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I wouldn’t be comfortable sharing sexual problems with a woman, or confessing sexual misdeeds with her. I wonder if women/YW experience the same thing with confessing to a male Bishop. I’ve often maintained that bishops wear too many hats. And I’ve never agreed with their role as judge, jury and executioner on certain matters. Whether men or women..
LookingHard wrote:If you want to listen to DBMormon’s real interesting history of “no jobs left for them” list to men-to-boys-development-of-the-priesthood]
From the comments section of that podcast:
Quote:OK…that was an EXTREMLY informative pod-cast bill. I found myself starting to jot down notes. Some of the things that jumped out:
1. boys were NOT moved up the priesthood stages based on age, and at one time, more dignity seemed to be associated with Aaronic PH offices.
2. non-ordained boys COULD pass the sacrament at one time, and it didn’t invalidate the ordinance.
3. In 1933, earlier and later, women use to prepare the sacrament, including filling the water cups. THIS ABOUT BLOWS MY MIND!
4. Young women in one ward took care of washing and cleaning the sacrament sets, but when paper cups came about, they were — it seems — overtly precluded from this duty.
5. IN 1950, women went back to taking care of the linnens and so forth.
6. Boys as young as 10 years of age were ordained elders and given their endowments.
7. There didn’t seem to be a giant push for everyone to get the priesthood and be endowed.
I do know that I have read that YW could pass the sacrament since it doesn’t require the priesthood. However the CHI says that priesthood holders should pass – so this is policy but not doctrine.
All this convinces me that the absolutism of “revealed” ways of doing things is mere policy. And that it is a cultural phenomenon, not a doctrinal, or perhaps, not even an inspired one. SilentDawning wrote:All this convinces me that the absolutism of “revealed” ways of doing things is mere policy. And that it is a cultural phenomenon, not a doctrinal, or perhaps, not even an inspired one.
Good point SD. One of the best examples of why deacons passing the sacrament is not stictly doctrinal is that it hasn’t always been the case. (It was also interesting to note during all those years of the priesthood ban that some few black men had been ordained prior) We have examples from our history where the current pattern was not followed. It says in the Bible that a bishop should be the husband of one woman – pretty good argument for a doctrinal stance. Yet when we look at the culture of the times it makes me wonder. Women from that period were not sent to school. It would be culturally unheard of for a woman to lead a congregation. Paul seems to suggest that women should not speak or pray in church and yet we disregard those statements or interpret them to be saying that women should not
leadin church. Further strengthening the doctrinal underpinnings of our own practice with Paul’s cultural sexism. But it brings up a good point. If the very scriptures have antiquated cultural references and policies, where can we turn for pure unadulturated doctrine?
And a little child shall lead them. This is the key to any change – if an adult asks these questions, they’re an apostate who should be shut down, a wolf in sheep’s clothing. If it’s a child, their innocence protects them. It’s all a matter of timing. Plus, we hate adults. Holy Cow wrote:russdm wrote:How exactly would a female bishop feel about hearing about what guys/boys have done? Would she be able to stand/handle hearing all sorts of things? I think a female bishop would be good for a ward made up specifically to test how things can progress first, to determine whether it is something that a woman would be able to handle and wouldn’t leave her with issues.
I think being able to “handle” the stress of being a bishop, and hearing the issues that he hears, has a lot more to do with the person and their personality than it does with their gender. There are plenty of men who struggle with the calling, and others who do a great job. I believe it would be exactly the same with women. Some would struggle, some would be fantastic. I see the bishop’s calling as being very similar to a marriage and family therapist in many ways.
Look how many female counselors, therapists, and psychologists there are. I don’t see them crumbling from the pressure of their work.In my opinion, the success of any person in almost any calling or job has much more to do with their personality than their gender.
There are LOTS of female judges, too.hawkgrrrl wrote:And a little child shall lead them.This is the key to any change – if an adult asks these questions, they’re an apostate who should be shut down, a wolf in sheep’s clothing. If it’s a child, their innocence protects them. It’s all a matter of timing. Plus, we hate adults.
I was assigned to ride herd on a hard-to-handle child of an investigator. He sat through all the sacrament meeting preliminaries and the sacrament itself, and then leaned over to me and asked, “What do the girls do?”hawkgrrrl wrote:And a little child shall lead them.This is the key to any change – if an adult asks these questions, they’re an apostate who should be shut down, a wolf in sheep’s clothing. If it’s a child, their innocence protects them. It’s all a matter of timing. Plus, we hate adults.
