Dorinda Steel, 19 years old in 1958 when she wrote this, was a student nurse in London. She had been born in Kenya and lived there until age 15, when her parents returned to their native England. Who knew that street meetings were still an effective way to interest investigators as late as 1957? Who knew that a Church magazine – in this case, the Millennial Star – would ever have allowed anyone to say, in print, that she was “horrified” by her first Latter-day Saint chapel meeting?

1957 will always be an outstanding year in my life, for it was a year in which much happened, a year in which my values and ideas about life changed abruptly, a year in which I had my ” first birthday.” In short, it was the year in which I met the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the year in which I was blessed with a knowledge of the Restored Gospel and a testimony of its truth.

I met the missionaries at a street meeting at Hyde Park, in London, one warm evening late in June. I recall that my initial reaction was to scoff at their claims. Here were some more fanatics, I thought – and Americans at that – to add to the prize collection already at Hyde Park. But it wasn’t many minutes before I realised that somehow these were different. They hadn’t come to the park like so many of the others for some ulterior motive, but simply because they possessed something which they held very dear and which they wanted intensely to share with us. Whatever it was that they had, it was something for which they were willing to withstand mockery and scorn; and, above all, something which I felt I was lacking. I determined to investigate further and in a few days received a copy of the Book of Mormon.

The first Sacrament Meeting I attended I remember as a singular experience. Being used to the traditional pomp and ceremony of the Anglo-Catholic religious services, I was amazed and slightly horrified by the simplicity of this meeting. The friendliness of the members among themselves and to outsiders astounded me, and soon I felt I could not keep away, so I began to meet with the missionaries to gain an understanding of this wonderfully unusual church.

A few months passed. One day when I was in bed recovering from the ‘flu and studying for my next cottage meeting, I chanced upon the following verses from Matthew :

“Ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

Feeling an overpowering desire to pray, I began to do so, and all at once

I was filled with an exhilarating sense of knowledge and surety and happiness, and I knew that what the missionaries had been teaching me was true. 1 knew that there could be but one true church of God upon the earth and that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was it. Now, I felt, the responsibility lay upon me to prove myself worthy enough to become a member.

Obstacles and difficult circumstances were what I encountered next. There were times in fact when I could have wished myself a nice warm spot somewhere in the sun to sit and vegetate rather than strive on in the face of bad circumstances, especially when the teachings of the Church were not well received at home. But in each trying time I have been greatly helped and inspired by the friends I have made in the Church.

I feel that my testimony has been immensely strengthened by these circumstances. And it has helped me in my work as a student nurse, in which one sees so much pain and suffering that it’s easy to become hard and unsympathetic, to lose one’s former ideals and one’s appreciation of others and the awareness of their potentialities as sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father.

Because my testimony means so much to me I think particularly beautiful the scripture in The Doctrine and Covenants which describes how all the testimonies are recorded in a book where the angels can look and rejoice over them. I pray that day by day and year by year each of our testimonies may grow, strengthened by adversity and purified by love and service to God and to our fellow men.

P.S.: I now have permission to be baptised!

-oooOooo-

The following year, Dorinda attended a mission-wide MIA conference and wrote:

Words seem inadequate to express the gratitude for the joy and tremendous inspiration we all felt at the meeting on Sunday, as well as all the fun we had in the competitions, talent show and dance on Saturday.

Always when reading about the early members of the Church I have had a sneaking longing to have lived in those days when, in spite of the vicious persecution, life was an adventure. But with the theme of the whole convention, “Pioneers of the New Era,” manifest in all, I see how life really is an adventure filled with excitement –here are so many opportunities to serve and thereby bring joy and peace of mind; and we never know what we are going to be called for, or when.

Thanks for so much happiness – and I only wish it might have lasted longer – but there is the hope that we will have many more in the years to come.