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Orson, you have a pretty grounded bishop, it sounds like. My brother is a bishop and is very much the same way. Honestly, while many people are frustrated that the church leaders “just don’t get it” or that TBMs are oblivious to some issues or historical details…I find it is unrealistic in our day and age of information flow that all leaders and members are completely ignorant of these issues.
Youth are smart, and like HGs kids, my kids have these questions and are aware of some things and ask some tough questions that I never was thinking about at their age, but it is because of the age we live in. Teenagers are aware of things, leaders are aware of things, general membership are aware of some things. Probably more so than what many of those who are struggling with their faith issue really give them credit for. And I think bishops are dealing with it more and more, so they have to be aware of some things.
To me, even the tone of the last conference showed to me that there are signs the large ship is turning. To me, some things are inevitable. I think Brian said it well in a post earlier, that the “truth claims” by themselves just don’t cut it anymore. Our kids demand better answers to some of these things to make sense of things.
Our ward just split, so I have a new bishop now. He called me in last week and wants to meet with me regularly, every other week or so. He is a kind man, but is really pounding on me hard that I need to be in the temple more often. So far from our talks, I like him and sustain him, but I don’t get the feeling he has a clue about what my faith looks like or how to process some things. I will have to tread lightly until I get a better read on him.
Heber13 wrote:He is a kind man, but is really pounding on me hard that I need to be in the temple more often.
Wow, I don’t think I would respond well to any sort of “pounding”
I tend to find ways to make my need for space/boundaries known. I’ll thank someone for their concern, and tell them I do everything in life with careful and prayerful consideration of counsel and my family’s needs etc. The last time I explained how I wouldn’t be able to accept a particular calling to a counselor of the BR I saw a truly shocked face. Apparently he didn’t take me for someone who would actually think about how new responsibilities would or wouldn’t fit into my life.
Orson wrote:“gee, I talk to him constantly – I wonder why He never mentioned it.”
Nice!
:thumbup: Hawkgrrrl, have you taken your kids to other churches or religious services? I brought my daughter to a buddhist temple with me, and she loved the experience. She went to mass with me, although that wasn’t as cool to her. I don’t know if I’m exposing her to too much…she seems to think a lot like I do…that other religions have so much good in them, which I’m glad to give her that experience…but now she doesn’t really want to attend YW ever. She’s 17, so that kinda goes along with 17yr olds…they think they are better than the youth program…but I wonder if I’ve exposed her to too much too fast.
How do you handle your kids’ ideas that maybe church isn’t a big deal to them?
They’ve been exposed to other religious stuff in other countries: Hinduism, Buddhism, Anglicanism, Catholicism, etc – mostly culturally, although we have seen some actual worship stuff with them. I think with my daughter, it’s got a lot to do with her personality. My husband just started reading scriptures with them at 9 each night this week while I was in Australia on business. I’d like her to know more what she’s talking about! Having said that, I think she actually knows more and has been exposed to more things than almost all of her same-age peers (even here where everyone gets exposed to other religions), but they just aren’t questioning sassy types. They are probably more indoctrinated at home. We are very sarcastic, questioning people, who say and do things that some Mormon families would be shocked at I suspect. We say what we think, not what we are supposed to say, or we change the way something is said to make it funny. We are more comfortable making jokes than bearing testimony. I have a hard time drawing a boundary around something and calling it “off limits” or “sacred.” There’s not a lot of superego going on in this house. As a case in point, the kids were having too much fun substituting the word “pants” randomly in the scriptures to really even follow what was being said. But they have read them 3 nights in a row. Tonight when she was off to a sleepover, he asked her if she minded if we read without her tonight. She said, “Nah, I don’t really care about reading scriptures anyway.” Neither of us are people who parent through guilt trips. I would try to persuade her with the benefits of reading them: know your religion, understand things better, they can provide you comfort in life – I just don’t think those are things that are persuasive to her even though they are to me.
How do parents get kids to find personal value in religion or in reading scriptures? I always enjoyed reading them from a mastery perspective so I would know them inside and out. I thought it was cool to be able to quote them and to use them to live my life. Maybe this is partly her age, too. Her brothers are more invested and interested.
Yesterday at church my daughter came up with a new one. She wanted to know why she can’t ever pass the sacrament. She says she always thought it would be cool to do that. Obviously I don’t have a good answer to that. She said she doesn’t like that she’s never going to be considered “worthy” to do that, and I said it’s got nothing to do with her worthiness. I resorted to the old fox and the grapes bit, that passing the sacrament is kind of a lame thing to envy. But really, I have no response to this. Thoughts, gentlemen?
I don’t think there’s a really good and satisfying answer to the difference in priesthood ordination for the sexes. If it were me, I would tell my daughter that the Church is just really slow on changing. Girls could pass the sacrament, but we need to wait and be patient for the hearts of people to change.
But that’s just me and how I would explain it. I don’t like making excuses for the Church anymore. I don’t think there’s really a great argument for women not exercising the “chapel” priesthood. I think we have ample room for this in our theology. It’s simply a cultural throwback sort of thing.
ibidI like Brian’s response too. My almost 8 year old will be baptized at the end of June, and wants to know more about the priesthood, so we’re going to have FHE on it. I hope she doesn’t ask the same question about why she can’t pass the sacrament. She might wonder. Tell her she can pass it, if she sits in the right place on the bench. 😆 I had a conversation about that topic with my wife a while ago, and I pointed out that the Deacons passing the sacrament is an artifical construct – since the actual wording is “administer”, which means “supervise”. Technically, for example, the Bishop could authorize the individuals who bless the bread and water to then hand the trays to the members sitting on the front row and have those members hand the trays back a row – repeated until everyone had partaken. No other person would have to “pass the sacrament” formally, as Deacons do now – and there would be nothing wrong whatsoever with that arrangement from a doctrinal standpoint. In fact, the Bishop could bless the sacrament and initiate the process himself while the deacons stood in the aisles and watched to make sure everyone received it without ever touching the trays – or the Priests could bless the sacrament, the members could walk up to the sacrament table, and the deacons could ensure that everyone had the chance to participate – or any other arrangement imaginable that included the bread and water being blessed and received.
That doesn’t address why males can supervise and females can’t, but it was eye-opening for my wife.
I sometimes use a bit of distraction to my kids when I can’t find good answers to directly answer their question. I have to be careful of this, because I don’t want them distrusting me that I just dodge the tough questions, but sometimes I find my daughter is also inquisitive, and asks a question like that, and if I can supply her with new facts and historical details not taught regularly at church, it satisfies her angst she has at the moment. I might, for example, tell my daughter that in the olden days of tabernacle meetings, deacons didn’t pass, but they would pass the same cup around to the whole tabernacle. Because it took so long, speakers would often speak for hours and hours. Imagine sitting on those uncomfortable hard benches with no A/C for 4 hours on a Sunday? They eventually had to change the practice for several reasons, including the non-members who sometimes would make mockery or sacrilege of the ceremony (would that be spitting in the cup??? … even if not spitting, i would for sure show up early to be in the first few seats rather than want to be in the last seats after everyone else backwashed into the cup…ewwww
:wtf: ).We don’t know why the girls can’t pass…but as Brian said, things change…and some changes are good (individual disposable cups of water
:thumbup: ) and some changes are long time coming and should have been changed long ago (think Blacks and the priesthood, LGBT and the priesthood, and women and the priesthood:thumbdown: ).Give her some “fun” facts to satisfy her smart little brain. You sound like you have smart kids who need more meat, unsatisfied with the milk they are given at church.
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