Church in New Delhi moving forward
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NEW DELHI, INDIA
"It is a great day to be a Mormon."
Vivian Richard Fernando speaks while sitting on a burgundy leather sofa. It is a Sunday afternoon in India; with the morning's Church services over, the 23-year-old president of the Pitampura Branch in the New Delhi India District has shed his tie and unbuttoned his shirt collar.
"When the mission president asked me to be the branch president, I accepted the call because I know when the Lord calls people He qualifies them," he explained.
President Fernando joined the Church in 2000 and subsequently served in the India Bangalore Mission. His wife, Teresa, the branch's Relief Society president, recalls the exact day of her conversion.
"I joined the Church in 2002, Nov. 24," she said. "I feel that is my birthday, because my whole life changed after joining the Church. The gospel came into my life and brought great joy and peace."
William K. Jackson presides over the India New Delhi Mission. A doctor by profession, he worked for the U.S. government at American embassies throughout Asia and Africa. From 1990-93 and again during 2002-07, President Jackson and his wife, Ann, were stationed in New Delhi with various groupings of their eight children.
"In 1990 there was one branch in New Delhi, and it was almost exclusively expatriates (non-citizens of India)," he said. "We came back in 2002, and by that time there were two branches in New Delhi — almost exclusively Indian with just a smattering of expatriates. The leadership was nearly all Indian, and the expatratriates who were called to things were usually as counselors or shadow leaders."
During 2003, President Jackson was called as an Area Seventy in the Asia Area and assigned to train the members in India, Pakistan and Nepal.
President Jackson and his family left India in 2007 for one final embassy stint that would be his last posting before retirement. On Nov. 1, 2007, the India New Delhi Mission came into existence, carved out from parts of the India Bangalore and Singapore Missions and canvassing northern India, Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh. This past July, when President Jackson began serving as mission president, the New Delhi mission had expanded to three districts that include 19 branches across its four countries.
"We couldn't be more excited," he said. "We already have a tremendous love for this people and appreciation for the pioneer members. We've seen them, watched them get baptized and go on missions, come back and get married in the temple and start raising their own families.
"I had four years working with these young leaders in [Nepal, Pakistan and India], which is fabulous because now we're back and they're predominantly the same leaders — just two years more mature."
With the personal perspective culled from living in New Delhi for a total of eight years spread over two decades, President Jackson understands just how far the Church has come and what has to happen for sustained growth to continue.
"Growing out of old cultures is sometimes a slow and painful process, but it's happening here," he said. "And as we do that with the first generation, with these pioneer members, I think the rising generation will get all the benefits that a rising generation should get growing up in the Church with all its programs and all its blessings, with the expectations of serving missions and marrying in the temple. …
"The districts are anxious to become stakes so they can have the blessings of stakehood, including a patriarch. Interestingly enough, our goal is not to establish stakes. That will happen when it's ready to happen. I think our goals here among other things would be to establish the Church and strengthen the priesthood, to find and help outstanding men and families come into the Church, teach and train them and encourage them to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood and to learn how to be leaders and ministers so that we can establish strong districts with a solid priesthood foundation upon which to build."
With all of its adult members being first-generation Latter-day Saints, the Pitampura Branch features 21st-century Church pioneers.
Only a toddler, Emmanuel Fernando is one of the first children born in the covenant in the India New Delhi Mission.
"We are trying to be good parents," Sister Fernando said. "I always felt [sad] that my parents were not members. When I'd go to seminary and come back, my dad would say, 'Why are you going to seminary?' And sometimes when I'd study my scriptures and say my prayers, he was very rude.
"I always wanted to be a mother, and always wanted to get married to a member of the Church so we both can support our children [in the gospel]. And I think we are doing that. We read scriptures with him; I know he doesn't understand now, but he will."
President Fernando's branch cannot boast of any gospel scholars. But what it does have are converts with firm faith, strong testimonies and a willingness to share the gospel. In that sense, the Pitampura Branch is a microcosm for how the Church can flourish in places even before generational roots can grow.
"We all go on [missionary] exchanges every week, all of us," he said. "All of the members are really good. They don't know a lot of stuff, but they all feel good inside. They all have the testimony of this gospel. They share it with everybody they know.
"The thing will keep growing, and one day we'll probably have several missions in this part of [the National Capital Territory of] Delhi."
