A Conversation About Humanitarian Missions with Julie and Marty Newton

Hello and welcome to another episode of Inside Out. My name is Jim Bennett and I am here with the fair dinkum bonza bloke, Ian Wilkes. Ian, how are you, sir?

I was feeling good until I heard that word, and I'm not sure what that word means.

So, uh, well, and I chose that word on purpose because I think our guests know what it means, uh, because we are, we are interviewing probably two of my favorite guests, two of my favorite people in the world. Uh, one of them is my sister and the other is my brother from another mother, but my brother-in-law. Julie and Marty Newton are with us. Julie and Marty, how are you?

Fair dinkum. We're doing great.

Good on ya.

Good on ya.

Good on ya. So fair dinkum. Well, I asked ChatGPT for an Australian adjective and I had never heard bonza before, but apparently you can call somebody a bonza bloke. Have you heard that at any point in time?

Yeah, we've got a library of all the different terms right here. Uh, slang dictionary, Australian slang dictionary.

All right.

Throw a whole bunch of them at you if you want.

Well, so I'm sitting here recording in Sandy, Utah. Ian is in Canada, uh, by Vancouver. And Marty and Julie, you are in Adelaide, Australia, correct?

As we speak. Yes.

Right.

Can you explain to everybody listening why you are in Adelaide, Australia?

Uh, sure.

Well, we are serving as senior missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Um, we were called last August, August, and we arrived here in May. So, Um, we got our visas, we had to get everything all set up and we arrived here in May and we are serving as a hybrid missionaries, they call it. We are, we have two roles. We are welfare self-reliance missionaries and we can talk more about that, but we also have a humanitarian side. We are the only humanitarian senior missionary couple for the country. Of Australia.

So what does that entail, being the only humanitarian missionaries?

Well, it means, it means that, um, we are the eyes and the ears for the church in the Pacific area to identify worthy, uh, projects through implementation organizations. Those can be NGOs, nonprofits, um, that are typically underfunded. Um, from various sources, and we try to find projects that will fulfill the role of the church's mission. And in this, in this area, the primary missions are healthcare and education, uh, and of course, emergency relief. Pacific area has a lot of, um, uh, emergencies, uh, disasters that, that occur from time to time. So that's, um, That's the primary area of focus that we work on. So anything that affects healthcare, education, a lot of it is with the indigenous folks, uh, within the, within the country as well. So we spend time, um, all over the country looking for projects, following up on existing projects that we've had. And, um, we can go into those in more detail later if you'd like.

Sure. Well, so I've seen pictures of you, uh, and you spent a lot of time out in the Outback, have you not?

We have.

Yeah.

We have.

That's where the indigenous people are.

Yeah.

Because a lot of books.

The bush.

Yeah, there's a lot of, you know, real negative history in Australia about how the bush, the people in the bush, the indigenous Aboriginal folks have been treated. Um, of course, um, we won't go into that, but because of that, there's, uh, there's an initiative. Here in Australia, it's called Closing the Gap. Um, it's the, it's a collaboration between the government and the, the tribes, the indigenous tribes, people that are trying to do everything they can to close the gap that has been created over the last years of, of negative history. And, and so, um, all the nonprofit organizations and, and, um, governmental sectors are doing things, donating money., trying to fulfill obligations that they feel that they have. We come in and we, we try to help solve for areas that are typically underfunded, as we said before.

And so you identify a project and you feel like, okay, this is a worthy project. This is something that we ought to be doing and getting involved in. What's the process by which that project sort of gets connected to the church and gets connected against funded and launched?

Good, good question. So the church has a program that we use to write up a project. We would go to a nonprofit organization. I'll give you an example, Purple House up in Alice Springs, which is in the very, the center of the bush, of the outback, up in the Northern Territory. And Purple House, uh, they, they provide, um, dialysis care in all the different communities of the bush. The Aborigines have a very difficult genetic issue with, um, with their kidneys. They can't process American food very well. And so there's a high propensity of, of, of kidney disease, liver disease, and in, in the areas of the bush. So they need equipment. Um, they, you know, they, we, we blend in, we ask them and they're doing wonderful work, great work up there. And so they might need some additional equipment, um, shade covers because it gets really hot out there. And we came in and we funded, um, about $100,000, um, US to, for multiple things. We try to make a project go, go from good to better. They, they say we need this. We say, well, what about more? What about this and this and this? So we try to keep the, you know, the funding at a certain level so that it goes through the process much more quickly. If it goes above $100,000, uh, the, the Pacific area can, can approve $100,000 US very easily at their level. If it goes above $100,000, say $100,000 to $2 million, the approval process for a project would go up to Salt Lake City. Um, an example of something that might cost more money is, uh, in the PNG, Papua New Guinea area, we are working with another organization called Fred Hollows, which is a vision care organization, worldwide known. Um, we do a lot of work with them. We do, we have a lot of contributions to Purple Eye, to, um, Fred Hollows, but we're building, uh, we're helping to build a hospital. A vision care hospital up in Papua New Guinea, because there's issues like that up there. Uh, that investment from the church is about $2 million, and that approval went through Salt Lake City, but the total project is about $10 million. And so, um, that's just a couple of examples. We can go through more if you'd like. Another company called CareFlight, they, um, have a rapid helicopter service out of, out of, um, Sydney, and then they've got jets and planes that go into the bush, bring people out that have been in accidents, um, car accidents or other, um, you know, other issues, bring them back up into, um, either, uh, Darwin or down to Adelaide or over to Sydney, Sydney for more care that they might need. So we funded equipment within those planes to help, um, carry those patients to where they need to go.

