Matt, over the years, I've really come to love and admire Brigham Young, but there are just some things about him which just can be disconcerting or discomforting. Maybe it's something he says in a sermon. Let's talk about that. Well, he was a man of the frontier. And at that time, the frontier could be a pretty rough, pretty violent place. And at the same time, he grows up in a religious culture in which the preaching is oftentimes very over the top, very excessive, at times militant. Brigham Young once said his preaching was like raining pitchforks down on the people. And the intent was to get their attention, to call them to repentance, to help them improve their lives. But the effect could be pretty rough on people. At times, he would feel uncomfortable himself with what he had said, and he would regret the way that he had used violent rhetoric in his preaching. But that's very much an area in which he participates in this larger culture of his day. And, also, that was really part of the frontier story, as well. What other types of context impacted Brigham Young? Well, he's a complex figure on race, as with so many other things. At times, he seems to transcend the culture of his day. He says things like Q. Walker Lewis, who was a Black Latter-day Saint missionary--says he's one of the best elders in the Church. He says on a different occasion color doesn't matter. But other times, he says things that we now recognize as racist. He says things that bring in ideas about the status of Black people, that bring in ideas about interracial marriage from the larger culture of the day. One thing that's helped me to kind of think this through is that Brigham has this very close friend named Thomas Caine. He's a non-Mormon. He's an antislavery advocate. And I love his story, because he's willing to do things that are very personally courageous when it comes to opposing slavery. And yet by our standards he was racist. He very much opposed interracial marriage, interracial mixing. And to me that's really an example of how we can't just judge people by our standards. We have to understand the world that they lived in. And even a prophet, who is clearly led by revelation, yet he's a product of the times in which he lives. They're always going to be influenced by the larger culture, and yet they have access to revelation that allows them to see beyond that culture at times as well. So what about things that maybe Brigham Young holds up well on under modern standards? I think that his prophetic priorities, what he focused most on, stand up very well. His big mission, as he saw it, was to help the Latter-day Saints build a Zion community in which they would be of one heart and one mind, in which there would be righteousness, in which there would be no poor among them. And oftentimes we think of the 19th century as a time of greed, a time of callousness towards the poor. And there was a lot of that, but not from Brigham. He stands against that culture. What are some other things about Brigham Young that you think we ought to know? One thing that really impresses me about Brigham is how he could make other people feel valued. And so he would respond to letters from Saints. We have thousands of these letters. He would visit them in their homes when he was traveling. They would visit him. And he made them feel like their concerns were important, that they were important, that God loved them, that the prophet recognized what they were doing to build the kingdom. When there's a recognition that there's not enough good medical care for women in the community, he approves and supports some Latter-day Saint women going to the eastern United States to become doctors. This is very unusual for the time. And you maybe wouldn't expect that of Brigham Young-- Right. --Out in this frontier area, but it's something he really champions. Right. So, what about Brigham Young's family? So, Brigham lives in an era in which the Church is practicing plural marriage. And for most Americans he becomes what they know of as a polygamist. That's how he's best known in his day, for his very large family. But if you think about how it would be to manage a household of many wives, many children, how to create a culture in the household in which everyone feels important, in which everyone feels valued--it was a tremendous, tremendous challenge. But yet his children talk about him with such affection. They do. I mean, it's really remarkable how they felt very much individually connected to their father. Another thing that I've been really impressed with is his personal devotions. I remember reading an account of one observer, a family friend, who said when he was in the room and Brigham Young prayed, it was as if he had to open his eyes, because it was as if God was standing right there in the room with them, because Brigham Young had such a way of communicating through prayer. One of the things I've really appreciated about Brigham Young is his desire to improve himself and, in particular, to master his temper--something which he struggled with all of his life. Absolutely. I mean, Brigham understood that he had weaknesses, and he understood that his temper was one of them. And we all have weaknesses. Oh, absolutely. We hope those who come after us will evaluate us kindly and with perspective. Yeah. A British novelist once said, "The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there." And so when we're a historical traveler to the past, we have to attempt to understand that culture. That doesn't mean that we have to accept the bad things of that culture or that we can't condemn things in that culture, but we have to at least try to understand that culture.