Guest Post: The Priesthood Question From the Perspective of a Male Convert.

I know I may have missed the “golden moment” of the priesthood topic, but here’s just one more point to consider and then I promise I’m done. At this point, I’m not offering up my own personal opinions on the matter, but I am giving a voice to people who have a fresh perspective that hasn’t already been beaten to death by other bloggers.

This is a guest post from my brother-in-law. As a recent convert, and a man, he wrote his perspective of why the Priesthood might be reserved for men alone in the Mormon church. We understand that this is only interesting speculation, and do not speak for the LDS church or their leaders. Without further adieu, here’s George Scott.

 

 

My Background.

From age 22 to about age 34 I was a regular attendee at the local First United Methodist Church. I had been pretty involved in church from running the Sunday School program for children, being on the Board of Trustees, and holding other leadership positions in church. I also was involved with outside Christian activities like the Walk to Emmaus program put on by the First United Methodist printing house called the Upper Room.

How I came to join the Church of Jesus Christ and Latter Day Saints.

When I was in grade school I joined the Cub Scout program which was held at the school. It just happened (and I didn’t know this) was put on by the LDS church while their church building was building built. Through this I gained a number of LDS friends and saw firsthand just how much better their family life was than mine. It took a number of years to figure out what was behind it but I realized it was the church they attended. I planned on joining but didn’t because church went on for 3 hours each Sunday and then they expected you to go on a 2 year mission. Needless to say, I thought that was far too much work and didn’t end up joining till years later, after I figured out that I had made a mess of my life. I wanted to finally take up the way I know works although I didn’t really know how the LDS church worked beyond the one church service I attended!

Thoughts on the Priesthood.

Why do Men have the “Priesthood” and women don’t? It all about getting people into church. Let’s break it down:

Way 1:

All other Churches (Methodist, Protestant, etc).

Men go to church to please their wife. To support the wife in getting men to attend the following must happen. Have a good praise band, nice church building, a pastor who gives good, short, funny sermons, end the service on time, offer activities for kids, offer lots of classes which women mostly attend on gospel subjects. The end result of this you get the man to go to 1 hour of church a week sometimes even on SuperBowl Sunday if they really love their wife a lot. That one hour of church attendance and hopefully a donation is what you get.

Example: The Rock Church in San Diego has stadium style seating, charismatic pastor, praise singers who are likely professional singers, a fog machine! Cameras that fly across stage capturing the performance putting it on a large projector and so much more. I went once just to see it in person and it was pretty amazing.

Way 2:

Men are given a responsibility in church and to their family called the “Priesthood”. Men still go to church to please their wife but there is no praise band, no charismatic pastor, church service lasts 3 hours, you do “small groupings” called Home Teaching with multiple families during the month, you help members move in and out of their homes as they come into your church area, watch a 2 day “General Conference” of short talks on various subjects twice a year and be expected to remember some of it, and the list goes on this is just a small part of it.

Example: Church service 1st hour all of the kids are in their with you, crying, moving about, lay speakers talking on serious subjects, not a lot of humor interjected, a few worship songs. 2Nd hour Sunday School (adults and kids off to separate areas), 3rd hour men and women split off and do a bible study separately. Men are divided into three age groups (teens, men 18 to 45(ish), and the rest).

How this works for attendance, donations, and community:

So why the big difference? Couldn’t your standard church on the corner do the same thing that the LDS church does? Couldn’t the Methodist church just expand their church service to 3 hours, give the men 5 home teaching (small groupings) assignments a month, etc etc? If they did, the men would escape and never come back.

It all comes down to a feeling of one responsibility that women cannot perform therefore as the male, you must go. Men respond to this responsibility. Do the men love God, yes of course. Do they really want to sit in church for 3 hours, no way. What causes them to do this great feat… it’s that they have a responsibility that cannot just thrown upon to their wife like they try to do for most other responsibilities.

What happens when you do the men a favor and give women the Priesthood. There is an example!

The RLDS / Community of Christ are essentially the “Mormons” who stayed behind and didn’t want to leave the community to follow Brigham Young. The RLDS decided to give women the Priesthood in 1984. Church attendance and donations dropped 50%.

Photo of women in the Priesthood

Guest Post: Why One Woman Would Want the Priesthood

A long time friend, my sisters-in-law’s best friend actually, wrote the following on her Facebook status as a result of some accusatory and insensitive posts regarding the excommunication of the founder of Ordain Women, the feminist group advocating ordaining women to the priesthood in the Mormon church. As a single mom, she explains why she feels women should get the priesthood and gives the reader(s) perspective on how it feels to be in her position.

