The Mormon Land newsletter is The Salt Lake Tribune’s weekly highlight reel of news in and about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Join us on Patreon and receive the full newsletter, podcast transcripts and access to all of our religion content.
Who’s minding the church’s mint?
You know, of course, that the church stockpiles food and other essential supplies in bishops’ storehouses. Turns out, it does the same with money and other assets.
A recent webpage, in fact, is dedicated to how the global faith of 17.5 million deals with its financial reserves.
The surplus funds aren’t stashed under a giant mattress at Temple Square but rather invested, the church explains, to “make them more productive,” and help pay for “current and future needs.”
“Church reserves are managed by dedicated investment professionals and by outside investment advisers in ways consistent with policies established by senior church leaders,” a finances webpage says. “The church seeks to diversify its investments, meaning that resources are placed in a variety of asset categories.”
You may have heard of the church’s three main investment arms:
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) Graphic snapshot of the faith's reserve resources.
• Ensign Peak: Perhaps the best known, due to widely reported allegations from an IRS whistleblower, this entity invests in stocks, bonds and mutual funds. (Its latest federal filing valued the overall portfolio at $52.3 billion.)
• Property Reserve: This church business and its subsidiaries oversee real estate investments. (Last year, for instance, it bought an industrial park in Florida and, in 2023, put up for sale thousands of acres in Missouri.)
• Farmland Reserve: This church outlet and its sister firms operate in agriculture. (This spring, the church scooped up tens of thousands of cropland acres through multiple sales in Australia.)
More time to vote
(Illustration by Christopher Cherrington | The Salt Lake Tribune)
We’ve had more than 300 votes to our ask from last week of who belongs on a mythical Mount Rushmore of Latter-day Saint history.
Our query parroted the real Rushmore, which honors four U.S. presidents, so we limited the voting to church presidents. Others from the faith’s history, of course, might be equally or more deserving. How about Emma Smith, Eliza Snow, Jane Manning James and Chieko Okazaki? Or Orson Pratt, B.H. Roberts, Bruce McConkie and Dieter Uchtdorf? Or Elijah Able, Helvécio Martins, Darius Gray and Gladys Knight?
The possibilities are endless. For now, though, you can vote for one more week on this Google Form for which church presidents to place alongside church founder Joseph Smith (the top vote-getter so far) on such a monument.
Latest ‘Mormon Land’ podcast: A beloved liberal apostle
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints apostle Hugh B. Brown.
Historian Matthew Harris discusses the life and times of progressive apostle Hugh B. Brown, who won the hearts of liberal Latter-day Saints but butted heads with powerful colleagues, including David O. McKay, Harold B. Lee and Ezra Taft Benson.
Listen to the podcast.
More new hymns. Can we get an ‘amen’?
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) Latter-day Saints in Ghana sing hymns during their sacrament meeting.
Another African American spiritual, this one titled “I’m Gonna Live So God Can Use Me,” is among 11 hymns released last week from the church’s ever-evolving new songbook.
The additions include the familiar Christmas choral carol “Still, Still, Still,” boosting the total tally of new tunes in “Hymns—For Home and Church” to 48.
Russian reduction
(Michael Stack | Special to The Salt Lake Tribune) Two Latter-day Saint “volunteers” walk in central Moscow.
The church reduced a decade-old stake in Saratov to a district, independent church tracker Matt Martinich reports, leaving Russia with two stakes and four districts.
“The war in Ukraine appears to be the primary reason for the discontinuation of the stake, with many active members reportedly leaving Russia in recent years,” he notes. “...This development underscores the dramatic decline of the church in Russia over the past decade, driven by emigration, restricted missionary efforts, government limitations and historically low activity rates.”
From The Tribune
• Latter-day Saint Lift + Love founder hopes to see all same-sex couples comfortable at church “in ways that we don’t have right now.”
• A “gracious” and “gutsy” former president of the worldwide Relief Society has died.
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) Elaine Jack, president of the Relief Society women's organization of the church from 1990-1997.
• Our joint “Mormon Land” and “Mormons in Media” podcast breaks down Season 2 of “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives.”
• Wyoming’s Supreme Court gives the green light to the 101-foot-high Cody Temple.
