Daughters In My Kingdom: Chapter 7

I'm done!  I'm done, I'm done!  I finished this wonderful little book!  I read the chapters that seemed most interesting to me first, leaving "'Pure Religion' Watchcare and Ministering through Visiting Teaching" for last, BUT this has actually been my most favorite chapter, so, I'm going to write about it first!

I loved the examples of Visiting Teaching and learned so much about the goals of Visiting Teaching.  After all the lessons, and lessons, and lessons on Visiting Teaching, I didn't think I could learn anymore.

I loved learning how VTing got started:  "RS leaders appointed a visiting committee of four sister for each ward.  [Their] most visible responsibilities were to assess needs and collect donations. . . .  Generally the sisters who were assigned to go visiting went with baskets in hand, receiving items such as matches, rice, baking soda, and bottles of fruit. . . " (106).  Now maybe I knew this and had forgotten, but could you imagine going Visiting Teaching and asking for money and goods!?  It's cool they they did this, but I'm glad I don't have to!  I also thought, 4 women?  That really is quite a burden to visit all the women in a ward with only 4!

I liked reading how Eliza R. Snow "counseled visiting teachers to prepare themselves spiritually before they visited homes so they would be able to ascertain and meet spiritual needs as well as temporal ones. . . ." (108). I don't know if Eliza R. Snow was a visiting teacher at the time of this instance from the life of my great-great grandmother after her husband died as recorded by her brother, but Eliza's actions demonstrate being guided by the Spirit:

One day Sister Eliza Snow with Sister Smoot took a walk together, when they came to my Sisters house in the 20th ward, she felt impressed to call in.  My mother was in the house at the time attending to Margaret, Sister Snow had never been in the house before, she did not know that Margaret was sick, she was led by the spirit of the Lord, she laid her hands on Margaret’s head and blessed her., that she would live and the Angels of God would preserve her.  Her enemies would not have any power over her and she would conquior her enemies.  Her words seemed to strenghten her faith and she began to amend from that time, and prospered.  She also blessed my mother. . .  (page 30 of Gibson Condie's Diary -- typescript.  A holograph can be found at the FHL in SLC, the years are 1864-65).

I also read in the chapter an example about a woman who "had been detailed by the Relief Society . . . to watch over and administer to the sick woman. . . ."  In modern day, we would interpret "administer" as just "minister" or "care for"; however, I wonder if in that instance, it was to actually bless, just as Eliza R. Snow blessed my great-great grandma.  (For more on the topic, see Stapley, Jonathan A. and Wright, Kristine, Female Ritual Healing in Mormonism (January 1, 2011). Journal of Mormon History, Vol. 37, pp. 1-85, Winter 2011. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1754069).  Daughters in My Kingdom does not go into the topic of "female ritual healing," which I would like to know more about from an official Church standpoint, but this is at least a start in understanding the topic.

In 1916, VTers were "asked to discuss a gospel topic each month as well as providing a temporal service" (108).  I know we often leave VTing assignments with a "Let us know if there's anything we can do to help!" but what if we actually took that seriously as an ASSIGNMENT to provide a temporal service?  Wow.  If we did this, I think we'd better connect as sisters through temporal work, just was we should connect with our children/families through physical labor.  I think we'd also open up emotionally more than we do.


In 1944 (8 years after the start of the Church's Welfare plan), the assignment of RS sisters collecting funds was discontinued (108).  That did make a lot of sense because it was as though there were two Welfare plans:  RS Welfare and Church Welfare.  With the consolidation, things would be more efficient.    I don't know when collection of Fast Offerings came about, but, again, it seems like an unnecessary duplication of efforts from the brothers and the sisters.  Even today, the RS President still plays a BIG role in the Welfare plan, just as she did a long time ago.

I enjoyed the section on seeking spiritual guidance and was reminded to do better in that area (114).  I also liked the Questions Visiting Teachers Can Ask on page 115.  They are pretty personal, but if we go about first being a friend to those we visit teach, then those are natural questions from a friend to a friend.

1.  What worries or concerns do you have?

2.  What questions do you have about the gospel or Church?

3.  Would you allow us to help you with _____?  Note, it doesn't say, "Let us know if we can help! :) :)"

I liked Sister Smoot's advice:  "My desire is to plead with our sisters to stop worrying about a phone call or a quarterly or monthly visit . . . and concentrate instead on nurturing tender souls" (117).

