Celebrating Columbus Day

De Lamar Jensen, “Columbus and the Hand of God,” Ensign, Oct 1992, 7

Columbus has become more a symbol than a person. In this quincentenary of his first voyage to the Americas, it is time to look at the man and his faith in God.

This has not been a good season for Christopher Columbus. The 500th anniversary of his discovery of America has been marked by more condemnation than commendation, especially in the popular press. There is ample reason, however, to recognize Columbus’s courage, persistence, and unshakable convictions.

Most people living one hundred years ago and celebrating the quadricentenary of Columbus’s first voyage honored Columbus as a hero who almost singlehandedly battered down the walls of medieval ignorance. This heroic image was perpetuated partly due to his accomplishments and partly due to the myth-making of several nineteenth-century authors.

This view extended far and wide. For many, Columbus had become a world hero, slaying the dragons of dogmatism, superstition, and prejudice while carrying the banner of nineteenth-century nationalism...

Many of these myths have been debunked over the years, including the notion that Columbus was the only person of his day to believe the earth was round and that Queen Isabel pawned her jewels to finance the first voyage. These and other legends die slowly. Many still resist any attempt to show Columbus as a human being, with vices as well as virtues. 1

Some of the debunkers, however, have become overenthusiastic, even slanderous, in their attempts to demythologize Columbus. Their approach often serves to bolster a political cause rather than promote a search for truth. Such activity is counterproductive, not because it tears down the heroic myth, but because it merely sets another myth in its place—the equally false myth of Columbus as a villain.

What, then, do we know of the real Columbus? What were his motives in pursuing his world-changing enterprise? Perhaps the greatest motivating feature of his life was his faith. His writings and the records kept by his contemporaries indicate that Columbus had unshakable faith that he was an instrument in God’s hands.

And, indeed, the Book of Mormon affirms that he was. In vision, Nephi “looked and beheld a man among the Gentiles, who was separated from the seed of my brethren by the many waters; and I beheld the Spirit of God, that it … wrought upon the man; and he went forth upon the many waters, even unto the seed of my brethren, who were in the promised land.” (1 Ne. 13:12.)

Columbus’s understanding of that design may well have been limited, but his conviction of being a part of it gave him a self-assurance, even stubbornness, that both amazed and exasperated his contemporaries....

We spent the month of October to study about Christopher Columbus.  We learned much and especially enjoyed reading the article above from the Ensign October 1992 by De Lamar Jensen.

We cut 20 oz. soda bottles and then paper mached them to make the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria.
Our CC memory sentence for this occasion is "In 1492, Columbus made the first of four trips to the Carribean in three Spanish ships, named the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria."



We've learned much, most of all, that we too can be just as committed to our goals and the mission that God has in store for us.  We all have a purpose in life and when the Lord guides us to do something, it may not be easy, but we can do it, just as Columbus, Nephi, Washington, Joesph, Moses, Ester, David, Mormon, Alma....and so many others.