FLASHBACK FRIDAY — The following interview is an excerpt from the Bugle Archives.  Original link (defunct, published in June 2000): http://www.angelfire.com/slc2/buglethebeehive/Page14.htm

President Gordon B. Hinckley – The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
AOL Keyword: Hincks

[…]And lastly, we had the chance to ask Pres. Gordon B. Hinckley what he’s been reading lately. His answer may just surprise you.    ;->

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President Hinckley: Well, I’ve had the blessing of receiving an interesting book from my youngest great-grandson.  It is a book of the so-called ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ genre, named “The Island of Time”, by R. A. Montgomery.  This book served as a reminder of how insidious the challenges our young ones are faced with, even in seemingly harmless fantasy books.  This book, and books written in a similar spirit, are harmful by their very nature.  Because they are rewarding the false illusion of choice, as opposed to the righteous agency of obedience, books like this lead young minds astray.  In the narrative of our lives, as in the narrative of scripture, there is no escaping consequences of a choice by sticking a finger in an earlier page.

The sacred covenant of linearity demands that what has happened, has happened.  Causality is one of the holiest gifts of our Father in Heaven.  But this book would present linearity as a paradox, where multiple decision points lead to multiple outcomes, all within the confines of one book.  You and I are faced with the stark question of accepting the truth of the causality, linearity, and that which followed it. On the question of its reality lies the very validity of this Church. If it is the truth, and I testify that it is, then the work in which we are engaged is the most important work on the earth.

With regard to the narrative structure of “The Island of Time”, authored by R. A. Montgomery, it is my testimony that either all of it is true, or none of it is true.

I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ.  Amen.

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