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Stories: Email from Elder&Sis Rigby (Humanitarian) -Bio on Pres. Barr
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| "One of the most interesting events of our mission occurred on September 10th in Skuodas, Lithuania. This small town in north western Lithuania was the birth place of our mission president, Peter Barr. So before we tell of the event, we will relate some of his history. He was born in December 1944 and was the youngest of four children. His father had been sent to Skuodas to establish a library in the town. Times were very difficult then and in the spring of 1945 the family was without milk for the children, so they walked outside of the town looking for a cow to milk. As they were heading back to their home, they saw many of the townspeople, coming their way. The people all said to them, “Don’t go back to your house, the Russian army is coming into the other side of the town.” So they turned around and followed their friends into the woods.
"For about four weeks they walked as they made their way to the port city of Liepaja, Latvia still occupied by the Germans. Since they left with nothing but the clothes on their backs, they had no passports and could not get on a refugee ship. So President Barr’s mother went to the passport office on the second floor of a building. She was told that they were only issuing passports to Latvian citizens, but one lady there compassionately made out passports for each member of her family and his mother put them in her purse. The next thing she remembers she was slammed to the floor by an explosion. Half of the building was gone and the stairs she was about to go down had disappeared.
"She climbed her way through all the rubble and began to search for her family. She finally found her children huddled in a bunker, all safe. With the help of the Germans they were able to get aboard a ship and they made it to a refugee camp in Germany. The war ended and they lived in this camp in the American sector until 1950 when they had the opportunity to select to emigrate to the United States, Canada, or Australia. They chose Australia.
"President Barr was raised in Australia by his mother and step-father with the emphasis that the children should learn English and teach it to their parents, so Lithuanian was infrequently spoken and he soon lost his ability to express himself in that language.
"When he was about 17 years old, he learned of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints because the missionaries were teaching his girlfriend, Genny. When he was old enough to make his own decision, he joined the Church. As the years passed, he became a bishop and then a stake president.
"In 2002 he was called to be the mission president of the Baltic Mission and he and his wife Genny came to live in Riga, Latvia.
"When we arrived here, we noticed that one of the projects completed by our predecessors was located in a school for disabled children in Skuodas. Through some conversation we learned that it was also our president’s birthplace. So we went to the director of the school with the idea that we would do another project there. We also suggested that at the conclusion of the project we would have a celebration and honor our president as this was his home town. We requested that they search the town’s archives to see if they could find a record of his birth. They thought this was a grand idea.
"The humanitarian funds were able to purchase a much needed water massage bath for rehabilitation of the cerebral palsied children and many other smaller games and tools for their development.
"As part of the celebration the Mayor of Skuodas presented President Barr with a certificate of his birth. To his surprise, he found out that he was born on the 11th of December, not the 18th as he had always been lead to believe! But even more important to him was a photo they found in their archives. It was a picture of a wooden building that housed the library his father had started on the first floor. President Barr’s mother had told him that they had lived in a wooden building on the second floor above the library; so, fortunately, he also has a picture of his birth place. The building no longer stands as there is now a park at that location.
"During the ceremony President Barr spoke partially in Lithuanian and partly in English. He told the audience that even though he had not been schooled in the language and it was rarely spoken in his home, as he has lived and traveled in Lithuania, bits and pieces have come back to him. Now President Barr has a very strong Australian accent, but the locals say he speaks Lithuanian as a native and he really won their hearts with his use of their language..." |
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| LDS QUOTE: |
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"You are a great army of returned missionaries. Go forward with new zeal and determination, and through your example shine the light of the gospel in this troubled world. This is the Lords work in which we are engaged. God lives. Jesus is the Christ. We belong to His Church. This is my witness to you in the name of Jesus Christ, amen."
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