Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share Gordon B Hinckley Interview With Mike Wallace On 60 Minutes
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
Gordon B Hinckley Interview With Mike Wallace On 60 Minutes
This is the classic interview, in its entirety, that Gordon B. Hinckley had with Mike Wallace, on 60 minutes, in 1996. In order to read the entire transcript, please visit the Mormon Truth Interviews website.
However, here are some of the highlights from this interview:
MW: No alcohol, no tobacco, no coffee, no tea, not even caffeinated soft drinks...
GBH: Right.
MW [voiceover; footage of GBH arriving on the dais of a meetinghouse, the chapel filled with missionaries]: The critics acknowledge they represent a tiny minority of Mormons. Still, they say that too many Mormons look and act like they came off an assembly line. But these young Mormon missionaries look that way on purpose.
GBH [addressing male and female missionaries]: You all look alike--white shirts, some of them a little wrinkled, ties. I look at you, I look at your faces, and think of your age, and I'm inclined to say, "Well, you're not much to look at, but you're all the Lord has." [GBH laughs.]
MW [voiceover; footage of missionaries working]: Many young Mormons leave college for 2 years, at their own expense, to be missionaries. Every day 50,000 of them go door to door in America and 150 other countries. Steve Young missed his missionary chance in college but...
[Steve Young interview]
SY: I will be a missionary in a remote village at some point.
MW: You think so really?
SY: Oh yeah, I think so. Even as a couple. My goal--and this is kind of my own little secret--but when I get married, just to head out and finish football and, and, and be a missionary around the world. Places where Steve Young--not that it's big really that many places--but places where they have no idea about football.
(Samuel here, I just wanted to interject that it appears that Steve Young is enjoying his pre and post game commentary job with ESPN and has yet to serve that mission and have nothing to do with football.)
[Hinckley interview]
MW: From 1830 to 1978, blacks could not become priests in the Mormon Church. Right?
GBH: That's correct.
MW: Why?
GBH: Because the leaders of the church at that time interpreted that doctrine that way. [cut]
MW: Church policy had it that blacks had the mark of Cain. Brigham Young said, "Cain slew his brother, and the Lord put a mark upon him, which is the flat nose and black skin."
GBH: It's behind us. Look, that's behind us. Don't worry about those little flicks of history.
MW: Skeptics will suggest, "Well, look, if we're going to expand, we can't keep the blacks out."
GBH: Pure speculation. [Laughs.]
[Hinckley interview]
GBH: We're reaching out across the world. [cut] We're not a weird people.
MW: A weird people?
GBH: Yes.
MW [voiceover; aerial footage of farmland, then of MW and GBH walking around Temple Square; then Orrin Hatch]: Another curiosity. The church owns more than 3000 acres in northwest Missouri where Mormons believe that Jesus will return for his second coming. Gordon Hinckley prefers not to talk about Jesus returning to Missouri, or about sacred undergarments. He says that those points miss the point. He wants to portray Mormons as mainstream, not extreme. And for that Hinckley has hired a Jewish-owned public relations firm. Mormons hiring Jews to help spread the word? Makes sense to Senator Orrin Hatch. But then he wears a mezuzah on a chain around his neck. A mezuzah is often put at the entrance to a Jewish home as a reminder of their faith.
I look forward to your comments,
Samuel the Utahnite
View all episodes
By Samuel the UtahniteThis is the classic interview, in its entirety, that Gordon B. Hinckley had with Mike Wallace, on 60 minutes, in 1996. In order to read the entire transcript, please visit the Mormon Truth Interviews website.
However, here are some of the highlights from this interview:
MW: No alcohol, no tobacco, no coffee, no tea, not even caffeinated soft drinks...
GBH: Right.
MW [voiceover; footage of GBH arriving on the dais of a meetinghouse, the chapel filled with missionaries]: The critics acknowledge they represent a tiny minority of Mormons. Still, they say that too many Mormons look and act like they came off an assembly line. But these young Mormon missionaries look that way on purpose.
GBH [addressing male and female missionaries]: You all look alike--white shirts, some of them a little wrinkled, ties. I look at you, I look at your faces, and think of your age, and I'm inclined to say, "Well, you're not much to look at, but you're all the Lord has." [GBH laughs.]
MW [voiceover; footage of missionaries working]: Many young Mormons leave college for 2 years, at their own expense, to be missionaries. Every day 50,000 of them go door to door in America and 150 other countries. Steve Young missed his missionary chance in college but...
[Steve Young interview]
SY: I will be a missionary in a remote village at some point.
MW: You think so really?
SY: Oh yeah, I think so. Even as a couple. My goal--and this is kind of my own little secret--but when I get married, just to head out and finish football and, and, and be a missionary around the world. Places where Steve Young--not that it's big really that many places--but places where they have no idea about football.
(Samuel here, I just wanted to interject that it appears that Steve Young is enjoying his pre and post game commentary job with ESPN and has yet to serve that mission and have nothing to do with football.)
[Hinckley interview]
MW: From 1830 to 1978, blacks could not become priests in the Mormon Church. Right?
GBH: That's correct.
MW: Why?
GBH: Because the leaders of the church at that time interpreted that doctrine that way. [cut]
MW: Church policy had it that blacks had the mark of Cain. Brigham Young said, "Cain slew his brother, and the Lord put a mark upon him, which is the flat nose and black skin."
GBH: It's behind us. Look, that's behind us. Don't worry about those little flicks of history.
MW: Skeptics will suggest, "Well, look, if we're going to expand, we can't keep the blacks out."
GBH: Pure speculation. [Laughs.]
[Hinckley interview]
GBH: We're reaching out across the world. [cut] We're not a weird people.
MW: A weird people?
GBH: Yes.
MW [voiceover; aerial footage of farmland, then of MW and GBH walking around Temple Square; then Orrin Hatch]: Another curiosity. The church owns more than 3000 acres in northwest Missouri where Mormons believe that Jesus will return for his second coming. Gordon Hinckley prefers not to talk about Jesus returning to Missouri, or about sacred undergarments. He says that those points miss the point. He wants to portray Mormons as mainstream, not extreme. And for that Hinckley has hired a Jewish-owned public relations firm. Mormons hiring Jews to help spread the word? Makes sense to Senator Orrin Hatch. But then he wears a mezuzah on a chain around his neck. A mezuzah is often put at the entrance to a Jewish home as a reminder of their faith.
I look forward to your comments,
Samuel the Utahnite