Tad R. Callister

General President of the Sunday School (April 5, 2014 – present)
Presidency of the Seventy (August 1, 2011 – April 5, 2014)
Second Quorum of the Seventy (April 5, 2008 – April 5, 2014)

General Conference Addresses

• April 2019 General Conference
  • The Atonement of Jesus Christ
    • “One reason it is so essential to understand the Savior’s Atonement and its infinite implications is that with increased understanding comes an increased desire to forgive ourselves and others.”
    • “Because of Christ’s Atonement, we are eligible to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost and its accompanying spiritual gifts. These gifts are attributes of godliness; therefore, each time we acquire a gift of the Spirit, we become more like God.”
    • “The Savior’s Atonement gives us life for death, “beauty for ashes,” healing for hurt, and perfection for weakness. It is heaven’s antidote to the obstacles and struggles of this world.”
• October 2014 General Conference
  • Parents: The Prime Gospel Teachers of Their Children
    • “As parents, we are to be the prime gospel teachers and examples for our children—not the bishop, the Sunday School, the Young Women or Young Men, but the parents. As their prime gospel teachers, we can teach them the power and reality of the Atonement—of their identity and divine destiny—and in so doing give them a rock foundation upon which to build. When all is said and done, the home is the ideal forum for teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ.”
    • “We might all ask ourselves: do our children receive our best spiritual, intellectual, and creative efforts, or do they receive our leftover time and talents, after we have given our all to our Church calling or professional pursuits? In the life to come, I do not know if titles such as bishop or Relief Society president will survive, but I do know that the titles of husband and wife, father and mother, will continue and be revered, worlds without end. That is one reason it is so important to honor our responsibilities as parents here on earth so we can prepare for those even greater, but similar, responsibilities in the life to come.”
• April 2013 General Conference
  •  The Power of the Priesthood in the Boy
    • “Inherent in every calling in this Church is the right to receive revelation. Hence, these deacons quorum presidents need to know they have the right to receive revelation to recommend their counselors, the right to receive revelation concerning rescue of the lost, and the right to receive revelation to train the quorum members in their duties.”
    • “I am thrilled when I hear the many stories of deacons quorum presidents who have caught the vision and occasionally are teaching all or part of the lesson in their quorum meetings. Several weeks ago I attended a deacons quorum class. A 12-year-old boy gave a 25-minute lesson on the Atonement. He commenced by asking his fellow deacons what they thought the Atonement was. Then he shared some meaningful scriptures and asked thoughtful questions, to which they responded. Realizing, however, there was more time than remaining lesson material, he had enough presence of mind and perhaps some forewarning from his father to ask the leaders who were present what questions they had been asked about the Atonement on their missions and their responses. He then concluded with his testimony. I listened in awe. I thought to myself, “I don’t recall ever giving a significant part of a lesson when I was an Aaronic Priesthood youth.” We can raise the bar and vision for these young men, and they will respond.”
• October 2011 General Conference
  • The Book of Mormon—a Book from God
    • “That is the genius of the Book of Mormon—there is no middle ground. It is either the word of God as professed, or it is a total fraud. This book does not merely claim to be a moral treatise or theological commentary or collection of insightful writings. It claims to be the word of God—every sentence, every verse, every page. Joseph Smith declared that an angel of God directed him to gold plates, which contained the writings of prophets in ancient America, and that he translated those plates by divine powers. If that story is true, then the Book of Mormon is holy scripture, just as it professes to be; if not, it is a sophisticated but, nonetheless, diabolical hoax.”
    • “C. S. Lewis spoke of a similar dilemma faced by someone who must choose whether to accept or reject the Savior’s divinity—where there is likewise no middle ground: “I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’ That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. … You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. … But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
    • “Only one interpretation of Christ’s doctrines survives the testimony of these two witnesses.”
    • “Together with the Bible, the Book of Mormon is an indispensable witness of the doctrines of Christ and His divinity.”
• October 2009 General Conference
  • Joseph Smith—Prophet of the Restoration
    • “First, he learned that God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, are two separate, distinct beings.”
    • “The second great truth Joseph Smith discovered was that the Father and the Son have glorified bodies of flesh and bones.”
    • “The third truth that Joseph Smith learned was that God still speaks to man today—that the heavens are not closed.”
    • “The fourth truth that Joseph Smith learned was that the full and complete Church of Jesus Christ was not then upon the earth. Of course there were good people and some components of the truth, but the Apostle Paul had anciently prophesied that the Second Coming of Christ would not come “except there come a falling away first.”
    • “Yes, Joseph Smith did see angels and visions—because he was the instrument in God’s hands to restore the same Church of Jesus Christ as existed in primitive times—all of its powers as well as all of its doctrines.”
    • “Through Joseph Smith have been restored all the powers, keys, teachings, and ordinances necessary for salvation and exaltation. You cannot go anywhere else in the world and get that. It is not to be found in any other church. It is not to be found in any philosophy of man or scientific digest or individual pilgrimage, however intellectual it may seem. Salvation is to be found in one place alone, as so designated by the Lord Himself when He said that this is “the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth” (D&C 1:30).”

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