Right now they're looking for a neonatal bed because the CareFlight helicopter is right next to the children's hospital. And so they get a lot of, um, flights coming right into the children's hospital. So neonatal beds are in need right now. And so this is a project that we're currently looking at for them.

Well, Ian, this sounds quite different from our missionary experience, does it not?

It's very different. We spent, uh, easily, you know, for 2 years, 10 hours a day, uh, knocking on doors in the rain and getting mostly, almost entirely rejected. It was excruciatingly painful, difficult, lots of rejection. It was a miracle when we could get into a door, frankly. And it was, uh, I, I, I think within the, if I, if I go back and I think about my experience in the MTC, in London. They— you're there for 3 weeks and, um, you go through all these different training. You've got the MTC mission present and you do these role plays and you all watch each other and you learn how to teach the discussions. And they did these role plays that, um, made it look very easy to get into a door in England or in Scotland, because I was going to Scotland, obviously. And so I thought, you know, this is probably not going to be as difficult as it appears. But within a few days, especially being from England and going to Scotland, where some of the Scots really don't like some of the English because of the history, it was difficult. It was a real shock. And so I felt very quickly within a week that the time that we were spending knocking on doors all day in the rain, getting going nowhere most of the time, frankly, was almost a complete waste of time. Not entirely, because there's a big, um, you know, marketing thing, I think, behind that, you know, missions in the area and doing something. And so I tried to speak with the mission president about getting more involved in the service projects, you know, can we do this for these neighbors and can we do this and this and this? And the mission president at the time was very regimental, very military-style individual, and there was no room or no interest from the mission president in allowing someone like me who was convert to the church that perhaps thought differently to some other missionaries about getting involved in some service project. And so I found that very frustrating. And so the whole mission, most of the mission, was time spent just knocking on doors and just the occasion where you might, you're able to teach people and very few of those people joined the church and the ones that did in Scotland, many of them, as Jim Bennett will tell you, left. And so I, when I came home and got married, had kids, eventually I became a bishop in Edinburgh Stake and I had the interview with the state president, I think Stephen Kerr, who was the area authority 70 now, I think he is. And I said, look, you know, you can call me, but this is how I think, this is how I want to do things. And I talked about wanting to do more service in the community. And he was great. He said, you know, Ian, when you called, just do what you feel is right, you know, check with him. Actually, it was, I think Mike Watson was the state president. He was very open-minded. So I did some interesting things that no one else had done in Scotland and probably in the UK. I teamed with local police station and we had a, we set up a, what they call a young driver's challenge event. So we opened, I got permission to, from the church to use the building in Dalkeith in the Edinburgh stake for the police to come in and the ambulance services and professionals to come in and invite loads of young people who were young drivers to teach and educate them. You're talking about education, to educate them on, uh, into, um, young driver safety. The first event was a massive success, and then we ran it for several years while I was the bishop. First time it's ever been done. Uh, the second, uh, thing that we did was we opened the building up, uh, Jim Bennett, to blood transfusion, uh, uh, program. And so we had this big building that wasn't used through the day and we opened it up and we partnered with the local medical center, the hospital, the blood transfusion service organization, then a whole bunch of other organizations with beds. They actually brought beds in, about 20, 30 beds into the building. And then loads of non-members would come into the building. Hundreds of them would come in and give blood. Never been done before. And so, and I did get a lot of stick. I got some negative feedback for doing that, saying I was outside of my scope and not the traditional way of doing things, but it actually transformed the reputation of that church. It was quite negative in certain places in that area for different reasons. It transformed how the local community saw the church in that area for sure. And so we did a, we, we, so we ran the blood transfusion every, every year. Um, and I think we did 3 a year. We did one Young Drivers Challenge, and we also opened it up to other charities and organizations that came into the building. It was, it was never been done before, and I don't think that's been done or wasn't done like that anywhere in the UK. And so to, you know, to listen, you know, I made some notes here. I, I think it's, first of all, I'm grateful. Marty and Julie for coming onto the podcast. I think the work that you do is extraordinary. I think this is an area that the church, uh, with its focus can do great things with wonderful people like you that have given and sacrificed your time to do this. You talked about, um, the two main areas, I think the two main responsibilities, which are humanitarian and, uh, relief. And I'd love to get into that a bit more detail with you. And those areas are kind of spread across, it sounds like, education, healthcare, emergency relief, and Indigenous communities. In Canada, by the way, you probably know this already, the history of Indigenous communities is very similar to what happened in Australia. Yeah, very similar. In fact, I would say it's identical in some ways. So we have a Truth and Reconciliation, committee, which is a Canadian federal organization. And the, and so, and I work in this industry. And so businesses and governments, municipalities have to consult Indigenous communities and have to make the effort to reconcile and to bring those opportunities or work together with Indigenous communities to bring relief, to help on education, to help on engineering projects. That's the area that I'm working, et cetera, water waste, water, wastewater distribution projects. And to build more collaborative partnerships and relationships with the Indigenous community. This is very much my role in the company that I'm with right now. It's a big part of this. And I do, I've been doing these joint venture partnerships and inclusion partnerships and what they call MBAs, mutual benefit agreements with First Nation communities on pipeline projects and water projects, et cetera. And, and for the most part, it's been successful only because we've taken the initiative, we've built collaborative relationships, and we're actually working together in the community to help these wonderful communities on all the areas, frankly, that you guys are involved in, in, in, um, you know, in Australia. So I'm doing some of what you're doing, albeit in a professional capacity and not full-time, obviously, uh, you guys are you're doing this, you know, full-time, weekend, 24/7 almost. But I do some of that professionally, but capacity. And so I just think it's fantastic actually that you are engaged in this, that you've signed up for this. And it has the power to transform lives. And can I ask, how long is the mission? Is it 18 months, 2 years?

