Elder James O. Fantone addressed students at Brigham Young University–Idaho on Tuesday, urging them to rely on divine support when confronting significant personal challenges.
The General Authority Seventy delivered his remarks during a campus devotional held in the I-Center in Rexburg, Idaho. He framed life’s difficulties as spiritual battles that require faith rather than solely human effort.
Fantone opened by referencing the historic 1975 boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier in Manila, Philippines. He used the image of a heavyweight bout to describe his father’s early life struggles. Joe Fantone began smoking at age 12 and encountered alcohol by 18 before meeting missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that same year.
“It was a spiritual heavyweight bout against the heavy anchors of addiction and worldly influences,” Elder Fantone said regarding his father’s conversion, which led to baptism the following year.
The speaker shared how his own life intersected with that history. He married Sister Cynthia Caseres Uy in the Manila Philippines Temple on Aug. 23, 1994. Later, he faced professional instability after losing corporate sales jobs twice due to downsizing. The family also endured profound personal loss when their second child was diagnosed with a rare heart condition at two weeks old. The son underwent surgery at 18 months and passed away shortly afterward.
Fantone drew on teachings from former Church President Thomas S. Monson, who wrote about “Meeting Your Goliath” in the January 1987 issue of the Ensign. Monson identified traditional spiritual adversaries such as pride, envy, greed, fear, laziness, doubt, lust, selfishness, and an unquenchable thirst for alcohol.
Fantone updated that list for contemporary audiences. He pointed to pornography, the numbing addiction of social media, and the paralyzing grip of depression and anxiety as modern Goliaths facing young people today.
He concluded by reminding students that they do not face these battles alone. “The battle is the Lord’s,” he said.