In the early 1830s, destitute Mormons flooded into the city of Kirtland, Ohio. Brigham Young himself wore borrowed pants and shoes. Alarmed, local residents warned the Mormons to leave.
That experience and a national recession — the Panic of 1837 — created economic distress for the infant LDS Church and many of its members, but leaders derived principles from those and other painful early trials that continue to drive the church and what it teaches its members today, the Presiding Bishop of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints saidFriday.
For example, 163,000 people around the world completed the LDS Church's new, highly practical self-reliance courses last year, Bishop Gérald Caussé said Friday during the 2018 Church History Symposium. Simultaneously, the faith's leaders practiced what they preached, storing food and investing a part of the church's revenues so it could continue if hardship hit.
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