Combined Relief Society and Young Women General Meetings

I just saw the announcement and was going to link to it. 🙂

I like the change. There really wasn’t any good reason to keep the separation among the women when there wasn’t the separation among the men – and I really like treating the young women like women in this way.

I was interested in the fact that during the first 10 years of the general women’s meeting, there only was one meeting – with everyone 12 and older. That changed in 1993, when the meetings were split into two different meetings. I like going back to the original format – and including all baptized female members.

I would love it if the Priesthood session changed to a male meeting and included all baptized male members – and I would appreciate it if this is the first move toward dropping the distinction of the men’s and women’s meetings as “holding the Priesthood”, which making it a meeting for all baptized male members would do. I don’t know if that will happen, but I think it would be a good change.

I was interested in the fact that during the first 10 years of the general women’s meeting, there only was one meeting – with everyone 12 and older. That changed in 1993, when the meetings were split into two different meetings. I like going back to the original format – and including all baptized female members.

I would love it if the Priesthood session changed to a male meeting and included all baptized male members – and I would appreciate it if this is the first move toward dropping the distinction of the men’s and women’s meetings as “holding the Priesthood”, which making it a meeting for all baptized male members would do. I don’t know if that will happen, but I think it would be a good change.

I remember when it was one meeting, too, and when they changed it. I thought one of the ideas of the change was to have fewer meetings for the sisters to feel like they had to attend. Frankly I don’t think a twice yearly meeting was too much to ask, and I’m not opposed to this change even though I no longer have a young daughter at home. I’m not sure of the logic of adding younger girls, I know girls are different from boys but my boys were never excitedly interested in going to priesthood session and often slept. I usually try to get my wife to watch it at home, but she likes going to the church and the sisters usually have a social/dinner of some sort before. On the other hand, I quite liked staying home and watching the priesthood session on BYUTV. The men in our ward don’t even do ice cream for the session anymore. I guess I wouldn’t care either way if younger boys came to priesthood.

This is one of those areas where a little transparency would be nice…just tell us why you did it. I know that’s wishful thinking, and may introduce more discord, but it would help me. It continues to appear that the brethren recognize the need for changes in gender roles in the church, but they just can’t let go of the residual cultural norms. Lowering the missionary age was one of those WTH! moments for me. I’m thinking, “You’re going to bring the age for sisters down that far and not just make it the same as the guys? Really?” I’m just left to speculate about why, and my speculations just lead me to believe that the brethren are really struggling to let go of outdated cultural ideas. I’ve seen it in my father’s generation in general. I have observed my uncles at the numerous family gatherings we’ve had over the years. The women all work in the kitchen together to prepare the dinner while the men watch or play sports, sit around and talk, etc. After dinner, the men return to what they were doing and the women clean up, do the dishes, put the food away, prepare dessert, etc. That’s just how it is. It’s always troubled me, and that’s why things are different in my home.

That was a bit of a rant, but I just fail to see why the meeting age restrictions need to differ at all from priesthood meeting. And now that the meetings are broadcast, it seems even sillier to me. I think an age restriction of 8 at the actual meeting houses or conference center makes sense from a reverence standpoint, but if I watch it at home there’s no reason my kids can’t listen in if they care. I also think it makes sense that the actual conference center seating is offered to only men or women based on the meeting, since the seating is limited and it would be silly to give a guy a seat for a meeting directed to the women or vice versa. Regardless, I watched the women’s broadcast on the couch with my wife this conference, and she watched priesthood meeting on the couch with me. It was wonderful to share that with each other and be able to discuss the things that we heard. I think I actually prefer that over being there in person.

I see what some of you are saying. I guess to me this sounded good because, during the ordain women thing the response the church gave to them as to why women couldn’t attend priesthood session was because it was for men and there was a parallel meeting for women. But it doesn’t take much to see how the woman’s meeting was not a parallel. So this seems like they are trying to fix some of those issues to make it more of a true parallel.

However, I am also unsure about why they are adding 8-11 year olds. I guess since it said they are having the primary presidency a part of it then that could explain it, but it does seem weird to me too. The other thing I wonder about is who will be speaking. It could be just the president of each organization (RS, YW, Primary). But the men’s meeting doesn’t go that way, so is it just another meeting where men will talk to women?

I’ve read on MormonDialogue that a GA spoke at a recent conference saying that this is paving the way for the men’s meeting to also change. By making women’s 8+ first that would allow the male meeting to be 8+ too.

Once it’s an 8+ meeting then it can’t be called a Priesthood meeting. It’s a step towards people not talking about “the priesthood” meaning “the men.”

So we’d have a general men’s meeting and a general women’s meeting, both every 6 months on the Saturday.

Now that would be an interesting change!

Source:

Based on some of the ways the recent GA visit for our Stake Conference was talking, and with news of this adjustment, I nearly EXPECT ‘Priesthood’ meeting to be renamed ‘General Men’s Meeting’, and likely include the primary boys 8+. Rather than just not being surprised if it does happen, to me I’d actually be surprised if it doesn’t happen.

The GA who visited said there is a strong concern with the confusion and misunderstanding that comes with the association of using the term “The Priesthood” to mean “The Men”, and there is a greater effort coming from SLC to acknowledge that ‘obtaining the Priesthood’ as mentioned in the Oath and Covenant is not the same as “Ordained to the Priesthood”. There will be a greater push to show that (and how) men and women access the Power of the Priesthood, and how that is different from a priesthood officer.

Hopefully, this can also begin to remove the confusing rhetoric of a priesthood officer being called a ‘priesthood holder’.

http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/62143-general-womens-meeting-and-what-about-8-11-year-old-boys/

Yeah, why do they need a separate meeting for men and women then? If it now includes all members 8 and older, then why separate by gender at all? They could drop them both and just do regular conference for everyone. But I do like the idea of changing how we talk and think about those who “hold” the priesthood. That would be great for that rhetoric to change.