I loved Pres. Kimball's quote:  "You are going to save souls, and who can tell but that many of the fine active people in the Church today are active because you were in their homes. . ." (117).  I've witnessed this and know it to be true.  I'll have to have my friend write a post about it.

Reading about the great efforts of visiting teachers from the past encourages me to be a better visiting teacher.  I'm impressed at how temporal visiting teaching was, yet now the main focus seems to be spiritual.  I loved the stories in this chapter; they were so encouraging and made me cry.  Overall, I think the feel I got from this chapter is to be a friend with a Gospel message.  I think we do a pretty good job at showing up, but do we really connect?  Do we really show we care?  Do we show real charity?  That is what I need to focus on.  Wonderful chapter; so much great stuff in it.

Sexualization in Society

These two articles from the Deseret News were just too good to pass up.  Kudos to the Deseret News for publishing them.

The end of innocence: The cost of sexualizing kids

Sexualizing kids: No child left behind — and fighting back

A few quotes from both articles:

"As a society, we know more about women who look good than we know about women who do good," (first article).

...
(The rest are from the 2nd article.)

While saying no is a natural parental instincts, he says the optimal approach is to help their child understand why a certain TV show or piece of clothing is not OK. "You'd be surprised at how reasonable children can be when rules are accompanied by an explanation," he says. "Children are always learning. If they're not learning from their mothers or fathers, they are going to learn from other sources."

...

Jenny Wykstra, a registered nurse from West Jordan, has figured out a way to help guide her three children without just saying something is bad or wrong.

She watches TV with her teens, 15, 14 and 13. And she pays attention to what they are looking at on the computer. When something sets off the alarm bells in her brain — and it happens a lot — she asks them questions.
"Wow, check out that girl's outfit. What do you think of it?"

She's genuinely interested, she says. But she's also guiding them through a process of analyzing things critically. "What do you think they're trying to sell?" she asks when a model runs her fingers through her luxurious hair for a shampoo commercial. "Is it just shampoo?"

...

Levin traces the introduction of the "sexualized childhood" to the mid-1980s deregulation of TV ads for children by the Federal Communications Commission, which allowed development of toys directly related to programming.

...

"What's going on here in 21st Century America is a war of values," wrote Annie Fox, a Cornell graduate who has written several books on teens. "On one side, parents doing their best to raise healthy young adults. And what are we up against? The marketing might of multi-billion dollar corporations. You probably don't need anyone to tell you who's winning."

...

"One girl told me [dressing provocatively] made her feel wanted," Evert says. "I told her, 'What are you hoping for — to be gawked at or to be loved? What do you want to be wanted for? If a guy really cares, he should want you for more than your body parts. I always tell the girls 'You will never convince boys of your dignity until you convince yourself.' "

...

On Aug. 31, 1,600 people used the Internet to protest a shirt being sold on JC Penney's website. The $10 shirt was emblazoned with "I'm Too Pretty to Do Homework, So My Brother Has to Do It for Me." The ad copy with it said, "Who has time for homework when there's a new Justin Bieber album out? She'll love this tee that's just as cute and sassy as she is."

Within four hours of the launch of an online petition drive by change.org, JC Penny yanked the shirt off its shelves, overwhelmed by the response.


 ...

And of course, there were several quotes/references to the Kite sisters from Beauty Redefined!  Go girls!

Daughters in My Kingdom: Foreword and Preface

I've been having a fun time reading the new Daughters in My Kingdom book.  Is that sick and wrong?  Fun?  When you really like history, yes, it is (usually) fun to read history.  I've also been torn because I'm writing a chapter on an ancestor for Women of Faith in the Latter-days, Volume 2.  I really need to be working on that, but I also really want to be reading this and blogging about it. And, I don't know how many people actually read this blog, but I'm 15 weeks pregnant, and of course, that makes everything just a little bit more complicated.

Anyway, enough about me, on with the book.  Kathryn at a Well-Behaved Mormon Woman posted her initial thoughts on the book, but I wanted to do more of a chapter-by-chapter review on the book.  Well, I don't know if  review is the right word, but I wanted to share my thoughts like Stephanie does about General Conference over at Diapers and Divinity.  If you feel so inclined to share your thoughts, please do, or even share a link to your own posts.  It's fun to discuss -- especially for those of us who don't get to go to RS -- not that this will necessarily be taught in RS, but it might on occasion.

