Two news items to talk about. This will be fun, especially for our friends north of the border.
Uh, What’s an Area?
First, from the LDS Newsroom: “The First Presidency Creates the Canada Area of the Church.” No, “the Canada Area” doesn’t mean Canada, which has already been there for a long time. And “creating the Canada Area” doesn’t mean establishing the Church there (it has already been there a long time, too) or setting up a new mission. It means realigning the Area-level LDS organization of North America.
Areas, you might or might not be aware, are an intermediate organizational grouping between stakes and the top-level leadership and organization of the Church. Every Area has an Area Presidency, staffed by GA Seventies and/or Area Seventies. Most members, even zealously active members, are largely unaware of their Area (can you name yours?) and their Area Presidency (can you name your Area President?). It’s not even clear what authority, if any, the Area Presidency has, or whether they have any “keys” in Mormon parlance. The whole Area system could disappear tomorrow and I doubt anyone would notice.
Until this change, parts of Canada were grouped with parts of the US in various Areas, with sort of a north-south alignment. So North America West included British Columbia (a Canadian province) as well as Washington, Oregon, and California. Likewise, Central and Northeastern Canada were tacked onto US Areas. Now these parts of Canada have been repatriated from their respective US Areas and joined together in one large east-west Canada Area.
Here’s a question for you: Why now? Anything going on in the world that might explain why, suddenly, it seems prudent to make Canada its own LDS Area?
Trump, Trudeau, and Tariffs
Maybe you have tuned out politics and “the news” since the US election in early November, but here is an item you should be aware of: President-elect Trump has announced his intention to place 25% tariffs across the board on all imports from Canada and Mexico. If this is news to you, just Google it. It’s a blip on the US news scene but, as you might imagine, big news in Canada (and Mexico, but I’m focusing on Canada).
Of course, one never knows whether Trump is just making noise to get some attention or whether he actually intends to attempt to impose such tariffs. I mean, he had four years and couldn’t even build a wall, so it is rash to ever think Trump can accomplish *anything* he talks about doing, much less a complicated and disruptive program of tariff increases. But simply making the threat, even if in Trump’s mind it is simply bluster to capture some headlines and make Fox viewers think he is doing something important, has consquences.
Canada’s Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, flew down to Mar-a-Lago to confer with Trump. He must have been fairly direct with Trump about the recklessness of Trump’s threats and the negative economic consequences to both countries, because Trump has been trolling him ever since the meeting. Trump now refers to Trudeau as “governor” in his tweets and refers to Canada as the 51st state. Canadians would be seriously offended by this, except for the fact that most Canadians consider Trump something of a buffoon. So it is only mildly offensive to most Canadians. It will probably make Justin Trudeau more popular in Canada. I saw a five-minute clip of him responding to the situation. Wow, compared to Trump he looks and sounds almost Churchwellian. Logical reasoning. Complete sentences. Any chance he could move south and run for President down here? Yes, I know the US Constitution requires that a US President be a natural-born citizen, but the Constitution doesn’t mean much anymore in Trump’s America. If Trump can make unelected Elon Musk his de facto vice president (again, if this is news to you, Google it) I’m sure we can find a way to put Trudeau on the ballot.
But Trump’s idiotic threats and statements do reflect badly on America. Which is our link to the new Canadian LDS Area move. I’m thinking either Canadian LDS leadership told American LDS leadership in Salt Lake that there were rumblings from Canadian LDS that they were suddenly a little but unhappy with being lumped together with American stakes south of the border. Or else American LDS leadership acted proactively to avoid alienating Canadian LDS by taking this largely meaningless administrative step (creating the new Area) and giving Canadian LDS stakes and members the appearance of a little more self-government.
