a system of religious education that is equal in its quality, in its thoroughness and in its comprehensiveness to the system of education that is being undertaken in this Church. The time will come, I verily believe, and before very many years, when week-day religious education will be offered to every high school boy and girl, to every college and university boy and girl in this Church. Mission president When Merrill left Utah in 1933 to serve as president of the European Mission of the church, he passed his fiscal philosophies on to the missionaries serving under him. One of them, future apostle and church president Gordon B. Hinckley, cited Merrill's influence as a major factor in his own financial thinking. J. Wyley Sessions called Merrill the "most economical, conservative General Authority of this dispensation." Later life Merrill served as an apostle until his death in 1952 in Salt Lake City from coronary thrombosis. Upon his death, fellow apostle Joseph Fielding Smith offered the following tribute: "I marveled at his energy. Apparently he never got tired; he loved the truth. He loved the truth of science, but he loved more the truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ ... He had a strong will, was pronounced in his opinions, but he was always submissive to the majority decisions of his brethren." Merrill was buried at Salt Lake City Cemetery. Notes References William E. Berrett, A Miracle in Weekday Religious Education, Salt Lake Printing Center, 1988. Casey P. Griffiths, "Joseph F. Merrill: Latter-day Saint Commissioner of Education, 1928-1933," (Master's Thesis, Brigham Young University, 2007). Gordon B. Hinckley, "Passing of Elder Joseph F. Merrill," Improvement Era, March 1952. Ward H. Magleby, "1926 – Another Beginning, Moscow Idaho," Impact, Winter 1968. Joseph F. Merrill, "A New Institution in Religious Education," Improvement Era, 1938. External links Tribute To Merrill by Alice Louise Reynolds in the Relief Society Magazine 1868 births 1952 deaths 20th-century Mormon missionaries American general authorities (LDS Church) Apostles (LDS Church) Burials at Salt Lake City Cemetery Commissioners of Church Education (LDS Church) Johns Hopkins University alumni Mission presidents (LDS Church) Mormon missionaries in Europe American Mormon missionaries in the United Kingdom People from Richmond, Utah People from Cache County, Utah University of Michigan alumni University of Utah alumni University of Utah faculty Latter Day Saints from Utah Latter Day Saints from Michigan Latter Day Saints from Maryland