Elder Jeffrey R. Holland Urges BYU to Embrace Its Uniqueness, Stay True to the Savior

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Hey guys, this address is a sensitive topic for many. Please be mindful of our rules, including civility and [no] excessive criticisms of Church leaders.

👍︎︎ 1 👤︎︎ u/OmniCrush 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

I think it’s important to pair this talk with Elder Uchtdorf’s from education week. I believe it was called Messages We All Need to Hear. I suggest watching them back to back chronologically. In fact it almost felt to me when I did so that Uchtdorf’s address was inspired message sent to lay the groundwork for Holland’s.

👍︎︎ 3 👤︎︎ u/folgers-neat 📅︎︎ Aug 25 2021 🗫︎ replies

Read the talk it has always bothered me that the leadership of the church is always prone to quickly call out the problem with “progressive” views taught at BYU, but seems hesitant to call out the more “conservative” views that may be taught at BYU. I heard some pretty wild and in some cases inappropriate opinions from faculty while attending BYUI

I believe both the far right and the far left views are dangerous to the church, but It seems that the leadership of the church quite frequently criticizes the far left, but let’s the far right slide.

I don’t mean to get to political but it is frustrating to see.

👍︎︎ 60 👤︎︎ u/coolguysteve21 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

I do not think it is fair to blame a professor, who is in good enough standing with the Church to teach at its flagship university, for the apostasy of someone that attended their class.

To treat Church history or other potentially sensitive topics with kid gloves does a disservice to students. I have seen far more people leave the Church because they were never told of something than those who had apostatized because they were trying to be taught about those same subjects.

👍︎︎ 58 👤︎︎ u/Nate-T 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

Can I get a tl;dr?

👍︎︎ 2 👤︎︎ u/Archiesweirdmystery 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

"As near as I can tell, Christ never once withheld His love from anyone, but He also never once said to anyone, ‘Because I love you, you are exempt from keeping my commandments.’”

👍︎︎ 61 👤︎︎ u/gorillaglue41 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

This is disheartening. I’ll take some time to process it and bring it to the Lord, but my initial emotion is sadness and frustration. I don’t want to be labeled as an enemy, but I feel like, per this talk, my existence in the church is an issue and something people would prefer to live without. This is seemingly backed up by the many comments on the YouTube video on the “worldliness” and “radicalization” of BYU. One in particular called for the firing of the “wolves” or the professors presumed to be infiltrators in the school of the faithful. At the end of the day, I feel welcomed and loved by Christ and God, but this talk has me feeling like I don’t belong. It’s a feeling that will likely pass, but it’s the emotion I have during and directly after listening.

👍︎︎ 107 👤︎︎ u/Iammeandnooneelse 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

[removed]

👍︎︎ 4 👤︎︎ u/[deleted] 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies

I think the brethren are trying to walk a tight rope of loving our gay friends and church members while not condoning the practice of homosexuality. I think this is a Elder Holland saying the pendulum has gone too far and it needs to be reeled in again - at the cost of the schools accreditation, if necessary.

