Choir Notes

Off to the Rescue
From Music and the Spoken Word
Delivered By: Lloyd D. Newell • Program 4252

We live in difficult times. Trouble seems to visit every door. Some rally to the challenges placed before them; others struggle. These neighbors, friends, associates at work, family members, and acquaintances desperately need an outstretched arm, a kind word or gesture, a generous opportunity, or another chance. Are we willing to reach out to them, to come to their rescue?

Clinton Duffy is an example to us all. When he was appointed prison warden in San Quentin, California, in 1940, he dramatically transformed a prison culture that had been treating convicts like filthy animals. He outlawed corporal punishment and permanently closed the prison’s dungeon of dark stone cells. Where before prisoners had been fed out of buckets, Warden Duffy instituted a cafeteria, complete with a dietitian. He started a job training program and even established a prison newspaper for which he wrote a regular column. Eventually he gained so much respect from his prisoners that he was able to walk among them unarmed—much to the dismay of his staff.1

Why did he treat hardened criminals with such dignity? Because he firmly believed in the potential for good in every person—even those who have made bad choices and terrible mistakes.

A critic who knew of Warden Duffy’s effort to rehabilitate convicts said to him, "Don’t you know that leopards can’t change their spots?” Duffy replied, "You should know I don’t work with leopards. I work with men, and men change every day.”2

Those who have stumbled or lost their way in life, whose hopes and opportunities are lagging, need a hand up. That hand can be ours. It could be said of us as of the Good Shepherd, "Off to the rescue he hastens, bringing them back to the fold.”3 As the great religious leader Thomas S. Monson has reminded us, "There are feet to steady, hands to grasp, minds to encourage, hearts to inspire, and souls to save.”4

1 See "California: Mister San Quentin,” Time, Jan. 7, 1952, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,815769-1,00.html.

2 In Thomas S. Monson, in Conference Report, Apr. 2001, 64; or Ensign, May 2001, 49.

3 "Dear to the Heart of the Shepherd,” Hymns, no. 221.

4 In Conference Report, Apr. 2001, 63.