January 12, 2016 J. Max Wilson

LDS Conference April 1971 – A Really Round and Hairy Look at Honesty

This is the latest post in the ongoing General Conference Odyssey project. My previous posts in this series can be found here.  Posts by other bloggers writing about the April 1971 General Conference today are included at the end of this post.

Today we are writing about the Tuesday Afternoon Session of the April 1971 General Conference.

While there were a number of excellent, memorable discourses in this session of conference, I want to highlight the talk “Honesty and Integrity” by Elder Delbert L. Stapley,  who was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles from 1950  until 1978.

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Before I jump into the primary subject, it is fun to notice the dated slang Elder Stapley describes in the opening of his talk:

“My brothers and sisters: This has been a wonderful conference. Most worthwhile messages have been given, which recalls a statement by a young man in his late teens. He sought out his stake president following a stake conference attended by our beloved brother, the late Elder Thorpe B. Isaacson, and enthusiastically said, in the jargon of youth, ‘President, this conference really shook me. Elder Isaacson was really round.’ And then he added, ‘This was a hairy conference.’ Now you dig his meaning.”

From the context, I gather that at some time the use of “shook me,” “really round,” and “hairy” were positive slang phrases. But I get the impression that they may have already been out of use when Elder Stapley gave this talk, with the possibility that “now you dig his meaning” was meant ironically. In any case, if anyone out there knows about the history of this slang I would love to hear about it in the comments.

Elder Stapley spoke about a topic that is very familiar to members of the church: honesty. But even though it is a core principle of the Gospel, I still found Elder Stapley’s discussion interesting and helpful.

“Today, with honesty and integrity among men of high position at a low ebb and becoming lost virtues…The reports of dishonesty, graft, and corruption in government, business, professional, and financial circles in our national life lessen our position and strength as a world leader.”

In April of 1971 the beginning of the Watergate Scandal was still a little more than a year in the future and wouldn’t culminate in the resignation of President Nixon until 1974. But even before all of that came to light, Elder Stapley felt that honesty in public life was at a low ebb. Continue reading →

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January 10, 2016 J. Max Wilson

Beware Uncharted Islands – The Beast Below and Enduring in the Old Ship Zion

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Last month, my daughter sent out an email query to the members of our family asking for each of us to respond as quickly as possible with the name our favorite magical creature of all time. I didn’t respond immediately and so her question slipped off my radar. She followed up with an email reminder, and then a verbal reminder. I didn’t understand why it was so important, but after a little thought, I told her that my favorite mythical creature was Fastitocalon.

Like most people, she had never heard of Fastitocalon.

Fastitocalon is the name of a gigantic mythological sea monster that floats at the surface of the ocean and deceives seafarers. The wicked beast waits for sea travelers, who easily mistake it’s huge carapace for an uncharted island, to secure their ships to its shell and disembark for a rest from their journey. Just when they are starting to feel safe and enjoying themselves, Fastitocalon dives into the sea, sinking the ships and drowning all the travelers.

For Christmas, my daughter gave each member of the family an original drawing of the creature they had told her was their favorite. And she gave me a wonderful drawing of Fastitocalon, a photo of which I have included at the top of this post.

I love my daughter’s conceptualization of Fastitocalon as a giant turtle. I like the line between what appears above the surface and what is below; the change in lighting and color. The welcoming island above and the beast below.

My first encounter with Fastitocalon was through J.R.R. Tolkien’s delightful poem of the same name in “The Adventures of Tom Bombadil“: Continue reading →

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January 5, 2016 J. Max Wilson

LDS Conference April 1971 – Profound Spiritual Experiences in an Elevator

This is today’s installment of the General Conference Odyssey project. Previous posts in this series can be found here. Posts by other bloggers writing about the April 1971 General Conference today will be included at the end of this post.

Today we are writing about the Tuesday Morning Session of the April 1971 General Conference.

Since the 1980s, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have grown accustomed to five sessions during each general conference of the church: Saturday Morning, Saturday Afternoon, Priesthood, Sunday Morning, and Sunday Afternoon. In just the last year or so the church has re-labeled the Women’s meeting, which is often held a week before the rest of conference, as the Women’s Session of conference.

But in the recorded conferences from 1971 through 1976 there were often more sessions of conference. In addition to the Saturday and Sunday sessions, there was a whole additional day. Often there were two sessions on Friday, though sometimes they were held on Tuesday, and at least once on the Thursday.

Starting in October 1975 they also added a Welfare Session. So in from October 1975 through October 1976 there were eight sessions each conference. Then in 1977 they discontinued the additional day and simplified to the Saturday and Sunday sessions we are used to now, with the additional Welfare Session which continued to be held through October 1982. The Women’s meeting was included periodically starting in October 1979.

