What would you like to hear addressed in General Conference?

General Conference????

I skip it. That’s 10 hours of sitting and well, I get bored and fall asleep.

Seriously, though, It would be nice to have it less stuffy and boring.

Yes – to those who are going to say “You get out of it what you put into it”, well then, I guess this session I will get nothing.

Financial transparency would be a great start.

I hear this all the time and I don’t understand why people want a church, which is a private entity, to give financial transparency.

I completely agree when it is a publicly held company to its stockholders or a government agency to its citizens, but not from a private entity. To me this is the same thing as me asking a person on the street, whom I may or may not know, for their personal financial records.

That is my libertarian coming out in saying that private entities (people and otherwise) have a right to their privacy.

Now that said, if you want to see a private (especially charity) entity’s finances before you donate money and they “choose” to not give it to you, then you do not need to donate money to that entity. If that makes sense. <=== My 2 cents on when to donate money. Enjoy!

Balance of work and family

The role of personal conscience as the filter through which all leadership advice must flow.

Respect for diversity

Elder Poelman’s “The church is not the gospel”.

More talks that address class

Accepting the doubter

Navigating a faith crisis

I like a lot of the ones SD listed. It would also be nice to hear encouragement to exhibit more Christlike behavior in our interactions with those that don’t believe the same or those who seek change or further revelation on matters that are important to them.

– Messages of hope & love.

– Being yourself vs. trying to be who you are not to fit in.

– Avoiding groupthink.

– Modesty, meaning living within our means and not being ostentatious.

– Finding ways not to succumb to pressure, not pressure of the big-bad-world, but how to avoid pressure from your fellow Saints who know no boundaries!

Here’s what I don’t want to hear at General Conference again:

– Any more incredibly dumb explanations of why women should be happy with the status quo and not seek more gender-integration and equality. I also don’t need to hear another word every again about gender essentialism. Ever.

– Black & white pronouncements and polemics. “It’s all true or it’s all false.”

– Veiled references to politics: homosexual rights, FoxNews-like diatribes about how the world is going to hell in a handbasket, anything that smacks of not appreciating our upper middle class privilege.

– Stuff that is simply not well researched or understood. (e.g. we say “thou” to show respect to God, when really “thou” is the familiar form. And we mostly say “thou” to sound like the KJV if we are being honest.)

– The word “supernal.”

It occurred to me that with the exception of the financial information, most of what’s mentioned has been addressed at one time or in one way or another. Embarrassing as it it to admit I’ve not heard them because it’s not been entertaining. Some speakers are just deadly dull even though their message may be Christ centered. I could never listen to Elder McConkie but I could Paul Dunn, Elder Hanks, Legrand Richards, and especially Hugh B. Brown. Sometimes I think it’s better to just read the talks than to have to take a chance on a poor presentation. I expect that everything we want is there, somewhere. The trick is finding it.

Pres. Uchtdorf as much as possible, and others channeling the messages he tends to give.