There are some adults that hate kids, but they usually don’t last too long in our church. They get tired of the fact they can’t hear the speakers in sacrament meeting, and in the few times they do hear the speaker it is all about families with kids – so they get tired anyway.The wording from the CHI that was just mentioned by Roy is interesting, since the Church is VERY careful to choose its words properly. 1) If it says “should”, that means it does NOT say “must”. Thus, those who pass the sacrament, based on the handbook, are not required to be “priesthood holders”.
2) Elder Oaks said recently, explicitly, that endowed women are given Priesthood power in the temple and that they are authorized to use that Priesthood power when those who hold the proper keys choose to authorize that use. Thus, those with keys could authorize endowed women to pass the sacrament even if the handbook wording was read as a requirement, instead of how it actually is written.
It is fascinating that the foundation is in place currently to change this particular policy. I don’t think it will happen any time soon, but the potential certainly is there.
3) Male and female members already pass the sacrament in all congregations with both attending. The deacons simply facilitate that passing.
I know E. Oaks is not always a favorite among the online Mormon crowd, but he is very in favor of equal pay for women and getting rid of gender discrimination in the work place. It’s possible some of the Q15 don’t hold such egalitarian views (the Proclamation raises an eyebrow), but the Proc can be viewed as helping women by domesticating men. Mormon men are, on the whole, more “domesticated” than other conservative Christian men from what I can see. I would stack up their dish-doing and diaper-changing against any Evangelical man any day of the week. hawkgrrrl wrote:I know E. Oaks is not always a favorite among the online Mormon crowd, but he is very in favor of equal pay for women and getting rid of gender discrimination in the work place. It’s possible some of the Q15 don’t hold such egalitarian views (the Proclamation raises an eyebrow), but the Proc can be viewed as helping women by domesticating men. Mormon men are, on the whole, more “domesticated” than other conservative Christian men from what I can see. I would stack up their dish-doing and diaper-changing against any Evangelical man any day of the week.
Good points, Hawkgrrrl.
I agree that DHO is not a favorite of the online crowd, and he’s not a favorite of mine – but that doesn’t stop me recognizing the truths he does teach. I also see that his thinking evolves – his talks are not the same as they were 10 or 20 years ago and believe it or not he is now less black and white.
BTW, I don’t do the dishes and my kids are way beyond diaper age – but I do the laundry and most of the cooking.
according to my cousin who works for the church…it would be equal LOW pay. hawkgrrrl wrote:I know E. Oaks is not always a favorite among the online Mormon crowd, but he is very in favor of equal pay for women and getting rid of gender discrimination in the work place. It’s possible some of the Q15 don’t hold such egalitarian views (the Proclamation raises an eyebrow), but the Proc can be viewed as helping women by domesticating men. Mormon men are, on the whole, more “domesticated” than other conservative Christian men from what I can see. I would stack up their dish-doing and diaper-changing against any Evangelical man any day of the week.
I live in the south and there was a big deal about a movement called “Promise Keepers” that had Christian (mainly evangelical’s) saying they committed to do certain things. I looked at it and thought, “well, that would be a step down from what I am already doing.”An interesting book I read had a female as the primary character. She was next in line to rule the country but the constitution said that the country cannot have a queen, only kings. So the lawyers said, let’s have a female king then to get around the antiquated verbiage. The country had a female king. Perhaps if we can’t have a female bishop, let the RS president do all the bishop’s duties and don’t have a bishop. Or make the bishopric the RS pres, EQ pres, HP group leader.
There is zero reason a woman can’t be bishop other than tradition.
LookingHard wrote:hawkgrrrl wrote:I know E. Oaks is not always a favorite among the online Mormon crowd, but he is very in favor of equal pay for women and getting rid of gender discrimination in the work place. It’s possible some of the Q15 don’t hold such egalitarian views (the Proclamation raises an eyebrow), but the Proc can be viewed as helping women by domesticating men. Mormon men are, on the whole, more “domesticated” than other conservative Christian men from what I can see. I would stack up their dish-doing and diaper-changing against any Evangelical man any day of the week.
I live in the south and there was a big deal about a movement called “Promise Keepers” that had Christian (mainly evangelical’s) saying they committed to do certain things.I looked at it and thought, “well, that would be a step down from what I am already doing.”
LookingHard – I agree! When we lived in that area my husband’s friend invited him to a Promise Keepers event and we weren’t keen on the idea, partly for the reason you give.
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