It's 18 months.

Uh-huh.

We do have the option to extend to 2 years if we'd like.

Okay. And where does the money come from? You know, you talk about these, these different projects with different organizations. The criteria is education, emergency relief, healthcare in disadvantaged communities. You'll, you'll filter them through the criteria. And I guess there's different levels of elevation depending on the amount of money. Can you tell us a bit about the funding piece? Where does the money come from? And what qualifies a project over one that might not qualify?

So, good questions. I, uh, the, the way that the church funds worldwide, um, humanitarian efforts is all the areas. There's areas of the Pacific, there's a Pacific area, there's South America, there's Africa and so forth. The area leaders of those, of those areas for the church will, uh, request from church headquarters in Salt Lake City, um, a budget. Annual budget for them. So the church will then allocate from that, from the church headquarters, a budget for the year for them to have for healthcare, um, you know, uh, education, whatever it may be for that, that specific area's mission or that area's mission. So an example, in 2024, the church, uh, allocated $1.45 billion in expenditures. For, uh, those, those types of, um, projects. 3,836 projects worldwide, 6.6 million hours volunteered by, by, uh, members, 192 countries and territories served. Um, there were 267 clean water, hygiene, and sanitation projects, 710 emergency relief projects, 732 healthcare projects, 71 mobility projects, 591 food security projects. That just gives you kind of a general, uh, understanding of the kinds of things that the church is doing worldwide. Going into your, your specific request, if, if wherever, wherever there's a, a couple like, like Julie and myself throughout the world, um, we identify a project, we work with the implementation organization to identify specifically what they need. These projects have to have a measurable and accountable aspect to them so that they just don't, we just don't give money for, to give money. We have to measure the success and the efficacy of that project as it goes through. So we write it up along with them collaboratively. They send it to us, we put it into a form, and that form goes up to the, our area authority. Same thing done all around the world. The area authority says, yes, it looks like it fulfills all those requirements. It's valid. It fits our mission. Um, it's measurable, it's effective, and we'll, so we submit that in. We've done 2 recently here, just since we've been here, and it takes about 2 weeks for the process to work through and the organization gets its funding. We just funded a, uh, an organization in Melbourne called West Welcome Wagon, and they fund, they support refugees from Myanmar that are coming through. Australia takes in these refugees and They don't have a place to live. They don't have food or clothing or whatever. And so they provide housing for them. And we've provided with a truck, uh, refrigerators and, uh, microwaves and so forth to help them with those, those efforts that they have. So all of the things that we're doing worldwide, uh, the church is now, they're, they're publishing a report, an annual report, uh, the Church's Humanitarian Report and everything that we do. Floats up to the area and the area floats that up to Salt Lake City. And that's what creates this humanitarian report and compiles the hours, the dollars spent and so forth on an annual basis.

And before I hand some time over back to Jim, I just want to say that is absolutely fantastic. It's established, it's organized, it's having, it's transforming lives. I think it's wonderful the work that you're doing. And two quick questions, Jim Bennett, for me. And again, so grateful, Marty and Julie, that you're here. What difference is it making? And secondly, if I may ask, what's the church's objective here? Is it to help unconditionally, which I'm sure it is, or is there an expectation by the church that that will translate at some point into people joining the church?

Yeah, let me just— I'll let Julie talk here as well, but in the project proposal, there is nothing in the project proposal that has a request or a need to have the church identified as the source. We don't publish it. We don't, you know, ring our own chain or anything like that. So it's really, these funds are given because there's a need out there. We do, you know, we're getting ready to do a presentation to the Rotary Clubs and the Lions Clubs to let them know, but people need to know that there are these needs out there and that The church is there and we're serving and we're doing this, but, um, there's no expectation, if you will. Um, at least I haven't seen anything here locally. And, um, I, I think, Jim, I'm not sure if you saw the video that they did on the Adelaide mission. Uh, I did.

Yeah.

Okay.

It was very impressive.

Well, to Ian's comment, you know, uh, back in the day when you were just doing knocking on doors and, you know, having all this lack of success and it was, that's a diff— that's a difficult mission. I totally get that. Um, the mission president here is doing, is doing something that's, that's still different. Our missionaries knock on doors and they say, what can we do to help you? How, what kind of service can we provide? And, and there's no expectation to do anything other than provide service. And they are having now people say, well, what church are you part of? You know, well, we're, we're part of this church. And they'll give a blessing on the house or they'll do a prayer or whatever after the service. They're cleaning yards, they're washing cars, they're doing whatever they're doing. And it's kind of a, a surprise for, for these people, you know, it's like, it's, it's a, it's a different approach and it seems to be working really well in, uh, in, uh, in Adelaide, at least in this area. We have our mission area covers Adelaide and Northern Territory. So we see a lot of the indigenous up in the Northern Territory and, and this particular area of Adelaide, but our humanitarian part is all over the country. Anything else you wanted to add, Julie?

