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It’s fine with me. I’m happy not to have three meetings to worry about on a Saturday. It’s been a long time since the Priesthood Session was any different any of the other sessions anyway. The only thing that will change is that there won’t be any talks saying “I now want to speak to the young holders of the Aaronic Priesthood…” which is generally followed by a fairly generic talk that those young holders probably aren’t listening to. Hope that doesn’t come across as too cynical but there are very few meetings in the LDS Church that I think are essential. I personally rather liked the live sessions. Some brethren really got into playing Satan (and in the old ceremony, the Protestant minister). It could be fun. It would be nice if they would keep one live session a week somewhere just for tradition’s sake but I suppose that’s “progress” for you. Don’t know anything about the murals as the SLC temple was not one I visited often but I’ve been around long enough to know that the Church for all its emphasis on its history isn’t really that great at preserving certain aspects of it. Anything that requires expensive maintenance (in my opinion) is bound to go eventually. I think this is why some lovely and interesting buildings with the Church system have been torn down or renovated beyond recognition. I generally enjoy Fast and Testimony meetings but that enjoyment has evolved over the years. I used to think how cute it was when little children (my own included) would get up and bear their testimony which usually sent along the lines “I want to bear my testimony. I know this Church is true. I know my Heavenly Father loves me. I love my family. Name of Jesus Christ Amen.” Perhaps it’s just me getting crotchety but I find little children’s testimonies tedious (unless they go “off script” then it’s cute again). We have an elderly gentleman in our ward who feels it his solemn duty to bear his testimony EVERY SINGLE FAST SUNDAY. That would be okay but his health has declined in recent years and 50% of the time he ends up rambling until his wife starts signaling him to sit down. It’s become the practice in the ward to time him to see how long he goes (I think 15 minutes is the record). I wouldn’t mind it if he would do it when there are obvious “lulls” in testimony bearing but no, he is the first one up there every single fast Sunday. :problem: But what do you do? It’s open mike night at Church and restricting one implies monitoring all and I’d rather listen to him meander verbally about the gospel than, heaven forbid, move to a policy where the bishopric calls on people to bear their testimonies. Most of the time, it’s sincere people bearing sincere testimonies. ( And to be fair, the elderly brother I referred to earlier does bear a very sincere testimony.)I also was glad to see this. My wife and daughter (both in public education) received their first round of the vaccine a couple of weeks ago. Their next one comes up in just a bit. No bad reactions (though an N of 2 is not generalizable). I appreciate the example set. I’m afraid my own mother (pushing 80) expressed reservation about the vaccine and I’m not sure if she’ll get it (though her health is pretty good considering her age). I hope to change her mind. If not me, hopefully, President Nelson changed her mind. I think we want to live in a world without risk and that world is gone forever. Actually, that world never existed. We take a risk just getting up in the morning. We take a risk staying in bed. I saw a good Tiktok (sorry don’t remember whose it was) about how we live in a world of probabilities and we want to live in a world of black and white. But this imperfect world can’t provide us absolute security or absolute answers. There are (a few) risks associated with the vaccine. A woman I know had the vaccine and did have a very bad reaction to it and had to be hospitalized. But that’s one of several hundred I know who have been vaccinated.
But if there is anything that Covid (and my own experience with it) has taught me is how precarious life is and always has been. We ignore that. I think we have to to just get through the day. But life can be taken from us at any moment. I’ve tried (not wholly successfully) to parlay that into an appreciate of individual moments that are good in my life. But it’s challenging. Eventually, the pandemic will end just because such things do. But life’s precarity will not, unfortunately.
When the vaccine becomes available generally, I’ll be taking it with my eyes open to the potential risk involved. Thankfully, the odds are in my favor…this time.
