In this conference we have heard repeated, and to me very impressive, references to the vital importance of the home and good loving parents who impress in that home the ideal of good example and sincere concern.

In the few minutes I stand here I would like to address my remarks to the place of the Church in helping to contribute to the lives of wonderful young people from such good homes, and in filling a well-nigh indispensable role with young people who haven't had the good fortune to have such homes.

This morning Elder Richard L. Evans referred to the suggestion of Paul to the Corinthians: "For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?"  1 Cor. 14:8

Recently at a church area conference I found interesting application of this sobering challenge. The choir selected to sing at the conference rose to perform that glorious hymn, "Let the Mountains Shout for Joy." Most of you will know that in that hymn there is a section where individual voices form a quartet in a beautiful refrain. The people who were singing the four parts to the quartet in this instance didn't leave their sections but sang from their same position. Because three of the singers were far from the chair where I sat, I heard them indistinctly. To the congregation in front of them I am sure this was a very well-balanced and delightful presentation, but from where I sat near the alto soloist, it wasn't quite so well balanced, although it was very beautiful and very pleasant. The young lady who sang the alto part was in her teens. Her voice was strong, her knowledge of the music very good, and apparently her capacity for courage was high, because she sang through her part without a qualm, knowing that many of us near her were listening primarily to her.

That incident set me to thinking about my own and other people's children, because it illustrated a very significant, simple principle. We hear most clearly those voices that are nearest to us, and we are inclined to be responsive to those voices.

So Many Kinds of Voices

Do you remember what Paul wrote to the Corinthians after his allusion to the uncertain trumpet? These words: "There are . . . so many kinds of voices in the world"  1 Cor. 14:10

What are the voices to which our young people are listening? What do they hear in their homes, in the streets of their towns and communities? What do they hear over television and radio? What is communicated to them in books and magazines and photographs? What do they hear when they mingle with groups of their associates?

Well, for some the answer will be very good because there are many wonderful parents whose hearts are truly moved toward a love for their young people. There are good teachers and fine, interested human beings all over the face of the earth who honestly try to be helpful to youth and to speak truly and honorably. But for many young people the answers won't be so affirmative. What voices are they hearing? Very frequently, commercial voices. They may be honest voices from honest commerce seeking the trade of youth. They may be voices of conspiring and deceitful men who seek profit at the expense of the future well-being of youth.

There are pagan voices, iconoclastic voices attacking old traditions and fundamentals, arrogantly assuring that the old ideals, the old standards, the old viewpoints of nobility and honest effort, all of these are outmoded, no longer applicable, and may be abandoned with old faith, old ways, old accepted patterns of moral behavior.

Entertaining voices come from illuminated screens, often in company with actions which are designed to emphasize that part of our nature that needs no emphasis. False voices issue from parked cars or darkened rooms, sometimes tainted with alcohol or inflamed with drugs, treacherously asking, always asking, for self-gratification. "Don't you love me?" they say. "You know I love you." Love they call it, but love it is not, and love they do not. True love "seeketh not her own"  1 Cor. 13:5 But these voices constantly sing their song of counterfeit love, always seeking satisfaction of their own lusts, never really giving or intending to give, or perhaps knowing how to give, not knowing how to truly love.

Misguided voices urging rebellion for rebellion's sake.

Beguiling voices inviting young eyes to filth or foulness, young ears to that which young ears should not hear.

Foolish voices which suggest that since most people seem to be doing it, it therefore becomes all right to do.

Cynical voices that propound moral relativism, saying that there are no virtues or principles that you can really count on anymore, none that are always applicable everywhere. You make your own rules in this time and generation.

Sophisticated voices that skirt the edge of truth, telling youth, "It's your life, you live it. Never mind what parents, honest teachers, earnest adults, persons who care, have to say about it or how they feel about it. You decide; it's your life."

Peer voices, voices that are inexperienced, something imitating what someone called the "imitation men" they have seen on the street corners.

Aladdin voices singing the same old strain, "New lamps for old."

Loud voices, persistent voices, persuasive, confusing.

Voices to Youth

In the midst of all this, where can young people turn to hear a voice that will move them in the direction of their dreams, their noblest and highest and most honorable dreams?

Do you remember the words of the Lord through Isaiah: "And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left"  Isa. 30:21

Where can young people hear this voice?

Just last weekend with some other choice associates I had the blessing of mingling for three days with almost three thousand wonderful young Britons, members of this Church who had gathered together for a three-day festival. I wish all of you might have listened with us as these young people, who had found at least a part of an answer to that great question about where you go to hear the voice, themselves reiterated and expressed personal convictions about the message the voice had delivered to them.

A beautiful young woman, through her tears, thanking God that she now could pray, now could feel warm and good about him because she had learned that there is available in this world reaffirmation and a new witness that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ and that the will of God is being communicated to man.

The voice of a wonderful twenty-year-old girl who had traveled hundreds of miles training youth and their leaders in preparation for a dancing exhibition and then stood there that night conducting in her modest, gentle, beautiful way, as scores of choice young people went through the traditional dances of their nations in a dignified, pleasant, and very joyful way. They danced the modern dances, too, and they were dignified, and the feeling was strong and good.

The voice of a young Scotsman who walked more than a hundred miles with two choice associates to get to that conference and who stood to testify of his joy in the companionship along the way, in the spiritual thoughts they had exchanged before their morning prayer together, in the company he had found at the conference. And then he bore his testimony about his own immediate future missionary opportunities. I sat thinking as he spoke of another voice that had sounded, a time before but in very close proximity, the voice of a boy with, I am sure, less than favorable background and maybe less than favorable memories, who stood before a small congregation and in tears said something that constitutes as great a sermon as I have heard about an important subject. He said, "The way to be happy is to obey the commandments of God and not try to fix up some of our own."

The Voice of the Church

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints recognizes the difficulties that arise in the lives of young people as they listen, often in confusion, to the strident chorus of voices of those who seek their attention. The Church seeks to provide for its youth the direction and leadership and inspiration that will help them to travel ways of integrity and honor and decency and responsibility.

If there were time to testify what we have heard these young voices repeat and reflect in their spirit and their witness, it would be a very impressive manifestation that there is a place to hear the right voice.

We met in England with a professional journalist who had lived in many parts of the land. He seemed unresponsive emotionally, as he watched, and I thought maybe he wasn't responding to these choice young people. And then he sought me out to say, "Mr. Hanks, it has been nice to hear you and the others, but the thing I really enjoyed after being in the Brighton riots and living in Asia and South America and elsewhere is to watch these young people. They are different from any other group I ever saw."

The Church offers to its youth answers to some of their serious, sacred, spiritual questions. It offers them a guide of conduct that will help them to live with meaningfulness and joy in this world, and it offers them this sacred personal commitment we call testimony that allows them to say, "I know God lives."

I echo that testimony, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.