Reformation vs. Restoration vs. Revolution – and Me

I have come to understand myself well enough to know that I am not a revolutionary. The casualty rates of revolution are too high for me to take that route.

I also am not a Restorer. I don’t look back, naturally, and pine for the good old days; rather, when I look back, it is to learn from the past in order to learn critical lessons and, especially, avoid previous mistakes.

I am a Reformer – but I also am a philosopher. I focus on influencing hearts and minds – sometimes by policy execution but more naturally by moral persuasion.

I am not Jesus (a radical reformer), nor am I Joseph Smith (a revolutionary restorer). If I were to pick a famous person as my archetype, it would be someone more like Mother Theresa – trying to respect, serve, and unite everyone within my sphere of influence without challenging the leadership directly – even with knowledge of the mistakes and historical failures of the organizational leadership to live the ideal for which I aspire.

I am staying LDS because of the grand theology I find within Mormonism and the fact that I can’t be my best self, the person I desire to be, outside of it. It isn’t that I need to be LDS; it is that I am LDS – and, like Mother Theresa, it is important to me to stay and minister to those who need someone like me among them. I am them, and they are me – and that is important to me, even if so many on both sides of any issue think I am one of the others.