President Monson’s Letters
From 1959 to 1961,
Thomas S. Monson served as the president of the Canadian Mission. In April 1993 he shared a wonderful
conversion story of Brother George H. Watson.
In 1978 Brother
Watson wrote a letter to President Monson which was never mailed, but in later
years it was shared with President Monson and he read portions of it in General
Conference:
"Dear Elder Monson: This is a letter out
of the blue. Its purpose is to thank you for the letters you wrote some twenty
years ago -- one to me and the other about me -- and to let you know the effect
they had on my life. My name is George Watson. In 1957, at the age of
twenty-one, I emigrated from Ireland,
where I had grown up, to Canada.
The main purpose of going to Canada
was to put together sufficient money to do postgraduate work at London
University. The firm for which I worked was in Niagara
Falls, and I found a room at the ridiculously
inexpensive cost of $6.00 per week. The only drawback was that I had to drive
the landlady -- age seventy-three -- to church each Sunday in St.
Catharines, Ontario.
I soon found this chore to be very
annoying, as she used the twenty-five minute drive to try to get me to see the
missionaries from her church. I resisted this very effectively for better than
a year, until one day she told me that there were two young ladies coming to supper,
and would I care to join them. It is
very difficult to be rude to lady missionaries! I did a great deal of thinking over the next
few months and decided that although what eleven sets of missionaries were
telling me felt right, I would have to give up too much, besides which I was
fed up running my landlady to church. In order to stop her asking for the ride,
I decided to take her half an hour late on the next Sunday and to go in and sit
with her in an open-neck shirt, sneakers, and sports slacks. I thought this
would embarrass her and she would not ask me again. My plan worked perfectly,
except that she was not annoyed at being late, and I made as much impact as a
damp squid. We arrived just as the Sunday School was
splitting for class. I would not go into class and spent my time talking to a
very fine man who was crippled and who 'understood' me. As I was to return to Ireland
eight days later (July 1959), he suggested that I should join the Church on the
Saturday before I left. He was to call and confirm this during the week, but I
effectively countered this by not answering the phone all week. On Sunday,
after a sleepless night, I phoned him to apologize and was baptized in Hamilton
virtually on the way to the airport-knowing that I would never meet any Mormons
in Ireland and
that the Church would lose track of me. I
have no idea, President Monson, how you found my address in Ireland, but on the
Friday after I returned, I had a letter from you welcoming me into the Church,
and on Sunday at 9:00 A.M., there was a knock on the door, and a President Lynn
stood on the doorstep saying he had a letter from President Monson in Toronto
asking him to watch over me. "The next few months or years were traumatic.
Three meetings on a Sunday were entirely unreasonable and there was no way I
would speak in front of that group; they can't expect more than 10 percent.
Even more traumatic: my girlfriend set out to show me how ridiculous I was. She
ended up being baptized. We now live in Illinois
with three wonderful children. I often sit and ponder why the Lord has blessed
us so greatly. We have all had reason to feel His sustaining hand in difficult
times. Although it is unlikely that we
will ever meet, I would like to very sincerely thank you for taking the trouble
to write those two letters. They have
completely changed the course of our lives. I am grateful for the knowledge of
the Savior's purpose in coming to earth, my relationship to Him, and what He
expects of me. The courage and steadfastness of Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and
the knowledge that he imparted to us will always be a source of inspiration to
me. I am thrilled at the opportunity of serving in the Lord's church. May the Lord continue to bless you in His
work, and thank you for the effect you have had on my life."
[signed] George Watson
In
1993, George Watson was serving as first counselor in the Naperville Illinois
Stake presidency. President Monson
shared the rest of the story. This
past Christmas, when George Watson and his beloved Chloe came to Salt
Lake City to visit two of their children and a
son-in-law, they came to my office, that we might formally meet. They expressed their testimonies and again
conveyed their thanks for all who had participated in this human drama, this
miracle in our time. Tears flowed,
prayers were offered, and gratitude conveyed.
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