Welding Families Forever

Two things really caught my attention in D&C 128:18.

First the term “welding” was used two times in reference to linking together generations. We usually think of this in terms of “sealing,” but I really like the term welding. It seems so much heavier and substantial. I envision a very thick chain being welded together which cannot be broken.

Second is “For we without them cannot be made perfect; neither can they without us be made perfect.” We need our families. They are what really matter in life. I feel blessed to live in a Church which puts so much emphasis on families.

This made me think of an experience my dad shared with me. After mom died, he would go visit her grave on Sundays before church. A man who lived in their neighborhood told him he wanted the sense of peace he could see in my dad. His wife had also passed away and he wanted what my dad had, so dad started teaching him about the plan of salvation and eternal families. One time while dad was visiting mom’s grave, he received a very strong impression that she was on the other side teaching this man’s wife the same things he was teaching this man.

Missionary work is happening among those who have passed on. They are at the mercy of our willingness to serve in the temple. I am blessed to serve in the temple. It gives me the opportunity and privilege of helping women there who are serving and those who have passed on.

Loving Those Who Have Strayed

In his talk Love and Law, Elder Oaks discusses how God’s love and His laws work together and not in contradiction to one another.

“The love of God does not supersede his laws and His commandments, and the effect of God’s laws and commandments does not diminish the purpose and effect of His love.”

Bad things can happen to good people and not nullify God’s love. Because of His love for us, He must allow people agency to choose—not only their actions but the consequences of those actions. If He were to stop every bad thing from happening, He wouldn’t have a person’s actions with which to hold them accountable to the law.

He gives great counsel as to how we should handle our loved ones who may make choices we don’t agree with.

In the midst of such stress, we must endure the reality that the straying of our loved ones will detract from our happiness, but it should not detract from our love for one another or our patient efforts to be united in understanding God’s love and God’s laws.

This really stood out to me. My daughter has many friends who have also left the church and fall under the LGBT umbrella. Most of them have parents who have disowned them, won’t talk to them, have kicked them out of their homes, and basically no longer support them. Exactly the opposite of how the Savior would treat them.

This breaks my heart. We have worked so hard to get our daughter to believe that we love her no matter what. She was convinced we would hate her because she chose to live a different way.

I have always been a Momma Bear when it comes to my girls and to their friends, who I love like my own. One of my hot buttons was hearing how parents would kick a daughter out of their home because she had gotten pregnant out of wedlock. I thought that at the moment when a child needed their parents love the most—they turned their backs on her. I told my daughter’s friends on several occasions that if that ever happened to them, they could come live with us.

No one has needed to take me up on that offer; however, that attitude was tested in my own home when my daughter left the church and again later told us she was pan sexual.

I just keep thinking of how the Savior would have me treat her. He would love her and support her, letting her know what He believed to be right and giving her an opportunity to come to Him, but loving her nonetheless.

This is how I am trying to love.

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Dallin H. Oaks, Love and Law, October 2009

The Purpose of Prophets: Case Study

Case Study: (in summation) Courtney walked out of Relief Society class after discussion from The Family: A Proclamation to the World and comments that children are best served when raised in a home with a mother and a father. It turns out that Courtney had a best friend growing up who was raised by two lesbians. She later texted Mariah "I believe, in God's eyes, love and kindness is what it's all about, not someone's sexuality. The church has a way to go, but I know that same-sex parenting is not wrong." The names were changed, but this was a real situation at BYU-Idaho.

We were asked how Mariah could reach out to Courtney.

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This is a very difficult situation.

My daughter has left the church. She identifies as pansexual, meaning that she isn’t limited by gender as to whom she may be attracted. Many of her friends are gay. Some of them also come from Mormon families.

One of the things that my daughter struggled with is that she can’t believe in a God who would make people feel this way and then not allow them to be married. She believes that if a person is gay, their spirit is gay – so my belief that all will be made right in the heavens doesn’t hold any weight to her.

She loves these people and can’t imagine that they are horrible, sinful, evil people, just because they want to have a loving relationship with someone of the same sex.

What I have come to learn is that you cannot change someone’s opinion about this. All we can do is love them.

As Elder Oaks states in As He Thinketh in His Heart, “I suggest that it may be preferable for our young people to refrain from arguing with their associates about such assertions or proposals.”

As to Mariah’s dilemma, she should approach Courtney with love and caring. Perhaps focusing on some of the following:

• We are all God’s children. God loves us all, no matter who we are or what we do. We know that families are central to the plan of happiness and that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God.
• We don’t understand why some people have same gender attraction. Nephi said: “I know that he loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things” (1 Ne. 11:17).
• While it may be true that her friend was brought up well in a same-sex parent home, that isn’t the standard that God wants us to strive for and isn’t the manner in which the heavens are ordered.
• Mostly Mariah should try to love and understand the feelings that Courtney is struggling with and remind her of her true identity and worth as a daughter of God.