As the blog post title indicates, I wanted to comment on the foreword and the preface.

I liked how the First Presidency message in the foreword mentioned that we women are "dedicated disciples."  How lovely is that?  Just like Mary and Martha and other women in the scriptures.

When I read that we "help strengthen families and build up the kingdom," I realized that women without their own families may have a hard time with this, but the strengthening doesn't have to be in one's own family.  We can help and support other people's families (the book goes on in a later chapter to address this in more detail).  Coming from someone who has a family of her own, I'm sure this can sound very insensitive to someone who does not have a family and wants one.  I can only imagine how hard that must be, but honestly, yes, we young moms with little kids would love any help anyone wants to give if you are willing to give it.

I also thought the "strengthen families" phrase really doesn't have to apply to just us in the LDS Church.  We can and need to help strengthen families all over the world.  There are so many good people throughout the globe also in support of the family, and we need to bind together.

OK, this could take a while.  I think I'd better not comment on everything.

I think it is good to remember that "this book is not a chronological history, nor is it an attempt to provide a comprehensive view of all that the Relief Society has accomplished" (xii).  As I have read, I find I do want to know more!!  The basics are there, but some of the more confusing/deep stuff is not.  A-ha!  Maybe that's why it's not there -- because it's not clear to anyone in the modern day, so they figured they'd leave it out or just touch on it briefly (such as "female ritual healing" and polygamy).

"We know that women who have deep appreciation for the past will be concerned about shaping a righteous future" (xii).  Amen.  Why I love history.

"...the women of the church have united with men who hold the priesthood to build God's kingdom..." (xii).  We are united -- definitely.  We have to be or the plan will fail.

"The value in this book is not so much in the dates and facts it provides but in the purposes, principles, and patterns it teaches" (xiii).  I believe this book is doing just that.  Why do we have Relief Society?  Of course it would still be nice to have a comprehensive history, but learning the purpose of the Relief Society is a starting point.

I like that the book is written by women (Susan Tanner - xiv) for women.  Some people complain that this isn't a lesson manual for both the men and women, but a lot that's in the book isn't necessarily what men (or women) NEED to know (for salvation), but things that are nice to know.  [9/12/11:  Actually I change my mind on that original statement.  This book IS a WONDERFUL summary of everything we need to know to be WONDERFUL people.  We can find all these principles all over the Gospel, but this book wraps them all up in one tight little package.  So, yes, you could use the book as a manual for men and women, you'd just have to expand on it with A LOT more detail.]  My husband has also enjoyed me sharing parts of this book with him before we go to bed at night -- I think some men will love to read it, whereas, some men will probably find it kind of boring, just as some women will.

I also like the extensive use of references in this book.  Some Church publications (at least older ones) lack sources and it drives me nuts.  I also like that Sister Tanner was given credit for this book.  I love knowing who did the work behind a project.

"Church members of all ages may use the book as a reference in lessons, talks, and council meetings" (xiv).  I've heard a couple times people say that quotes by women just aren't as credible as quotes from the "Brethren."  The first time someone said that, I was quite taken aback.  I didn't really believe them, but just to be safe, I stopped using quotes from sisters.  The quote above affirms to me that, yes, it is okay to use quotes from sisters.  Thank goodness.  I mentioned this to my mom and she wondered how the women wouldn't be taken as seriously as the men.  Yes, that's the type of family I grew up in.  If a quote is from General Conference, it's from General Conference, does it matter if a man or woman said it?  So yes, lots and lots of women quotes in this book.

Apparently Lucile Tate and Elaine Harris (xiv) wrote a history of the RS starting in 1996, but it was unpublished and kept as a resource in Church archives.  Wouldn't it be wonderful if it were someday published?  I'd love to read that!

Update on Entitlement

The Deseret News ran, The age of entitlement: Selfishness is rampant, but can be corrected, experts say, recently.

..."The gratitude is vanishing," Greer says.

This change in behavior is a symptom of a greater phenomenon that psychologists, family experts, sociologists and scholars say is gripping the world. Now, more than ever, entitlement — the idea that "I should get everything I want when I want it, even if I haven't worked for it" — is rearing its ugly head.