Um, no, but that way of, of serving has become very interesting or very effective, wouldn't you say?

Yeah.

And, um, bringing people into the chapel, into the church. Um, they'll walk out after they've cleaned someone's house and say, hey, do you want to come to church with us on Sunday? And the people say, well, sure, because they're now friends with them. They're now They now have a relationship with them and that's it. And then they show up at church and then it's up to the person at church, whether they decide if they want to come back or how they want to progress or what they want to do with this information that they're receiving. So it's, it's, it's more like what you said, Ian, about what you did as a bishop in providing all these situations for people to come into the, into the church and then decide for themselves, you know, what they see and how they experience it. So it's been really fun watching these missionaries, um, enjoy their mission.

Yeah, the term has moved from investigators to friends. Uh, they're referring to all these individuals as friends, which I love that. I love that.

I do that. I do that.

That's amazing.

And I think it just changes the way people are approached now and people are interacted with.

And we were at the ward the other night and there were they told us there were 45, they had a basketball, they were all playing basketball and they had a tournament.

Yeah.

And they had 45 friends just from young adults from this area playing basketball. And then on Sunday they had 8 people, 10 people, what'd they say? 10 friends show up at church the next day because they're all friends and they want to still come back. Right. Yeah. So it's, it's great.

Yeah. So I think this, I think the church is really, um, through very deep, you know, challenging times of the past missionaries, you know, the door-to-door knocking, uh, it may work in some ways, but it's not highly productive. And I think that service is really where the church is going.

And our mission president is Australian. So he understands the Australian culture and he understands how Australians think. And he says, if you knock on doors and They're not, they're going to turn you away. They don't, they don't want you knocking on their door. So it doesn't work. It doesn't work here. So it's been very effective, but going back to your other question, what's the church's goal? I think, was that what you were asking?

Objective.

Yeah. Objective. Um, I, I think it's two, it can be two things. Um, they look at people with physical humanitarian needs and say we can't even talk or meet spiritual needs if human, if physical needs aren't even being met. People with no home or no, um, food or water, like, and I'm thinking in PNG that don't even have electricity, like they're up there. We, we talked with the humanitarian couple who's our counterpart up in PNG. Actually just yesterday and got an overview of what they're doing up there. And I mean, basic needs have to be met. I mean, the church is there to, to serve in any way we can to meet these basic needs before they can even begin to talk about other specific needs. But also on the other side, um, I think it gives us as church members a way to develop and grow ourselves because You know, as you know, as church members yourselves, is if you're a baptized member of the church, we covenant to care for, for those who are in need. We covenant to help and serve the best way that we can. And so we get a chance. I mean, this is what I'm feeling in serving as a missionary. We get a chance to fulfill our own personal covenants as we serve other people. And it's, it's just, it's just fascinating and brilliant and wonderful. For us personally, you know, in a selfish way to see how we can serve other people in a way that's really needed physically right away.

Yeah, we're, we are enjoying our mission so much. It's, it's, it's, it's been, that's just very fulfilling.

I can tell, I could tell you're heart and souls into it.

Well, it's, it's fascinating to me. So the church released some numbers, uh, fairly recently that said that convert baptisms hit record highs this last year, which is really encouraging given how difficult, as the secularization of the world continues, it's really remarkable that the church is defying some of those trends. But I think one of the reasons why that is happening is that the church, when I asked Ian, you know, this is so different from when we were missionaries, I think the church has learned so much between the time 35 years ago when we were knocking on doors in Scotland and now to where you are as you're serving as humanitarian missionaries. And when my sons, your nephews, were serving missions in Argentina and when they got reassigned in COVID, there was a big focus on social media that they said, okay, stop knocking on doors, start using social media. And you started to see this transition away from the traditional proselyting model to something else. But one of the reasons why I thought it would be so much fun to have you on here, but why I wanted to have this discussion, is if I were president of the church, which doesn't seem to be in the cards as of yet, but— Yeah, there are, there are things happening, uh, events are in motion. We'll see what happens. Uh, if I were president of the church, uh, and I, you know, one of the things that I would want to do is essentially scrap the traditional proselyting model and lean heavily into this kind of humanitarian model. Yeah, because, because I, I think once you have made those kinds of friends and once you have demonstrated the goodness of the church, I mean, one of the things we, we talked to Terryl Givens a few weeks ago. I don't know if you know who Terryl Givens is, uh, but he's, he's a scholar with the, or was a scholar with the Maxwell Institute and has written a number of really wonderful books. And he was interviewed on a BYU podcast. And the BYU professor said to him, one of the problems people are having who leave the church, uh, it's not an issue of whether or not the church is true. It's an issue of whether or not the church is good. And young people are, are leaving the church because they don't think the church is good. And Terrell Givens made this interesting comment where he said, Young people are also disturbed, for instance, by the temple because they want to spend less time helping dead people and more time helping live people. They want to replace the temple with a soup kitchen, and they want to be involved in improving lives in this life rather than doing ordinances for people who have passed on. And as I look at what you're doing and the amount of freedom that you guys have I mean, the ability you have to actually use kind of this discretion to go and figure out what projects are needed, what projects are going to be most effective, what projects are going to have the most impact. Uh, as, as president of the church, I would say, okay, we're going to have all kinds of Julies and Marties sent to all kinds of countries, but then we're going to have missionaries who come and volunteer to sort of staff these projects and run these projects and make friends. And then it's the most natural thing in the world for somebody involved.

