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The scripture under the virtue category has been removed. Hooray for small and significant changes. http://www.sltrib.com/lifestyle/faith/4399443-155/lds-feminists-applaud-as-church-removes :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: This is indeed positive.Absolutely a positive, but I do fear that this change will not be communicated and like so many other things and just left to die a slow death – as in at least a generation. I have had a SP in the last 3 years get up and say in sacrament meeting, using vague words like “self-abuse”, that masturbation is still a sin next to murder. I don’t think that is what the church is currently teaching from HQ and has not for more than a decade, but I assume it is still going to take another generation or so to cease to exist. Same with contraception is a sin and oral sex is “unnatural” – never done away with explicitly. It does not seem to me it would be that hard in some sort of leadership meeting to be explicit when things have changed. For the church to come out and say that a scripture, in the most perfect book in the world, is wrong, is not going to happen anytime soon. It took 3 years since the first person publicly called them out on this verse to remove it from the YW program. One, the church does not want to look like it is bowing to outside pressure, which it most certainly is. So they just wait until nobody is looking, then make the change. Second, by their own emission, the church is evolutionary, not revolutionary. Look how long it took to disavow the racist explanations to the priesthood ban. Sheldon wrote:For the church to come out and say that a scripture, in the most perfect book in the world, is wrong, is not going to happen anytime soon. It took 3 years since the first person publicly called them out on this verse to remove it from the YW program. One, the church does not want to look like it is bowing to outside pressure, which it most certainly is. So they just wait until nobody is looking, then make the change. Second, by their own emission, the church is evolutionary, not revolutionary. Look how long it took to disavow the racist explanations to the priesthood ban.
I don’t think I’m expecting the church to say this or any part of the BoM is wrong, and I don’t think that’s really what Sr. Haglund was asking for. I think she wanted that scripture to not be used as an illustration of losing chastity/virtue in the YW program. Current teachings by church leaders do not indicate that forcible sex or sexual abuse deprives anyone of her honor, chastity, or virginity and I think pointing out that this scripture as used in that context is counter to current church teachings was the point. Elizabeth Smart has also become much more prominent and outspoken lately, and it’s hard for the church to put her forth as an example with that scripture in mind. I agree that the church is bowing to pressure, but it’s far from the first time they have done so – they are just generally slow about it.
FWIW, I have not heard leaders in my lifetime encouraging people to behead rich drunk guys so you can take something he has that you want.
Quote:Elizabeth Smart has also become much more prominent and outspoken lately, and it’s hard for the church to put her forth as an example with that scripture in mind.
http://nymag.com/thecut/2016/09/elizabeth-smart-is-speaking-out-against-the-mormon-church.html Quote:“They wait until nobody is looking.”
Hogwash. They made this change while everybody was looking. Thus, it made social media immediately.
Legitimate issues and complaints are one thing, and we spend a lot of time here talking about them, but charges like this can’t go unchallenged in this forum. We can’t take every positive step and make them negatives – not if we really are trying to find more peace and joy in our lives.
Sheldon wrote:One, the church does not want to look like it is bowing to outside pressure, which it most certainly is. So they just wait until nobody is looking, then make the change. Second, by their own emission, the church is evolutionary, not revolutionary. Look how long it took to disavow the racist explanations to the priesthood ban.
This may not fit the MO, but it sure seems to me that the norm for the church is the more that top church leaders are pushed, the more firm they resist. There is a limit where it starts really hurting. That is how I see the priesthood and temple ban on blacks. It was after most every US organization had stopped outright discrimination and the pressure was really on dealing with tax status of BYU and social pressure from other schools.That was bad enough, but I don’t think white parents were surprisingly having black children and those children having issues growing up in this culture. We do have that with the current situation with gay kids. I have a hard time just waiting that one out.
As much as I want faster change (and I do, especially in some areas), I am glad the Chruch is more evolutionary than revolutionary. Revolution causes massive destruction and death – always. I like the analogy of pruning according to the strength of the root, even as I believe we don’t prune aggressively enough, often enough.
Just something to consider.
Yes Ray. I agree. I think it was a podcast that I listened to a few weeks ago (or maybe it was a web page – or even this site!). But it was discussing how conservatives often want to preserve how things were done in the past with the assumption that there was wisdom and trial and error getting to that state. Liberals want to change things because they feel their is a better way to do things. As in so much of life, either taken to the extreme has issues. Making too much change is hard and can cause chaos while too little change prevents positive progress. So we need to be shooting for something in the middle. Lucky for me, that is exactly where all of my opinions are – so if everyone would just do what I think!! 
Old Timer wrote:Quote:“They wait until nobody is looking.”
Hogwash. They made this change while everybody was looking. Thus, it made social media immediately.
Legitimate issues and complaints are one thing, and we spend a lot of time here talking about them, but charges like this can’t go unchallenged in this forum. We can’t take every positive step and make them negatives – not if we really are trying to find more peace and joy in our lives.
What I meant by “They wait until nobody is looking” is that they waited a long time (three years) from when somebody called them out on it, then make the change when the uproar has subsided. If they had done it a few months after the original call out, it would have been obvious they were making the change because of what some lady said. They waited 3 years, then changed it.
I was not clear in my words, and could have chosen other words to get my point across. Curt is right, they did not try to hide the change.
Thanks for the clarification, Sheldon – and for your charity toward my too harsh response. I shouldn’t have used the word hogwash. I’m sorry. I was raised in the country where that word isn’t as harsh as it sounds, but I still shouldn’t have used it.
Sheldon, I had a similar feeling because the change is so obvious and important. Miracle of Forgiveness fell out of favor for putting forward many of these same wrong ideas about rape, but again it was just quietly set aside, never repudiated, which means that leaders who have it in their heads still preach it that way. But I think you’re wrong to say that it was done quietly 3.5 years (sorry to correct you, but it was closer to 3.5 than 3 years) after they were called out on it. I don’t think they made the change until two more recent things happened: 1) BYU’s rape scandal in which they absolutely blew it and are taking steps to fix things, and 2) Elizabeth Smart’s follow up work on the BYU scandal. While I as a blogger may say something and compile information and link to articles about their Title IX violations and how their honor code office is enabling rapists, I’m just some nobody with a wordpress account. Elizabeth Smart is America’s Sweetheart, a faithful LDS woman with an absolute following and whose harrowing experience has brought attention to the church, mostly for good. They can’t throw her under a bus. She’s got the ability to shed a light on things without being so easily dismissed.
hawkgrrrl wrote:Elizabeth Smart is America’s Sweetheart, a faithful LDS woman with an absolute following and whose harrowing experience has brought attention to the church, mostly for good. They can’t throw her under a bus. She’s got the ability to shed a light on things without being so easily dismissed.
Amen.I actually was in Park City a few months ago and went to church and she was there. I wanted to go tell her how much I appreciated her speaking out and that she really made a difference. But I figured she probably would rather be left alone – at least at church.
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