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SALT LAKE CITY — Sister Patricia Terry Holland, wife of Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, died Thursday after a brief hospitalization. She was 81.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced her death Thursday afternoon.
Sister Holland also served as a counselor in the Young Women General Presidency for the church.
The public is invited to attend Sister Holland's funeral services on July 28 at 11 a.m. in the Conference Center Theater in Salt Lake City. The service will also be broadcasted. There will not be a public viewing. Sister Holland will be buried in St. George.
Sister Holland grew up in Enterprise, Washington County, and moved to nearby St. George while she was in high school. She met Elder Holland at Dixie High and wrote to him while he served a mission for the church in England. They were married on June 7, 1963, after a five-year courtship and recently celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary.
Elder and Sister Holland have three children — Matthew, Mary Alice and David — and 13 grandchildren.
Sister Holland attended LDS Business College, graduated from Dixie College, and was trained in piano and voice at Juilliard in New York City.
"She literally put me through school while she continued to go and had walked away from a musical career to come home and marry me," Elder Holland said. "I can't overstate the incredible gift that a companion can give to another."
While Elder Holland was president of Brigham Young University beginning in 1980, he said she was "a mother to that whole campus."
Sister Holland served as Relief Society president four times, and was called as a counselor in the church's Young Women's General Presidency while continuing to fulfill her responsibilities as the wife of a university president.
"Her faith has always been as pure and powerful and strong as any person I have ever known," Elder Holland said of his wife.
She encouraged women of all ages to be a light and to teach the truth through her church service. In one address she spoke specifically about women's responsibilities.
"If your role or assignment is a supportive one — and many of us will often have that role — we must study and prepare ourselves enough to clearly state to the world that we are not apologizing for strengthening the home, but are rather pursuing our highest priorities, personally, socially and theologically. We will be noticed," Sister Holland said.
She wrote multiple books with messages for women in the church.
At a January devotional for young adults in St. George, Sister Holland encouraged members of the church to have faith, hope and charity.
"Please stop running to the point of exhaustion. Be quiet. Be still. Simplify. Be meek and lowly of heart and pray. I testify that miracles will come when we slow down, when we calm down and when we kneel down. All that the Father has can one day be yours. What a truly hopeful way to face your future," she said.
Her obituary is available on the church's website. A tribute, written by Sheri Dew, is available on LDSLiving.