👍︎︎ 23 👤︎︎ u/no_user_name_sleft 📅︎︎ Aug 24 2021 🗫︎ replies
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And those of you who know me are aware that I cry at the opening of supermarkets. I, I've wept over ribbon cutting at a used car lot. I have really been in tears since I walked in here, partly just for the nostalgia, but more than that is what I feel when I am with you and when I’m on this campus. I’m going to try to talk about that if I can. But it's been a moving morning already. I, really, truly, I can’t imagine anything that I could say that would add anything to a remarkable morning. I think, Korina, where are you? Green and white, Korina, your prayer. The older I get, the more I listen to prayers. I need them more the older I get. And I was very moved by your prayer and then these two remarkable dancers. Since this neuropathy has hit me, I can’t put my socks on in the morning, and to watch those, whoops. It was a stunning, beautiful. I don't know. I don't know who chose that piece to be part of this program. But how wonderfully, wonderfully appropriate sheas baritone solo here. Robyn was one of my students somewhere once along the way back when the clay beds were settling in. And so it goes on, our beloved Kevin and Peggy were then. Thank you for the presidential message, Kevin, but thank you for being presidential. Thank you for every day trying to make this university what it's supposed to be. There are only two or three living men who know the burden you carry. And that has added to the nostalgia this morning for me. I love you, Kevin, and I pray for you. I do literally pray for you as I pray for the destiny and course of all who serve here, If you can’t tell, I’m really, really moved to see you, these people who’ve been awarded various awards and who represent so many others—who really represent all of us— but take their turn in receiving an award for making the university work. Everything from a Maeser faculty lecture to the chief carpenter and lots of people in between and along the way. Well, I have to get on, but you know, you've really moved me one more one more, please. Can I ask you to do what I want here today, President? Andrew, stand up, please, would you? Friends, this is my dear, dear friend Andrew Teale, the Reverend Dr. Andrew Teale from Oxford University. But more than that, my beloved friend, who's come to spend a semester at BYU, and you’ll recognize him by that unusual little collar that he wears. And be sure and pester him and throw rocks and do all the things that we do to our guests. Andrew, I can't wait to spend time with you all semester if we can figure out how to do it. But thank you and welcome. You can go back to Oxford if you want afterwards, but it won't be the same after this. I’ve got to get serious here— off to my business. Someone once told me that the young speak of the future because they have no past, while the elderly speak of the past, because they have no future. Although it damages that little aphorism, I who have no future and come to you as the veritable ancient of days. I’m going to speak of the future, this future of BYU but one anchored in our distinctive past. Now, if I’ve worded that just right, it means I can talk about anything I want. I am grateful that the full university family is gathered today: faculty and staff and administration. Regardless of your job description, I'm going to speak to all of you as teachers, because at BYU, that's what all of us are. Thank you for being faithful role models in that regard we teach at BYU. I can't be certain, but I think it was in the summer of 1948 when I had my first BYU experience. I would have been seven years old. We were driving back to St George in a 1941 Plymouth from one of our rare trips to Salt Lake City. As we came down old Highway 91, I saw high on the side of one of the hills a huge, huge block Y. It was white and bold and beautiful. I don't know how to explain that moment. But it was a true epiphany for a seven-year-old if a seven year old can have an epiphany. If I had seen that Y on the drive up or any other time, I couldn't remember it. I somehow thought I was seeing it, probably was seeing it for the first time that day. I believe I was receiving a revelation from God. I somehow knew that bold letter meant something special, and it meant something special to me that it would one day play a significant role in my life, and I didn’t know what it was or what it meant. I asked my mother what it meant. She said it was the emblem of a university. I thought about that for quite a while, still watching the side of the hill, and then said quietly to her, “Well, it must be the greatest university in the world.” What can you expect from a seven-year-old? My chance to actually get on campus came in June 1952, four years after that first sighting. That summer, I accompanied my parents to one of the early leadership weeks, which is a precursor to what is now the immensely popular Education Week just concluded on this campus. That means I came here for my first BYU experience sixty nine years ago with a preview of that four years earlier. Now, if anyone in this audience has been coming to this campus longer than that, please come forward and give this talk. Otherwise, sit still and be patient. As Elizabeth Taylor said to her eight husbands, I won't be keeping you long. My point, dear friends, is simply this: I have loved BYU for nearly three fourths of a century. Only my service—service in and testimony of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which includes and features foremost my marriage and the beautiful children it has given us. Only these have affected me as profoundly as has my decision to attend Brigham Young University. No one in my family had. In so testifying, I represent literally hundreds of thousands of other students who made that decision and say that same thing. So for the legions of us over the years, I say thank you. Thank you for what you do. Thank you for classes taught and meals served and grounds kept. Thank you for office hours and lab experiments and testimony shared, gifts given to little people like me so we could grow up to be big people like you. Thank you for choosing to be at BYU, because your choice affected our choice. And like Mr. Frost's poetic poem, “that path has made all the