(Photo courtesy of the official website of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).
The New York Times was one of the global publications that wrote about President Hinckley within a few hours of his passing. This part of its article made me smile:
During his tenure, Mr. Hinckley faced tough questions about whether the church had muzzled critical scholars and about the role of Mormons in the Mountain Meadows massacre in 1857, when a wagon train of emigrants crossing the Utah territory was attacked. Under Mr. Hinckley, a church magazine published an article about the event and a memorial was constructed at the massacre site.He would often disarm interrogators with peppery humor, once welcoming a reporter for The New Yorker magazine to his office with the greeting, “All writers should be put in a box and thrown in the sea.”
I think President Hinckley’s peppery humor was one of the reasons he was loved so much 
.
Yes, as Pres. Hinckley has shown that this is possible. I believe one of the reasons he was so loved by the younger generations (ahem! Ahem! tayo yun!) was because he connected with us and made people feel at ease while even giving the most serious of counsels.
Aside from his sense of humours, he was quite witty and knew how to charm an interviewer. I will never forget his remark during the 60 minutes interview when he was asked what he thought about the church being led by “old, white-haired men” to which he replied that “isn’t it great that you have these leaders who have aged in wisdom and maturity to lead the members”.
Rachel, that’s also my favorite part of the interview! Kakatuwa siya ano? Try to watch the interview with Sheri Dew (aired on byu.tv), ang dami mo pang malalaman dun na funny moments niya. It really IS possible to have clean, real fun!