https://www.npr.org/2018/01/03/575270897/the-private-prophet-mormon-church-president-thomas-monson-dies-at-90

If you listen to the audio of this, you can tell that KUER reporter Lee Hale is really nervous. That said, I like the point that the editor of Dialogue makes about Monson not speaking out (publicly anyway) about issues confronting the LDS church during his reign.

"For some, the past few years have been uncertain times. But, Haglund says, that's the price of having leaders who serve for life and this likely won't be the last time a Mormon prophet retreats during their final years.

"We have to get used to this kind of leaderlessness, or at least the diluted sense of a leader's presence," Haglund says."

The 'we have to get used to this kind of leaderlessness,' isn't something new.

It's been happening for as long as I can remember, since I was a child and my first president was David O. McKay. The cult transitions from one old timer to the next.

It isn't a transition based on what ability someone has. Merely seniority rites trump all.

If the cult does choose someone younger than Nelson to succeed Monson it will be because Nelson may decline the position and allow it to go to someone younger.

A healthy 93 year old man is just that. A healthy 93 year old man.

The system works great. Power transitions to the next old dude with no fuss. You have a figurehead that’s accepted. The prophet is like a king or queen. Occasionally they will issue a common sense proclamation or make a needed policy change. The members go oh wow! Our prophet is really enlightened!

If they want someone who is going to be bold and tackle issues that are in front of them, they need to start selecting younger leadership. The youngest member of the 12 is in his 60s - Dieter and DoDo, the two fan favorites, are creeping up on 80. I get that 80 is the new 60, but it is still 80. What incentive does a leader have to reform the church if they are just trying to coast through to death's door?

One thing that struck me about Monson (and the NPR piece obliquely references this) is that the late prophet never publicly endorsed the policies he put in place, particularly with regard to the place of homosexuals in the church. Though the church he led put the policy into place (presumably with his approval), he never publicly (as far as I know) defended or even discussed the policy. The fact that he wouldn't (or couldn't) own up to church policies that took shape while he was prophet, in my mind at least, speaks a lot more against him than for him.

TRIVIA QUESTION:

Who was the last person to become LDS Church president under the
age of 70?

Answer: Heber J. Grant ordained at age 62 on 23 Nov. 1918.

LDS Presidents age at ordination:

Joseph Smith 26
Brigham Young 46
John Taylor 71
Wilford Woodruff 82
Lorenzo Snow 84
Joseph F. Smith 62
Heber J. Grant 62
George Albert Smith 75
David O. Mckay 77
Joseph Fielding Smith 93
Harold B. Lee 73
Spencer W. Kimball 78
Ezra Taft Benson 86
Howard W. Hunter 86
Gordon B. Hinckley 84
Thomas S. Monson 80

The Church is about 188 years old. It has had 16 presidents for
an average tenure of 11 years and 8 months.

Doesn't it make perfect sense then sense then that leadership is *always* decades behind the times? It's a guaranteed way to be out of touch and deaf to progress.

"Yeah, I know it's, slow and the tranny's about to go, but it's my dad's Buick."

The flip side is that no single revalator has many, many productive years to really screw it up more.

"Let him snooze, brother. We don't want him to hear this next part."