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I like that we are going back to scripture to clarify some things. Good changes, though I admit that it’ll feel weird to ME that a girl/woman/young woman will be sitting where our menfolk used to sit. I’m a traditionalist at heart.
Now…to change the rule for keeping the male new name a secret……here’s to hoping!
:thumbup: Wow!! Thanks for the update. This is great news! Definitely a big step in the right direction. I hope this is moving things closer to extending the priesthood to any member that desires to hold it. Wonderful! wonderful! “In the mouths of two or three witnesses” – can we have three witnesses?
😆 Looks like boys and girls as young as 8 can now act as witnesses. I somewhat dislike recently baptized children being lumped in with women. However, I am not entirely sure where else I might draw the line. The Aaronic office of a priest is required to perform the baptism, would the equivalent age be a good line in the sand? A baptized individual male or female that has at least reached the calendar year in which they will turn 16? That seems so arbitrary. Better I suppose to go with baptized members as young as 8. At least that might have some scriptural references to draw from if pressed. Mosiah 18:9 talks of baptized individuals standing as a “Witness of God”
D & C 20:37 lists as requirements for baptism that the individual “Witness before the church” that they have repented.
Doctrinally, there is a case to be made that 8 year old baptized members can act as witnesses.
:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: Hopefully the next step will be that mothers can hold babies during naming.
Is there the possibility that they can’t get enough men to come to the temple? Especially with the number of temples being built?
One of my daughters sent the announcement to our family text group. My wife and daughters are ecstatic. I’m not even remotely ecstatic about this as it points out just how ridiculous it was that it took us to 2019 to get there. Ardis did a great post in 2017 on the history of women as witnesses: http://www.keepapitchinin.org/2017/12/16/women-as-temple-witnesses-in-living-memory-what-i-know-and-what-i-dont-know/ Also, how am I supposed to be jazzed about being lumped in yet again with children? That’s where this gender essentialist garbage leads to: women are in the same category as children. Only men are full people.
These changes are all bittersweet for me in that I think the actual changes are good and needed. But, they seem to reinforce the notion that the original policy/stance was wrong or just something someone decided arbitrarily at one point, the people who were critical of it originally had legitimate criticisms (even though they were often criticized and marginalized themselves for making the criticism) and things were easier to change than were originally presented. It’s doubly frustrating when I point this out to people and am criticized for being too rigid or nitpicky and holding the Church to an unrealistic standard. So many of these cosmetic changes were recommended by Nylan McBaine in her Book Women at Church 10 years ago. I think they are good changes, but it rubs me the wrong way that they are rolled out as revelation.
I agree Hawkgrrrl. And yet, as my post above illustrates, where else would we draw the line? 18? Is that the universal demarcation of adulthood in all parts of the world? In some ways this is like the “let women pray in conference” movement in that in the end it seems rather silly that there was ever a prohibition at all.
However, in contrast to “let women pray”, this change will allow women to participate in an essential and recognizable way in specific ordinances for their family members and loved ones. That is still a very good thing at the end of the day.
P.S. Felix and I were writing at the same time.
Felixfabulous: I was thinking about this problem we progressives have with these changes, and I think it’s really the manner in which the announcements are made and received. Nobody’s giving a grown man a treat for pooping in the potty, but I feel like that’s what’s expected here. Here’s a better alternative. How about having a sense of context and proportion and some sense of humor. “We really couldn’t imagine any reason other than tradition that women were not included as witnesses. Unfortunately, in times past, these types of gender role distinctions often went unchallenged. There’s no doctrinal reason for it, and we are correcting it as a result.”
But instead, we are throwing children in with grown women as witnesses to baptisms (implying that women & children are one category yet again), and leaders make it out like this is the most wonderful momentous progress ever, which it really isn’t, and the membership is going to be all smuggity smug, “Those feminists will never be satisfied, even when Church leaders are doing what they ask for! Those pants-wearing man-haters should all be burned at the stake!”
One thing I’d like to see change: 10/1/2019
Person 1: “I think women should be allowed to be witnesses of ordinances.”
Person 2: “God is the arbiter of truth, not people disaffected from the church.”
10/2/2019
Person 2: “Isn’t it so beautiful that we received the revelation that women are allowed to be witnesses of ordinances.”
I suppose that phenomenon will always be with us. Add this to the list of examples of people advocating for something, being labeled a villain for doing so, and the suggestion being implemented later. So long as a leader or god gets the credit for the idea I guess it’s cool.
All I’m saying is that we could stand to omit the step where we label the villain for being out ahead of the leaders in the inspiration department.
Roy wrote:
I agree Hawkgrrrl. And yet, as my post above illustrates, where else would we draw the line? 18? Is that the universal demarcation of adulthood in all parts of the world?
Maybe draw the line at endowed as a start? I know that line is drawn for proxy sealings, but with the way this new policy was rolled out, women hitched a ride with children. Note that the announcement doesn’t include the word “woman” or “women.” Women are only implied. The announcement does explicitly reference children and youth though.
Making the policy exclusively about endowed women (not children or youth as of yet) would have brought women’s increased role to the forefront. As it stands, we all had to infer their increased role.
Quote:“As leaders in the Lord’s Church, we need to understand the eternal truths taught in the temple. We need to know the importance of and the difference between sacred covenants, ordinances and procedures.”
Using both historic and recent changes to temple ordinances and procedures to illustrate this point, President Nelson said that “any adjustments made to ordinances and/or procedures do not change the sacred nature of the covenants being made. Adjustments allow for covenants to be planted in the hearts of people living in different times and circumstances.”
I find this quote fascinating. It looks on the face of it to say that ordinances can be adjusted or changed without affecting the saving efficacy of the underlying covenant. This seems to go against many of the church teachings in the past about ordinances and apostacy. I am not complaining, mind you, just pointing out that thought on this matter appears to be evolving.
FINALLY!! I read the newsletter/email. I shouted to my empty apartment. I came here to post my shout.
I’ve wondered ever since I was 12 why only Priesthood holders could witness. Especially when we would have to wait for there to be enough witnesses. And then again when I first did sealings. I wondered why women couldn’t help. I literally couldn’t get any of my male family names sealed to their parents because we were operating with the bare minimum number of men in the room.
I get the problems with how it’s been announced. For me personally, I don’t mind it because it was a question I had as a youth equally as much as when I grew up. But I do understand that. I think it’s a situation, for me at least, where I will just be grateful for the good and let the bad alone.
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