On page 7 of his February 19, 1981, letter to Eugene England, Bruce R. McConkie wrote the following (emphasis added):
This puts me in mind of Paul’s
statement: “There must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved
may be made manifest among you.” (1 Cor. 11:19.) I do not know all of the
providences of the Lord, but I do know that he permits false doctrine to be
taught in and out of the Church and that such teaching is part of the sifting
process of mortality. We will be judged by what we believe among other
things. If we believe false doctrine, we will be condemned. If that belief is
on basic and fundamental things, it will lead us astray and we will lose our
souls. This is why Nephi said: “And all those who preach false doctrines, . . .
wo, wo, wo be unto them, saith the Lord God Almighty, for they shall be thrust
down to hell!: (2 Ne. 28:15.) This clearly means that people who teach false
doctrine in the fundamental and basic things will lose their souls. The nature
and kind of being that God is, is one of these fundamentals. I repeat: Brigham
Young erred in some of his statements on the nature and kind of being that God
is and as to the position of Adam in the plan of salvation, but Brigham Young
also taught the truth in these fields on other occasions. And I repeat, that in
his instance, he was a great prophet and has gone on to eternal reward. What he
did is not a pattern for any of us. If we choose to believe and teach the false
portions of his doctrines, we are making an election that will damn us.
It should be perfectly evident
that under our system of church discipline, it would be anticipated that some
others besides Brigham Young would pick up some of his statements and echo
them. Those who did this, also on other occasions, taught accurately and
properly what the true doctrines of the gospel are. I do not get concerned when
a good and sound person who. On the over-all, is teaching the truth happens to
err on a particular point and say something in conflict with what he has said
himself on a previous occasion. We are all mortal. We are all fallible. We all
make mistakes. No single individual all the time is in tune with the Holy
Spirit, but I do get concerned when some person or group picks out false
statements and makes them the basis of their presentation and theology and thus
ends up having a false concept of the doctrine, which in reality, was not in
the mind of the person whose quotations they are using.