Pure Religion

For years I've had this dream of serving a humanitarian aid mission. I remember when I first filled out my mission papers, I hoped and hoped that they would call me to serve as a humanitarian missionary rather than a proselyting missionary. Not that I didn't want to share the gospel with people, but I really felt a strong desire to bring physical comfort and hope to people. I wanted to prepare them physically so that they could be fed spiritually. I didn't end up serving a full-time humanitarian mission for the church, but it is a not-so-secret hope that at some point in my life I am asked to devote the majority of my time serving those in need, instead of spending only nights and weekends here and there after a long day or week of work. While I am happy to do it, I look forward to the time when I have the capability of doing even more.

Today I toured Welfare Square and the Humanitarian Aid Facilities in Salt Lake City. I've had lots of experience serving in the bishop's storehouse, donating time to the cannery, etc. but never have I seen it on the scale that it operates on here. The bishop's storehouse is enormous. The second we stepped out of our car, I could smell the baking bread, ready to be sliced and packaged for distribution to the poor and needy. There in welfare square, all the temporal needs of an unemployed, poor, needy individual can be met. Their spiritual needs can be met as well. Some of the things that impressed me the most:

• The church has five transient bishops called just to serve at welfare square. In the LDS church, a bishop is the steward of his congregation, both temporally and spiritually. When a member is in need of food, a job, or other temporal assistance, he or she meets with the bishop to determine the need and together they make a plan to fill that need. Five bishops serve here because 80-100 people per day come in off the street into this particular bishop's storehouse for food and/or clothing. The majority of walk-ins are not members of our church, and no one is turned away. All are expected to serve in exchange for the assistance they receive. Some serve at the storehouse, some serve at D.I.
  
• Deseret Industries is the church's thrift store. The one at welfare square is the biggest one I've ever seen. Today I learned that 15% of clothing donated is kept in the D.I. stores; the other 85% is sent to the humanitarian center for distribution. Many people who work at D.I. are there to receive on-the-job training to prepare them for employment elsewhere. Some are U.S. citizens, some are refugees, some are immigrants. While they receive job training, those who need it also receive language training as well as application and interviewing skills. Last year they placed over 100 people in jobs. Many are not members of the church. I did not realize this until I walked past three muslim women hard at work behind the scenes. I felt a swell of emotion as I considered the church's philosophy on helping any in need, not just tithe payers.
• The grain silo on Welfare Square was built in 8 days during the Great Depression. This may not seem like a huge feat until you consider the fact that it holds 16 million pounds of grain. It's big. Real big.
  

The humanitarian aid center was my favorite place of the day. We saw where the other 85% percent of D.I.'s clothing went. They bale them into 1,000 pound bundles and send them over to the humanitarian aid center. From there the clothing is sorted by gender and general age and repacked into 100 pound bundles, ready for shipping. No soiled or damaged clothing is retained for distribution. The discarded clothing is sold to second-hand or rag stores and the money is used to pay for relief kits. Absolutely nothing goes to waste.

There isn't enough room to talk about how I feel about the various relief kits available. There are palates of materials called an "orphanage module" and another one that's a relief module. Then there are newborn kits, hygiene kits, school kits, cleaning kits, wheelchair initiatives and donations, Atmit production (a porridge-like substance malnourished children are able to digest), health services provided in third-world countries, and the list goes on and on. I fought back tears of emotion throughout the day as I considered the products the church produces, their quality, and their determination to give freely while helping the recipients to become self-relaint and teaching them to give back in service. The church's purpose is to attend to the sick and the afflicted, to improve the quality of physical life so that eventually they can be fed spiritually. I thought about the millions of lives that are affected by this...and that's when the tears really came.

The process is so streamlined, and yet so individual. The relief kits that go to one country are different than what goes to another country. The food will be different. The clothing will be different. You have to see it to really grasp the magnitude of it all. It makes me want to give all my money, all of my time, and everything with which I have been blessed to contribute. Both Welfare Square and the humanitarian aid center are full and busy, but the Spirit is special and very strong there. It was a strong and needed reminder of what I really need to be focusing on. I can get so easily distracted by the things in life that don't really matter. But helping the poor, helping the needy, helping those affected by tragedy--not only abroad but my neighbors as well...that is where my focus needs to be. I need to emulate the Savior's example. I need to be better. I am going to be better.

If you are looking for ways to contribute to LDS Charities, feel free to poke around on this website. They really are doing amazing things. It's Pure Religion.