I was just gonna say that that's exactly what we're seeing here. We even got a call out of the blue, um, 3, 4 days ago.

Peter.

Peter. Yeah. From the welfare self-reliance person in Melbourne. She's— Welfare Self-Reliance is huge over here and they have specialists and they have stake specialists. It's just a big need. Anyway, she called us out of the blue and said, I got your name. You're the humanitarian people over, um, Australia. And we're working with West Welcome Wagon and we have volunteers going in and that's the refugee company we talked about. We have wealth. We have, um, We have volunteers going in and serving and helping them, but we want to just make sure they got their funding because I want to make sure the relationship is still good with them before I start sending all these missionaries in there with them. And we said, oh, yep, they just got funded today. As a matter of fact, the money's come through. We got a nice email from them. They're very happy. And she says, oh, good. We're going to, we're, we're in there with them. So they are doing that. I just think the church, um, is doing this more and more than I think the general public is aware. We've learned a ton since we've been here about it. We didn't know X, Y, and Z was even happening. And the church isn't, um, here to toot their own horn. They're not, they're not doing this to say, hi, look at us. And I think it is like we were saying, it's new that they are now publishing their reports. But I think this has been going on for a lot. Longer than we've realized, at least I personally have realized. And I just think it's just not information that the general public is really aware about.

Let me, let me, let us give you a couple more examples. We met with the two, there's two stakes in Adelaide that, that just, there's just, just Marion Stake and this, and the North Stake. And we've met with the Relief Society presidents and they are desperate looking for service projects. They want their, their youth, and their other organizations to be involved in service projects. Well, there's, there's a birthing kit project that they were involved in last year. And then another one that we're going to continue again this year, where we, the humanitarian part, we secure funding to acquire these solar-powered, little solar-powered kits that need to be assembled. That will only end up in PNG, in Papua New Guinea, because there is no solar power up there. There's, there's these schools. I mean, not the schools, but there's all these children that need to have light at night to study with or to read with, and they don't have anything. And so there's a company up in Brisbane that produces these solar-powered juniors, and they're like little square lights. I have a, I have one, but they have to be assembled. So we acquire them, we secure the funding, and then they ship down the, these, these solar buddies that need to be assembled. It takes about 20 minutes to assemble each one. And we did 2,800 through our, um, I think it was the FSY was part of it, the YSA and the Relief Society. And they had this one-day project where about 2,800 were, were assembled and then ultimately shipped back up to PNG for delivery to all the individuals throughout the islands up there. And so we're trying to combine the humanitarian, the self-reliance and the service part along with the humanitarian funding part and try to let get people get involved in these service projects. So they feel they're doing something good. And then the people that are receiving the benefit are feeling good because they've got, they got power, they got light, they've got, so it's working in tandem. And, and that, I think that that's really what the church wants to do this model. I think it's, it's not just in Australia either.

It's, yeah. And for, for your information, when we were in the NTC, we, in our class, there were 3 other couples. One was going, doing the same thing. One was going to Pakistan. One was going to Laos and one was going to France. And we were going to Australia and we were all learning how to do the same thing. So it's happening all over the world.

Ian, I just wanted to, Ian, and I think, uh, what's interesting is that there's a lot of people in the church that don't know this stuff either, right? We were up in the Northern Territory, up in Darwin, and met with the district president there and kind of described what we were doing. He goes, I didn't know that. I didn't know we were involved in that. I didn't know we were funding this. So we have to, we have a job to do. We have to communicate to our own people what the church is doing. And the church has to, it has to get better and better at that. Um, we have global partnerships with Red Cross, CARE, Save the Children, MAP International. The Hunger Project, IDE Global, Vitamin Angels, Helen Keller International. I mean, this is, this is something that we, this is another responsibility we have to communicate to our own members that we are giving and that we are doing service throughout.

Involved.

Yeah.

Yeah. No. Well, so how, how do you feel about my model then of when I'm president of the church? Do you, do you think that this is something that should continue alongside the more traditional proselyting model, or do you think that the church would be more successful— and again, we don't have the power to do this and we're just sort of speculating— but if the church were to shift entirely away from the traditional proselyting model and into this idea of, okay, missionaries are going to go out into the world to do good and to make friends. Do you think that that would be a more successful missionary effort in terms of actual baptisms?

You know, I think, I think, I think what we're seeing here is that that model is working really, really well. We have more people, more friends being invited to church after services has been performed, service performed, and it's, it's It's been very successful here in the Adelaide area. Each mission president has their own prerogative to do things, but I think what's happening is these models are being communicated to all mission presidents throughout the world, and they're seeing that this has been very successful. People are responding more positively to badge that's on their, on their shirts. They're seeing friends now and instead of, you know, uh, people that are accosting them. And I think that that's, I think that's working. And I, I, I, I can't tell you, all I can tell you is what's happening here in Adelaide and it's working really well.

