In December, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS). At first, I was stunned. How can this be? I feel fine, I am healthy. Questions for my future flooded my mind. What does this mean for my golf, my skiing, my eyesight?

Nine German prisoners of war were being held at a camp in Salina in July 1945, two months after Germany had surrendered, and were waiting to be processed and sent home when a mentally unstable guard opened fire on them. The guard had been stationed in Italy earlier during World War II, but was sent back to the U.S. after showing signs of mental distress.

How do we manage when we are living in a family situation that does not seem to be up to par with the Mormon ideal? How do we approach serving others when they are experiencing intense struggles with divorce or wayward children?

Close behind the organization of the Church in the meridian of time came the apostasy, accompanied by a diversification of beliefs that would lead ultimately to thousands of different Christian denominations. Every doctrinal disagreement seemed to be a cause for reorganization: perhaps the only cause. In any religious organization where doctrine does not matter, or where there is unity of opinion about the doctrine, splinter groups are not likely to break off from the main body. But thousands had broken off and now, on the 6th of April of 1830, the time had finally come for the Lord to put things right and to restore “the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth . . .” (D&C 1:30).

A catalog of the vast holdings of the LDS Church History Library in Salt Lake City is now available online at history.lds.org. You can browse through or search the catalog to see what the Church History Library has to offer before you go to the library in Salt Lake City. Use it to figure out what reference you want to see, and then save it electronically and simply access it once you arrive at the library.

For LDS seniors, missions can become addictive. In part, this is due to the reality that there is a vast range of service opportunities that can be molded to the needs and talents of most senior members of the Church.

Once a new year starts, one inevitable thing happens. People start obsessing about goals and resolutions. But with this tendency toward self-improvement, we need to be careful of one very dangerous reality: comparing ourselves to others.

The Pacific Northwest is home of the Hoh Rain Forest, where the majority of the trees are several hundred years old. The forest is so dense that the only chance young seedlings have of survival is when one of the great trees falls. Light that was once unable to reach the ground now breaks through the foliage to nourish the seedlings that begin to grow in the trunk of the fallen tree. This tree is called a “nurse log.” It provides moisture, nutrients, and disease protection to the young trees that have taken root in its trunk. Hundreds of years later the only evidence that remains of the nurse log is a perfectly straight row of magnificent trees. Like the nurse logs in the Hoh Rain Forest, our legacy as mothers is often evident only after our work is done.The world does very little honor the role of mothers. However, when all is said and done, what we do with our family within the walls of our own home has far more influence on society as a whole than anything else. Elder Neal A. Maxwell said:

How can I make daily prayer more meaningful? It’s a good question, and it’s one that applies to all of us. President Hinckley used to say that sometimes when we pray it’s like we’re picking up a phone, ordering groceries, and then we hang up the phone—we put in our order, and we don’t think any more about it than that. But if we take a few minutes just to think about our particular need in a given moment, then prayer becomes more meaningful.