an afternoon with elder holland
So I was interested in what sorts of questions you all would ask because I wanted to get a feel for where other people view things as being. I know where I am in life and where I stand, but a slightly more generalized overview would be advantageous going in. Last Wednesday Salad and I drove up to Salt Lake to meet with Elder Holland. We had spoken with him for about 15 minutes on the phone before, but he wanted to meet us in person and have time to actually sit down and talk.
We got there about 15 minutes early, and waited about 20 minutes before we were shown in. Elder Holland apologized profusely for running late. Hah, 5 minutes. My family runs about 45 minutes late. :P We were nervous before going in, but as soon as we saw him and shook his hands, all nervousness vanished. He shook my hand, then took Salad by the cheeks and exclaimed "Oh, how wonderfully rosy your cheeks are!"
We talked for about half an hour, then he had to take an international conference call - but he wanted more than just the 25 minutes or so with us, so he asked us to stick around until he was done, and we could continue our conversation. All told, we spent about 45 minutes in his office speaking with him.
I don't want to go into the entire meeting all in one post - having this up here will help me remember that I have to post. :P So I'll continue on later with some of the things we talked about. One question in particular that I raised was posed by a friend. He wanted to know whether supporting gay marriage issues would be grounds for taking away one's temple recommend. Elder Holland was quite clear on this point - that is not grounds for losing a recommend, nor, he hopes, will it ever be. Political opinions of such a nature have no bearing on temple worthiness. If ever it were to be such an issue, a statement would have to be issued directly from the First Presidency, and it would likely become one of the temple recommend questions. He cited the ministry of President Heber J. Grant. He was president of the church when prohibition was first instated, through the entire time it was in effect, and when Utah was the state that cast the deciding vote, ending prohibition in the United States. He was horribly distraught over it, especially after urging the members to work towards it, but it never became a point of temple worthiness.
--drex
