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On Own Now wrote:
M. R. Ballard, April, 2012 GC:
Quote:“Husbands and wives, you should be equal partners in your marriage. Read often and understand the proclamation on the family and follow it. Avoid unrighteous dominion in any form. No one owns a spouse or children; God is the Father of us all and has extended to us the privilege of our own family, which was previously only His, to help us become more like Him. As His children we should learn at home to love God and to know that we can ask Him for the help we need. Everyone, married or single, can be happy and supportive within whatever family you may have.”
Yes, but then the family proclamation says husbands preside over the home. I know this is semantics… But it’s pretty important. Just like over or with.I had a huge struggle with garments being a trigger to my eating disorder. I don’t wear them and I’ve explained myself to my close friends. for everyone else I just try and wear clothes where you can’t tell if I’m wearing them it not. At first this gave me major anxiety, but honestly the more time goes by the better I feel about mu decision. Where I live there are a lot of single girls who didn’t serve missions or get married but have been through the temple. I guess it probably depends on the age group you are around too-I also have a lot of divorced friends. Hang in there! All I can say is be true to what is right for you. It is a great article! Refreshing to see the church say that equal partners make for a better marriage. One thing that I didn’t get though, was the paragraph about presiding. It said there was a misconception of the word, then described it in the traditional sense as far as church goes and then said husband and wife are equal. Am I missing something or did they not define what it actually means? I agree with Ann, but they are definitely heading in a good direction! vickzorz wrote:Personally, I am all for women’s ordination. It is very sad to me that our church has virtually no female leadership (160+ men to the 9 women in Primary, YW and RS). That’s even less representative than most Arab parliaments.
If you haven’t already, make sure you check out Feminist Mormon Housewives blog, they have some excellent posts on this topic.
Agreed. I love FMH, I’m a frequent there as well.Thanks guys, I am definitely not opposed to bending the rules or cultural norms in those ways, however, I don’t want to have to do that. I don’t want to have to bless my baby at home so I can hold them because my bishop thinks it isn’t appropriate. I don’t want to secretly give my children blessings and hide it from people. If I am a child of God, and the priesthood is the power of God on the earth, why wouldn’t I be able to use that power if I am worthy? The only rationale I have ever been able to come up with in my life for women not having the priesthood is that maybe men need it to have a standard to live up to. I never loved that thought because it is totally sexist, but in my TBM days that sat better than women aren’t leaders, don’t deserve it or are ‘too spiritual.’ Now that my faith has changed I don’t see a real reason why women don’t have it other than tradition. My husband and I watched this documentary tonight. It was so interesting! Thanks for sharing it. I think it’s almost impossible to not question your perceived promptings if you are a Mormon who has gone through a faith crisis. I do think that we can get answers to prayers and that we do when it’s important, but maybe most of the time our decisions are not really make it or break it type decisions. Maybe God is just letting us use our own internal ‘gods’ for those decisions. SamBee wrote:I think we are moving forward but at a snail’s pace and slower than society at large.
Agreed!For me when I think about the things that bother me as a woman in the church, a lot of the things have to do with the fact that women don’t have the priesthood. The reason I have been told that men preside is because they have the priesthood. That’s the reason they preside in the home and in the church. Women are unable to bless or baptize their children. Single mothers who have sick children that need blessings have to call someone else to come bless their children. Women can only be leaders in ‘auxiliaries’ of the church not in the non auxiliary areas. All of these things are because women don’t hold (or are not recognized as holding) the priesthood. And an unfair burden is put on men to support their families so they get to spend less time with their kids. They also have more church responsibility than women and that isn’t fair either. Dax wrote:interesting that you feel that the women here are “looking” for the slightest offense from men. It is not men but the way things are set up.
Thanks Dax, I totally agree with this. It is not men who are to blame or women who are to blame. It’s the culture, the problems it perpetuates and the people who support those problems. They may know or they may not know. Most of them probably don’t know, and don’t mean harm by it. If we don’t say anything, don’t raise awareness that there are problems that hurt people then we can’t expect anything to change.SamBee wrote:If the man knows hopefully that’s it over. If he does it again, then you have a problem. For now, forgive him his stupidity.
There are a lot of gender issues in the church and they’re not all female ones. For example, I was discussing last year how there’s nowhere a man can change his baby’s diaper in our chapel… the facility’s in the ladies’ toilet. It’s never crossed anyone’s mind apparently that a) we might one day have a single dad in or a widower, or that b) men look after babies too. (Several men often bring their babies into priesthood) Besides, I’m sure mothers would like a rest too.
SamBee, I don’t know why you are assuming I don’t forgive him. I took care of it when it happened and it’s done. I don’t expect to have a problem with this guy in the future.I really want to emphasize that feminism covers both men and women. What you describe is a feminist issue. It honestly bothers me personally just as much as anything else. Part of the reason I feel so strongly about feminism is that my dad works (and has for my whole life) 18 hour days and sleeps 3-4 hours a night. My mom has never really worked. I feel for my dad, he has such a difficult life and it honestly pains me to see him killing himself like that. I wish so much that my mom would help out, (her youngest kid is in high school) but she has bought into the idea that it is only my dad’s responsibility to provide a living. I’m not trying to talk badly about my mom. I just want to illistrate that feminism is about equality, which goes for both men and women.
SamBee, so you mean in talking to people, try to convince them that women have the priesthood already? That makes sense. I just came across a campaign for ordaining women. Exactly what you were just saying would be viewed as blashpemy. 😆 [
Admin note: There is another new thread that deals specifically with the campaign mentioned in this comment. The url is in that thread.] SamBee, I am sorry you have been treated like that. It is never good to get treated poorly by anyone-even if you don’t care that much. Here’s my take on things like this (and I’m an aggressive person, so that is part of it.) if I don’t tell someone that something is not ok, it is my own fault if it happens to me again. I’m also not helping to prevent that type of situation from happening to someone else. If someone makes an honest mistake that is fine-but I think it’s important to make them aware of it. Roy, thanks. All of that rings very true. I cringe every time I hear either of those words. They are sometimes used right after ‘husband and wife are equal’ like in the proclamation to the family. I will never understand how you can preside over something in equality.
