Earlier this year, BYU announced that Elder Holland’s 2021 devotional address, “The Second Half of the Second Century of Brigham Young University,” would be added to the required reading list for BYU’s mandatory intro course, UNIV101. This announcement caused celebration for those of us concerned with BYU’s administrative decline into moral ambivalence and expected cries of outrage from the FaithMatters crowd who still chafe over Elder Holland’s “musket fire speech.” BYU has since been flooded with angry letters from such detractors.
Last week, the Cougar Chronicle set the Latter-day Saint opinion sphere ablaze by pointing out that the text of the talk present in the course curriculum had removed what many felt were key points in Elder Holland’s address. Many readers immediately jumped to BYU’s defense, saying that talks are often truncated for length and audience concerns in reprints, that this is a non-issue, while others immediately jumped up to condemn BYU for yet another capitulation to the woke mob.
Both opinions are largely reactionary as no one had compiled the full list of changes. So, using a little code, I standardized the formatting of the talks and ran them through a diff program to identify every single change made to the talk. I’ll go through each change—important or not—and see if we can answer the question: Is this the scandal many feel it is? Or is this a big nothingburger?
If you want to follow along, I have published the full side-by-side diff of the text of the address here.
Deletion #1: You’re right, we didn’t keep it long.
This is a softball. I don’t feel this change needs too much commentary. I thought the joke was funny, but younger audiences may not get the Elizabeth Taylor joke, and it’s not especially applicable to a printed format. Some think there is some sort of protective infantilism by removing the line, but I don’t see it.
Deletion #2: Who’s in charge here?
The previous paragraph to this deletion quotes Pres. Nelson, saying that college, while important, is ultimately “not essential for eternal life” and, by extension, ancillary to the core mission of the Church. Elder Holland then reminds BYU that the Prophet is the ultimate authority on all funding at Church schools and that they are ultimately answerable to him—a direct warning directed to those who wish to oppose Church leadership while profiting from Church payroll.
BYU decided not to pass that reminder on to students as part of this course. Apologists for BYU say that’s a detail only relevant to faculty and staff so it deserves omission in the student course material. I see the points they make, but I think this deletion is worth our attention and ties into a larger theme I will address at the end.
Change #3: “Church” scholars
Another softball. This was the only non-deletion change in the talk. BYU replaced the term “Church of Jesus Christ” with “Latter-day Saint.” An extreme skeptic might say that cuts against the spirit of using the name of the Church and the Savior as Pres. Nelson asked us to. However, I think this change is actually appropriate. Saying “Church of Jesus Christ scholars” can sound like he’s referring only to scholars employed by the Church, whereas “Latter-day Saint scholars” more clearly indicates he means all scholars who are members of the Church, regardless of where they are employed. I think this more expansive meaning is more in line with his intent.
Deletion #4: Forget Matt Easton
One reason Elder Holland raised such ire among progressive advocates was the specificity of his denunciation. After all, it’s easy to dismiss general prohibitions against “sin,” but it’s another thing when an Apostle condemns a specific incident in detail.
BYU students will be unfamiliar with the Matt Easton controversy in future years of the course, and including this account in the talk will just spike their curiosity about past wrongs and unnecessarily dig up old offenses. “Matt Easton is a thing of the past; let’s leave him there.”
I understand this line of thinking, but I also note that it fits into the larger theme I will address in my final analysis.
Deletion #5: Confusion? I don’t know what you’re talking about!
It’s no secret that BYU is a hotbed for the pride movement– especially when compared with its stricter sister school in Idaho. But while Elder Holland addresses the concept of activism, this is the only place in the talk where he condemns specific forms of advocacy like pride flags and pride parades. So it’s no wonder that many are concerned that this specific condemnation is quietly redacted.
Deletion #6: Softening the musket fire
This one is pretty straightforward: in the wake of the consternation and hand-wringing over the “musket fire” wording, it seems BYU felt it appropriate to remove Elder Holland’s explicit statement of endorsement of that wording.
BYU apologists opine that perhaps the word “today” was the offender– as if acknowledging the moment in which he spoke would detract from making the message truly timeless to future students– but that doesn’t hold water as such references are left in throughout the talk. I really don’t see any way to justify the removal of this entire phrase except as an attempt to avoid the clear, authoritative endorsement of the controversial wording.
