An Interview with Gordon B. Hinkley

Interesting Quotes from Larry King Live Interview with Gordon B Hinkley.
for complete transcripts see: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0412/26/lkl.01.html

KING: Is it important to you that the president be as - for want of a better term - religious as he is? Does that comfort you that politics and religion somehow have come together in this administration?

HINCKLEY: The president of the United States? Yes. I'm glad to see that he is religious, that he does pray. I believe in prayer, in divine power. And I'm grateful that he's a prayerful man, yes. (talking about Bush)

KING: Do you like the president's idea of faith-based initiatives? Having various churches get involved in things that previously government was involved in?

HINCKLEY: Well, I think that the churches do a better job in many respects than the government does in various kinds of things. Extending aid, the helpfulness, and so on, yes.

KING: ... we were all people. But as the mores have changed - for example, I know that the Church is opposed to gay marriage.

HINCKLEY: Yes.

KING: Do you have an alternative? Do you like the idea of civil unions?

HINCKLEY: Well, we're not anti-gay. We are pro-family. Let me put it that way. And we love these people and try to work with them and help them. We know they have a problem. We want to help them solve that problem.

KING: A problem they caused, or they were born with?

HINCKLEY: I don't know. I'm not an expert on these things. I don't pretend to be an expert on these things. The fact is, they have a problem.

KING: Do you favor some sort of state union?

HINCKLEY: Well, we want to be very careful about that, because that - whatever may lead to gay marriage, we're not in favor of. We - many people don't get married. Goodness sakes alive. You know that. Many people who have to discipline themselves. If they transgress, they become subject to the discipline of the Church. But we try in every way that we know how to help them, to assist them, to bless their lives.

KING: You once said that you didn't like women working outside the house. Has that changed? The realities of economic life?

HINCKLEY: I think we're paying a price for it ...

KING: Explain.

HINCKLEY: ... in family life, in looking after children. The family across America, across the world, is under terrible stress. We all recognize it, I think. You see it. Latch-key children. Gangs in our cities. The absence of a mother in the home is a very serious thing, I think.

KING: But the absence also of strong financial help causes many, many families to require ...

HINCKLEY: That's ...

KING: ... both people to work.

HINCKLEY: That's true. That's very, very true. But I simply say this. Be careful. Do the very best you can. When all is said and done, the greatest satisfaction you'll have in this life as you grow old will be seeing your children grow in righteousness and faith and goodness as citizens of the society of which they are a part. There'll be no greater satisfaction than the satisfaction you'll gain from your family.