LDS marking 30-year milestone

Since 1978, when 19 Africans were baptized members of the LDS Church, more than 270,000 people on that continent have become Latter-day Saints, and the estimate of black membership worldwide is pegged at about 1 million.

Currently, Africa has 46 LDS stakes, 19 missions, 41 districts, 336 wards, 466 branches, three temples and two missionary training centers (in Ghana and South Africa.)

Those numbers are not only cause for celebration, but they will likely grow in the future, according to Elder Sheldon F. Child, a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, reflecting on what has happened to the face of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in three decades since the priesthood was extended to "all worthy males."

On Sunday, the church will celebrate the 30th anniversary of the June 8, 1978, announcement that then-President Spencer W. Kimball had received a revelation lifting a ban on priesthood ordination — and thus temple ordinances — for black Latter-day Saints worldwide.

The 7 p.m. service in the Tabernacle will feature Elder Child and Elder Earl S. Tingey of the Presidency of the Seventy, along with two stake presidents who preside over several LDS congregations in New Jersey and Atlanta. Tickets for the event are gone, but standby seating will be available on Temple Square.

Elder Child, a former mission president in New York, said he was contacted Thursday night by one of his former missionaries, Phoenix attorney Dustin Jones, who had heard about the event and was asking if he could find tickets. He has made plans to fly in Sunday to attend.

As a missionary in the early '90s, Jones was one of a handful of blacks who served under Elder Child. "He was just a great missionary. He loves the church, he taught the gospel well, he did a great job. He wanted to be here because this is very significant to them."

When told that two stake presidents would be sharing experiences, Jones said he believes there will be many more black Latter-day Saints called to leadership in the church. "He's very upbeat about African Americans becoming stronger in the church," Elder Child said.

The Sunday event is the first of its kind to be sponsored by the church. A local group of black Latter-day Saints, known as Genesis, sponsored a similar event in the Tabernacle five years ago.

The commemoration is another indication of the vast diversity represented by church growth worldwide, Elder Child said, recalling the first time he attended the Queens Ward in New York. "It was like the United Nations," he said, with blacks, Tongans, Hispanics, Indians and Chinese members all working in leadership roles.