And we just had, uh, the area president here for the zone conferences and we, we attended that and he, um, he was showing data. So the church is aware of this, but he was showing data that The numbers, the numbers of people that you get to come to sacrament meeting, friends, people who are not members of the church that come to sacrament meeting, it's 18% of those people join the church and it's pretty, it's pretty regular. Yeah, pretty consistent. Um, and so if you take those numbers. I think the church is leaning towards just invite, invite, and, and they, the brethren have said this, love, share, and invite, but they're, they're focusing here in Australia on inviting, inviting, inviting. And the first week we were here, there were 17, they call them friends. Our next door neighbors are missionaries, right, that live right next to us, these darling sister missionaries. And they walk in and they said, we have 17 friends at church with us today. And you know, that's something we don't see in the States, unfortunately, but here it was fantastic. And so we all sat with all these friends and we got to know all these new people who have never been in a church before. And it was, it's fabulous. So this turn towards inviting, inviting, inviting, I think is becoming church-wide.

Yeah. Well, Ian, this kind of brings to mind to me that this is the exact opposite of the thing that the church did before we got to Scotland, which is the whole baseball baptisms model. Julie and Marty, are you familiar with baseball baptisms?

No.

No. It was kind of a huge scandal back in the day. What happened in the UK, throughout the UK, was that missionaries would set up baseball leagues and they would teach British children how to play baseball. And in order to join the league, all you had to do was get in these white clothes and, and get dunked in the water for a second, and then you were on the team. And so it was this, this— it was— there were all these perverse incentives to baptize people just to get the numbers of baptisms up. And even when— and I don't know if you had this experience, but there were, there were people on the rolls and we were assigned several times to go and just check if they even knew they were members of the church. And many of them had been baptized in these sort of baseball baptisms programs. And the idea was very cynically, okay, we're just going to We're going to get you in the church with kind of this false premise of community, or this false premise that we're your friends, but really we're tricking you into joining the church. And the thing that I'm seeing here is again sort of the exact opposite of that, which is we are genuinely going to be your friends whether you join the church or not. We're going to have a positive impact on your life regardless of what your membership status is. And so truly, when you come to church, you truly are friends. And if 18% of you, or fewer or more, decide to join the church, that's wonderful, but you will still be our friends. And that to me is just so encouraging and such a positive approach to this. Is, I mean, is that an accurate description of what's happened?

Yeah, I think, I think it goes to the old, the old adage, you people don't care what you know until they know that you care. And I think that, that, I think that these missionaries are having a wonderful time doing what they're doing because they get to go out and show people that they care. And then, then they teach the doctrine later. And the doctrine is much more accepted once they know that people do care about them.

And Jim, the people that we're meeting, um, by traveling around and For example, West Welcome Wagon. Um, this woman who's running this organization has served herself. She's not a member of the church, but she served herself in 16 different countries working with people. Oh, she's over, she's in her 60s, I would say, but over the period of her life. So she's seen everything, everything, and people struggle and she's helped in so many ways. And so we're watching people like this, um, who have, who have done amazing things with their life and served people in amazing, amazing ways. And these are good people. These are phenomenal people. And this is what we love too, is being involved with humans like this who are teaching us how to be better and how to serve and how to, help other people in ways that we have never been able to do that before in our circumstances. So it's a win-win.

Just a little bit more information on how, on the organization here. Um, the church is spread out, especially in Northern Territory. We have these little, these communities all over the place that are 4 hours to get to this one, 5 hours to get to that one. And, um, there are other senior couple missionaries that are called as MLS or Member Leader Support. Support missionaries to go into these communities and be there to help the younger missionaries. But while they're there, they're going to this food bank and volunteering at the food bank, or they're volunteering at this nonprofit or that nonprofit. And, um, they're supporting the missionaries in the mission effort. They're the senior couple, they're the grandpas and the grandmas these missionaries need to have just to feel a little bit like they're at home. And, but they're, they're so spread out. Up in Broken Hill, you know, you kill a couple of kangaroos on the way up to get there, right? It's just, it's, it's, it's just, it's, um, it's amazing the kind of different, the different kinds of senior missionary opportunities there are out there in the world. We're, we're, we're what we call hybrid missionaries. We have humanitarian and welfare self-reliance, you know, those programs that they have to, to teach emotional support resiliency or how to get a job or whatever it may be, those programs were over. We're responsible for helping the missionaries transition away from the mission and back home. There's a, there's a, there's an organ— there's a curriculum called My Plan. And they, we start 6 months before they're finished and we help them get, get acclimated to life after the mission.

Um, so with young missionaries that are serving.

