Mormon Pacific Historial Society Focuses on Tongan Mission Centennial

Contributed By Mike Foley, Church News contributor

  • 4 November 2016

Emeritus General Authority Elder John H. Groberg and his wife, Sister Jean S. Groberg, answer questions following his keynote address during the opening session of the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s annual conference on October 21, 2016, in the Polynesian Cultural Center’s Hawaiian Journey Theater. Elder Groberg was the main character in the 2002 movie The Other Side of Heaven, based on his 1996 autobiography, In the Eye of the Storm, which detailed the challenges the young missionary known among the Tongans as Kolipoki and his companion, the late Feki Pōuha, faced on the remote island of Niuatoputapu. New star Anne Hathaway portrayed Sister Groberg in the movie. The couple married soon after his return from Tonga and together were called back there in 1966 when he served as mission president.  Photo by Mike Foley.

Article Highlights

  • Elder Groberg was the keynote speaker at the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s annual conference.
  • He served as a missionary, Tongan Mission president, and General Authority in the islands.
  • He is often known as the focal point of film “The Other Side of Heaven.”

LAIE, HAWAII

Emeritus General Authority Seventy Elder John H. Groberg shared lessons and insights from his more than 60 years of service to Tonga, the Pacific islands, and other international areas as the keynote speaker on October 21, at the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s (MPHS) annual conference.

Service in the Islands

Elder Groberg—who served as a young missionary in Tonga from 1954 to 1957, Tongan Mission president from 1966 to 1968, and later as a General Authority in the islands—spoke during the opening session of the historical society conference, which focused on the formal centennial of the Tongan Mission (1916–2016).

Missionaries from Samoa originally attempted to open a mission in Tonga 25 years earlier, between 1891 and 1897, but left. Other missionaries sent from Samoa returned again in 1907 and persisted until the Church formally opened the Tongan Mission nine years later.

As Elder Groberg and other MPHS conference presenters pointed out, from those humble beginnings approximately 65,000 Latter-day Saints currently live in Tonga, making that small island kingdom with a population of about 103,000 the first and only country in the world where a majority of its people are Latter-day Saints.

In addition to his many years of service, Elder Groberg is often recognized as the focal point in the 2002 feature film The Other Side of Heaven. The film primarily depicts his growth as a young missionary known by the Tongan name Kolipoki, as well as the challenges he and his Tongan companion, the late Feki Pouha, overcame on the remote island of Niuatoputapu. His 1996 autobiography, In the Eye of the Storm, which he said President Thomas S. Monson encouraged him to write, became the basis for the film.

MPHS Conference Address Highlights

Emeritus General Authority Elder John H. Groberg delivers the keynote address during the opening session of the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s annual conference on October 21, 2016, in the Polynesian Cultural Center’s Hawaiian Journey Theater. Over 500 people, many of them Tongans in traditional clothing, attended the conference. Photo by Mike Foley.

BYU–Hawaii professor and vice chairman Tevita O. Ka'ili conducted both sessions of the Mormon Pacific Historical Society annual conference on October 21–22, 2016. In introducing the program on the second day, he noted that in 1896—120 years ago—his great-grandfather invited two of the Latter-day Saint missionaries sent to Tonga to live with him on the northern island of Vava'u. Photo by Mike Foley.

Brent R. Anderson, who served a mission in Tonga under President John H. Groberg in the late 1960s, traced the mission of 1930s missionary Ermel J. Morton in one of the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s conference breakout sessions. Elder Morton played a key role in translating the Book of Mormon and other Latter-day Saint materials into Tongan. Anderson developed his own exceptional skills in the Tongan language during his mission and was given the chiefly matāpule title of of Ha'elefeke by the late Motu'apuaka, talking chief to the king. Following his mission, Anderson became friends with Morton and had many opportunities to hear firsthand accounts of the translation process. After completing his studies, Anderson also taught at the Latter-day Saint Liahona and Saineha High Schools in Tonga. Photo by Mike Foley.

BYU history professor emeritus, author, and former BYU–Hawaii vice president R. Lanier “Lanny” Britsch traced the history of Tonga’s 1922 passport law, which excluded Mormon missionaries from receiving visas, during his Mormon Pacific Historical Society breakout session on October 22, 2016. Professor Britsch, who also served a senior history mission at the Polynesian Cultural Center, pointed out it took approximately two years of international diplomacy at the highest levels to get the unfair law repealed. Photo by Mike Foley.

