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So … I shoot my mouth off all the time here about being calm at church, finding peace, not letting things bother you, and all that. I haven’t been to church in a couple weeks due to traveling and other stuff, so I finally made it back today. LOL. They got my goat today. I was doing so good until EQ meeting.
SM was a little boring, and the talks might have gotten on my nerves, but I bring my quiet activity books and Tic Tacs (instead of cheerios) with me so as not to become a disruptive little boy that has to take out to the lobby to sit in a chair
😆 
GD class was pretty good too, but I made a classic mistake and blurted something out. The GD teacher is really cool, and I like him. We talk sometimes in church. I don’t know him super close, but he seems really knowledgeable about church. I was chit chatting with him about his lesson about Jonah and the whale. He started saying “I wonder if it could have been a really big catfish…” and talking about gills and oxygen … he sort of lost me, but I am familiar with that sort of attempt to make it literal. I made the big mistake of saying “well, not to be too edgy, but it also might have just been a story. It’s 3000 years old, and maybe Jonah preached in Nineveh and the fish thing was sort of tacked on later.”
😯 He got uncomfortable and said “well I just take it as it’s written.” Realizing my error in assuming he was less literal, I quickly brushed it off as cool too that way.So my big downfall was EQ. It was “teaching for the times” Sunday and a talk from Russell M Ballard about the divine role of women. This whole topic and theme is a HUGE problem and stress, and is very sensitive for me in my personal relationship of continuing to go to church and keeping peace with my wife. It also hurts me deeply with my daughters no longer wanting to participate in YW because “all they ever talk about is getting married in the temple and being a good wife for a righteous priesthood holder. Not only is that weird, but I am not interested in that right now in my life.” (quoting my daughter’s criticism).
I got all agitated because I read/heard a quote from Joseph F. Smith wrong that was used in the talk. I was in error, but that was because I was so agitated about the topic, it was literally coloring my perception. To be fair though, when I blurted out my complaint, a couple other guys around me commented they had to re-read it several times because they had the same initial meaning.
I opened my big mouth and said “quotes like that, and topics like this are the reason women in
MYlife don’t come to church. It tears me apart. When this is the message from the highest levels of leadership, it turns off the switch and all the other good the church does is dismissed. Women have a “divine” and pre-ordained role to nurture, sure. But don’t they have any divine abilities other than that? Can’t they also be great leaders, great thinkers, created important discourses on the gospel, and achieve other great things in business and society?” ugh … I was all flustered too. So it was not a great day for me. I am still feeling agitated about it. And worse, I misunderstood the meaning of the quote which I thought said something about women not leading, but should be led in all virtuous things … *paraphrasing* (by their husbands, I assumed). That was not it. I went home and looked up the full text and Joseph F. Smith was actually being pretty cool and talking about women leading the world with their organizational skills from the Relief Society model. So I feel like a bit of a jerk too for letting myself get upset. Well … the rest of the talk really was a little patronizing and stereotypical, but that quote was what really set me off on the wrong track.
FWIW, I still have days like this too. I wanted to confess that.
It all took me by surprise because I was really enjoying being at church today.
I’ve had those moments, too, Brian – when something jumped up and slapped me and I reacted badly. Granted, it happens rarely now for me, but it still does occasionally. Fwiw, have you read the new post about the RS General Broadcast? Pres. Monson’s words about women in his talk were absolutely wonderful to read.
I blew it in HP Group a while ago. They were talking about the Book of Mormon being the fulness of the gospel. And I asked for input on how it can contain the fulness of the gospel when it doesn’t go into the temple. I said – “I have trouble understanding how it can contain the fulness of the gospel when it doesn’t contain the fulness of the gospel?” The teacher looked all uncomfortable and said “That’s not in the lesson”. Everyone else looked around uncomfortably because I guess it came out as a challenge rather than an earnest attempt at sparking interesting discussion.
And then, there was the time a guy from the facilities group came to our chapel to do an assessment of our capacity utilization — probably because everyone is complaining that the building is too small for the 3 units that meet there. We were all crammed into a small room in HP Group, and someone said — we’re over capacity in this room”. I piped up and said “Yea, we’re at the point we can’t serve alcohol because we’ve exceeded the room capacity” — citing a local bylaw that everyone is familiar with.