But the problem isn't just in preschool classrooms; it's in homes, high schools, offices and even the highest levels of government. It impacts the way children treat their parents and siblings, interferes with education and can contribute to a lifetime of unhappiness, financial instability and disdain for work, experts say....

---

Talk about entitlement:  Stand Up and Say Something.   The article's mainly not about entitlement, but about respect, but the examples just show how entitled our kids feel.

Canadian Study on the Influence of Fathers

My BIL (yes, brother-in-law, don't hear that too often), shared this report on fathers with me.

"Fathers make important contributions in the development of their children's behaviour and intelligence," says Erin Pougnet, a PhD candidate in the Concordia University Department of Psychology and a member of the Centre for Research in Human Development (CRDH).

"Compared with other children with absentee dads, kids whose fathers were active parents in early and middle childhood had fewer behaviour problems and higher intellectual abilities as they grew older -- even among socio-economically at-risk families. . . ."

The findings, however, should encourage governments to formulate policies that encourage increased and positive forms of contact between children and their fathers. "Initiatives such as parental leave for men and parenting classes that emphasize the role of fathers could help to maximize children's development from early childhood to preadolescence," says Serbin.

How Long Is Your Marriage Going to Last?

From A New--Surprising--Relationship Predictor on Shine:

. . .marriages are more likely to last when the man and woman enter into it thinking the marriage is forever. . . . "People who believed [that the marriage was forever] seemed to have the happiest marriages, perhaps because they were more willing to work though their problems in a lifelong effort to fulfill their own expectations."

They also found that the amount you squabble with your spouse now, will probably be about the same in 20, or however many years!

The study was based on interviews with 2,000 married people over the course of 20 years!

Polygamy

After one day short of 2 months, I finished reading "Polygamy" by VH Cassler.  Yes, I'd fail college at this rate.  I've said before that I try and leave the polygamy topic alone, especially on this blog, but it is a fascinating subject as I have several polygamous ancestors and the topic has been in the news a lot lately with the Warren Jeffs trial.  If you've wondered about polygamy in the past as well as its potential in the future, this article is for you.  Although this is not official LDS doctrine, Cassler's interpretations of the scriptures and examples do make a lot of sense.

A commenter stated well (Kathryn):  "I'll have to wait for this to be taught as 'official' doctrine in some future General Conference.  Maybe it will be shouted from the roof tops in great rejoicing and relief by those who think it makes more sense and clarifies the apparent conflicts between various scriptures in which the Lord either condemns or commands multiplicity of wives.  It has always seemed inconsistant [sic] and difficult to understand or explain. . . ." 

The premise is that the basic marriage law is monogamy, but under certain circumstances, some people may be asked by God to have plural wives. She compares this diversion from monogamy to the great sacrifices of Abraham with Issac as well as Christ with his death.  She points out that in the end, there was always a "ram in the thicket," or rather, an escape, a way out.  She suggests that just as there was an end to Christ's suffering as well as an end to Abraham's fear in sacrificing his son, there will also be an end/way out of polygamy (if one desires it).

I'll share a couple of my most favorite parts --  Cassler brings up a few points, perhaps rumors/traditions, that have been floating around in LDS culture regarding polygamy and suggests that they very well may just wrong -- we really can't prove them (so we should stop perpetuating them!)

Some in LDS culture assume that polygamy is not merely a doctrinal necessity but a circumstantial necessity in the hereafter.  Generally this assumption takes one of two forms.  In the first form of the assumption, some assert that there will be more women who inherit the celestial fullness than men, and since everyone in the highest level of the celestial kingdom is married, polygamy then must follow as a natural consequence of the sex ratio there. This “folkways” is unsound both doctrinally and demographically.  There is simply no basis for assuming a celestial sex ratio highly skewed in favor of women.

           First, how could God be no respecter of persons and create a system where one spirit, because of gender, has a much better chance of reaching the celestial kingdom than the other gender?  If God is the author of all fairness and if gender equality is a foundational principle of the gospel, he could not have authored such a system.  Even if this system were somehow fair, for such an outcome to ensue would mean that the male gender was disproportionately assigned to or an attribute of weaker spirits.  There is no doctrinal or scriptural basis for such a belief. 

