Elder D. Todd Christofferson was called as the LDS Church's newest apostle on Saturday, the same day church members sustained the new First Presidency in a solemn assembly.

A bevy of new leaders were also sustained to new positions Saturday. L. Whitney Clayton of the Quorums of the Seventy was called to the replace Elder Christofferson in the Presidency of the Seventy. Several new members of the Quorums of the Seventy were also called, along with a new Young Women General Presidency.

Elaine S. Dalton, formerly first counselor in the Young Women, is now president, with Mary N. Cook, formerly second counselor, as first counselor and Ann M. Dibb as second counselor. Sister Dibb, a former Young Women General Board member, is President Thomas S. Monson's daughter. Sister Susan W. Tanner was released as president after serving since October 2002.

Elder Christofferson filled a gap in the Quorum of the Twelve left when President Uchtdorf was called to serve in the First Presidency. He had been serving as a member of the Presidency of the Seventy since 1998, and was sustained to the First Quorum of the Seventy in April 1993.

As yet another American in the Quorum of the Twelve in a growing global church, Elder Christofferson was asked during a press conference Saturday afternoon how he would explain to church members why a non-American was not called as an apostle.

His answer: "It's a question of time."

"Remember, though, that we are not called to represent any place, any group any region," he said. "We don't need to try to tell the Lord about his sheep and how to take care of them. He knows them better than we do."

Elder Christofferson has served in various positions of leadership in the church, as a former regional representative, stake president, stake president's counselor and bishop. As executive director of the Family and Church History Department, Elder Christofferson was involved in the high-profile negotiations to block the names of Holocaust victims from submission for temple work. In 2001, with Elder Christofferson at the helm, the church compiled and released a new database to aid African American family history research called the Freedman Bank Records.

Before serving the church in a full-time capacity, Elder Christofferson worked as a lawyer. He was an associate general counsel of NationsBank Corp. (now Bank of America) in Charlotte. N.C., and practiced law in Washington D.C., Tennessee and North Carolina.

He had a "pretty unique start" to his law career in 1972 when he served as a 26-year-old clerk for Judge John J. Sirica during the Watergate hearings.

"It gave me, interestingly enough, a great deal of added faith in government and good people in government, for many people it had the opposite (effect)," Elder Christofferson said. "I saw there many, many good people do the right thing and restore the equilibrium, constitutional balance and status of the government of the United States."

He received his bachelor's degree from Brigham Young University and juris doctorate from Duke University.

Born and raised in Utah, Elder Christofferson moved to New Jersey when he was 15. As the only member of the church at his high school, Elder Christofferson said the time was "the most formative part of my life."

"It forced me to think very deeply about what I believe," Elder Christofferson said.

He lives in Sandy with his wife, Katherine Jacob Christofferson. They have five children.

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E-mail: ldethman@desnews.com