I thought it would be funny to everyone who KNOWS that serving alcohol is the most outlandish activity any HP Group could be involved in — especially within the Church building. That my humor was an attempt at ridiculous humor, and also poking a bit of fun at ourselves. Whoops. The facilities guy’s face lit up for a second as he understood the amusement, and then he FELT the uncomfortableness in the room — including a severe lack of approval from our ex-Bishop and former Stake Presidency Counselor and others — and then he got serious and looked disapproving. I felt REALLY DUMB afterwards. My wife asked me how I could be so uncooth when I bounced the experience off her.
And then, there was the time I was teaching the priests about the Word of Wisdom, mentioned the evils of drug use and said “you don’t want to be a HIGH priest”. The parents scowled at me (it was a home teaching visit and I went for the cheap laugh when it came to me). I think my tendency to make light of things that I don’t agree with, or don’t enjoy in the Church sometimes rears its ugly head.
I think that’s why I have to devote time to thinking positively about those aspects of my Church experience that I disagree with so I’m more culturally sensitive and less offensive to people when I speak on impulse.
However, I will no doubt make mistakes, and will have to forgive myself.
I’m going to think of ways to use those statements at some point, SD – the ones about serving alcohol and HIGH priests. 😆 I had to do a lot of tongue biting myself today! Here are three instances… 1) lady expressed how much more blessed she feels she is because she came from “good pioneer stock”
2) sickly elderly lady shared with us all that her patriarchal blessing states that she will not die until after the Lord returns and there is peace across the world.
3) well loved HP leader expressed that the only way to experience and achieve unity within the church is to all conform together in our interpretations of gospel principles.
On a happier note… today was the primary program. My kids all sang there little hearts out. My 9 year old son wrote and gave a great talk using many basketball analogies, my 7 year old daughter melt my heart with her big smile and pigtails as she presented a scripture, and my 4 year old son got to write his own parts answering two questions. He enthusiastically exclaimed that… “I know Heavenly Father loves me because he made me so awesome!” and… “I can follow Jesus’ example by loving everyone in the whole wide world, even mean people!” Love those kiddos! I am obviously doing something right.
flowerdrops wrote:I had to do a lot of tongue biting myself today! Here are three instances…
“1) lady expressed how much more blessed she feels she is because she came from “good pioneer stock””
Ouch! I’m thankful we’re all rag tag converts down in my neck of the woods — I keep hearing about this Church arrogance. My in laws live in an area where if you’re not a descendent of Joseph Smith you’re in the out-group.
“3) well loved HP leader expressed that the only way to experience and achieve unity within the church is to all conform together in our interpretations of gospel principles. “
Ouch! That’s a recipe for people feeling on the fringe in your ward if that attitude prevails.
Quote:On a happier note… today was the primary program. My kids all sang there little hearts out. My 9 year old son wrote and gave a great talk using many basketball analogies, my 7 year old daughter melt my heart with her big smile and pigtails as she presented a scripture, and my 4 year old son got to write his own parts answering two questions. He enthusiastically exclaimed that… “Heavenly Father loves me because he made me so awesome!” and… “I can follow Jesus’ example by loving everyone in the whole wide world, even mean people!” Love those kiddos! I am obviously doing something right.
You are, and I love those experiences.
SilentDawning wrote:You are, and I love those experiences.
Thank you
Wow! I missed church today (I’m writing this from a hotel room near Minneapolis), and now I’m wondering what I missed. Brian, you’re one cool customer and if a guy like you can crack, I’m afraid there’s no hope for the rest of us.
SD, I’ve earned a reputation in my HP group as the court jester. Occasionally I’ll throw out a serious comment, but people know I’m mostly there to provide comic relief. Humorless people will always be with us, unfortunately.
My wife attended the General Relief Society broadcast last night, and she also liked Pres. Monson’s talk.
I prefer to think that Jonah was swallowed by a submarine, but then again I’ve read too much Von Daniken. 😆 SamBee wrote:I prefer to think that Jonah was swallowed by a submarine, but then again I’ve read too much Von Daniken.