I can think of an actual benefit here: the new Canadian Area Presidency is likely to be staffed by Canadians. So when a member of the Canadian Area Presidency attends a Canadian stake conference, leading leadership meetings and speaking in the general session, you won’t have a Utah or Idaho MAGA leadership Mormon unwittingly (or wittingly) throwing MAGA doctrine or talking points into his talks. If you are Canadian, that’s a real plus. If you live in the US but outside the Utah-Idaho corridor, you have probably rolled your eyes a time or two at something a visiting Utah authority said at stake conference. I’m sure eye-rolling happens more often in LDS Canada.
So if you are Canadian, I want to hear from you in the comments. If you have lived in Canada for a period, I want to hear from you in the comments. If you have ever bought auto parts at Canadian Tire or donuts and a hot chocolate at Tim Horton’s, I want to hear from you in the comments. If you put gravy on your french fries or like salt and vinegar potato chips, I want to hear from you in the comments.
- If you are Canadian LDS, has your view of the Church or Americans changed since Trump started making tariff threats or insulting Canada and its Prime Minister a week ago?
- Do you think making Canada its own large Area is going to make any difference for the LDS Church in Canada? Will it make Canadian LDS members a little happier?
- If you are not a Canadian, do you (without using Google or the Internet) know what Area you are in? Can you name any member of your Area Presidency (again, no cheating with Google)?
Wheat & Tares 
The way to look at this is to compare it to the way other big US corporations are organized. I’ve worked for a US company that made its Canadian organization its own entity and I’ve worked for a company that had a North America region which included the US and Canada. Both of these organizations can work. My point is to look at the Church as a corporation, not a religion.
As for Trump joking that Canada could become the 51st state: if you as a US citizen make this joke in Canada, you will of course be seen as a typical classless ugly American. You might be a nice person. But you’d be the stereotypical ugly American who gives us a bad name. That’s who is in charge folks.
I’ve lived in the Inland Northwest my whole life (I’m 51). I remember there was a time when southern British Columbia was more accessible and the border was more of a formality. Crossing to and fro was very common. No passport, no paperwork. Just some questions about weapons and alcohol and you were on your way. 9/11, increased international crime and the pandemic changed that. Crossed the border last summer to take my family camping up near Banff; first time in over 20 years. It’s quasi militarized now. Cameras, unfreindly armed guards, papers demanded. I have no idea what its like in other locations at the border.I can see the practicality in making Canada its own area.
I’ve had Tim Horton’s in two countries, prefer my fries without gravy, and my step-mother is Canadian. So those are my qualifications for this topic.
The area alignment change is meaningless to essentially everyone. No one cares. I don’t even know what Canadian LDS leadership there would be that would have objected to being in areas along with the US. In a recent conversation with my stake president, he told me that even he doesn’t have a way to directly communicate with the area president – he has to go through an area 70. Area presidencies are the layer of upper middle management that exists to provide separation between the upper management (general authorities) and middle management (SPs and Bishops) that actually have to interact with members. And area 70s are the toadies for the Area Presidencies.
I know what area I live in, because it’s easy to remember that it’s the Utah area. And I know who the president is, because he’s a tool. (I’m from the 90s, so I can call people “tools”.)
My guess on the reason for the change is that someone looked around and noticed that the US and Canada were the only countries in the world that were split into multiple areas. That or someone got tired of people mixing up US dollars and Canadian dollars on reimbursement forms as they crossed the boarder regularly.
I once interviewed for a job at the University of Toronto. Unpleasant experience, but I guess it qualifies me to comment. (Sidelight: They had notices posted in the dorms that any citizen of the British Commonwealth could vote in the upcoming Ontario provincial elections. That was different.)
Anyway, I know that Canada has different laws regarding religious financing–annual reports have to be filed, tithing money that leaves Canada has to be earmarked for BYU, etc. Perhaps the Church figures that it is more efficient for a single area presidency to master the Canada-specific rules than to force three such presidencies to do so. If that means that the Church is solidifying its commitment to following the rules, I’m all for it.
But do not assume that the area presidency will be all Canadian. It will contain at least one Canadian, but based on the other three single-country areas, there will be at least one American in the presidency (see below).