Yes. That's part of our, that's part of our job. As welfare self-reliance, which we really haven't talked about today because we focus more on the humanitarian. But we have a whole welfare self-reliance role as part of our mission where we oversee the My Plan, um, program. We have to run a leavers conference. They call it the leavers conference for the missionaries that are leaving. Um, every transfer we meet with, we run a 5-hour seminar and we talk about the transition process of going back into real life. And make sure that they have, um, support on the other end going home. Mentors, um, coaches for education or jobs, whatever they want to do. Have— and so 6 months before they leave, we are planning with them. Um, you had a phone call last night. I meet with my— one of my gals. We're doing it ourselves so we understand the program, uh, better, but I'm meeting with mine next week and I just chatted with her. I saw her the other day and said, hey, what do you think? She's going back to Utah. You know what? Usually the people in the States know what they're doing with their life when they go home. She says, well, my mom doesn't really want me to go to college, but I think I need an education. And so I just looked at her. I thought, I said, yeah, we need to have a conversation. So we're going to meet next week. She has a My Plan book and it's very well written. It helps them process, um, a plan of what they're going home. We just brought home two laptops from, um, Sydney that were given to the mission for these two sister missionaries who are going home to Pakistan and have nothing. And this mission president says, I want them enrolled in BYU Pathways before they leave this mission so that they will continue their education before they get on that airplane because once they get to Pakistan, it won't be available or they don't even have laptops. So we provided laptops for them and we have someone working with them. There's a BYU Pathways specialist here in Australia that's going to get them going. We run the English Connect program to make sure that these missionaries who don't speak English, who come from Samoa, Tonga, yeah, islands where English is not their first language. They have to take an English test in order to get into BYU Pathways. So we make sure that they are in an English Connect class while they're here on their mission so that their English improves so that they can pass that test when they leave so that they can further their education remotely or get into BYU-Hawaii, which is where a lot of them go. So we have— and then this brand new initiative has just come out from the Area Presidency on career coaching, where I guess this is more of a Pacific area need, but a lot of these, um, Islanders go home and don't have a path. And so they do need continued coaching to help them discover what is available or what is the art of the possible. They— a lot of them don't even know that they have access to education. A lot of them don't even know what, um, opportunities are for occupations. So we are here, we just got ourselves this certified, we got our certificate yesterday to be certified career coaches, and we can now train other career coaches. So that's part of our job as we travel around is to meet people and invite them to consider being a career coach. Now, this is a volunteer. It's not, doesn't come with any priesthood keys. It's not a calling. It's not a church mandated job, if you will. It's an invitation. Would you like to coach young adults and help them in their education and career prospects? And so we just, we're in the process of, um, we just got a new one signed up and we're going to start training her hopefully this week. And she's already, um, very, very good with young adults. She's already in the psychology fields, you know, it's people like this who are interested in doing things like this. And it's just on their own time and they can work with anywhere from 1 individual to 10 or however many they want to take on. And, um, the church has a whole, uh, ECM system, client management system worldwide. The Welfare Self-Reliance Program is worldwide. You can go on the church website and type in, I want a career coach, and it connects you. It has you fill out your information, and we see it on our ECM system here. If it, if they're from Australia, it comes to us, and we're in charge of assigning them a career coach, finding out what their needs are so that these young adults aren't getting lost in the mix and they're progressing in a way that will better their life. It's fascinating.

Yep.

And this is new. This is new.

Ian, can you imagine 6 months before the end of your mission, having people sit down and say, okay, we're going to help you make that transition? I mean, when I came home, it was like a ton of bricks. I, I, I got dumped by my girlfriend. I, I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life. I was just an absolute mess. And the idea of, of people sitting down and working with me and like, okay, the mission is at the end. Let's do this, this kind of transition training. That's just unreal to me. I mean, Ian, what would have that, what would that have done to you if that had been available back in the day?

It would have, um, I extended my mission because I didn't want to go home. Yeah. And when I did go, when I did go home, uh, the state president had to chase me for almost a week to release me.

I really get that. I get it.

4 days. It was 4 days. I was about 4 or 5 days before I responded to the stake president.

I'm feeling quite emotional right now.

It developed the whole about the tears because there's a spirit in this meeting that I didn't expect. There is a Uh, I didn't expect to have this conversation. I didn't expect to hear this. I had hoped for this. I didn't know that, uh, the church was doing this to this extent. And as I listen to you both, and you're both extraordinary people, um, I, I, I, I I miss the church. I don't go anymore. And, uh, it's, uh, you're describing an organization that, um, we don't have here in Canada. We have in, uh, in the UK. Uh, the church here, mostly, not entirely, it's very internal-focused, you know, meetings about meetings. We do some external stuff, but it's not much, to be honest. UK is the same. Um, describing completely something that I had hoped and dreamed for. I don't go to church anymore, and Jim Bennett may have told you that, but you're describing something that is, you know, my heart longs for and I miss. And I just wish that we were doing that here. A lot of the members, Martin, that you're talking about, a lot of the members worldwide I think don't know about this.

Right.

And I think it's, listen to you guys, it sounds like the church is finally achieving its full potential and all these programs with no expectations, doing it out of love and kindness. And yes, if people want to join the church and be part of this, absolutely, they have that opportunity to do so. It's an organization I in some ways, not entirely, hardly recognized, you guys. And I just wish that we, uh, I just wish that, uh, you know, other parts of the world where the church, uh, is, was doing what you guys are doing in, uh, I'm sorry, I'm, I'm embarrassing myself here. Um, I just wish it, all the things that you're doing that we were doing here and we're not. That's the truth.

We're just not.