Elder Groberg was originally scheduled to deliver his keynote address during the opening Friday night session of the MPHS conference in the Polynesian Cultural Center’s recently renovated and rededicated Tongan Village, but due to threatening weather, the event was moved into the center’s enclosed Hawaiian Journey Theater. The audience, many of them Tongans dressed in traditional clothing, nearly filled the 600-seat theater. Former Tongan Mission presidents Melvin B. Butler (1983–1985) and Isileli Kongaika (1989–1992) also attended.

“The great blessing of Tonga, in one respect, besides the number of people who are members of the Church, is the great opportunity it has allowed hundreds of others like me to learn something that we probably wouldn’t have learned as well,” Elder Groberg said, “and that is how to love, serve, and sacrifice and, yes, how to stay alive physically and spiritually.”

From the Tongan Mission’s informal beginnings to now, Elder Groberg pointed out, there is a direct correlation between the growth of the Church there and sacrifice. “Where there is great sacrifice, there come great blessings. One of the major challenges we have in our generation today is that people are forgetting more and more that basic principle. It’s sacrifice that brings forth the blessings of heaven, not entitlement. It’s hard work and it’s patience over long periods of time. It’s having, holding, believing, and nourishing the truth for long periods of time.”

Further, he said: “As we study the history of Tonga and the Restoration, we should always look to those who sacrifice greatly and be so thankful for all that they have done. At the same time, we should ask ourselves this question: What are our descendants going to see when they look back at me? As you study your ancestors, be grateful for what they have done, but also turn around and ask yourself: am I willing to pay that kind of a price? …

“One of the great blessings of the Church in Tonga is not only the improvement in the lives of individuals and families but in the opportunity many have had to serve and help,” he said.

“One of the great things you can do is to be willing to put your whole heart into building the kingdom of God, whether you deem it a sacrifice or not. Put your whole heart into it, and the Lord will bless you.”

“We’re all brothers and sisters,” Elder Groberg concluded. “We all have legacies, but for you who have that [Tongan] heritage, I want you to know that you have a responsibility to not let it die or even wane. I pray that all of us will increase the light that comes in our lives and remember that we are part of the kingdom of God on earth.”

The MPHS conference continued the next morning, Saturday, October 22, in the new Brigham Young University–Hawaii Heber J. Grant Building. In the opening general session, Richard, George, and Derwin Merill presented the seventh missionary journal of their grandfather, Olonzo D. Merrill, to BYU–Hawaii President John S. Tanner. President Tanner noted Elder Merrill was among the missionaries sent from Samoa to Tonga in 1893 and served there for the next three and a half years.

On behalf of their family, George Merrill explained that during his mission their grandfather meticulously “filled seven journals, with entries of what happened each day. He included all kinds of information.” He added the family discovered the journals after their father died and initially presented six of them to BYU–Hawaii in 2007.

Breakout sessions followed, including presentations on the apostolic visits of Elders David O. McKay and George Albert Smith to Tonga in 1921 and 1938, respectively (President McKay also returned in 1955), as well as a look at the 1922 Tongan law that excluded Latter-day Saint missionaries from obtaining visas. Conference attendees learned it took international diplomacy at the highest levels to get the law repealed two years later.

Other topics covered more information on the Merrill journals, the Tongan building missionary program, the impact of Liahona High School, the tenures of several mission presidents, the diaspora of the Tongan Saints, retrospectives on several key Tongan member families, and the future of the mission, among other topics.

The Mormon Pacific Historical Society, which was founded at BYU–Hawaii in 1978, concluded its 2016 conference that evening with a free screening of The Other Side of Heaven for attendees and community members in the Polynesian Cultural Center’s Hawaiian Journey Theater.

Members of the Brigham Young University–Hawaii Tongan Club and others—wearing traditional tupenu ta'ovala mat wrap-arounds—provide traditional missionary-related Tongan music for the opening session of the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s annual conference on October 21, 2016, in the Polynesian Cultural Center’s Hawaiian Journey Theater. This year’s MPHS conference focused on the formal centennial (1916–2016) of the Tongan Mission, although the Samoan Mission sent missionaries to test the waters from 1891 to 1897 and again from 1907 until the Church officially launched the Tongan Mission in 1916. Photo by Mike Foley.

The Po'oi sisters from nearby Kahuku, Oahu, sing a traditional Tongan hymn during the opening session of the Mormon Pacific Historical Society’s annual conference on October 21, 2016, in the Polynesian Cultural Center’s Hawaiian Journey Theater. In June 2016 the sisters also sang for the king and queen of Tonga’s official visit to the Polynesian Cultural Center for the blessing of the PCC’s recently renovated Tongan Village. Photo by Mike Foley.

  Listen