Salt Lake City 2005 -- Temple Square
Before leaving for this conference, my
colleague and I had a brief moment of panic where we thought we might
get kidnapped by Mormons and forced to be some 60-year-old's 20th wife.
Alas (or fortunately?), we soon realised we were too old; not even the
Mormons would want us. Anyway, the trip was all in all fairly
enjoyable, and no men or women or minorities (see last week's The Daily
Show) or cute little animals/plants were hurt or harmed in any way during
this process.
Temple Square is really a lovely place. All of the guides (mainly Mormon young women, called Sisters, who are serving their 18-month mission) were extremely friendly notwithstanding the occassional blank stares and somewhat brain-washed answers. Temple Square has over 250 flower beds; unfortunately, they had already pulled out most of the flowers by the time I got there. I went to two organ recitals and one choir rehearsal (both were at the Conference Centre because the Tabernacle was under construction), and all of them were quite amazing.
This is the Great Salt Lake Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. No visitors are allowed inside. Actually, not even regular Mormons are allowed to go in...Only high-level Elders, and I don't really know what that means...It is a beautiful and magnificent building though (they started the building in 1853, and it took them more than 40 years to complete it); it has the effect of making the viewer feel insignificant, which, I think, is something all religious buildings strive for.
The Assembly Hall. Built in the 1800s in traditional Gothic style. This building is used for normal church gatherings and is open to the pulic.
The Conference Centre (not where I had my conference) on Temple Square. Its auditorium seats 21,000 people and houses the 2nd largest organ (see below) on Temple Square. The Mormons have semi-annual meetings here and at least one session is given by their Prophet. Yes, yes, they have a living Prophet, that's where the "Latter-Day Saints" came from. Joseph Smith was their first prophet. God (the Father and the Son appeared together) spoke to him when he was 14 and told him that he must found his own church. Joseph Smith later on "translated" (I haven't figured out how this worked) The Book of Mormons, which is like an extra bible on top of the Old and New Testments. I'll go as far as saying the Mormons are wacky, but hey, the Old Testment is full of wacky stories. If you're going to found a new religion, no one is going to follow you unless you are radically different from any of the existing ones (I'm sure the Catholics thought Martin Luther was a complete lunatic when he claimed that people could communicate with God directly instead of vicariously through priests).
The Conference Centre organ, a American Romantic style organ with a five-manual console that controls 7,708 pipes in 130 ranks. Temple Square has four organs, and this isn't even the largest. The largest one , which has 11,623 pipes in 206 ranks, is housed in the Tabernacle. The acoustics of the auditorium were just perfect, and it made the organ recitals and choir rehearsal I went to sound a lot better than anything I've heard at my school's auditorium (the large organ my school has is a Casavant Opus 474, but it needs some serious repair).
Elegant glass sculpture in the conference building on Temple Square. It hangs directly from the skylight and extends all the way down to the lower level where there is a fountain.
Does anyone watch The Daily Show? Anyway, here's your moment of Zen (taken in front of the Great Temple on Temple Square).
Temple Square is really a lovely place. All of the guides (mainly Mormon young women, called Sisters, who are serving their 18-month mission) were extremely friendly notwithstanding the occassional blank stares and somewhat brain-washed answers. Temple Square has over 250 flower beds; unfortunately, they had already pulled out most of the flowers by the time I got there. I went to two organ recitals and one choir rehearsal (both were at the Conference Centre because the Tabernacle was under construction), and all of them were quite amazing.
This is the Great Salt Lake Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. No visitors are allowed inside. Actually, not even regular Mormons are allowed to go in...Only high-level Elders, and I don't really know what that means...It is a beautiful and magnificent building though (they started the building in 1853, and it took them more than 40 years to complete it); it has the effect of making the viewer feel insignificant, which, I think, is something all religious buildings strive for.
The Assembly Hall. Built in the 1800s in traditional Gothic style. This building is used for normal church gatherings and is open to the pulic.
The Conference Centre (not where I had my conference) on Temple Square. Its auditorium seats 21,000 people and houses the 2nd largest organ (see below) on Temple Square. The Mormons have semi-annual meetings here and at least one session is given by their Prophet. Yes, yes, they have a living Prophet, that's where the "Latter-Day Saints" came from. Joseph Smith was their first prophet. God (the Father and the Son appeared together) spoke to him when he was 14 and told him that he must found his own church. Joseph Smith later on "translated" (I haven't figured out how this worked) The Book of Mormons, which is like an extra bible on top of the Old and New Testments. I'll go as far as saying the Mormons are wacky, but hey, the Old Testment is full of wacky stories. If you're going to found a new religion, no one is going to follow you unless you are radically different from any of the existing ones (I'm sure the Catholics thought Martin Luther was a complete lunatic when he claimed that people could communicate with God directly instead of vicariously through priests).
The Conference Centre organ, a American Romantic style organ with a five-manual console that controls 7,708 pipes in 130 ranks. Temple Square has four organs, and this isn't even the largest. The largest one , which has 11,623 pipes in 206 ranks, is housed in the Tabernacle. The acoustics of the auditorium were just perfect, and it made the organ recitals and choir rehearsal I went to sound a lot better than anything I've heard at my school's auditorium (the large organ my school has is a Casavant Opus 474, but it needs some serious repair).
Elegant glass sculpture in the conference building on Temple Square. It hangs directly from the skylight and extends all the way down to the lower level where there is a fountain.
Does anyone watch The Daily Show? Anyway, here's your moment of Zen (taken in front of the Great Temple on Temple Square).