Area Pres. 1st Couns 2nd Couns
Brazil Brazil Brazil US
Mexico US (Hispanic) US Mexico
Philippines Philippines Hong Kong US
And then, just for fun…
Africa South Brazil Brazil Tonga
I agree with lastlemming about religious financing laws. Back in the late 1980s, when the then- RLDS Church was fundraising for the Independence Temple, contributions from Canadians had to be kept separate from US funds. That money was ultimately used to pay for the Temple’s 103-rank pipe organ built in Quebec by Casavant.
Also, when I lived in Vancouver, BC, in the 1970s, crossing the border was a relatively simple process, albeit one that often included long traffic backups. The organizational structure of the RLDS Church back then had British Columbia included with Washington and Oregon in the Pacific Northwest Region. A couple decades ago, when the CofC restructured stakes regions, and districts into mission centers, they created Canada East and Canada West Mission Centers. Because of the distances involved, conferences use Zoom or aomething similar.
Honestly I haven’t really thought about why the creation of a Canada area. There are reasons particular to church administration, no doubt, but I kind of doubt that they have anything to do with tariffs.
As for tariffs, I wonder what Trump is really going to end up doing. He keeps saying that the tariffs are going to make foreign countries pay the cost of exporting their goods to the US. They won’t be paying a dime. It is American importers who will pay the cost and then pass it on to American consumers. The idea is to make it so that more stuff is American-made. Heck he’ll even deport all undocumented migrants to ensure that that stuff is made by “real” Americans. You go right on ahead and do that Donny and we’ll see just how much your supporters like paying those drastically higher costs for those good ol’ American-made products, untouched by the hands of them “illegals.” I mean it is policy based on pure xenophobia (where even Canada is treated as an enemy of sorts) that can’t be bothered for one second to listen to the basic fact that the global economy is massively interconnected, that migrants are a net benefit to the American economy, and that autarky is a pipe dream.
Not sure if an area authority from Southern Alberta would be any better than an area authority from Utah or Idaho. Visited Cardston a couple of years ago and saw a truck with a Confederate flag in the LDS church next to the temple. I’ve met quite a few people from Southern Alberta and most of them are extremely conservative. I also attended sacrament meeting in a Canadian branch a long ways from Southern Alberta, and they had jokes about Southern Alberta church members like those of us in the U.S. have jokes about Utah Mormons.
Last time I entered Canada it was in a minivan with Idaho plates, with my wife and 3 kids. Canadian Border Patrol grilled me pretty hard about if I had a gun in the van (I didn’t).
Being an American who has traveled to Canada exactly twice, I can say with conviction that the donuts at Tim Horton’s are damn good. That’s all.
I started clicking links and learned that there are 40 Area Authorities in the Utah Area. Several of them work at the Church Office Building, and they are identified by their department. Did you know the Church had a Priesthood and Family Department? I’ll paste in the bios of the Church employees, just because it’s so interesting to see behind the corporate curtain.
John W. Boswell III, Bountiful, Utah; director of finding, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; former bishop, high councilor, mission president, and stake presidency counselor; married to Susan; five children. [[What is director of finding? Is that supposed to be director of funding? I want a job description.]]
Aaron T. Hall, Huntsville, Utah; director, finding, Missionary Department, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; former bishop, bishopric counselor, high councilor, stake president, and mission president; married to Kim; four children. [[Nope, it looks like “Finding” is a real church thing. I am SO curious.]]
Richard I. Heaton, Provo, Utah; managing director of Priesthood and Family Department, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; former bishop, branch president, mission president, stake presidency counselor, and stake president; married to Valerie; nine children.
Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, Salt Lake City, Utah; senior manager of Missionary Department, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; former bishop, high councilor, mission president, and stake president; married to Jeni, five children.