The purpose of this post is not to try to convince people that women should or shouldn’t have the priesthood- that is for the Brethren to sort out. This is not intended as criticism of church officials or people whose opinions differ with those of my guest writer. I believe that where a person stands on an issue is ultimately up to them, but that it’s impossible to make the best choice unless both sides have been fairly represented. I hope that by reading this, my reader(s) will better understand my friend and the others in her boat.

Without further adieu and with her permission, I give you Rachel Hoffman:

 

 

I believe there is something very wrong when we start celebrating someone’s excommunication from their faith or post things that are mean spirited. Even though I am hardly a devout Mormon, I actually watched General Conference in April and one of the talks that really stuck with me was that of Sister Bonnie Oscarson when she said, “I invite you to not only love each other more but to love each other better.” I think that in the last week, we all may have some room to improve in this area. With that being said, I want to tell you why I feel the way I do about how women are treated in the church. Feel free to disagree but please do so respectfully and thoughtfully.

When someone says that Kate Kelly is leading others away from the church by teaching them false doctrine, I have to wonder why the leadership of the church thinks that I blindly accept anyone else’s view just because they publicly made a statement, advocate for something different or politely asked to be admitted to an all men’s meeting during General Conference. Contrary to what they may think, I actually make thoughtful decisions about my life every day. Many of the friends that I love, promote conservative ideas and statements on Facebook and other social media sites. If you know me at all, you know that I am not what most people would call conservative but more of a liberal. Some might choose to put “bleeding heart” in front of that and I accept that title with pride. I think we can just agree to disagree and that is that. I have yet to find myself running out to join the Tea Party because somebody is advocating for that side. I can almost guarantee that I will be a democrat for the rest of my life. While you may think that I am going to hell in a hand basket for my views, I don’t really think I am going to convert you over to my side either. We can agree to disagree but it is insulting to me as a human being to have an organization seemingly assume that I don’t think for myself. Kate Kelly and Ordain Women did not change the way I think or convince me to “follow them”. I was already someone that just happened to have the same questions and concerns about patriarchy in the church. If anything, they are what made me want to come back to church. I thought that maybe I could finally feel comfortable and that there was a place for me there.

Being a single mother in the church is really, really hard. You kind of don’t fit in anywhere. When I go to the family ward, I feel awkward. When I go to the singles ward, I feel awkward. The last time I was in Relief Society someone said that they were concerned about the children that are growing up in a home without priesthood holders. Well, in my opinion, there is a simple solution to that and I guess I am told that I should bring it up on Sunday in Sunday School because that is the more appropriate forum and tone. I doubt that would be any less awkward than I already feel. Anyway, I sat in Relief Society that day thinking how odd that was. I mean, here I was a single mom raising a son without a priesthood holder in her home. Not only that, I grew up in a home that didn’t have a priesthood holder in my home. My dad is not a member of the church. Do you have any idea what that felt like to me? It felt alienating. The woman that brought this up is kind and had good intentions but I don’t think that she realized how alienating these comments were to me. I know she had a genuine concern for these children but I could not help but wonder if she realized there were probably more single parents and part member families in the room. I mean, I had to wonder what she thought was going to happen to my poor kid.

As a kid and as an adult, I have never been comfortable asking people for priesthood blessings. You know how I mentioned that the family ward and the singles ward now often feel awkward? Well, asking people you don’t know or kind of know or even people I do know to come to my house and give me a blessing or a family member a blessing feels awkward. Maybe it shouldn’t and it is my issue but it is my reality. I recognize that my reality may be different from yours. However, if I was a single dad in the church that held the priesthood, the whole situation would likely be significantly less awkward.

I think that there are a lot of women that don’t feel comfortable discussing their personal and/or sexual transgressions with male only leaders. I think it can be violating for a woman to be asked detailed questions about her sex life by a man and not have other women present in a bishop’s office or disciplinary councils. I think that not having men and women in leadership positions in the church puts women and children at more risk for abuse. There should be a balance and we don’t have that right now. I know that many of the women in the church are totally okay with the way things are and that is okay. I know that there are women in the church that have suffered abuse at the hands of male leaders. I know that there are women that don’t really feel the need to hold the priesthood but do want a more equal voice. I know that there are many women in the church like me that don’t want to feel awkward because they have a different type of family than what is typical. We are actually a diverse group and I think it would be wonderful if we were able to embrace that.

