In late April BYU and UNESCO
co-sponsored a South Pacific Regional Law & Religion Conference in
Samoa. Although most countries in the South Pacific have constitutional
provisions that protect religious freedoms, implementation of them is sometimes
a little less than desirable.
Most countries in the South Pacific
are relatively new to democracy, with the customary authority being the village
council wielding virtually absolute power. Given the long standing and
quite strong desire for “unity and conformance” in the villages, this sometimes
results not only in mandating only one church in a given village, but also
fining or even banishing village residents who join a church other than the one
approved by the village council.
This symposium featured speakers and
panelists from as far away as Scotland, former attorneys general of 3
countries, legislators, law professors, the leaders of most of the churches in
Samoa and judges. The keynote address was delivered by the Samoan Head of
State, who also attended virtually all of the conference sessions. It was
not only intellectually stimulating, but broke a lot of ground for further
meetings and discussions among the persons attending.
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| George Hunt (former Samoa Parliament Member), Elder Larsen and Bob. (Is this approved Mission dress?) Photo by Karen Larsen |
Highlights for Bob were
the dinners with the presenters at the conference, including the Samoan Head of
State, and the discussions and interaction at those dinners
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| Invitation to the dinner with the Samoan Head of State |
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| The conference dinners with the presenters were sumptuous buffets. The man seated at the end of the table and the woman sitting next to him (his wife) are both former Attorneys General of Tonga. Photo by Karen Larsen |
Bob discovered he and the Samoan
Head of State had similar college undergraduate experiences, but we won’t go
into the details of that here...
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| Elder Hamula and His Highness (You can bet they weren’t exchanging college undergrad stories.) Photo by Karen Larsen |
