New Mission President and Companion/Area Realignment

Today it was announced that the new President and Companion of the Spain Barcelona Mission will be Craig D. and Laurel E. Galli. They will report to the mission on July 1, 2018.

Craig Galli was born and raised in Reno, Nevada by Peter and Dorothy Galli. From 1978 to 1980, Craig served in the Spain Seville Mission where he gained a strong testimony of the Savior and love for the Spanish people, culture, and food.

Lark Evans was born and raised in Salt Lake City’s historic Gilmer Park where she was blessed by the examples of wonderful LDS teachers and leaders. She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Utah and master's degree from BYU, both in English.

Craig and Lark met in Washington, D.C. while attending the BYU Washington Seminar Program. After graduation, they moved to New York City where Craig attended law school at Columbia and Lark finished her master’s degree. They then moved to the Washington, D.C. area where they raised their three daughters and Craig worked for the U.S. Department of Justice. A fourth daughter was born in Salt Lake City in 1993.

Their daughters Rachel, Ariel, Hannah and Laurel are married, finishing school and rearing their families; Craig and Lark have seven grandchildren. Rachel served a mission in Italy and Laurel in Alaska. Their sons‐in‐law served in Venezuela, Portugal, Singapore, and Paraguay.

From 2013 to 2015, Craig and Lark lived in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where Craig served as the Area Legal Counsel for the South America South Area under Elder Walter F. Gonzalez.

Craig is a partner at the Salt Lake City office of the law firm, Holland & Hart LLP, and has taken a leave of absence to teach fulltime at BYU Law School where he teaches Corporate Compliance, Business Ethics, and Environmental Law.

New Mission Boundary Alignments

"Mormon Newsroom reported in October that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would adjust the number of its 421 missions to better fit the needs of each region of the world. Today (February 1), the Church announces boundary realignments for 19 missions, as well as the creation of five new missions. With the changes there will be 407 missions.

Changes to mission boundaries are common. Since President Thomas S. Monson announced in 2012 the change in the ages for missionary service, the Church has created 76 new missions to accommodate a surge of growth in only a few years, from 58,000 to 88,000 missionaries. The initial wave of missionaries has since receded to about 68,000 missionaries, as anticipated.

Fewer missionaries means that not only are fewer missions needed but also a heightened importance of a more strategic placement of missionaries in areas of need around the world; thus the creation of five new missions.

“We want missionaries to be in the best possible place and position to help people, whether through sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ or community service,” said General Authority Seventy Elder Brent H. Nielson, Executive Director of the Missionary Department. “The pattern established by the Savior is to make a difference in individual lives, one by one, all over the world, which requires continuous planning and organizing.”

Details on mission merges will be coming in future communications from mission presidents to parents of missionaries in the affected missions."

https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/mission-adjustments-2018

As part of those changes, the Spain Málaga mission will be dissolved into the Madrid and Barcelona missions. Our new mission boundaries will include all of our current mission area, as well as Elche, Cartagena, and the Canary Islands.