Beating the priesthood drum

Through my own eyes, I see an over-reliance on church-u-mony’s. Where it’s about being a good Mormon and not necessarily a good Christian or person.

I would love every Sacrament meeting, every Sunday School lesson, and every priesthood/Relief Society lesson to be focused on the Savior and the core principle of love. Alas, that will not happen.

I can’t say that I have noticed any drumming of the priesthood happening in my area. My meetings today were not particularly great, as a matter of fact. In SM there were three scheduled speakers, a very nervous first time Beehive (she did fine, actually, and did talk about love – but finished in less than 3 minutes); a middle aged single guy who drifts in and out of activity and spoke about “civility” (I think) and took just over five minutes; and an older sister who primarily read from the general handbook about how SM should be (really – oh the irony!). Since there were over 30 minutes left after talk 2, three missionaries (all new to the ward ) were asked to bear testimony. Speaker three still finished 10 minutes early – thankfully. I skipped SS, but priesthood was a doozy – missionary work by inviting people (basically everyone you know and meet, store clerks included, members and non-members) to the Hill Cumorah Pageant. I like pageant – but I’m not inviting the clerk at the convenience store (or anyone else for that matter). So perhaps a little Elder Oaks where I could have pointed out some overlooked points and witnessed that he said we all exercise someone else’s priesthood authority in our callings might have been a welcome change.

There has been a lot of focus recently on Priesthood, but also ancillary topics that seem like a response to what is going on such as Obedience and the necessity of Ordinances.

Our 5th Sunday lesson (today) was supposed to be about Social Media but we spent most of the time talking about Ordinances. It was not a very inspiring meeting for someone with my point of view.

And apologies, rant coming:

My biggest issue with the church is the idea that somehow God is a loving God, he is our Eternal Father and yet some infinitesimally super small group of people here on the earth will be saved because they have the Ordinances. And yes we can do work for the dead, but it really does seem like a very inefficient way to go about saving everyone who has ever lived on the earth. And then, people who didn’t have “the Gospel” here on Earth just have to say yes in the next life and they get a free pass for whatever happened on Earth, while those of us who were a part of the LDS Church who didn’t live perfectly to every ordinance will somehow not be eligible for exaltation. I just have a really hard time buying all that. If there is one path to it all, as a father I would give my kids an infinite number of opportunities to get there.

he said we all exercise someone else’s priesthood authority in our callings

Actually, DJ, he said that people exercise priesthood authority and access priesthood power when they do things authorized by someone with keys – NOT that they exercise that person’s authority. It’s similar to him saying that men and women BOTH receive the exact same priesthood authority and power in the temple – NOT that a wife uses her husband’s priesthood, like has been said in the past.

His exact words were:

When a woman—young or old—is set apart to preach the gospel as a full-time missionary, she is given priesthood authority to perform a priesthood function. The same is true when a woman is set apart to function as an officer or teacher in a Church organization under the direction of one who holds the keys of the priesthood. Whoever functions in an office or calling received from one who holds priesthood keys exercises priesthood authority in performing her or his assigned duties.

I understand this, I just didn’t articulate it very well.

Our ward has been discussing priesthood non-stop it seems. I’m sure it’s because of the combination of recent events and the youth lessons this month. I admit at first I was annoyed. I felt like this was just a type of retrenchment. But as the month went on, I found myself grateful.

I am in young women’s. We had 5 lessons on priesthood. I know the girls also discussed it in Sunday school. I feared lots of repetition, platitudes, and folk doctrine to explain gender differences in the church. And there was some of that. But there were also some real, interesting, meaty discussions. We had some great opportunities to be taught by the Lord. I feel like I learned something.

I’m grateful we got to spend a whole month on the priesthood. The vitriol right now tells me we are certainly divided on these issues. Obviously we have a lot to learn before we can become a “Zion people.” We (as a people) likely need to gain further truth about the roles of men and women, the priesthood, and how we interpret “all are alike unto God.” I have no idea whether or not this will include the ordination of women. But I feel certain there are things we don’t understand on these issues. I also think there is an established way to receive revelation, whether personally or as a church. And we aren’t going to recieve anything without lots of pondering, study, and prayer.

I feel like having so many chances to think about priesthood this month was a blessing. It gave us all the chance to learn more. As Kate Kelly pointed out, prophets won’t ask God something that isn’t “on their radar.” I felt like we as a people were given the chance to all have priesthood “on our radar” for a month. Maybe we can be led as a people, one-by-one. I was pleasantly surprised by the Holy Ghost this month, as I tried to approach this prayerfully.

SunbeltRed, cwald and I have been friends online for quite a while now, and we take gentle jabs at each other regularly. It’s cool. I got a good laugh from his comment – and he is right that some people might consider that statement as a sign I am on the road to apostasy. It’s not teaching or advocating in any way, so it doesn’t fit the recent statement from the FP and Q12, but there are some who still get their undies in a wad over a simple statement of belief.

Anyway, he wasn’t pointing that at you in any way, and it wasn’t criticism. Really, it’s cool. :thumbup:

Hey Ray, I hope I’m not betraying trust here, but I have talked to some family recently and they say that you are the only normal person on stay LDS website. You’re the only person keeping this site from being a full on anti Mormon website. I thought that was interesting and a nice accolades from my family.

That is all meant as a compliment, btw.

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