difference.” I asked President more for a sample of the good things that have been happening of late. And I was delighted at the sheaf of items he gave me. Small type, single-spaced lines, reams that looked like everything from academic recognition and scholarly rankings to athletic success and the reach of BYU TV. Karl G. Maeser would be as proud as I was. But President Worthen and I both know those aren’t the real success stories of BYU. These are rather, as some say, of ordinances in the Church, these are outward signs of an inward grace. The real successes at BYU are the personal experiences that thousands have had. Personal experiences, difficult to document or categorize or list. Nevertheless, these are so powerful in their impact on the heart and the mind that they have changed us forever. I run a risk in citing any examples to be on my own, but let me mention just one or two. One of our colleagues seated here this morning speaks of his first semester, his pre-mission enrollment in my friend Wolfert Greg's history of civilization class. But this was going to be civilization seen through a BYU lens, so as preambles to the course. Wilf had the students read President Kimball’s second-century address, President Worthen. And he added the first chapter of Hugh Nibley’s <i>Approaching</i> <i>Zion</i>. Taken together, our very literate friend says these two readings, quote: “Forged an indestructible union in my mind and heart between two soaring ideals, that of a consecrated university with that of a holy city. Zion, I came to believe, would be a city with a school”— and I would add a temple— “creating something of a celestial college town or perhaps even a college kingdom.” After his mission, our faculty friend returned to Provo, where he fell under the soul- expanding spell of John Tanner. Quote: “the platonic ideal of a BYU professor, superbly qualified in every secular sense, totally committed to the kingdom, and absolutely effervescing with love for the Savior, his students, and his subject. He moves”—still speaking of John— “seamlessly from careful teacher analysis to powerful personal testimony. He knew scores of passages from Milton and many other poets by heart. Yet verses of scripture flowed, if anything, even more freely from the abundance of that consecrated heart. I was unfailingly edified by the passion of his teaching and the eloquence of his example.” Close quote. Why would such an one come back to teach at BYU after a truly distinguished postgraduate experience that might well have taken him to virtually any university in America? Because our colleague says: “In a coming day, the citizens of Zion shall come forth with songs of everlasting joy. I hope,” he writes “to help my students hear that chorus, hear it in the distance, and lend their voices in time to its swelling refrain.” Close quote. Well, such are the experiences we hope to provide our students at BYU, though probably not always so poetically expressed. Then imagine the pain that comes with a memo like this one I recently received. These are just a half a dozen lines from a two-page document. “You should know,” the writer says, “that some people in the extended community are feeling abandoned and betrayed at BYU or by BYU. It seems that some professors, at least the vocal ones in the media, are supporting ideas that many of us feel are contradictory to gospel principles, making it appear to be about like any other university our sons and daughters could have attended. Several parents have said they no longer want to send their children here or donate to the school. Please don't think I'm opposed to people thinking differently about policies and ideas,” the writer continues. “I’m not. But I would hope that BYU professors would be bridging those gaps between faith and intellect and would be sending out students that are ready to do the same in loving, intelligent, articulate ways. Yet I fear that some faculty are not supportive of the Church’s doctrines and policies and choose to criticize them publicly. There are consequences to this. After having served a full-time mission and marrying her husband in the temple, a friend of mine recently left the Church. In her graduation statement on a social media post. She credited such and such a BYU program and its faculty with the radicalization of her attitudes and the destruction of her faith.” Well, fortunately, we don't get too many of those letters, but this one isn't unique. Several of my colleagues get the same kind, with almost all of them ultimately being forwarded to poor president Kevin Worthen. Now, most of what happens on this campus is absolutely wonderful. That's why I began, as I did. That's why I'm crying. I say it with my own undying love for this place. But every so often we need a reminder of the challenge we constantly face here. Maybe it's in this meeting. I certainly remember my own experience in these wonderful beginning-of-the-school-year meetings and how much it meant to me to be with you then. Well, it means that again today. Here is something I said on this subject forty-one years ago, almost to the day. I was young, I was unprepared. I had been president for three weeks. I said and I say now that if we're an extension of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and take a significant amount of sacred tithes and other human precious resources, all of which might well be expended in other worthy causes, surely our integrity demands that our lives be absolutely consistent with and characteristic of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. At a university, there will always be a healthy debate regarding a whole syllabus full of issues. But until we all come to the unity of the faith and have grown to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, our next-best achievement will be to stay in harmony with the Lord's anointed, those whom he has designated to declare Church doctrine and to guide Brigham Young University as its trustees. In 2014. Seven years ago, then- Elder Russell M. Nelson came to campus in this same setting. His remarks were relatively brief, but tellingly, he said: “With the Church growing more rapidly in the less prosperous countries, we must conserve sacred funds more carefully than ever before. At BYU, we must ally ourselves even more closely with the work