Member of The Quorum of The Twelve
In October 1906, McKay became an assistant to the superintendent of the Deseret Sunday School Union. At the time, Joseph F. Smith was both President of the Church and Superintendent of the Sunday School, so much of the actual running of the Sunday School was performed by McKay. After Smith died, McKay became the Sunday School superintendent.
In 1920, the First Presidency assigned McKay to make a worldwide tour of the missions of the church with Hugh J. Cannon. They dedicated China for the preaching of the gospel, traveled to Hawaii where McKay first had the vision that led to the founding of BYU–Hawaii many years later, and visited Samoa, Tonga, New Zealand and Palestine. In Palestine they met up with Wilford Booth and visited the Armenian Latter-day Saints. McKay arrived back in Utah on Christmas Eve, 1921. The details of this 61,646-mile journey are recorded in an account by Hugh Cannon.
From 1923 until 1925, McKay served as president of the church's European Mission, headquartered in London. In this capacity, he had direct responsibility over all church functions in the British Isles and supervisory functions over mission presidents on the European continent. It was while in this position that McKay first used the slogan "every member a missionary" for the promotion of outreach. The philosophy has since become a standard practice in every unit of the LDS Church.
In 1934, McKay was called as second counselor in the First Presidency by Heber J. Grant. He also served as second counselor to George Albert Smith.
Read more about this topic: David O. McKay
Famous quotes containing the words member of the, member of, member and/or twelve:
“If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.”
—Bible: New Testament, Philippians 3:4-6.
“Every member of the family of the future will be a producer of some kind and in some degree. The only one who will have the right of exemption will be the mother ...”
—Ruth C. D. Havens, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 13, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)
“We live in a highly industrialized society and every member of the Black nation must be as academically and technologically developed as possible. To wage a revolution, we need competent teachers, doctors, nurses, electronics experts, chemists, biologists, physicists, political scientists, and so on and so forth. Black women sitting at home reading bedtime stories to their children are just not going to make it.”
—Frances Beale, African American feminist and civil rights activist. The Black Woman, ch. 14 (1970)
“Then Jesus called the twelve together and gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases, and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal.”
—Bible: New Testament, Luke 9:1,2.