Deletion #7: Cleaning out “The Cleaner”
Elder Clark G. Gilbert has a reputation within the Church for his willingness to make drastic cuts and “clean house.” He is seen as the source behind a purge of Deseret News in the 2010s, and as commissioner of education, he has continued to be more selective in the hiring of Church employees, including instituting mandatory Temple worthiness requirements for all CES employees, resulting in a reduction of subversive hires at BYU. This attitude has earned him the nickname online of “The Cleaner.”
It’s little wonder Elder Holland chose to deliver this address with Elder Gilbert at his side. In his address, Elder Holland commended Elder Gilbert to BYU, reminding the school of his office, and publicly invited Elder Gilbert to come regularly to campus to oversee addressing the concerns Elder Holland described.
It is understandable that with so much progressive ire directed at Elder Gilbert, the complete elimination of all references to him would be suspect.
BYU apologists have likewise appealed to the “timelessness” argument. Elder Gilbert won’t be the commissioner of education forever, so why bring him up? But if that’s the case, why include other leaders like President Worthen, who is already out? Well, maybe it’s that the students don’t need to know the duties of the commissioner of education– that’s more a concern for faculty. This is true, but that’s really a point we could make for this entire address, isn’t it?
Overall Analysis
So who is right? Those who say it’s a scandal? Or those who say these changes are a big nothingburger? In my opinion, neither extreme is right.
Let’s put aside the deletion of the joke and the change in the adjective referring to scholars which are both fine no matter which side you come down on. What of the rest?
After evaluating these changes, I think we can dismiss the idea that these changes are just to shorten the talk for printing or are just cutting irrelevant pieces. The fact that there are so few changes actually cuts against those arguments– the talk is not substantively shorter than it was before. If the staff were looking for places to cut, there is plenty of “fluff” they could have tackled but didn’t, and plenty of other “faculty-relevant” sections they left in. I think we can rule out talk length or student relevance as motivating factors.
So what motivated these changes? We can only speculate.., so speculate I shall.
I think the deletion of the musket fire endorsement is just a pure and simple case where someone said, “This is the part where Elder Holland doubles down on the musket fire wording the hardest. That hurt a lot of feelings. It’s not strictly necessary to the talk, and it’s easy to remove, so let’s nix it.” I don’t see another way to explain that one.
What about the other 95%– the real meat of the deletions? Boiling down and combining the other deletions, this is their message:
BYU, you forgot your purpose and who cuts your paycheck. You authorized a student to preach false sexual doctrines to a captive audience. You permitted LGBTQ+ advocacy from authorities within your institution and confused students about the doctrines of the Gospel. We’re sending Elder Gilbert to make sure you don’t continue this trend.
Do you see the theme? These passages, more than most in the talk, are saying, “BYU, you messed up.”
I can understand why these passages would be embarrassing for an organization to print and distribute, especially to incoming students for many years to come. No one wants to start off a relationship with, “Hi, here’s that time I was rebuked by an Apostle!” But I don’t personally think deleting these passages is the right approach, either.
But in all things, let’s keep some perspective. Given BYU’s history of administrative concessions to woke mobs, I’m just happy Elder Holland’s talk hasn’t been memory-holed from the BYU Speeches archive itself. The introduction of this talk as mandatory reading for all students is a pleasant surprise I didn’t see coming, and the sections BYU removed from the talk did not alter or diminish the theme and tone of the talk at all.
It may be that these changes were approved by Church leadership. Some of them may have even been approved by Elder Holland himself, and that’s fine. But assuming it was some BYU administrator who made these deletions, is it a scandal? Not close. Is it a nothingburger? Not quite.I think it’s worth noting which changes were made, but not worth getting our knickers in a twist about it.
Written by: Matthew Watkins
Guest Contributor at the Cougar Chronicle
Matthew Watkins is a blogger, podcaster, and software engineer. He has also written for Latter-day Saint Lifehacker and the Interpreter Journal. You can read more of his work at http://powerinthebook.com and hear him share his thoughts on General Conference talks at http://conferencetalk.org. You can follow him on X @JoyfulRepenter
The Cougar Chronicle is an independent student-run newspaper and is not affiliated with Brigham Young University or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