of our Heavenly Father. A college education persay for our people is a sacred responsibility, but it’s not essential for eternal life.” A statement like that gets my attention, particularly because just a short time later, President Nelson chairs our board, holds our purse strings, and has the final “yea” or “nay” on every proposal we make. From a research lab to more undergraduate study space to approving a new pickup for the physical facilities, staff Russell M. Nelson is very, very good to listen. He is very good to listen to us. We, who sit with him every day, have learned the value of listening carefully to him. Three years later, 2017. Elder Dallin Oaks, then not then, but soon to be in the First Presidency, he would be sitting where only one chair, one heartbeat away from the same position President Nelson now has. He quoted our colleague, Elder Neil Maxwell, who had said, and I quote: “In a way, Latter-day Saints scholars at BYU and elsewhere are a little bit like the builders of the temple in Nauvoo, who worked with a trowel in one hand and a musket in the other. Today, scholars building the temple of learning must also pause on occasion to defend the kingdom.” I personally think Elder Maxwell went on to say this is one of the reasons the Lord established and maintains this university. The dual role of builder and defender is unique and ongoing. I'm grateful we have scholars today who can handle, as it were, both trowel on musket. Then Elder Oaks said challengingly, “I’d like to hear a little more musket fire from the temple of learning.” He said this in a way that could have applied to a host of topics in various departments. But the one he specifically mentioned was the doctrine of the family and defending marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Little did he know that while many would hear his appeal, especially the school of family life, who moved quickly and visibly to assist, some others fired their muskets all right. But unfortunately, he didn't always aim at those hostile to the Church. We thought a couple of stray rounds even went north of the point of the mountain. My beloved brothers and sisters, a house divided against itself cannot stand. And I’ll go to my grave pleading that this institution not only stands but stands unquestionably committed to its unique academic mission and the Church that sponsors it. We hope it isn't a surprise to you that your trustees are not deaf or blind to the feelings that swirl around marriage and the whole same-sex topic on campus and a lot of other topics. I and many of my brethren and have spent more time and shed more tears on this subject than we could ever adequately convey to you this morning or any morning. We have spent hours discussing what the doctrine of the Church can and cannot provide the individuals and families struggling over this difficult issue. So it’s with a little scar tissue of our own that we are trying to avoid and hope all will try to avoid language and symbols and situations that are more divisive than unifying at the time we want to show love for all of God’s children. If a student commandeers a graduation podium intended to represent everyone getting diplomas that day in order to announce his personal sexual orientation, what might another speaker feel free to announce the next year until eventually anything goes? What might commencement come to mean or not mean if we push individual license over institutional dignity for very long? Do we simply end up with more divisiveness in our culture than we already have? And we already have far too much everywhere. In that spirit, let me go no farther before declaring unequivically my love and that of my brethren for those who live with this same-sex challenge and so much complexity that goes with it. Too often the world has been unkind, in many instances, crushingly cruel. To these our brothers and sisters, like many of you, we have spent hours with them. We have wept and prayed and wept again. In an effort to offer love at the hope while keeping the gospel strong and obedience to commandments evident in every individual life. But it will assist all of us, it will assist everyone trying to provide help in this matter if things can be kept in some proportion and balance in the process. For example, we have to be careful that love and empathy do not get interpreted as condoning an advocacy or that orthodoxy and loyalty to principle not be interpreted as unkindness or disloyalty to people. As near as I can tell, Christ never once withheld His love from anyone. But he also never once said to anyone, “Because I love you, you are exempt from keeping my commandments.” We're tasked with trying to strike that same sensitive, demanding balance in our lives. Musket fire? Yes, we will always need defenders of the faith. But friendly fire is a tragedy. And from time to time, the Church, its leaders, and some of our colleagues within the university community have taken such fire on this campus. And sometimes it isn’t friendly, wounding students and the parents of students. So many who are confused about what so much recent flag-waving and parade holding on this issue means. My beloved friends, this kind of confusion and conflict ought not to be not here. There are better ways to move toward crucially important goals in these very difficult matters— ways that show empathy and understanding for everyone while maintaining loyalty to prophetic leadership and devotion to reveal doctrine. My brethren have made the case for the metaphor of musket fire, which I have endorsed yet again today. There will continue to be those who oppose our teachings, and that will continue the need to define, document, and defend the faith. But we all look forward to the day when we can beat our swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks. And at least on this subject, learn war no more. And while I have focused on this same-sex topic this morning more than I would have liked, I pray that you will see it as emblematic of a lot of issues our students and our community, our Church faces in this complex contemporary world of ours. But I digress. Back to the blessings of a school in Zion. Do you see the beautiful parallel between the unfolding of the Restoration and the prophetic development of BYU, notwithstanding that both will have