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| Odgerel and Saranchimeg on their one year anniversary of their temple marriage |
Temple work. Four
times a year members from Mongolia travel as a group to the Hong Kong temple.
Members qualify for one time temple patron funds to help them make the trip.
They contribute some of their own money and prepare themselves spiritually to
make this trip. Part of the preparation is to do Family History work to do
vicarious ordinance work for their deceased ancestors work in the temple.
Part of our calling as missionaries in Mongolia is to train Family History
Consultants to assist members in doing this work prior to going to the temple.
In some cases, we directly help members prepare their family names and
genealogy as a part of getting ready for their temple trip.
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| Tracing Mongolian Family History |
Many go with the purpose of doing temple work for their
deceased spouses, children, parents, and
grandparents with whom they have personal relationships.
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Painting in Dornod Province Museum
"My mother awaits my return" |
Young couples go to be
married for time and eternity in a temple. Older couples who have been married
for years go to have their marriages sealed for time and eternity in the
temple.
The purpose of going to the temple is to weld families
together through priesthood authority so they can be together in eternity.
Parents bring their minor children to the temple so their children can be
sealed to them. In the temple, this ordinance work is very spiritual and
emotional.
Mongolians love their ancestors and family history. It is natural for them to engage in temple work and feel the spirit in the temple.
Senior couples
accompany the trip. During their mission to Mongolia, most senior couples
have an opportunity once on their mission to accompany a group in order to
provide support and leadership to the group. We are asked to pay our own
expenses (airfare, housing, food).
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| A scout troop in Hong Kong wanted to speak English and have their picture taken with us |
A Mongolian member is
also invited to be a translator and leader for the group as they navigate
through the airports, immigration, local transportation, and at the temple and
patron housing in Hong Kong. This is a lot of responsibility as very few
members speak Chinese or English nor have they travelled internationally
before.
Our group didn’t have any young children or teenagers. Seven
women, one man, ourselves, and one translator travelled together. Another young
couple, Odgerel and Saranchimeg, went to Hong Kong by train and met us there. Of the group of 13, six were from our local
congregation and we knew them ahead of the trip. This was unusual as there are
22 LDS congregations in Mongolia.
We also knew Puje, our translator, from day one of our
mission. We had traveled together to Murun, Erdenet, and Youth Conference
together. We had also worked with a member
from Choibalsan to get her ready for her temple trip.
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| Ganaa and Puje |
That left only five
members we didn’t know prior to this trip. We rapidly made their acquaintance
and formed relationships with them. Most temple groups have been larger and
children are often a part of the travelling company.
Patron housing. The men and women are in separate sleeping
quarters. I shared sleeping quarters and a bathroom with our two brothers from
Mongolia and three from Thailand.
The sisters were divided in two rooms and Darlene
had the challenging experience of sleeping in a top bunk. Not exactly the
Hilton! There were keys issued for each room and rules for cooking and using
the refrigerator.
A mall was located about four blocks from patron housing
where members could do some grocery shopping. Most of our group preferred to
make their own meals. We had a Wi-Fi connection for the three of us that
brought computers.
Temple experiences. A
young couple from India had come to be married in the temple. They had been
legally married just five days prior to their trip. They joined our getting
acquainted meeting at patron housing.
We bonded with them. We agreed that it
would be wonderful if we could be a part of their temple marriage. An older couple in our group, Batarch and
Davaasuren, would also have their temple marriage in the same sealing session.
After the session, the bride from India emerged from the
temple in a lovely wedding dress and the couple celebrated with their new
wedding party of Mongolians.
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| From left to right: Ariuna, Batarch, Davaasuren, Choluunsukh, Buyandelger, Ganaa, Dolmaa, Prash, Alex and Suvd-Erdene |
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| Alex, Prash, Davaasuren, and Batarch |
I became
the wedding photographer enjoyed posing them and the group for special
pictures. What a blessing for them and
for us.
The other temple experiences I won’t describe other than the
group members were prayerful and deeply spiritual.
Several times we were in tears as each members
did their own personal temple work for family members. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, we attended
the temple pretty much full time with an afternoon lunch break.
Our group felt the worldwide nature of the church as we interacted with members from India, Thailand, China, Qatar and temple missionaries from China, Hawaii and mainland US all working together in loving harmony.
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| Bro. Chan, his wife and daughter spent all day Friday with us |
On Friday the temple was closed because of the Mid-Autumn
Festival and the group went touring courtesy of Bro. Chan.
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| Tasting Big Macs and French Fries for the first time |
At the Peak, he led us to the point where Hong Kong was dedicated for the preaching of the gospel on July 14, 1949.
The date is inscribed on a rock behind the group.
On Saturday we spent a half day at the temple
before the temple closed for the afternoon. Sunday morning the group attended a church
service and then we had our own sharing time about the spiritual experiences of
the week.
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| LDS chapel across from the temple - patron housing is on the left |
On Saturday afternoon, one of our members got lost during a
mall visit and we sent a young couple back to find her. Our member had offered
a prayer and within a minute of her prayer she was found.
Typhoon 8 warning
(just below hurricane level). The worst storm in 34 years was predicted to
hit Hong Kong Sunday and Monday. We
braced ourselves for the unknown.
Though the storm didn’t materialize as
predicted, it did delay our airplane flight back to Mongolia by 7 ½ hours
causing us to arrive in Ulaanbaatar at 3:30am on Tuesday morning.
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| Breakfast on the day of departure - a long, long day |
The flight delay actually helped us as we had a medical
emergency on Sunday causing one of our members to be hospitalized for 24
hours.
Because of the typhoon warning,
the physician in charge of discharging our member wasn’t permitted to travel
into the hospital until the Typhoon 8 warning had been lifted. The discharge didn’t happen until 3:30 pm Sunday
afternoon – about the time our original flight was scheduled to leave.
The weather delay actually helped us all travel back as a
group rather than be faced with leaving a member in China. We had a Plan B
lined up with the temple president but it wasn’t nearly as good as Plan A –
going home together.
It was a long, long day and we were happy to be back in
Mongolia.