So, while you may agree with the church’s decision to excommunicate Kate Kelly, I hope you make the conscious decision not to “celebrate” this or say that “she deserved it”. Take time to hear both sides of the story and proceed with kindness and let’s try not to judge one another so much. In the end, it really isn’t for any of us to judge anyway. I don’t personally know Kate, but I know that she did what she felt was right for her and she stood up for me and other women that are afraid to stand up for ourselves and often feel awkward. She is our sister and I admire her for being brave enough to stand up for what she believes in whether you think it is right or wrong. It takes personal conviction and character to do what she did. She is a Human Rights attorney and must see injustice in the world that we are probably not accustomed to seeing. Some of you may not think that it matters and maybe it doesn’t but the fact that she is somebody that is not afraid to stand by her own convictions and is willing to advocate for others inside and outside of the church actually speaks volumes to me about her character.

In 2010, I had the opportunity to visit Tibet where I saw Buddhist people praying on the streets while surrounded by soldiers with machine guns. That is where I realized that there is a whole other world out there that faces oppression and hardships. It was humbling to see them continue to practice what they believed while facing such oppression. The thing that most stood out to me was their resiliency and humility. When a woman on our tour set down her camera to do something, she told me not to leave her camera unattended. Our Tibetan guide immediately said, “Don’t worry. We are taught to be kind and honest. Nobody is going to steal your camera.” For us, this was such a foreign concept but I have never forgotten it. We had already made a judgment about the character of the people around us without knowing them or their belief system. The Buddhist people that we essentially accused of being dishonest, continued to smile, be kind to us and pray despite our judgment.

While I hope that I one day see change in the church, I also hope that I can follow the example of these men and women in Tibet and be less judgmental. I hope that we can all love each other better and be kinder to each other. I hope that we can remember that we are all God’s children and that we can learn things from each other. So, let’s stop deciding who is right and who is wrong and move forward. Let those of us that feel sad and hurt heal without having to see posts about how wrong you think we are or how “apostate” you think we are becoming. As a young child in primary, I was taught to be kind to others. Even though I feel awkward at church when I do go, I hope I can always be kind and try to see where you are coming from without being hurtful. We should move forward and listen to each other and love each other better.

What if moms were paid?

Here’s an interesting thought exercise:

“What if the government paid stay at home moms*?”

Before you boo me off the stage for talking Socialist, consider a few things:

1.Many of the problems our country is facing socially are due to the breakdown of the nuclear family.

2. Moms don’t want to stay home and raise their kids anymore, or can’t afford to even if they want to.

3. Moms who do stay home often feel invisible and unimportant to society, or that their education and skills are not put to use.

4. One reason the economy is imbalanced is because there are too many workers and not enough jobs. I’ve heard theories that part of the problem is that each family is putting two adult workers in the workforce instead of one.

5. The U.S. is not pumping out enough skilled labor in the sciences and engineering to continue to compete in the global economy.

How can we put moms’ skills to work and strengthen families and society in one shot? Pay them to do their job.

What if the government were to pay a mom a salary based on the number of kids she’s raising, the hours per week spent in doing activities directly related to raising kids, and the quality of work she turns out?

For instance, lets say a mom could get paid between $10,000 and $20,000 for each kid. Each year, a therapist can assess if the kids are getting their needs met. School grades will be taken into consideration, as well as special needs, etc. Basically, a mom who communicates with her kids, reads to them, keeps the home orderly, feeds them healthy food, etc, would get near the maximum salary. Moms of special needs kids would get the maximum because the work and stress is more than most kids. Moms who sit the kids in front of the TV so they can dink around on the computer (which is what I’m doing right now) would be paid less. Moms who are abusive or neglectful would be “fired” and their children taken to a higher qualified mom.

A mom of 4 who’s doing a really good job could get paid up to $80,000 a year. I think that’s reasonable.

This could solve, or at least help with, the problems listed above. There are several countries in Europe who pay young adults to go to college, with the idea that an educated work force will help make a strong economy. Paying moms would be the same idea- raising healthy, happy, educated children is good for the economy and the country.

What do you think?

*This would also apply to stay at home dads, but I wrote “moms” because I didn’t want to have to use gender neutral pronouns for the whole article.

http://verilymag.com/feature/o-alma-mater/