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A Temple Open
House
“The Spirit of the Lord was upon Finland” Part 2
Text by Maurine Proctor
Photography by Scot Facer Proctor
Continued
from Part 1. Click here for Part 1.
A Miracle
Consider the phenomenon, then: 55,633 people
came through the temple during the open house, amounting to 1% of
the population of Finland. 5,711 comment cards were received and
referrals and Book of Mormon requests numbered 2,713!
Members worked hard to make this happen. Though
the convert baptisms are slow in Finland, a new Finnish convert
is not likely to go inactive. Finns are like the northland they
inhabit — built on granite. In the midst of Finland’s
lush forests, granite intrusions show themselves above the soil.
Pink and gray granite cliffs suddenly expose themselves amidst the
woods. Go down only a few inches in Finland’s black soil,
and there is a bedrock of granite.
Click on
Photos to Enlarge
The Temple itself sits on top of a solid granite
base.
It is a perfect symbol for the Finnish member.
Growing amidst such opposition, they are dedicated and hardy like
few others. They have clung on to their discipleship and have become
strong for the flexing.
Kari Haikkola of Turku, Finland.
Kari Haikkola, the first stake president in
Finland said, “When people join the Church in Finland, a very
big part of them stay. Almost all stay — 70 to 80%. They have
to have their own testimony and they are valiant in that and they
serve very well. Later on there might be problems, but most of them
are really strong. They don’t give up.”
Everybody whose faith grows in an easier clime
should be required to meet with the Finns once in awhile just for
a booster shot.
They have sisu — a Finnish word for tenacious
determination, an ability to stick to something like you mean it,
an undying commitment. They even have a candy called sisu —
a black licorice with punch.
Temple circular sent out around the nation of Finland.
With the temple open house coming, they tore
into action. Five-hundred thousand full-color newspaper circulars
displaying the temple and explaining its purpose were distributed
in the Helsinki area — including 40,000 distributed by the
members themselves. For months leading up to the open house, meetings
and firesides were held to help the members be effective in inviting
their neighbors. They had pass-along cards to give to friends with
an invitation to the temple.
Members across Finland piled their friends into
their cars and drove hours to Helsinki to show them the temple.
Ritva Makinen drove two carloads of friends and work colleagues
three hours — from Rauma on Finland’s seafaring west
coast to Helsinki — all for a walkthrough of the temple.
Ritva Makinen of Rauma, Finland.
“It has been so positive,” she said,
with some surprise. (Finnish members are not used to a positive
response from their friends.)
“They all say that they had never thought
that Mormons were so fine and so spiritual. One of my colleagues
asked if she could come to Church on Sundays. All of them loved
the experience. They cried and they hugged each other. Between our
travel time and the time it took to go through the open house, we
had about eight hours together. In that setting it was so easy to
speak with them about the gospel.” She said that her friends
are searching for truth and they don’t even know it.
Lotta Niemenen, a young mother in her early
twenties, said, “I had a lot of friends whom I invited, and
I was surprised to see the ones who came. It was a good experience
to tell our neighbors and see how much they wanted to know about
the Church. It was surprising that they didn’t already know
that we were members of the Church.
Lotta Niemenen, mother of three, in Turku, Finland.
“We are not afraid to tell them that we
are members. We have invited the missionaries to help them with
projects around their house. They’ve seen us go to Church
every Sunday, dressed up, but they still didn’t pay attention
enough to know we are Mormons. People just don’t get involved
in each other’s lives in Finland. Now we can talk to them
about the gospel.
The Lord at Work
Still all the member effort in the world couldn’t
have produced the numbers that showed up at the temple. President
Jouttenus described it, “The Spirit of the Lord was upon Finland.”
Kari and Auli Haikkola, sat in their home on
the wind-swept edge of the Baltic Sea in Turku and observed, “With
the temple open house, I think it was a snowball effect. It started
to roll. One journalist in local radio in Espoo, said at least three
or four times, ‘There is something special you have to see,’
so people came.
Kari and Auli Haikkola sit on their dock on an inlet of the Baltic
Sea.
“There was good weather most of the time
also, which is amazing for us this time of year. The temple is at
a busy intersection so there are lots of cars driving by so the
people have been looking at it for three years. Many have believed
that there is a feeling of secrecy about the Church and now everything
is open and so they came.
“Many said, it was a must; we had to come.”
Of the 5,000 VIPs invited, 1200 came —
including the Prime Minister, the Head of Parliament, some ministers
and government members. Many of the VIPs also made the trip from
the Baltic States, including the mayors of several towns.
At receptions after the open houses they attended,
instead of idle chitchat or hurried departures because of pressing
schedules, many stayed and stayed, asking thoughtful questions indicating
they were truly interested in what they’d seen.
Auli Haikkola said, “We found that when
we were seeking to be only informative, they were comfortable and
wanted to learn more. It was OK. But if we try to preach, then they
would withdraw.
“That’s also what many journalists
said about us, “They aren’t trying to preach.”
She said when Bruce Olson, the Church Director
of Public Communications came to train them on how to conduct tours
he impressed them with the same message. “Don’t overtalk
the visitors who come. Let the temple do the talking. Let them feel
the spirit of the place.” And they did.
The press became fascinated with the temple
— and to a media that has fed on the occasional negative story
about the Latter-day Saints, listing the Church as one of the most
unpopular religious organizations in Finland, suddenly everything
was transformed.