their critics along the way? like the Church itself, BYU has grown in spiritual strength in the number of people it reaches in service and in its unique place, among other institutions of higher education. It's grown in national and international reputation. More and more of its faculty are distinguishing themselves, and even more importantly, so are more and more of its students, reinforcing the fact that so many of them do understand exactly what that unfolding dream of BYU is that President Worthen then spoke about. Not long ago, one of your number wrote to me this marvelous description of what he thought was his call and our call and the call of these new faculty members who just stood who come to serve at BYU. I quote: “The Lord’s call to those of us who serve at BYU is a call to create learning experiences of unprecedented depth, quality, and impact. As good as BYU is and has been, this is a call to do better. It's a call to educate more students, to be more effective, to more effectively help them become true disciples of Jesus Christ, to prepare them to lead in their families and the Church and professions and in a world filled with commotion. But answering this call cannot be done successfully without His help. I believe,” the writer, one of you, concludes “that will help,that help will come according to the faith and obedience of the tremendously good and faithful people at Brigham Young University,” I agree wholeheartedly and enthusiastically with such a sense of calling here and with that reference to and confidence in the tremendously good people of Brigham Young University. Now, let me underscore that idea of such a call by returning to President Kimball’s second-century address still focused on by President Worthen. Our bright, budding new Commissioner of Education, Elder Clark Gilbert, is one of my traveling companions today. You may be certain that Clark loves this institution, his alma mater, deeply and brings to his assignment a reverence for its mission and its message. As part of Dr. Gilbert's introduction to you, I'm asking Elder Gilbert to come on campus on any calendar he and President Worthen can work out. And whether those visits are formal or casual or both, I hope they can accomplish at least two things. First of all, I hope you'll come to see quickly the remarkable strengths Elder Gilbert brings to his calling, even as he learns more about the flagship of his fleet and why our effort at a Church educational system would be a failure without the health success and participation of BYU. Secondly, noting that we're just these few short years of halfway through the second 100 years that President Kimball spoke about, as Elder Bednar said earlier, I think it would be fascinating to know if we are, in fact, making headway on the challenges he laid before us and of which Brother Bednar reminded the leadership team just a few weeks ago. When you look at President Kimball’s talk again, a copy of which will be distributed following this conference, may I ask you to pay particular attention to that sweet prophet's effort to ask that we be unique? In his discourse, President Kimball used the word <i>unique</i> eight times and <i>special</i> eight more times. It seems clear to me and my 73 years of loving it that BYU will become an educational Mt. Everest only to the degree it embraces its uniqueness, its singularity. We could mimic every other university in this world until we get a bloody nose in the effort. And that world would still say BYU, who? No, we must have the will to be different, to stand alone if necessary, being a university second to none in its role, primarily as an undergraduate teaching institution, that is unequivocally true to the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. If at a future time that mission means forgoing some professional affiliations and certifications, then so be it. There may come a day when the price we are asked to pay for such association is simply too high, too inconsistent with who we are. No one wants it to come to that, least of all me. But if it does, we will pursue our own destiny, a destiny that is not a matter of chance, but largely a matter of choice, a destiny, not a thing to be waited for, but a thing to be envisioned and achieved. Mom. What is that big Y on that mountain? Jeff, that stands for the university here in Provo, Brigham Young University. Well, It must be the greatest university. In the world. And so for me, it is. To help you pursue that destiny in the only way I even know how to help. I leave that apostolic blessing on every one of you this morning as you start another school year. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And with gratitude for His holy priesthood and as if hands were on your head. Had we time to do that, we surely would. I bless you personally, each one of you personally. I bless the students who have come under your influence, and I bless the university, including its marvelous president in his campus-wide endeavor, I bless you that profound personal faith will be your watchword and that unending blessings of personal rectitude will be or eternal reward. I bless your professional work that it'll be admired by your peers, and I bless your devotion to gospel truths that it will be the saving grace in some student’s life. I bless your families that those you hope will be faithful in keeping their covenants will be saved, at least in part because you've been faithful in keeping yours. Light conquers darkness. Truth triumphs over error. Goodness is victorious over evil, in the end, every time. I bless each one of you with every righteous desire of your heart. And I thank you for giving your love, your loyalty to BYU. To students like me and my beloved wife, please, from one who owes so much to this school and has loved her so deeply for so long, keep her standing, but stand in for what she uniquely and prophetically was meant to be. And may the rest of higher education see your good works and glorify our Father, which is in Heaven, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
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Channel: Church Newsroom
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Length: 39min 51sec (2391 seconds)
Published: Mon Aug 23 2021
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