            For those who feel polygamy is ubiquitous in the celestial kingdom, this belief demands that, at a minimum, twice as many women make it to the celestial kingdom as men.  But human demographics argues against such a conclusion.  Approximately 106 male babies are born on earth for every 100 female babies born. [20]  More males have existed on earth than females.  Yet by age five, the sex ratio is about 1:1, for male babies are more susceptible to genetic disorders.  Therefore, a large number of males die before the age of accountability and are automatically saved in the celestial kingdom.  Also, male deaths through such mechanisms as the wholesale killing of male children by an enemy power (e.g., in Moses’ time and in Jesus’ time), or males laying down their lives in righteous defense of family and homeland also increases the pool of males eligible for the celestial kingdom.  Using established demographic procedures, several  BYU sociologists declare in perhaps only a partially tongue-in-cheek essay that they can demonstrate there will be more males in the celestial kingdom than females! [21]

            All the foregoing serves to make the point that it is by no means clear that females will outnumber males in the celestial kingdom.  There is absolutely no scriptural or empirical basis upon which to assert the sex ratio of the celestial kingdom.  If we cannot confidently assume that there will be more exalted women than exalted men, then one cannot conclude that polygamy must then follow.

            The second form of the assumption that polygamy is a circumstantial necessity in the celestial kingdom is the notion that one Heavenly Mother is incapable of producing and nurturing the vast numbers of spirit children that Heavenly Father appears to have fathered.  After Christ comes, “time is no longer” (D&C 84:100; D&C 88:110).  With God, past, present, and future are continually before his eyes (D&C 130:7).  What this means, no one knows in this life.  But clearly it means that the same temporal constraints do not exist for Gods.  What, then, does it mean to say that something “would take too long” for a God?  Additionally, it does not appear that God is in some great hurry to do his work.  It may have taken billions of years to produce the universe and, eventually, our solar system.  Why does he need to rush the production of spirit children?  Furthermore, we do not know anything about how spirit children are organized or how long it takes to organize them.

            But how could one Heavenly Mother take care of so many children?  This question takes on its true character if we change it to ask: How could one Heavenly Father take care of so many children?  We believe Heavenly Father is capable of loving each one of us completely.  If a single he has such abilities, why do we doubt that a single She has the same? [22]  In addition, Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother do not exist as a typically modern nuclear family unit--they have an entire and very large eternal family organization to help them.  Think of all that Christ, Their Son, accomplished in creating numberless worlds at a time when he did not yet possess a body and had not yet entered into the new and everlasting covenant of marriage.  We must suppose that our divine parents have plenty of help in bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.

Additionally, I really enjoyed learning about who was sealed to whom in the early days of the early LDS Church and how confusing it all got.  It seemed most important then just to be sealed, but it didn't quite matter to whom.

Thus it appears that choosing to enter sacred covenants of sealing and remaining worthy of those covenants is all that matters from the standpoint of the individual’s exaltation as a member of God’s eternal family--the actual people to whom one is sealed might or might not change in the re-forging of the great family link of all God’s exalted children.  Even if you are sealed to an unworthy person, it is as if that person is a stand-in for one who is worthy--whom you may not even meet in this life.  This explains why the Church does not cancel the sealing of a wife in a divorce situation unless another marriage sealing is to take place; because what matters is that the wife chose and presumably remains worthy to be sealed to a worthy Melchizedek Priesthood holder--even though she will most likely end up having that sealing transferred to someone else.  Her first husband remains, as it were, a “stand-in” until a transfer can take place. [26]             

Such stand-in, or “proxy,” marriages were common in the early Church, because in the first several decades of the restored Church, one could not be sealed to loved ones who had not been baptized into the Church before they died.  Surviving family members were sealed to General Authorities to assure their exaltation.  Widows whose husbands had died before hearing the Gospel were sealed to a general authority as the authority’s wife in order to assure their exaltation, and then typically had their husbands sealed to the same General Authority as a child so as “to keep him in the family”! [27] This resulted in many women becoming plural wives because of the mistaken understanding that they could not be sealed to their dead husbands and could not gain their exaltation unless sealed to someone as a wife.  For example, women who had never even met Joseph Smith while he was alive were sealed to him after his death; also, one woman had her aged mother sealed to her (the daughter’s) husband shortly before the mother died so that the mother could receive her exaltation.  Wilford Woodruff had over 400 of his dead female ancestors sealed to him as wives.  These practices seem to indicate that the parties involved understood that the man in question was more of a stand-in or proxy so that the woman could receive the marriage ordinance and thus her exaltation, than an understanding that these women were married in some meaningful sense to these particular men for all eternity.  For example, what can it mean to have a dead woman sealed to you, whom you have never met in this life, whose will on the matter you cannot possibly know, and who is in fact one of your great-great grandmothers?  Or to have your own mother-in-law sealed to you as a wife?  Or, in the case of a woman, to be sealed to a dead man whom you have never met, and whose will on the matter you cannot possibly know? These marriages make sense best as proxy marriages.  Indeed, when President Wilford Woodruff announced in 1894 that women could be sealed to their dead husbands (and children to their dead parents) even if the deceased had not been baptized before their deaths, many thousands of sealing transfers took place to rightfully reorganize family lines. [28]