A major Helsinki newspaper, with wide circulation,
ran a story called “Mormon Temple, a Hit.” Not one negative
word came from the press as the media were duly impressed with the
power and beauty of the building.
People Stood Waiting
Instead of turning their backs, people stood
in long lines waiting, winding their way up the drive that led to
the dark-spired temple that stands on the rise of a granite hill.
It was, they said, like the scripture in Isaiah, “And it shall
come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s
house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall
be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it”
(Isaiah 2: 2,3).
The temple sits on a small hill in Espoo, a large
suburb of Helsinki.
Such a crowd, talking in their different tongues,
had to wait for their turn in the temple, but they didn’t
seem to mind. Guides described how people’s eyes would grow
wide and sometimes fill with tears in the Celestial room —
these people who had said they were not interested in religion.
They waited in the sunshine in long lines without
complaining. The only day it rained was when a group of protesters
had planned to come to the temple. That day one of the sisters ran
out and bought every umbrella she could find — at least one
hundred.
Leena Hoge, guiding tours said, “Before
entering the Celestial room, I suggested to the visitors to “listen
to the silence” and the peace in that gorgeous room. I had
never experienced such reverence with any other group, and there
were even some children, too. You could hear a needle drop. In the
sealing room, I told them briefly about my own eternal family and
its meaning for me. We could all feel the Spirit so strong.
Celestial Room of the Helsinki Finland Temple.
Copyright 2006, Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights
reserved. Used by permission.
“Outside, many of them came and thanked
me for what they had experienced. One woman, a total stranger before,
hugged me. Another shook my hand with both her hands. They were
just overwhelmed, as was I.”
Rough-looking boys with tattoos and multiple
piercings came out in tears.
Another guide told the story of being in the
Celestial room with a tour when a slight breeze ruffled the curtains
a bit. A woman in the group said, “I feel like God is coming.”
The children were wonderful. Many schools came
on field trips to see the temple, teachers with their students mingling
around them. When they had questions, they raised their hands as
if they were still in school.
One little child with her mother, hearing all
of the talk about the Savior, turned to her mother and asked, “Who
is Jesus?” Another man in the group said, “Now you have
something to teach your daughter.”
The feedback from the open house attendees was
overwhelmingly positive. Some wrote, “This is an experience
I will never forget.”
Auli and Kari Haikkola observed, “What
affected the people most who came was not the building, but the
members. One of the newspapers reported that the members didn’t
just act kind and nice, but they really felt that way. What they
were saying wasn’t a campaign to sell something, but it came
from their heart.”
President Matti Joutennus talks about the open house.
“My wife and I took maybe 15 groups through
the temple,” said President Joutennus, “but sometimes
we had 45 minutes when we were just outside. I realized this was
a great time to teach the gospel, so I started answering the questions
I wished they would ask. It was a wonderful time just to teach the
gospel for hour after hour — just the kind of experience you
dream about.”
President Joutennus said something long lasting
came out of the temple open house experience. “For us members
it has been a very important thing to learn that there are a lot
of people in Finland who are interested in religion and interested
in what the Church has to offer. It has taught to me that people
who seem completely uninterested can have spiritual experiences.
“There are people who can feel the Spirit
outside of the Church. That was very much evident in the temple.
I saw when the people came in the Celestial room; I looked at their
faces and saw when their eyes went wide open when they saw the room.
When they came into the sealing room, couples took each other by
the hand; when they went in front of the mirror and saw eternity,
they took each other by the hand. When we invited people to the
open house, we gave cards to people and we realized that it was
not so very hard. Hardly anybody got harsh feedback. Now we know
that’s the thing we can do in the future.”
What’s Being Done Right
Now
It’s always been tough to be
a missionary in Finland. Common wisdom has it that only babies and
missionaries can learn the Finnish language. The winter nights are
nearly endless; the days are freezing. Former mission president
Lyn Thompson said he had one missionary call in to tell him it was
– 53 degrees. President Thompson said that it was because
it was tough that Finland has attracted missionaries who are the
cream of the crop — and that their service binds them to the
Finns in ways that become indelibly printed on them.
Lately, President Philip Estes, the current
mission president, has redirected the missionaries from tracting
to service, emphasizing the skills the elders have to find a way
to serve in the community. Elder Lance Wight of Ogden, Utah, plays
on a community basketball team. Elder Dee Egan, of Draper, Utah,
is a film buff who has been helping to form a children’s film
club.
Since the temple open house, even all that has
taken a backseat. The missionaries with member help have been visiting
the 2,713 people who wanted a visit and a Book of Mormon. They have
given up their P-days for several weeks to meet the flood of requests.
Elder Egan said, “We had ten new investigators
last week, and we have a stack of prospects this high.” He
motioned three inches with his hand.
Elder Bryan Zike of Clearfield, Utah, said,
“They’ve all been thankful as we’ve delivered
the scriptures to them, and many who hadn’t originally requested
the missionaries invited us in to talk.”
In fact, the day of the temple cultural celebration,
three people were baptized in Helsinki.
Everyone hopes it is the promise of more to come.
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Keep watching this entire week as we
bring you coverage from the Helsinki Temple Youth Cultural Celebration
and Dedication as well as fascinating inside views into the members
from Finland and other Baltic States and Russia. If you haven’t
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