In the College of Life Sciences, “we cultivate an environment that inspires learning and discovery bathed in the light of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. . . . We value scientific and spiritual truths and affirm that all truths are compatible.”1 As you graduate from our college, I hope you carry these ideals with you and that you are even now thinking about how you will maintain the integration of faith and science—of the religious and the professional—as you move forward in your lives.
A Medical Man
I want to tell you the true story of a young man who maintained this integration of the religious and the professional extraordinarily well. Like many of you, he was interested in both healthcare and scientific research. He grew up in Utah, raised by parents who were not active in and not interested in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But he was interested in the Church, and, when he was 16 years old, he was baptized.
He went to college, and he did very well—so well that he was admitted to medical school and graduated first in his class. That excellent performance secured his slot in an exclusive medical residency program at the University of Minnesota. There, he worked on the research team that invented and built the first heart-lung bypass machine, which was used to perform the world’s first open-heart surgery using a bypass machine in 1951.
Today, open-heart surgeries are commonly performed, and we don’t often stop to consider what a miracle that kind of surgery really is. Think for a minute about what a heart does: It pumps blood to the lungs to pick up fresh oxygen, and then it circulates that blood throughout the body to deliver oxygen and nutrients that keep cells, tissues, and organs functioning. Without a continuous supply of fresh oxygen, the brain and other organs would shut down within minutes.
The body’s perpetual need for oxygen presents a significant challenge when the heart itself requires surgical repair. The heart is in constant motion, making it extremely difficult for doctors to perform a surgery with precision. Cutting an incision into a beating heart could cause a person to rapidly bleed out; but stopping the beating of the heart to perform surgery on it would leave the patient’s organs without oxygen for too long, causing irreparable damage.
The heart-lung bypass machine that this young man helped invent solved this problem. It rerouted a patient’s blood flow to a machine outside the body, where it could be oxygenated and then pumped back into the body to provide oxygen to the tissues. With that machine doing the work of both the heart and the lungs, the beating of the heart could be stopped long enough to do surgical repairs on the organ without depriving the rest of the body of oxygen. This incredible breakthrough literally changed the world!
A Disciple-Surgeon
This young man earned a PhD in addition to his doctorate in medicine degree while also spending two years in the US Army Medical Corps and another year at Harvard’s Massachusetts General Hospital. He then returned to his home state and became a research professor of surgery at the University of Utah School of Medicine. He built his own heart-lung bypass machine soon after he arrived back in Utah, and he performed the first open-heart surgery west of the Mississippi. Shortly thereafter, he did one of the first successful open-heart surgeries on a child.
Over the next several years, he became more well-known and in demand. He performed thousands of surgeries and trained heart surgeons all around the globe—including in China, Africa, India, Greece, Italy, and throughout Latin America. He became head of a prestigious thoracic surgery residency program at the University of Utah School of Medicine. He was chosen by his colleagues to serve as president of the Society for Vascular Surgery, director of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery, chairman of the Council on Cardiovascular Surgery of the American Heart Association, and president of the Utah State Medical Association. His career was on the fast track!
During his demanding surgical training and while building his career and reputation as a cardiac surgeon and a pioneer of new surgical techniques, he was also raising a family. Throughout this foundational and very demanding period of his career, he served continuously in whatever church callings he received. In addition to his conventional church callings, he also served as a missionary on Temple Square giving tours every Thursday afternoon for the first ten years after he arrived back in Utah. In his forties and fifties, he served as the Sunday School general president and as a regional representative.
In April of 1984, as a 59-year-old at the height of an illustrious career, he was called to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Like Peter, James, and John, who left their fishing boats to become fishers of men, this man followed a call from the Savior Jesus Christ.
Who am I talking about? His name is Russell M. Nelson, current president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
A Faithful Heart
President Nelson is a perfect example of someone who excelled in his profession. He used his medical and scientific training to help so many people while also making his faith and religion a central and inseparable part of his life. A story that President Nelson shared in general conference some years ago illustrates this powerfully. He talked about an experience he had with a stake patriarch from southern Utah in the earliest days of open-heart surgery.
This man came to President Nelson because he needed surgical repair of a damaged heart valve. Unfortunately, a thorough evaluation revealed that the man had not one but two damaged valves, and while one was repairable, the other was not. Repairing one valve but not the other would not be sufficient to reverse the man’s heart failure, so surgery was not advised.
In desperation, the man pleaded, “Dr. Nelson, I have prayed for help and have been directed to you. The Lord will not reveal to me how to repair that second valve, but He can reveal it to you. Your mind is so prepared. If you will operate upon me, the Lord will make it known to you what to do. Please perform the operation that I need and pray for the help that you need.”2
After praying with this man, President Nelson agreed to perform the surgery. He prayed fervently for guidance in the days leading up to it, but when the day of the surgery arrived, he still did not know what to do for that leaking tricuspid valve. The surgery began, and he successfully relieved the obstruction of the first valve. He then exposed the second valve and found it to be intact but so badly dilated it could no longer function.
While he was examining that valve, a message was strongly impressed upon his mind: “Reduce the circumference of the ring.”3 As he pondered this message, a picture came vividly to his mind showing how stitches could be placed to make a pleat here and a tuck there to reduce the ring. President Nelson said he still remembers that mental image, “complete with dotted lines where sutures should be placed.”4 He completed the repair according to the image diagrammed in his mind, and it was effective! Not only did that patient recover, but thanks to the combination of President Nelson’s expertise and divine inspiration, a new treatment became possible for many other people with similar heart valve problems.
This is just one example of how President Nelson fully integrated his faith into his scientific and medical work. He spoke again about the importance of this integration in another talk when he said:
Danger lurks when we try to divide ourselves with expressions such as “my private life” or even “my best behavior.” If one tries to segment his or her life into such separate compartments, one will never rise to the full stature of one’s personal integrity.5
What a powerful lesson that is so important for all of us. If we integrate our faith into everything we do, we can be filled with God’s power. If we divide our spiritual from our professional selves, we weaken ourselves. Graduates, I hope you will go forward with a firm commitment to integrate faith into every aspect of your lives. As you do, you will receive strength and power beyond your own to accomplish the work God needs you to do.
I bear witness of that in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
President Russell M. Nelson passed away on September 27, 2025, shortly before this magazine was printed. We dedicate this article to his memory. May we all learn from his life and live by his example of faithful and dedicated service.
2. Russell M. Nelson, “Sweet Power of Prayer,” Ensign, May 2003.
3. Nelson, “Sweet Power of Prayer.”
4. Nelson, “Sweet Power of Prayer.”
5. Russell M. Nelson, “Let Your Faith Show,” Ensign, April 2014.