(by Dennis B. Horne)
The strings holding up the notion that President McKay believed in evolution are thin and fragile indeed. The two or three hints that evolutionists have promoted to make their case are entirely insufficient. Of course, even if we hypothetically decreed that President McKay was a believer in evolution, which he was not, he would be vastly outnumbered by his Brethren in the leading councils of the Church. The two items below are very relevant and interesting, as is the material reviewed in blog #7:
President Harold
B. Lee [private letter on official Church letterhead stationery, October 2,
1973. This was written a few months before President Lee’s death.]
I have a few moments to respond to your letter of recent date in which you express some concern about some contradictory information as to the position we should take with regard to the doctrine of evolution. This, as you know, has been long a bone of contention so serious that in the earlier years when Darwin’s theory first was enunciated, a number of professors at the Brigham Young University were released because of their unwillingness to teach the theory and then counter by delivering the true doctrines of the gospel.
Apparently
the thing that confused you was that these who have contended have shown you a
copy of a letter which was signed by President David O. McKay in which he
disavowed the church having taken any official position on the subject of
organic evolution. And, furthermore, that in that note to Professor William Lee
Stokes, he declared that the book, Man, His Origin and Destiny was not
published by the church and is not approved by the church.
There is a
little bit of history that I should tell you about. One summer some years ago,
I was assigned to deliver a day by day set of lessons to all the seminary
teachers and some of
the institute teachers of the church, which proved to be a
very demanding assignment. I went down each morning and met with all of these
teachers. President Joseph Fielding Smith’s book had just come off the press
and I assigned, as a part of the course, the reading of this book and writing a
dissertation not less than 2500 words on the subject “What Your Appraisal Is of
the Value of This Book to a High School Senior or a College Student.” This
caused quite a consternation among the teachers, some of whom wanted to write a
very critical analysis of the book and were fearful of doing so lest I would
downgrade them in the course. This was not
at all my intent, it was merely to have them respond
critically if they wished, and I so told President Smith that I was inviting
criticism and he said that was all right.
Some of
these brethren who were critical of the book came directly to President McKay
and represented to him that I had used President Joseph Fielding Smith’s book
as a text for my lectures at the BYU. He called President Ernest Wilkinson in
to express his criticism that I had done so, and President Wilkinson told him
that that was not true, that he, President Wilkinson, had sat in on most of the
lectures that I had given and I did not use the book as a text, it was merely
an assigned reading outside of the lessons.
It was
undoubtedly the undue pressure of some of these dissidents, one of which was
his own son, who was a professor at the University of Utah, that induced him to
write this brief and to them a satisfying but to you a disturbing note, which
poured water over their wheel and tended to lessen the influence of President
Joseph Fielding Smith’s book.
When your
letter came to our attention, President Marion G. Romney told me of a
conference address which he had delivered at the April conference in 1953,
where he spoke directly to this subject of the fall of Adam, or the fall of
man, as it is spoken of, and then brought forth scriptures to support the
position of the church with respect to the advent of man upon the earth, etc.
At the
conclusion of his talk, President Romney said that President David O. McKay had
congratulated him and had written a brief note, a copy of which I am attaching
hereto, in which he congratulated President Romney and then said, “I congratulate
you for your excellent contribution during the conference and express gratitude
for your remarks as well as your
fine spirit, and I assure you that I agreed heartily in
every instance.” President Romney thought if you had this statement from
President David O. McKay, signed by himself, to counter this other statement
which has been so confusing, that that should be sufficient for you to
understand that President McKay had made this other statement probably because
of a compromising position he had been in due to the circumstances as I have explained
them.
I might add
one further thought. Just after this book of President Joseph Fielding Smith’s
was printed, I had a young student of science from the University of Utah who
came from a
family who lived in my stake, come in with several books and
wanted to argue against statements made in President Joseph Fielding Smith’s
book. I said to him, “Now Brother ___.” (his name was Dr. ___.) “I haven’t had
the opportunity of delving deeply into science, but I want to tell you an
experience that Mark E. Petersen and I had when we organized the new Kansas
City Stake. In our interview we had a man who was considered
as a bishop of one of the wards who was a teacher of anatomy in the Kansas City
University, which was a dental school. Of course this made it necessary for us
to examine very carefully his faith as contrasted with his teaching of the
evolutionary theory which of course would be taught in connection with the
subject of anatomy. After we had discussed this, I asked him if he had read Brother
Smith’s book. He smiled and said, ‘’Yes, I have, and it was the most difficult
book I have ever read.’ ‘’But,’ he said, ‘’I want to tell you that in my
opinion this is the finest book that the church has ever produced for men who
were teachers in the field of science. And I endorse what President Smith has
said entirely.’ “
I said to
this young Dr. ____, ‘”I wish you would write to this professor of science, who
is much older and more experienced than you, in Kansas City, and have him
respond to your questions.”
A few weeks
later this young man came back in a humble spirit and said, ‘”Well I need
nothing more to quiet my concerns, when a man of his experience can say what he
said, that’s enough for me.” “Now if I were you, Brother ____, I would not be
discouraged. This is a contention which has gone on and will continue to the
end of time I suppose, and until the scientists get nearer and nearer to the
doctrines of the Church, there will still be contention, but remember this, that
truth can never be composed with the errors of men. Just know that the gospel
is true and that these are the theories of men which you as a student must
learn if you want to pass the courses you are taking.
With
kindest personal regards and trusting this letter will be
sufficient to set the matter right in your mind I am,
Very
sincerely yours, Harold B. Lee.
See also:
https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/david-o-mckay/gospel-ideals-lifes-surest-anchor/?M=A
go to about 23 minutes.
And also blog #19.
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