Elder Bednar (Sunday Afternoon): These four words–”Receive the Holy Ghost”–are not a passive pronouncement; rather they constitute a priesthood injunction–an authoritative admonition to act and not simply to be acted upon. The Holy Ghost does not become operative in our lives merely because hands are placed upon our heads and those four important words are spoken. As we receive this ordinance, each of us accepts a sacred and ongoing responsibility to desire, to seek, to work, and to so live that we indeed “receive the Holy Ghost” and its attendant spiritual gifts.What should we do to make this authorized admonition to seek for the companionship of the third member of the Godhead an ongoing reality? Let me suggest that we need to 1) sincerely desire to receive the Holy Ghost, 2) appropriately invite the Holy Ghost into our lives, and 3) faithfully obey God’s commandments.
Elder Oaks (Sunday Morning): On this personal line of communication with the Lord our belief and practice is similar to that of those Christians who insist that human mediators between God and man are unnecessary because all have direct access to God under the principle Martin Luther referred to as “the priesthood of all believers.”
Elder Cook (Saturday Afternoon): Let me be clear that all voices need to be heard in the public square. Neither religious nor secular voices should be silenced. Furthermore, we should not expect that because some of our views emanate from religious principles, they will automatically be accepted or given preferential status. But it is also clear such views and values are entitled to be reviewed on their merits.
GERRIT GONG!!!!!: Perfection
Elder Christofferson (Sat Morning): Five elements of a consecrated life: purity, work, respect for one’s physical body, service, and integrity. “A consecrated life is a life of labor. …God Himself is glorified by his work. We naturally desire to participate with HIm in His work, and in so doing, we ought to recognize that all honest work is the work of God. Thomas Carlyle: “All true Work is sacred; in all true Work, were it but true hand-labor, there is something of divineness. Labor, wide as the Earth, has its summit in Heaven.” Integrity is not naivete. What is naive is to suppose that we are not accountable to God.
Pres Uchtdorf (Sat Morning): hahahaah I know you all are wondering.... “…it is good advice to slow down a little, steady the course, and focus on the essentials when experiencing adverse conditions.” “It is said that any virtue, when taken to an extreme, can become a vice. …There comes a point where milestones can become millstones, and ambitions, albatrosses around our neck.”
