LDS faithful raise their hands in solemn pledge and support

By Maddie Wilson

April 9, 2008 | Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints participated Saturday in what former church President Gordon B. Hinckley once called "a tremendously significant and sacred occasion for members of the [church] throughout the world," as they sustained a new church president in a solemn assembly.

During the solemn assembly portion of the morning's session of the church's 178th annual General Conference in the LDS Conference Center in Salt Lake City, thousands stood raising their right hands creating a square, showing their support for President Thomas S. Monson, the church's leader since the January death Hinckley.

Although members stood and raised their hands, Elder Robert D. Hales made it clear in his Saturday afternoon session talk that the sustaining was not a vote for the church's president.

"I appreciated the participation in the solemn assembly," he said. "But I thought I might just give one point of doctrine and help. When we raised our hand to the square in the solemn assembly, it was not a vote. In that, we gave of ourselves a private and personal commitment, even a covenant, to sustain and to uphold the laws, ordinances and commandments of the prophet of God."

The Deseret Morning News reported that the last solemn assembly the church held was in April 1995 when Hinckley was sustained as a "prophet, seer and revelator," and 15th president of the church.

"We can see [based on scripture revelations] that solemn assemblies are held to enhance the Saints' spirituality and to give added emphasis to the importance of the assembly's purpose," Robert J. Norman, then director of the Tucson, Ariz., LDS Institute of Religion, reported in a 1988 issue of the Ensign, an official magazine of the church.

According to the LDS Church News, solemn assemblies are an ancient tradition. The Church News stated that the Old Testament records solemn assemblies being held on the seventh day of the Feast of the Passover (Deuteronomy 16:8) and the eighth day of the Feast of Tabernacles (Leviticus 23:33-36; Nehemiah 8:18). Solomon's temple was dedicated in a solemn assembly during the latter feast (2 Chronicles 7:9).

The first solemn assembly in the latter-day gospel dispensation ­ which began in 1830, the date the church was restored by Joseph Smith, the church's first president ­ was the Kirtland Temple dedication in March 1836, the Church News reported. At this time, the Church News stated, Smith recorded the assembly, which included his own sustaining as President. He wrote that several quorums, beginning with the first presidency, "manifested, by rising, their willingness to acknowledge me as Prophet and Seer, and uphold me as such, by their prayers of faith. All the quorums, in turn, cheerfully complied with this request." The congregation of saints followed, Smith wrote, giving their consent by rising on their feet, which they did unanimously."

The order of solemn assemblies held to sustain the prophets has remained the same, as shown by the rising of members in Saturday's assembly.

Norman wrote that solemn assemblies can be held for temple dedications, membership sustaining of presidents ­ he said that each president of the church has been sustained by the priesthood of the church in a solemn assembly ­ and other reasons. These have included times when presidents have presented new ordinances to members and the first presidency has instructed all priesthood leaders and returned missionaries. Assemblies can be held in temples, the Tabernacle (and the Conference Center), and stake centers.

In the solemn assembly Saturday, as members participated in sustaining the new president, Norman said that by doing this, members signified "their willingness to heed (the president's) counsel, as the Lord admonished the Saints in Joseph Smith's time: 'Thou shalt give heed unto all his words and commandments which he shall give unto you as he recieveth them, walking in all holiness before me; For his word ye shall receive, as if from mine own mouth, in all patience and faith,' (Doctrine and Covenants 21:4-5)."

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