This week in Church history
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50 years ago
Every family in the Church would be "drawn to the fundamentals of the Church Welfare Plan as a result of a special Ward Teachers' Message to be distributed during March," the Feb. 10, 1945, issue of the Church News announced.
The message - published under the auspices of the General Church Welfare Committee and distributed through the Presiding Bishop's Office to ward teachers - was an address given by President J. Reuben Clark Jr. titled "Fundamentals of the Church Welfare Plan." President Clark, first counselor in the First Presidency, had given the address in the previous general conference in October 1944.
In the address, President Clark outlined the duties, regarding care and support, of children for parents, husbands to wives and parents to children. He also discussed caring for the widow and fatherless, the obligation to work, spiritual and temporal rehabilitation, an overview of the Lord's storehouse and the duties of bishops in relation to welfare production and distribution.
The Church News article concluded: "When families of the Church read the message of President Clark as it is delivered to their homes, they will find it both instructive and important. It is a far-reaching statement of the fundamentals underlying the Church Welfare Plan, which has become a permanent part of the Church program."
Quote from the past
"This people must increase in beauty before the world; have an inward loveliness which may be observed by mankind as a reflection in holiness and in those inherent qualities of sanctity." - President Harold B. Lee, in an address given in general conference, April 6, 1973.