😆 YES! I’ve been arguing this for years. Pretty well this was the catalyst that got me “kicked” out of the family. Finally somebody else understands the scriptures! ;
Brian – thanks for this post, as this sunday was probably the worst sunday I’ve had in a year. I came home very discouraged and wondering if I was going to be able to continue. SS meeting – the teacher and some members go off on the whole earrings and tattoo policy. We have a new convert that has several earrings, and eyebrow earring and an awesome tattoo of “footsteps in the sand” representing the poem about jesus carrying us etc. By the time it was over she was in tears. I wasn’t in there, but I heard about and I did talk with her afterwards.
EQ meeting. I’m giving the lesson. It goes reasonable well, but I make a few comments about putting families first before church callings, and I quote the world wide leadership training manual that states “sometimes to magnify a calling, we need to do less.” etc.
Anyway – after church I get questioned by the HC and BP councilor why I made those comments. Then I get put through the ringer why I’m wearing a blue shirt. I’m told that I’m just being rebellious and have a bad attitude. I explain the whole “converts and visitors feel uncomfortable with all the leaders wearing white shirts and suits — politician/lawyer look” so I’m just trying to make myself accessible and make them feel more comfortable coming to church, and that it’s really not a commandment, just a cultural tradition that I don’t care to follow. He shot back that if I want to be part of the church I need to just accept the word of the prophets and conform to the culture and quit being childish.
The Councilor LITERALLY started yelling at me on the church steps. We had SEVERAL part member families there visiting, who are in T-shirts and jeans, and he is yelling at me about my blue shirt. Then he starts in on “Elder Oaks says we need to address our leaders with their proper title, president etc. and that I need to stop calling folks by their first name. Here is where I really messed up Brian. I said, “Well, I guess I just don’t agree with Elder Oaks.” S@#%^$ hit the fan.
I asked him twice to lower his voice and calm down. Finally I just walked away.
cwald wrote:SamBee wrote:I prefer to think that Jonah was swallowed by a submarine, but then again I’ve read too much Von Daniken.
😆 YES! I’ve been arguing this for years. Pretty well this was the catalyst that got me “kicked” out of the family. Finally somebody else understands the scriptures! ;
Don’t even get me onto Ezekiel and the ET hypothesis.
😆 (You have to admit though, parts of the Book of Ezekiel do read something like a close encounter. People have even written books on it!
Since there is a moratorium on the posting of certain links, I’ll quote another website – do a websearch if ye must
Quote:A friend passed on a book written by NASA engineer Josef F. Blumrich entitled The Spaceships of Ezekiel. This book concludes that the passage shown above wasn’t the whole story. Blumrich agrees that the “wheel within a wheel” was extraterrestrial, but he goes one step further and claims that it only describes a small part of the craft.
According to Blumrich, the whole chapter was a detailed description of an encounter with an UFO. Even the story behind the book is very interesting. Blumrich notes that he began researching the topic in response to Erich von Daniken’s book Chariots of the Gods.
In the forward [sic] to his book, Blumrich states that he,
“began to read von Daniken with the condescending attitude of someone who knows beforehand that the conclusions presented can by no means be correct.”
In other words, he thought von Daniken was full of it and was going to set out to prove it scientifically.
What he found, after an extensive amount of research from an engineering point of view, was just the opposite. He went from an extreme skeptic to becoming convinced that the book of Ezekiel was a real accurate and detailed account of an encounter with extraterrestrial visitors. Very interesting coming from a person who is not a religious zealot by any means and is about as far as you can get from a gullible person who might be prone to jump to conclusions.
Blumrich passage by passage analysis of Ezekiel chapter one that is based his work.
)
wow Cwald … 😥 Your day takes the cake. That is so completely out of control. You are really fighting against a lot of discouraging behavior on multiple fronts.
wow…
Brian Johnston wrote:wow Cwald …
😥 Your day takes the cake. That is so completely out of control. You are really fighting against a lot of discouraging behavior on multiple fronts.
wow…
Yeah, it was ugly. I liked the topic you started here, gives me a place to vent – and I’m glad that I’m not only normal person left on planet.
🙄 SamBee wrote:Don’t even get me onto Ezekiel and the ET hypothesis.
😆 (You have to admit though, parts of the Book of Ezekiel do read something like a close encounter. People have even written books on it!
Thanks for the link. Good stuff – pretty well fits into my whole religious philosophy of “how and why” certain things may have happened.
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