I am prompted in the subject of my few remarks by a recent saddening experience, which I had with some young people of Latter-day Saint parentage who have allowed their faith to dwindle while they have sought for higher education in the so-called secular fields, and I am encouraged in discussing some of these matters by what has appeared to be the theme of this session of our conference. I therefore seek for the sustaining of your faith and prayers for these next few minutes.

Some two years ago I came across a report in the New York Times of a statement made by Dr. O. H. Mowrer of the University of Illinois, psychologist and former president of the American Psychological Association. This statement came out of a symposium on the relationship between religion and mental health at the sixty-fifth annual meeting of the American Psychological Association held in the Statler Hotel in New York City. This is what Dr. Mowrer says:

"Psychology does not know enough about religion, psychology does not have all the answers. In fact," he observed, "it has not even asked all the right questions—the great soul-shaking questions of life and death which lie at the very heart of human experience and existence." Dr. Mowrer further said: "It is striking how many psychologists are themselves going back to church, or at least carefully sending their children to Sunday School." He concluded then by saying: "This symposium is far from an occasion for celebration, but rather a call to labor in a vineyard which we psychologists have rather systematically neglected and despised."

It has been a source of great satisfaction for me to have observed in my contacts with men in various fields that other great men in other fields are likewise seeking for the answers to the soul-shaking questions, as he put it, which lie at the heart of human experience and existence.

Some time ago I was privileged to have a telephone conversation with one of the religion editors for a great national news chain. He was preparing an article that was to precede the showing of the great Hill Cumorah Pageant. He said he wanted to talk with me about what he called—I think he called it the "intricate" teachings of the Church. When I asked him to explain what he meant, he said, "Well, this baptism for the dead." So, as I explained to him the teachings of the Church, he said, "Well, your teaching regarding baptism for the dead is like praying souls out of purgatory." I said, "Well, I suppose the intent may be said to be the same, but there is one distinctive difference. One is scriptural and true, and the other is not." Then he challenged me to prove from the scriptures—this over the telephone—how we could take this stand.

I called his attention to what the Lord said to the evilly intended Jews who sought his life: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live"  John 5:25 That hour that he spoke of was explained, undoubtedly, by the Master to his disciples—at least Peter understood it so well that in his epistles he wrote very clearly about it. After the resurrection he said: ". . . being put to death in the flesh [Jesus], quickened by the Spirit . . . went and preached to the spirits in prison, which had been disobedient in the days of Noah" (see  1 Pet. 3:18-20

And he further said: "For this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh but live according to God in the spirit"  1 Pet. 4:6

Then I called his attention to the fact that the method or practice of this gospel ordinance was used by the Apostle Paul as an argument for the resurrection, when he asked the question as he wrote to the Corinthians: "Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?"  1 Cor. 15:29

Some while later, after his article had been written, I had occasion to visit this man again in a hospital where he was convalescing from a major operation. This time his wife was present and after the necessary introduction, he said: "I wish you would explain to my wife here what you told me about the intricate teachings of your Church." And so, with the realization that I was in a man's hospital room and he was convalescing, I proceeded to explain what I had previously said to him, at the conclusion of which he said to her: "I told you that the teachings of the Mormon Church are like bricks in a wall of a house, put together with no gaps in them. They have an answer for everything."

Then I said to him, "Of course, you realize that your comment is to us but another testimony of the divine origin of this Church and the gospel principles which do supply an answer for everything affecting life and death."

The principles of the gospel are unchangeable, and they are fixed according to the gospel plan. I came to that conclusion in a rather startling way. Brother Kimball and I had an experience with one of Brother Moyle's friends, a great industrialist, to whom Brother Moyle had presented a Book of Mormon, and with whom he had had many gospel conversations. In our presence, and before the Brigham Young University student body this man declared that he accepted the Book of Mormon as a true record of his ancestors, he being of Cherokee Indian descent. When we questioned him about that, then if he accepted the Book of Mormon as a true record what did that make of Joseph Smith, and he said he accepted Joseph Smith as a prophet, and he accepted the Church as divine, but he could not believe the principle of baptism for the dead. He said, "I believe God could save those who have died in any way he wanted to."