Blaine R. Maxfield, South Jordan, Utah; managing director, Welfare and Self-Reliance Services Department, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; former bishop, high councilor, and stake president; married to Jennifer; three children.
Stephen T. Rockwood, Draper, Utah; managing director, Family History Department, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; former bishop, bishopric counselor, high councilor, mission presidency counselor, and stake presidency counselor; married to Jill; four children.
pretty much everyone is a CEO, or attorney, or financial guru. There is also a surgeon.
Sorry I don’t have comments about Canada. Other than a trip to Niagara Falls about 20 years ago, I have no connections.
The authority of Area President [or Area Presidency?] has been publicly defined as “[To] travel within the assigned area to minister, to teach, and to encourage local leaders, missionaries, and Church members. They are assigned by the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles to preside at stake conferences and other meetings” {churchofjesuschrist.org} Apparently that ‘teaching’ also involves handing down personal prejudices and opinions as doctrine. One recent example was the North America West president, who directed the stake presidencies in his area [mainly California] to keep females from sitting on the stand during sacrament meetings unless they were one of the speakers [see https://exponentii.org/blog/women-on-the-stand/ ]
The various Europe areas were rearranged following Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. So there can be political reasons for such moves, which no am assuming justifies my comment, as not Canada. We’re now part of the Europe North area which bizarrely also includes Portugal and Capo Verde, but otherwise the countries you’d expect: UK, Ireland, Scandinavian nations, Baltic nations..
The area president is Dutch, so from outside the area, one counsellor a Utahn, and the other is Alan Philips (yes, Tom Philips’ son).
My companion in the MTC in 1988 was from Alberta.
My only thought on this issue is that there are Americans (primarily transgender people and their families) getting their passports and moving to Canada because of concerns about the upcoming Trump presidency. Don’t know if that has anything to do with anything, but it might.
Perhaps my strongest connection to Canada is that I hosted a Candian refugee on Sept. 11, 2001. I was working west of Detroit and had a house half a mile from the office. Kevin, who I worked with, had tried living in Michigan, but found he preferred Canada, so he commuted across the river every day. On Sept. 11 the border crossing was severely backed up, so Kevin stayed with me that night, went home to his family the next afternoon, and stayed there the rest of the week.
Each of the area presidencies covering the United States includes one Seventy from another country.
Perhaps my strongest connection to Canada is that I hosted a Candian refugee on Sept. 11, 2001. I was working west of Detroit and had a house half a mile from the office. Kevin, who I worked with, had tried living in Michigan, but found he preferred Canada, so he commuted across the river every day. On Sept. 11 the border crossing was severely backed up, so Kevin stayed with me that night, went home to his family the next afternoon, and stayed there the rest of the week.
Each of the area presidencies covering the United States includes one Seventy from another country.
We moved our family to eastern Canada for a few years during the 2010’s for work. It was very disappointing to go to church and be surrounded by the most conservative Trump supporters in the whole province. The only Canadians I met who weren’t horrified by Trump were church members. I have no idea why they’d change up the area leadership but I’d be suprised if it had anything to do with politics.
Canadian here, born and raised. There has been a continuously operating branch of the church in Toronto since 1837. We have a hand carved pulpit from that era in our RS room. Joseph Smith personally preached the gospel in Ontario. John Taylor and Mary Fielding were both baptized in Toronto. Thomas Monson was mission president in the 1960’s. I could go on. The roots of the church here go much further back than most members from the Mormon corridor realize. I don’t know the reason for the administrative change but it makes sense to me.
BTW, having worked as a Deputy Returning Officer on more than one occasion, I can tell you for certain that to vote in the Ontario election you must be a resident of Ontario. LOL
“It will probably make Justin Trudeau more popular in Canada.” Now this was really funny. With respect, you could not be more wrong. Justin Trudeau is despised, even in eastern Canada where he recently lost back to back by-elections in Toronto and Montreal which are normally Liberal strongholds. He’s 23 percent behind in the polls and has virtually no chance of being re-elected in our next election which should be in the spring. This is largely due to his ongoing efforts to turn our beautiful and once wealthy country into Venezuela.