I can definitely relate. My oldest daughter had learning difficulties in school and problems relating to people socially. This followed her throughout her life and, as she reached her twenties, still struggling with these things, I mentally prepared myself for the possibility that she would live with us for the rest of her life. But then she met a nice young man who wasn’t too bothered by these things and she is now married with two children. I would never have believed that would happen ten years ago. She still struggles of course. She and her husband clash at times, due in part to some of her limitations. Her oldest boy has indications of the same problems. But her life is much richer than I thought it would be. I don’t know how much of that I can attribute to myself and her mother but I’m grateful that, whatever the influence, that she exceeded my expectations. The “tithing settlement” patter has begun in our ward. I’m not trying to avoid it but I’m not working too hard to get it done. My wife thinks it’s important so I shrug and say, “Okay, sign us up.” But she has a hard time remembering appointments and last year (because I wasn’t proactive) we scheduled two appointments that we missed. I think we finally did meet with the bishop but it always feels like such a meaningless exercise that I don’t even recall what we talked about. I’ve said before I’m not a big fan of tithing settlement. So we’ll see what happens this year. I’m grateful for the science and technology that has made dealing with this pandemic better than it would be without it. Technology has allowed many to keep jobs they would have lost had this happened 30 years ago. I’m grateful for my own health (which I’d kind of taken for granted) and for knowledge which allows to make the most of whatever amount of life I have left. I do feel for them as well. They’re just doing their best and trying to make good use of their time. I liked having them for dinner (which isn’t happening right now) and I tolerated the inevitable message that followed (they’re just doing their job). A month ago, they contacted us about coming over. (It was the third time in as many months). Thankfully (?), I had Covid and we were on quarantine. I felt rather guilty to feel grateful for the excuse. I live where everyone is Mormon (who wants to be). There’s honestly very little missionary work that we can do (reactivation is another story I guess) and I weary of their well-intentioned messages. It’s like hearing the same sacrament meeting talk over and over again. Okay, now I’m going to go and repent. Quote:I’ve found that on the internet everything seems hopelessly polarized, but when you find people who are actually willing to have a real, civil, face-to-face (before Covid) discussion on political issues there’s a lot of common ground. Individuals’ views are often much more nuanced than what you’d expect from what gets posted on social media.
I don’t do social media (beyond texting my family…is that even social media?) but I recently read an article about the current U.S. election issues and jumped down to the comments (I thought of an interesting comment to make…well, it was interesting to me anyway) and was deeply saddened but not surprised by what I found there. Nothing but vitriol, condescension and dogmatic condemnation and worse, people calling their fellow humans horrible names. And this was being carried out by individuals from both sides. In the end, I just didn’t bother. It was just so depressing. I have really worked hard this past year to try to remain optimistic in the face of some really terrible things that happened generally and personally. I know there is still great good in all humans and great good being done right now. It just doesn’t make good clickbait.
I’ve never felt like I fit easily into the the cultural structure of Mormonism. I enjoy attending church and Sunday School. I don’t mind going to other related meetings but I hate…hate…hate discussions of leadership. That’s when I feel the LDS Church is run by a bunch of successful businessmen who can’t seem to fathom that leadership is something THEY are interested in but not others. In fact, I wonder if our rather superficial exploration of doctrine via Sunday School etc. is due to that. Businessmen (forgive me if I paint them all inappropriately with the same brush) don’t really look at the processes they are using but rather the bottom line (that makes sense…in a business). But religion, in my opinion, is about understanding, spirituality, service, connection, worship and many other things that aren’t going to be measured as easily. I’ve been listening to a podcast by Richard Rohr, a Catholic priest with some very interesting ideas about God and religion, and it’s fascinating to listen to someone who is diving deep into an understanding of our relationship with God. Not to say that I agree with everything he says, but the process he uses seems so satisfying and refreshing. Of course, this is where the “fitting in” comes in. I’m fairly sure that the vast majority of members have little desire to engage in that kind of philosophical exploration. It’s not a criticism. It just reinforces the idea that what I’d like to see at Church is very different. I will say one thing: every once in a while, I’m asked to give a talk and I try hard (while staying within doctrinal lines) to do a somewhat deep dive into different issues. As much as I can anyway. I think my ward has come to realize that my talks don’t follow the same track and I think many people enjoy them (at least they tell me they do…maybe they’re just being polite). I imagine that there are a few other people like myself but it’s hard to find one another. Quote:The other thing I have learned is that unhappiness is part of the journey also. We need to allow ourselves to be sad at times, to be unhappy or down, to be negative, to doubt things and be cynical for periods of time. All that is realistic in the balance of the “middle way” that both things can exist. We should not seek perfection, but embrace imperfection and the spectrum of emotions we can have.