I made, what I came to realize a little later, a loose remark that I have repented of many times, when I said to him, "Yes, I suppose God could have said, 'Throw your hat over a cliff, and you will be saved.' But he did not say that. He said, '. . . Except a man be born of the water and of the Spirit, only then could he be saved'" (see  John 3:5

I told that to a friend of mine, and when I repeated that last, "He could have said, 'Throw your hat over a cliff,'" he said, "Brother Lee, I am surprised to hear you say that. Could there have been any other way than the way he said?" Then, too late, I remembered what the Master said: ". . . strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it"  Matt. 7:14 and in the controversy that followed the healing of the blind at the pool of Siloam, ". . . He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber"  John 10:1

The Lord has summed up the gospel in these words: "And this is my gospel—repentance and baptism by water, and then cometh the baptism of fire and the Holy Ghost, even the Comforter, which showeth all things and teacheth the peaceable things of the kingdom"  D&C 39:6

What is the gospel then? What a glorious definition we have listened to this morning in President Richards' address. So often I hear my brethren saying something that I wish we would not say quite that way—that the gospel is a way of life. It is not a way of life—it is the way to eternal life. It is the science of salvation. I quote from something that our late beloved brother, Orson F. Whitney, wrote some years ago when he said:

"The principles which compose the gospel—and not merely the first principles, but all that have been or will ever be revealed are self-existent and everlasting in their nature. They have existed from all eternity, and will endure through all eternities to come, for they are absolute, essential, uncreated truths, without beginning of day or end of years, the same yesterday, today, and forever. Concerning the time, place, and method of their compilation . . . it is not man's present province to enquire" (Elder's Journal, 4:26).

Yes, our religion editor of the national newspaper chain, you are right. Gospel truths are as brick upon brick in a solid wall. There are no gaps. Will you choice young Latter-day Saints and our friends in the fields of science and psychology and philosophy—will you heed the call of Dr. Mowrer, one of the most brilliant leaders in your secular world, and as he said, heed his call to labor in the vineyard, which all too often you have systematically neglected and despised.

Our beloved late Dr. James E. Talmage, an eminent scholar, has set forth in clearness the essential relationship between scientific theory and truth in an article entitled: "Prophecy as the Forerunner of Science." It was written many years ago, and this is what he said:

"The man of truly scientific spirit regards a theory in its real character—as a provisional and tentative explanation of phenomena not otherwise easy to comprehend. Theory is but the scaffolding necessary to the work of rightly placing the building blocks of truth in the wall of the rising edifice of science. These building blocks are demonstrated facts, truths made plain and when they are in place, their proper relation to each other duly established, the scaffolding, which is inadequate and unsightly at best, is torn down. Theory becomes unnecessary as our knowledge of facts increases" (Improvement Era, 7:487).

Nearly twenty years ago because of, shall I say, some immature observations at that time I wrote something that I read again the other day to see if I could now say the same thing. The testimony of those nearly twenty years that have intervened convinced me all the more that these facts are true. That person who thinks he has outgrown his Church and his religion has in reality proved himself too small to bear the responsibilities his membership entails and has shut himself up in his small intellectual world, and the vast treasures in the unseen world of spiritual truths are closed to his understanding. "And if your eye be single to my glory, your whole bodies shall be filled with light and there shall be no darkness in you; and that body which is filled with right comprehendeth all things"  D&C 88:67

The gospel of Jesus Christ does have the right answers to the great soul-shaking questions which lie at the heart of human experience and existence, for it is indeed the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth. And I bear humble testimony that I know it is true, the science of salvation, the power of God unto salvation, and I bear that testimony humbly in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.