Envisioning BYU: BYU Speeches

Kristine Hansen was a professor of English and associate dean of Honors and General Education when she delivered this inspiring devotional on BYU’s aims. She reflected deeply and lucidly on each aim, which she compared to facets of a towering mountain, ultimately encouraging faculty, staff, and students to unite in their efforts to live the aims and ascend together as they help BYU fulfill its div...

Bruce C. Hafen was provost of Brigham Young University when he delivered this address. He spoke first about BYU as a distinctive institution that has serious dual allegiances to a “red world” of academics and a “blue world” of the Church. He then explored the challenges and blessings “of BYU’s exciting life in the land of the purple overlap”, where people take seriously both halves of the divine i...

Boyd K. Packer was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles when he delivered this address explaining how the BYU Board of Trustees makes decisions in unity. He also discussed threats on the horizon facing BYU and other religiously affiliated universities. Elder Packer spoke encouragingly of BYU’s future: in a field of predominantly secular universities, BYU can stand out by using the catalys...

Dallin H. Oaks was president of Brigham Young University when he delivered this seminal address to university employees. He discussed the vision of education set forth by the Lord and prophets in such revelations as the Olive Leaf, found in Doc- trine and Covenants 88, and President Spencer W. Kimball’s revelatory address “The Second Century of Brigham Young University.” President Oaks then elabor...

Justin Collings, associate dean and professor in the BYU Law School, delivered this devotional address on February 1, 2022. Collings encouraged BYU students to seek holiness, learning, rev- elation, the best gifts, Christlike exemplars, and, above all, the Savior Himself. Collings’s devotional touches on many of the themes in Envi- sioning BYU. As such, it provides a fitting preface for this volum...

Becoming BYU means balancing scholarship and discipleship, building covenant communities, and having the courage to be different. C. Shane Reese, president of Brigham Young University, delivered this address at his inauguration on September 19, 2023. You can access the talk here.   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

President Russell M. Nelson, an apostle at the time that he gave these touching remarks, recounted in this talk how the gospel had “provided the under-girding foundation” for his remarkable educational journey. His journey had taught him, among other things, that “all truth is part of the everlasting gospel” and that “when the laws of God are obeyed, wanted blessings will always result, not just m...

C. Terry Warner was a BYU professor of philosophy when this devotional address was given on November 11, 2008. You can access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

John S. Tanner was academic vice president when this address was delivered at the BYU Annual University Conference faculty session on August 26, 2008. You can access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

John S. Tanner was academic vice president when this address was delivered at the BYU University Conference faculty session on August 28, 2007. You can access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

BYU has weathered much in the struggle to determine its mission of blending the sacred and secular—which our students, like snow-white birds, need to fly. Boyd K. Packer was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when this BYU University Conference address was given on 29 August 1995. Access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for pr...

Bruce C. Hafen was the provost of Brigham Young University when this address was delivered at the BYU Annual University Conference on August 25, 1992. Access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Discovery, Titanic, BYU—all began with a dream. We must nail our colors to the mast to ensure the safety and success of our ship. Jeffrey R. Holland was president of Brigham Young University when this devotional address was given on September 10, 1985. You can access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Featuring excerpts from the dedicatory prayers given by Joseph Fielding Smith, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for the Provo Utah Temple (February 9, 1972) and by Dallin H. Oaks, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, for the Provo City Center Temple on March 20, 2016. Access them here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Spencer W. Kimball was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a member of the BYU Board of Trustees when he delivered this address to BYU faculty and staff on September 12, 1967. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Zina P. Young Williams Card, ladies matron of Brigham Young Academy, recorded these words in her personal papers: “Short Reminiscent Sketches of Karl G. Maeser,” unpublished typescript, undated. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Karl G. Maeser was completing his time as ­principal of the Brigham Young Academy when he gave this address on 4 January 1892. Access the talk here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an excerpt of a discourse delivered by John Taylor, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, on April 13, 1879, in Ephraim, Utah. Access the excerpt here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Elder Holland looks at where BYU is now and offers counsel about reaching for the university’s prophetic future. Access the talk here.  Jeffrey R. Holland, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, delivered this university conference address on August 23, 2021. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Though Elder Hafen was particularly addressing religious educators when he gave this speech, he chose to focus on the broader history and mission of BYU. Elder Hafen traced the history of why prophets have chosen to preserve a few Latter-day Saint colleges and universities—such as BYU and its sister institutions—in which religion can be integrated across the entire campus, rather than opt exclusiv...

In this university conference address, President Kevin J Worthen captured the essence of BYU’s mission and aims in a memorable two-word phrase: “inspiring learning.” The idea of inspiring learning quickly spread across campus, guiding educational initiatives and enabling student learning in new and expansive ways. Access the speech page here . See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Aims of a BYU Education builds upon the Mission of Brigham Young University. Focusing on student outcomes, it attempts to articulate the desired effect of a BYU education in the lives of students. The document appeared just as higher education was undergoing a fundamental paradigm shift from a “teaching paradigm” to a “learning paradigm.” The aims prepared the university to translate its educa...

When President Jeffrey R. Holland began his administration, the university did not have a formal mission statement. It was felt that BYU needed to set forth its mission publicly, clearly, succinctly, and boldly. President Holland briefly discussed writing that statement in a BYU devotional in 1981. He said that he “tried to read almost everything that had been said about BYU and then attempted to...

Spencer W. Kimball was president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when he gave this seminal address at the Founders Day commemoration on October 10, 1975—almost a hundred years to the day after the university’s founding. Speaking prophetically, President Kimball envisioned a remarkable destiny for BYU in its second century. His talk drew upon his visionary 1967 speech “Education...

Concerned about rising secularism in Church education, J. Reuben Clark Jr., first counselor in the First Presidency, gave this address to Church seminary and institute leaders at the BYU summer school in Aspen Grove. It has been called “the most influential address to seminary and institute teachers in the history of Church education.” While President Clark focused on seminary and institute teache...