On Being Spiritually Left-Handed

When I was young and sitting in a boring Chemistry class, I once decided to write all my class notes with my left-hand, even though I am right-handed. I did it for quite a number of weeks. I had heard somewhere that writing with the non-dominant hand helps with retention of new information (which probably isn’t true, but Chemistry being what it was for me, I thought I would try anything at that point.)

I remember the focus I had to muster to make my hand translate what my brain was trying to put down. The letters came out squiggly. A task so simple for my other hand transformed the pen in my fingers into something completely foreign. Even my brain felt like it was cramping up. Not only was it awkward, but the results were sloppy, illegible at first. I did get better at it over time, but it took a lot of concentration.

I share this as an imperfect metaphor of my experience in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which has been not too different from being left-handed in a spiritually right-handed church. The good part is, this has not been a bad thing! Let me explain what I mean.

There is plenty of tension in the world right now between what we have labelled “the political left” and “the political right.” Fortunately or unfortunately, this spills over into other aspects of life, including at church. I will call conservative members “spiritually right-handed” whenever they are focused on conserving parts of church culture, tradition, and policy that they feel are important, and I will call progressive members “spiritually left-handed” whenever they want to improve or change those same things that they believe are detrimental to our progress.

I recognize this is reductive to the complexity of a wide range of political, social, and spiritual views, because a person could be “left” or “right” handed in any number of issues (a person can write with their right hand and pitch with their left, after all) but it is worth pointing out that whether someone is predominantly “right” or “left’ handed, bringing a diverse group of left and right-handed worshipers together in the same church does pose some challenges. It also provides remarkable opportunities for growth.

On Discovering That I Was Left-Handed

I was in my early twenties when I came to terms with the fact that I was spiritually left-handed. For context, I am a participating latter-day saint who also identifies as gay. In those developmental years spent trying to conform to heterosexual identity, I tried to fit in politically and socially as well, and that meant adapting to a really difficult situation. In other words, not unlike those midcentury left-handed pupils who, at least according to my mother, had their knuckles struck by their teacher if they were ever caught using the wrong hand, I grew up learning to take spiritual notes with my right hand.

Looking back, though many have had different experiences than me, I consider my formative years to be a blessing in the end. Not because I think my church culture did a great job supporting me as a gay member (to be honest it didn't; having to grow up terrified of strange feelings that were barely mentioned except in shameful whispers or ridiculed during quorum activities is not something I would wish on anyone) nevertheless the time spent writing with my right hand helped me gain skills I wouldn’t otherwise have learned.

I came to value what a conservative perspective of the gospel brings. I gained a personal testimony of covenants and religious traditions related to priesthood authority and prophetic voices. This includes commandments around same-sex relationships, as currently taught by church leaders. As I wrestled with the doctrines of Christ with my non-dominant hand, I learned to respect the capable right-handed leaders who were sincere in their efforts to follow Christ, and whose gifts and perspectives, though sometimes different from my own, helped me to see things I would not have otherwise seen. 

Nevertheless I confess that being in a battalion of right handed warriors, the sword of truth always felt a little clumsy to my grip. It wasn’t until much later that I learned that I was even allowed to use my other hand. It was a liberation! And the best part of it was that the gospel of Jesus Christ gave me insight into progressive ideals that fit more closely what I was experiencing as someone who struggled with belonging, especially in a church where conservativism was as dominant in the church culture as right-handedness.

The realization that I was spiritually left-handed came for me during the church’s involvement in Proposition 8 in 2008, which was to maintain the definition of marriage to be between a man and a woman in California. Through the Proclamation to the World on the Family, church culture had by and large established itself as a bastion of Christian conservatism, at least when it came to questions of sexuality and family relationships. The mental notes we were taking in Sunday School back then emphasized over and over that marriage was only between a man and a woman, and that gay members and their allies should have no place among the saints. In fact, we were dangerous. I remember one member suggesting we should round up the gays and shoot them. It took me a few minutes to process that they were talking about me. I was the “them.” I was sitting in the same room with him on those same metal grey chairs.

As the rhetoric and urgency to “defend the family” reached its frenzy in the chapels and classrooms of Provo where I was attending BYU, Sunday after Sunday I heard about this army of gays coming to destroy the family. It was exhausting! I had personally felt the love of Jesus Christ many times in the church, and I was quite baffled by what I was hearing. How was I destroying Brother so-and-so’s marriage? Was I really the enemy within the gates, lurking in the pews? I knew I was hiding my sexuality to fit in, so maybe that made me the exception. They couldn’t really be talking about me, right? And yet I had close friends who had left the church to pursue same-sex relationships, and they didn't seem to want to destroy anyone's family, either. They were good, often abundantly compassionate people trying to do the best they could with a difficult situation. I watched them struggle with the decision to choose between their sexuality and their faith. It was heartwrenching.