Trump is not serious about the tariffs. He just wants Trudeau to control the border. So do most Canadians. Trump is not trolling Canada or Canadians. Just Trudeau. We are fine with that.
last lemming,
Ooooops. I meant citizen of Canada and resident of Ontario. I don’t know anything about the Commonwealth.
I am a Canadian. Areas are irrelevant. No one cares.
The only Canadian Mormons I know are from Alberta, and I have to say, they would be right at home with the Aryan Nations in Coeur d’Alene. They are the most rabid pro-Trump, anti-LGBTQ people you can imagine.
BB,
My interview was in 1985 and the laws have apparently changed since then. But note the following passage from http://www.elections.sk.ca/voters/voter-id-requirements/special-eligibility/. So it really was a thing in certain provinces (I’m guessing not in Quebec).
Hawkgrrl, I am a Mormon born and raised in Southern Alberta and somehow am appalled by Trump, and do my best not to be anti-people, regardless of their gender or sexual identity. I’ve now lived about half my life in Utah.
Trump insulting Trudeau or threatening tariffs has made less than zero difference to me or anyone I know. At this point, no one in the world is changing their mind either way about him (they either love him or hate him), but most Canadians don’t equate Trumps assery (or heroics) with Americans or America broadly. They are too intimately familiar with American culture and politics, even more than their own.
I doubt it will have any effect that to have a separate Canadian Area, other than making it harder and more expensive to administer (its a long way from St. John’s to Victoria).
I’ve lived in dozens of wards in Alberta and Utah, and overall I’d say that there’s clearly a lot of right-wing extremists in both places, but there’s more visible political/religious diversity in Alberta wards than Utah (even in Magrath). But still, way too many Mormons in Southern Alberta would love to secede from Canada and join the US (as long as Democrats are not in charge). There is an amazingly strong persecution complex among a core group of Alberta Mormons who have been convinced for 80 years that their guns are going to be confiscated, their land given back to the indigenous tribes, or be they’ll be forced to allow gay marriages in the Cardston Temple (or shortly the Lethbridge Temple for some reason). It feels worse to them than it does for Utah Mormons because they are clearly the minority and someone like Trump could never be elected because Canada has fewer stupid electoral systems and more than two parties.
My connection to Canada is that my parents joined the church in 1958 in Australia; in 1959 they migrated to Canada to live in a Mormon community, and be near a temple. 10 month later they were called on a building mission to Scotland/UK. After 10 years of that they were called to go back to Australia to run the building programme there. Obviously not meant to be in Canada.
Our youngest daughter has spent the last two years fighting forrest fires in Canada for a month, this year a couple of weeks in Banf, leading a 5 man crew of remote area fire fighters, who are helicoptered in to control a fire on foot with the equipment they carry. Can also call in water bombing aircraft. They each carry 50 pounds of equipment, incredibly fit. In Australia they are volunteers and get reimbursed for expenses. In Canada paid because local forest fire fighters are professionals (same qualifications though).
I had to look up the Pacific area presidency. President is an Australian, councilors are a Fijian, and a Utahan. They are based in New Zealand. The utahan cv is a little bit desperate with “Other callings include stake missionary preparation teacher, assistant stake executive secretary, elders quorum president, seminary teacher, counselor in a ward Young Men presidency, counselor in a bishopric, ward mission leader, and bishop.”
I am watching the third cricket test match between Australia and India on TV. Play keeps getting interrupted by heavy rain showers, (sub tropical Brisbane) and the ground staff have to cover the pitch to keep it dry. I’m eating warm mince pies (christmas treats), which my wife is baking (a couple got damaged so I got them). Most commonwealth countries play cricket but not Canada. Do America or Canada play international sporting contests with other countries? We play other countries at cricket, rugby union, rugby league, soccer, and tennis.