We're not doing that in the UK. I'm in regular contact with my, on my, on my wife's side, they're all in the church, active bishops, stake presidents, and counselors, and etc., very committed to the church. And so I get, I get to know what's happening in the UK. It's not happening in the UK, and certainly not happening in Canada the way you're describing. And we've said often on the podcasts, and this is for me is a very, a very different experience on this podcast. We were over 2 years, and this is a feeling I've not really had before in any of the conversations, to be honest. But I just, you know, wish that, well, it's happening. It sounds like what you're doing, you guys doing in Australia, is a catalyst and a benchmark, a standard that the church can then roll out, if you like, across the world. I just know that we could do, the church could do a lot more, and it clearly is doing a lot more in Australia and in transforming people's lives. And that's what it's all about. It's about helping people and making people feel better. And you said something that really hit me earlier. Years ago, I was homeless. I was thrown out of my home for joining the church. I was homeless for a few days. I slept on a park bench. I was terrified. And I was worried about where my next meal was coming from. And I certainly wasn't thinking about trying to be spiritual. And you hit the nail on the head that people, if you don't deal with basic people's basic needs, they, uh, it's hard to think spiritually and you guys in these programs and these initiatives, uh, have nailed it. And I think trying to help people in those basic needs like food and shelter and education, try to help them get out of this rut and help them get a career and get a job so they can be, you know, self-provide and be self-reliant and self-efficient. I think it's absolutely amazing. The world doesn't know about this and I think they should. And many of the members don't know about this, and I think they should. So I was so grateful that you're doing what you're doing, and I just wish that we could do what you're doing over here in Canada, certainly in the UK.

Yeah, yeah, it's starting to bubble up. I mean, I think the church, the more the church communicates these things, and this podcast is a way to do that.

Right.

I think, um, they are looking for, uh, more senior missionaries who to do what we do actually. I mean, they need the feet on the ground, right? That's where it starts. Um, our manager, we report to a manager out of Sydney, even though we're in Adelaide and we report to humanitarian manager out of New Zealand, even though we're in Adelaide. And so we don't report to our mission president here at all. He, he's. He's just our buddy, but, but our managers, both of them say, hey, do you know any more people like you? Because we want, the church needs these kinds of people to get on the ground and get out there and connect with these organizations. So it starts there too.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, uh, we're coming up on a hard, um, a hard break here. So I just, I am so grateful that you have shared this with us because I think that this information, I think, will inspire an awful lot of people and will be very, very helpful in terms of letting people understand that the church is not only true, but the church is also good. And how much good the church is doing and is capable of doing. And I'm to Ian's point. I mean, yes, I think the church can do more. I think the church will do more. I mean, I look at what the church was doing 35 years ago when we were missionaries and how much has changed and how much has changed for the better and how many lives have been lifted by this, this approach, this approach of loving unconditionally. And loving without expectation of return, because I think that's the kind of Christlike love and service that builds the kingdom. So I think you, I love you guys and love what you're doing, and I'm so grateful that you shared that with us.

So we're glad to be here.

We're glad to be here. We love you all right back. It's fun to serve. And yes, you are away from your family, You know, for, but it's 18 months. They calculated in Arabic.

I'm here for you. We, we, we looked at your grandson with the big gash on his head, but he, that he got.

Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for taking our role.

Uh, we have FaceTime, you know, we're connected. It's, it's, this world is so different now. Everyone's connected. We can talk to them and everything. It's, it's just, it's easy.

And it's just such a blessing to serve. I can't even, I, I, it's more than I expected.

Yeah. And if there's a, if there's an advertisement that we can make on this, Um, if there's senior couples that are listening to this, um, we need you. We need more senior couples doing humanitarian work throughout the world.

And you get to go to movies. You get to do whatever you want. You don't, it's not the structure that it was 50 years ago.

For younger missionaries.

For younger missionaries. Yeah. They, they have more set boundaries, but, but for seniors, we can be, we can be seniors.

Māori, Julie, I'm so grateful. This is an experience I didn't expect to have. I'm so grateful to meet you, with you both. You wonderful people. I think the work you're doing is amazing. I think you're wonderful. I really do. And I, the key to bringing joy to people's lives through the gospel, like the service missions that you're involved in, is to do outward unconditional service missions. Because of love, right? Instead of what we— I see often, again, not always, church focusing on retention, putting in guardrails internally to stop people getting to the edges, to stop them leaving the church. The key is service at the extent that your guys are doing, and that is the retention. That's how you hang on to people, and that's how you attract people into the church, by being open, community engaged, by doing these collaborative service projects and transforming people's lives and bringing, uh, security, emotional security, spiritual security, uh, physical security to these people's lives. And that's where you forge those lifelong relationships. When you feed someone, when you shelter someone, they never forget that. So I'm so grateful to meet with you both. It's a real honor. And I'm just, um, I just think it's amazing what you're doing. Thank you.

Well, we heard much about you, Ann, and we're glad to finally meet you.

Thank you.

Yeah, this has been great. Thank you.

Yes, thank you to everyone, and thank you to everyone who's been listening to this. This has been an emotional and an inspiring episode, and we're very grateful to have all of you along for the ride here. So, uh, thank you all very much, and we look forward to speaking with you next week on Inside Out. Out. Thanks to Ian Murray. Thank you, Ian.

Thank you, guys.

Cheers.