Nicely put, Heber13!
I really hadn’t referred to myself publicly as “Mormon” for a while before President Nelson’s change to the church nomenclature. I would usually say “member of the LDS Church” or “member of the Church of Jesus Christ etc.” (Of course, living in the “Mormon” belt, I didn’t have to explain myself all that often.) But I didn’t mind the term though I do understand why we might want to change it. The question is: what do I call myself now? Member of the Church of Christ? Christian? Latter-day Saint? I’m really not sure how to present my religious affiliation. I’m sure it’s been said somewhere (too lazy to look it up) but it’s clear that it’s a bit of challenge. Let’s face it: the name of the Church has always been a mouthful. No wonder we didn’t really mind a shorter version. “I’m a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
ah, heck, I’m a Mormon.”Apologies always work for me when I’ve been offended and hurt. But I know it’s not the same for everyone. A couple of my children struggle with some anger issues and when they are in the throes of an offense, apologizing has no effect. That’s a tough place to be. But the fact is that we live in such close quarters to one another (literally and figuratively) it can be really challenging to get along even when apologies are offered. And let’s face it, the current political climate does little to help this situation. I’ve included a quote that I like about Sigmund Freud, not because I’m a Freud fan necessarily but because it says something about modern life and its challenges.
Quote:Freud brought psychologists face to face with the whole range of human problems, with the central questions that had been treated by great thinkers, artists and writers from ancient times, but had been almost excluded from the arid abstractions of the academic schools—with problems of love and hate, of happiness and misery; with the turmoil of social discontent and violence, as well as the trifling errors and slips of every day existence; with the towering edifices of religious belief as well as the petty but tragic tensions of family life. —-L.S. Hearnshaw—-
Growing up, my parents NEVER apologized when they were in the wrong (though to be fair, it didn’t happen that often). So I was dumbfounded when one evening when I was 14, my father apologized to me after we had an altercation. He never really apologized again but I was so struck that when I had children of my own, my wife and I committed to apologizing to them when we had done the wrong thing. It just felt appropriate. I didn’t realize how important that was until two of my now adult children mentioned to me how much they appreciated our willingness to apologize to them when they were children. I think they were motivated when they mentioned this practice to some friends and those friends were amazed saying that their parents never apologized to them. Now I don’t want to make it sound like we’re Parents of the Decade by any stretch. Both my wife and I made plenty of mistakes and still have things we need to work on. And it was always uncomfortable to apologize to our kids as it felt like we were confessing our imperfections and failings. But I think now, in hindsight, that those apologies strengthened the relationship we had with our children and I don’t regret a single one.
I don’t pretend to have a particularly profound answer to that question but I do remember that Victor Frankl (author of Man’s Search for Meaning) didn’t believe that our ultimate quest should be for happiness but rather that, through our choice, we impose or discover some meaning from our lives. I’ve always really appreciated the following quote from Man’s Search for Meaning: Quote:Once, an elderly general practitioner consulted me because of his severe depression. He could not overcome the loss of his wife who had died two years before and whom he had loved above all else. Now, how can I help him? What should I tell him? Well, I refrained from telling him anything but instead confronted him with the question, “What would have happened, Doctor, if you had died first, and your wife would have had to survive you?” “Oh,” he said, “for her this would have been terrible; how she would have suffered!” Whereupon I replied, “You see, Doctor, such a suffering has been spared her, and it was you who have spared her this suffering — to be sure, at the price that now you have to survive and mourn her.” He said no word but shook my hand and calmly left my office. In some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.
