Alma the Aviator Saves Hostages, Leaping over Tall Estates on a Single Modest-Stipend

Many New Order Mormons (NOMs) and some traditional members feel Apostle Dieter Uchtdorf is the most honest, humble and interesting Apostle in the LDS church.  This may very well be true, especially given the others in the quorum.   On 13 January, 2013, Elder Dieter gave a church education devotional.  

 At around 33 minutes into the broadcast, Dieter says the following:

"…Remember that in this age of information there are many who create doubt about anything and everything at anytime and everyplace. You will find even those who still claim that they have evidence that the earth is flat. That the moon is a hologram. It looks like it a little bit. And that certain movie stars are really aliens from another planet. And it is always good to keep in mind just because something is printed on paper, appears on the internet, is frequently repeated or has a powerful group of followers doesn't make it true."

  True, how true.  This may include the opening paragraph of Dieter’s biography at LDS.ORG.

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From this bio, (apparently penned by Jeffrey Holland) we learn that Dieter flew a small group of emergency personnel to follow the hostages in a hijacked 737.  His company president ordered Dieter “to negotiate for the release of the plane, the pilots and the hostages.” He was told after having accomplished this, he should fly the recovered aircraft back to Frankfurt headquarters, which apparently happened without bloodshed.  Reading the bio, it would seem Uchtdorf was at the center of negotiating, rescuing, apprehending and recovering the hijacked hostages and plane.  That’s major hero action.

Uchtdorf gave the church permission to relate a story that apparently isn’t corroborated in other accounts of the hostage event.  See the references & sources of this Wikipedia article to get the facts.

A lot of this has been discussed in forums online (here & here) already this week.  Still some ask, is Dieter F. Uchtdorf pulling a Paul H. Dunn?  Is he as trustworthy as some believed?

What I have uncovered about him may cause more concern.  Not only about the junior Apostle, but about some of what the LDS church is doing related to him in real estate dealings.  This is preliminary, but so far, what I’ve found is alarming.

Apparently, the LDS church is buying lots of land in Utah resort and vacation towns.  Some of these are in highly prestigious gated residential communities.  One is the Red Ledges development.  Homes (estates & mansions) here start at half-million and move up quickly into the several million.  LDS inc seemingly owns a large (undeveloped) plot (lot 184).¹ 

The LDS owned  lot is small enough not to serve for a chapel/church lot, but large enough to place a nice sized estate upon.  Why does LDS inc purchase residential lots in a gated elite community? 

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The reason they purchase home lots could be, perhaps, tied to Dieter F Uchtdorf.  He received the very first (Lot 1 Parcel 00-0020-9118 (the link to it changes, so search by parcel)) finished town home late last summer.

 

Dieter's Summer estate in Red Ledges.

He bought it for $782,000, and it is a tenth the size (at 0.063 acres) of the lot owned by LDS inc in the same development. 

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MLS report on Dieter's Red Ledges sale


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Wasatch County Tax Report on said property

Uchtdorf’s home is not his principal residence. That’s in the upper-crust North Salt Lake area at 399 Aerie Circle.  This primary residence is worth $778,000, and the taxes for it are mailed to the Church’s offices at 47 East South Temple St in SLC.

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Davis County Tax Report on Dieter's primary residence

What we see is, Hero Dieter owns two homes worth three-quarters of a million each.  Hero Dieter, who quit his aviator position at Lufthansa in 1996 hasn’t worked a job in 16 years, but bought two homes with combine worth today of $1.5M.  The latest, last year, in the development where the LDS church already bought homestead plots bigger than Dieters.

This is just preliminary, and already I have found other interesting bits which I will address in future blogs.  But I’d like to point out that for supposedly a modest stipend, the junior apostle is doing very well.  When Uchtdorf  tells his religious student audience to beware of critics who are just like flat-earthers and alien watchers (because the internet isn’t very true), he’s like Alma telling Korihor that his denial of Christ is crazy talk.  Alma, we’re told, worked for his living without even a modest stipend to obtain fancy estates in high-society resort developments.  Readers contrasting Alma the honest with Korihor the agitator feel they can trust Alma. 

Dieter asks in the same 13 Jan CES talk:

"How can we know that this truth is different from any other? How can we trust this truth? The invitation to trust the lord does not relieve us from responsibility to know for ourselves."

 He assures his listeners that truth is found in the whispering of the spirit which only comes from living the gospel.   He encourages them to accept an assumption about how we source truth (through feelings). And goes on to end with this:

"I add my witness as an apostle of the Lord that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. I know this with all my heart and mind. I know this by the witness and power of the Holy Ghost."

Can he provide any more evidence of these claims than flat-earthers or moon-hologramers do of theirs?  Can we trust the hero, mansions-owning pilot?  He’s no humble-living Alma. He’s Dunn.




1 - Previously I had shown/listed two additional lots(lot 77, lot 99) under Church Properties LLC, but it has been commented elsewhere that the two properties listed may not be owned by the LDS church, instead they may be a private company held by an individual with the last name Church.  If so, my confusion is noted here as an innocent and perhaps sloppy mistake.  I'm checking this out.  In the mean time, note that a search on Wasatch County Appraiser's site for owner "LDS:" or "Bishop" or "Property Reserve" (all associated with the LDS corporations) yields a combine more than 100+ properties in that county alone. Many of these are in private residential areas (some are church buildings) and in wilderness/recreational areas.  The Church's holdings are significant, and I did assume the LLC was somehow associated with the Mormons. Red Ledges  Lot 184 is held by the church, and may have been acquired by them from a member donation--another piece I am still tracking down.