I wonder if there was a differentiation between the word "sealing" and the word "marriage" in the past.  Today, we tend to group them together as though they are one, but if you separate the two, it sure would explain a lot of things.  Women could be sealed to a man, yet not really be "married" to him in the full sense of the word.

One question I had was regarding the very strong statements by people in Church history regarding the practice of polygamy, such as (taken from The Juvenile Instructor blog):

[Polygamy] was at the center of LDS theology, it was emphasized within Mormon practice, and it was exemplified by all ecclesiastical leaders. The fact that it was at the center of the Mormon ideal image transcends demographics. A few examples help provide a glimpse:

• Plural wife Esther Romania Bunnell Penrose proclaimed polygamy as “the platform on which is built Endless Kingdoms and lives and no other or all combined principles revealed can be substituted as a compensation.”[6] 

• Brigham Young’s counselor Daniel W. Wells, when under oath in the Reynolds Trial, explained that if Mormons “failed to obey it [polygamy] they would be under condemnation, and would be clipped in their glory in the world to come.”[7] 

• Joseph F. Smith in 1878 protested against the “false idea” that monogomy was enough for the highest glory, and that “whoever has imagined that he could obtain the fullness of the blessings pertaining to this celestial law, by complying with only a portion of its conditions, has deceived himself. He cannot do it.”[8] 

• As late as 1884, Apostle Moses Thatcher declared polygamy was “the chief corner stone in the hands of [God].”[9] 

• That same year, George Q. Cannon emphasized that he “did not feel like holding up his hand to sustain anyone as a presiding officer over any portion of the people who had not entered into the Patriarchal order of Marriage,” and that everyone who is capable “must have more than one wife at a time in order to obey that Law.”[10]

Regarding statements like these, Cassler states:

Last, nonscriptural statements by early Saints indicate that they believed polygamy to be the mode of married life in the celestial kingdom and that quantity of wives in the hereafter is a sign of a man’s degree of righteousness, which statements seem to support the “reward” interpretation. [30] However, we must remember that these statements were made in that period of time where some confusion existed about the sealing order of heaven.  It was thought that one could not be sealed to dead relatives who had passed away without being baptized.  Widows felt they had to be sealed to a general authority to assure their exaltation; remember that men thought they had to be sealed to General Authorities as their children, and that all must eventually be sealed directly or indirectly to the head of the dispensation (Joseph Smith) and that is where their sealing duties ended.  Thus, many early General Authorities had many wives and many children because of the confluence of these ideas about sealing and the God-given commandment to practice polygamy.   In a sense, then, the actual practice of polygamy in the early Church was profoundly affected by some confusion over the sealing order.  It is conceivable that this situation affected the understandings of these early Saints on the topic of husband-wife sealing in marriage, as well. [31]  We note that this confusion was cleared up by the same prophet in whose tenure God rescinded the exceptional commandment to practice polygamy: Wilford Woodruff.  Indeed, we believe it is no coincidence that this was the case.  In rescinding polygamy in 1890 in the context of the constrained views of the time about sealing, Wilford Woodruff, acting as the Lord’s mouthpiece, was seemingly placing exaltation out of the reach of many persons whose immediate family had not received the Gospel before death.  The sorrow of this situation could only have been rectified by removing the confusion over sealing.  Thus, resolving the confusion over sealing in 1894 was a necessary appendage to the rescindment of the commandment to practice polygamy in 1890.

I also always consider that those people were commanded to live polygamy, so if they were going against a commandment, wouldn't they be condemned?  Wouldn't you think they'd try and support it the best they could?


So, again, this isn't Church doctrine, but it gives me some good pondering.




(bold emphasis added)