining that they had no basis in the Hindu sacred writings (although the latter would not be abolished until 1829).

Dorothy Carey died in 1807; Carey remarried a year later to Charlotte Rhumohr, a Danish member of his church who, unlike Dorothy, was his intellectual equal. They were married for 13 years until her death.

From the printing press at the mission came translations of the Bible in Bengali, Sanskrit, and other major languages and dialects. Many of these languages had never been printed before; William Ward had to create punches for the type by hand. Carey had begun translating literature and sacred writings from the original Sanskrit into English to make them accessible to his own countryman. On March 11, 1812, a fire in the print shop caused £10,000 in damages and lost work. Amongst the losses were many irreplaceable manuscripts, including much of Carey's translation of Sanskrit literature and a polyglot dictionary of Sanskrit and related languages, which would have been a seminal philological work had it been completed. However, the press itself and the punches were saved, and the mission was able to continue printing in six months. In Carey's lifetime, the mission printed and distributed the Bible in whole or part in 44 languages and dialects.

In 1818, the mission founded Serampore College to train indigenous ministers for the growing church and to provide education in the arts and sciences to anyone regardless of caste or country. The King of Denmark granted a royal charter in 1827 that made the college a degree-granting institution, the first in Asia.

Carey's second wife, Charlotte, died in 1821, followed by his eldest son Felix. In 1823 he married a third time, to a widow named Grace Hughes.

Internal dissent and resentment was growing within the Missionary Society as its numbers grew, the older missionaries died, and they were replaced by less experienced men unused to the rigorous work ethic of Carey, Ward, and Marshman. Andrew Fuller, who had been secretary of the Society in England, had died in 1815, and his successor, John Dyer, was a bureaucrat who attempted to reorganize the Society along business lines and manage every detail of the Serampore mission from England. Their differences proved to be irreconcilable, and Carey formally severed ties with the missionary society he had founded, leaving the mission property and moving onto the college grounds. He lived a quiet life until his death in 1834, revising his Bengali Bible, preaching, and teaching students.  Known as the "father of modern missions." Carey was one of the founders of the Baptist Missionary Society. As a missionary in Serampore, India, he translated the Bible into Bengali, Sanskrit, and numerous other languages and dialects.
   
Love from Sister and Elder Evans (Grandma and Grandpa)