So today we are reading in the Tuesday Morning Session of April 1971. As the first speaker in this session, Elder Boyd. K Packer, who had been ordained an Apostle just one year before, gave an important discourse titled “The Spirit Beareth Record.”

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Elder Packer recounts his experience from a year earlier in which he unexpectedly encountered President Joseph Fielding Smith in an elevator: Continue reading →

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December 29, 2015 J. Max Wilson

LDS Conference April 1971 – A Rebuke from President Harold B. Lee and Debunking the Iron Rod vs Liahona Taxonomy

In this week’s installment of our ongoing series reading sermons from past General Conferences of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we are looking at the Sunday Afternoon Session of the April 1971 conference. Posts by other bloggers on this session will be included at the end. A useful index of all of the posts by all of the bloggers in this series can be found here.

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Among dissident members of the church, this particular session of conference is somewhat famous, or perhaps more accurately infamous. Or at least it ought to be. In 1967 Richard Poll, a BYU professor, published a talk he had given in sacrament meeting, in which he characterized members of the church as either “Iron Rod” members or “Liahona” members.  The published talk is still quite popular in certain circles. I have seen it cited many times, even in the last decade.

For anyone who is not familiar with these terms, “Iron Rod” is derived from a metaphorical vision recounted in the Book of Mormon by the prophet Lehi, in which he saw an iron rod or handrail that guided people along a path through a dark and dangerous landscape to the tree of life, with pure and delicious fruit. The term “Liahona” is also from the Book of Mormon and is the name of a compass-like instrument that God provided to Lehi and his family to guide them as they traveled in the wilderness to a new land.

Brother Poll explained his taxonomy like this:

“The Iron Rod, as the hymn reminds us, was the Word of God. To the person with his hand on the rod, each step of the journey to the tree of life was plainly defined; he had only to hold on as he moved forward. In Lehi’s dream the way was not easy, but it was clear.

The Liahona, in contrast, was a compass. It pointed to the destination but did not fully mark the path; indeed, the clarity of its directions varied with the circumstances of the user. For Lehi’s family the sacred instrument was a reminder of their temporal and eternal goals, but it was no infallible delineator of their course.

Even as the Iron Rod and the Liahona were both approaches to the word of God and to the kingdom of God, so our two types of members seek the word and the kingdom. The fundamental difference between them lies in their concept of the relation of man to the ‘word of God.’ Put another way, it is a difference in the meaning assigned to the concept ‘the fullness of the Gospel.’ Do the revelations of our Heavenly Father give us a handrail to the kingdom, or a compass only?

The Iron Rod Saint does not look for questions, but for answers, and in the Gospel–as he understands it–he finds or is confident that he can find the answer to every important question. The Liahona Saint, on the other hand, is preoccupied with questions and skeptical of answers; he finds in the Gospel–as he understands it–answers to enough important questions so that he can function purposefully without answers to the rest.”

This Iron Rod vs Liahona characterization clearly appeals to those who find Brother Poll’s “Liahona Saint” applicable to their own views and a “liberal” approach to the gospel. That is why it has had such staying power for nearly 50 years. For many of those who cite his taxonomy approvingly, “Iron Rod” is used as a kind of pejorative, similar to the smug internet acronym TBM (True Blue Mormon) used to refer to faithful members who accept the authority and direction of the living prophets and apostles. Continue reading →

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December 22, 2015 J. Max Wilson

LDS Conference April 1971- Broken and Contrite Empires

In this week’s installment of our ongoing series retrospectively writing about sermons given in past LDS General Conferences are looking at talks from the Saturday Morning Session of the April 1971 General Conference. Posts about this conference session by other participating bloggers will be included at the end of this post.

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N. Eldon Tanner was called to be a counselor in the First Presidency of the Church by President David O. McKay in October of 1963, only one year after having been called as an apostle. He continued as a counselor in the First Presidency under Presidents Joseph Fielding Smith,  Harold B. Lee, and Spencer W. Kimball. He was also the nephew of LDS Apostle Hugh B. Brown.

President Tanner’s starts out his talk from this session, titled “Choose You This Day,” referring to a series of lectures, apparently hosted by Carnegie Mellon, called the “Last Lecture Series.”  University professors were asked to prepare a lecture as if it were to be their last lecture before they died, in which to communicate the most important information they had gleaned from their careers and experience. It sounds a bit like a predecessor to the modern T.E.D. talks that have been so popular in the internet era.

President Tanner decided to give his talk in the spirit of this “Last Lecture Series”:

“I chose my subject for this conference as though it were to be my last lecture—the most important message I could leave with the people.“

And the message he chose to share was upon the need to choose today to serve God.

Continue reading →

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