Elder Jessop

It was 1963, and the morning was cool.  The snow-capped peak of the volcano Popocateptl loomed on the horizon of the town of Atlixco in Puebla, Mexico.  Two Americans walked down the street dressed in white shirts and ties.  The tags on their shirts announced that they were Mormon missionaries, and they carried their scriptures under their arms.

The younger missionary walked slightly behind the tall missionary named Elder Jessop.  The younger one had only been in Mexico for a short while and didn't really speak Spanish yet.  Elder Jessop, on the other hand, had been in Mexico for a while and spoke Spanish almost perfectly.

In the almost two years since Elder Jessop had arrived in Mexico, he had picked up the language so naturally until he spoke it like a native.  He had totally immersed himself in the culture and found himself considering himself more Mexican than American.  Hard to believe that a few years ago, he had been growing up in Los Angeles of the 1950s, a typical teenager listening to the new sounds of rock and roll.  No longer.  He preferred Mexican rancheras now.  Mexican food suited his palate.  He couldn't stand speaking in English anymore.  Was this really the same young man whose only previous experience with Mexicans was to get into fights with them in high school in L.A.?

They came to the door they were seeking - a small, humble house made of concrete.  They knocked on the door, and their prospects answered the door - the family that they had been teaching.  They were invited into the small, spartan living room.  There were two other missionaries waiting for them on a couch.  They were not dressed as the LDS missionaries, and they were Mexican.  One was older, and the other was so young that he looked like a boy.

The family was receiving lessons from the Mormon missionaries, but, at the same time, they were being taught by missionaries from the fundamentalist Mormons - Mormons that still practiced polygamy.  These two natives were remnants from the Third Convention and represented a small faction in nearby Colonia Industrial - a group of native Mexicans that refused to obey the mainstream Church when they were told to put aside their plural wives.

The family wanted to arrange a confrontation between missionaries of the LDS Church and missionaries representing the Mormon polygamists.  Elder Jessop was sure of himself and cocky.  He had right and might on his side.  He was convinced that he could show up these apostates.  In order to attend this debate, he needed to get the permission from  his Mission Home.  He was advised not to go, but the elder was afraid that if he didn't go, it would only make the Church's position look week.  He was ready to fight for the Lord.

So they took a seat opposite these other missionaries, and the debate started.  Elder Jessop argued with passion.

Perhaps the passion came from the fact that his last name was "Jessop".  His grandfather (named Moroni Jessop) had been one of the key figures in the start of the Mormon fundamentalist movement in Utah in the 1920s.  He had never really known his grandfather.  Although the Jessop family broke off and became a part of the polygamist groups that are well known today (AUB, FLDS, etc.), Elder Jessop was never a part of these.  His mother made sure that they stayed in the LDS Church.  His father had halfway sympathized, but he died with the elder was only fourteen.  Elder Jessop knew that he had polygamist relatives, but he was not allowed to talk about them.  They were a dirty secret, and he constantly observed the whispers in church about him, "Yes, he's a Jessop, but he's not one of those Jessops."

Even while on his mission in Mexico, he had encounters because of his name.  An old woman - Grandmother de Gante - in the city of Puebla had belonged to the Third Convention.  She remembered when the Salt Lake polygamists had come to Mexico.  There was an old man with the last name of "Jessop", and she assumed that this was the father of the elder.

The debate was fierce and heated.  Elder Jessop defended the position of the Church, and the fundamentalist missionaries pushed across their beliefs.  Years later, the elder would say that he really didn't remember everything they discussed.  But one event came to mind.  This is from his memoirs:

"Towards the close of the meeting, the older missionary said, "Elder, I don't know how or when, but someday you'll be with us!"  He was moved by the Spirit to say this, and I felt perplexed, wondering why the Spirit would move him to say such a thing.  I shared this experience later to my wife in our early married life."

After his mission, Elder Jessop moved to Utah to study at Brigham Young University.  He had a polygamist uncle who lived in Salt Lake.  The elder, still full of missionary zeal, set off on a quest to prove his uncle wrong.  He had access to library at BYU.  There was a restricted section with old Mormon documents and books.  You could only read these papers if you could arrange to have a professor sit across from you while you read, and you could not take the books out of the library.  In these books, he found the old teachings of the LDS Church, teachings that are no longer taught by the Church, teachings still taught by the fundamentalist Mormons.

Elder Jessop looked up from the dusty book and demanded of the professor, "Is this true?  Did they really teach this?"

The professor looked up from his own papers, "Yes, they did.  There is no question.  But they were wrong."

What ensued after that is a story in and of itself.  It was a twenty year struggle.  He was continually in trouble with the Church.  He continued studying, but he was afraid to do anything about it for fear of having his family excommunicated.  The short version is - he was eventually excommunicated, along with all of his family.  He began to have meetings at home with his wife and his children.

In 1990, he was directed to a small congregation of Mormon fundamentalists in Phoenix, Arizona.  They were all Mexican, and their meetings were in Spanish.  Elder Jessop felt at home again, in his element.

One Sunday, he was invited to a special meeting.  There would be a some of the leaders from Salt Lake in attendance.  The two visitors were too elderly men.  They brought an interpreter with them.  As the meeting commenced, Elder Jessop looked at the interpreter.  He was a thin man in his fifties, wearing a white shirt that contrasted with his dark, Indian face.  The years melted away, and Elder Jessop could see that this man was the younger missionary all those years previous in Mexico.  This man was one of those fundamentalist missionaries from all of those years ago.  The words of the heated debated came back to him, "Elder, I don't know how or when, but someday you will be one of us."

Elder Jessop could only stare in silent amazement at the events that had led him to this room.  It was as if a prophecy had been fulfilled.

It was through these events that Elder Jessop led his family into the fullness of the gospel.  His experiences as a missionary changed him and influenced all of his actions and decisions for the rest of his life.