And then there were those liberals. Those dang liberals. I remember one acquaintance during that same year walking ahead of me into the priesthood session of General Conference, pointing to a man and saying to his Aaronic priesthood aged sons, “See that man? He voted for Obama!” To which his son said in disgust, “Ugh, what is he even doing here?” As a Canadian, I found this strange conflation of religious and political identity nauseating, especially in a setting meant to foster brotherhood.

The culture wars continue to divide us and blind us in ways I still struggle to wrap my head around. At the time back then, I had never even considered myself a liberal. I barely even knew what it meant. I thought it meant you drank diet coke or got a tattoo. But now I was hearing that no threat to this church could compare to the liberals. Or at least, that was how it was perceived in the late 2000s. And if I agreed with any platform designated liberal, I was deceived. Unfortunately, I am not sure if things have improved today. Much of our political discussions, even among members of the church, feels like it has flung itself headfirst into crazyland. No matter what degree of insanity exists on the right, the liberals will always remain the bigger threat. The disillusionment this has brought to many members who find themselves on the left cannot be overstated.

As I came to understand firsthand how certain policies and cultural attitudes at church affected same-sex attracted members, I started to question whether taking the sword in hand to defend our traditional understanding of homosexuality was really the best way to help same-sex attracted members. I wished so much to see the sword of truth migrate to the left hand of my brothers and sisters at church, to fight for my place with them, to see them fight for me instead of against me!

After much deliberation, even though the church will likely never change doctrine about chastity and marriage, I concluded years ago that the church, or the culture at least, needed to change certain policies and practices if I were going to survive. For so long I had learned to adapt to “right-handedness” when it came to understanding my sexuality and been blessed by their perspective. But now it was my brothers’ and sisters’ turn.

And luckily for me, I can say most have. The timing for me was a miracle. While simply being out and gay would easily have led to disciplinary action in previous years, I can breathe freely serving in my calling and attending the temple without too much worry. But I know that is not the case for everyone. Many, including personal friends, still live in closets because their church congregations are simply not safe. I am confident it is getting better, but it’s important to realize that these changes don’t happen by themselves.

What brings about this change? Well, it is those much maligned progressives, those dang libtards cutting through prejudice with their left hands both inside and outside of the church. This includes gay rights activists who, no matter how much I might disagree with them on moral issues even now, have nevertheless fought for a greater understanding of gay identities and protected my right to exist. I owe them so much.

A Right Handed Church?

While the Church has always tried to maintain political neutrality, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, like most religions, has a robust legacy for preserving tradition with right-handed fervor. There is nothing wrong with being spiritually right handed. Right-handedness is vital. In this church, right-handed members remind us of covenants God made with His people anciently, and how holding onto these covenants can bring strength in new or challenging situations. Right-handedness gives stability in a world that is increasingly unmoored from moral safeguards. Right-handedness maintains a sense of familiarity in a world that feels very uncertain. I admire how spiritually right-handed members take what is good in tradition, including ordinances, doctrines, policies, and preserve them, conserve them, and help keep Christ the center of our worship. We need our right hand to connect us to truths that have been the bedrock of our relationship with God for thousands of years. I love my spiritually right handed brothers and sisters! They have saved me from some of my more hasty and headlong left-handed impulses many, many times.

There is also much in our church history which could be considered enormously progressive, or “left-handed.” For example, I am enamored with teachings from Joseph Smith about an inclusive Zion where there are no poor among us, in a society where we are of one heart and one mind. Joseph Smith was a true left-handed progressive when he challenged institutional Christianity to restore a church based on revelation and lost truths about the inclusivity of God's love. But I am also discouraged when we fail to measure up to that ideal. 

When I ponder what it will take to maintain Brother Joseph’s progressive vision of the Kingdom of God, I am convinced it will require a lot of innovative, and revelatory change. We will need to spend at least as much time repenting of wicked cultural practices and traditions as we do retrenching ourselves in the traditions and doctrines worth holding onto. It will require discernment to know the difference, as well as both prophetic and personal revelation working together.

But make no mistake, building Zion will require both hands.

Jesus is Ambidextrous, And We Can Learn to Be Ambidextrous, Too

I find a lot of peace reading about the moments in Jesus’ ministry when he used his “left hand” over his right one to challenge the religious institutions of his day. It seems He was most fierce when putting down pharisaical wickedness that used established law and traditional interpretations of doctrine to oppress those suffering at the margins. I think this resonates with me so much because that person has often been me. For years, I was labeled and treated as unclean because of who I am. LGBT members, even faithful covenant keeping men and women, have long been misunderstood and pushed out by well-meaning churchmen for centuries. I love the left-handedness of Jesus that reaches after me when I feel misjudged or forgotten, and He helps me feel his unconditional love.

I also appreciate Jesus operating with His right hand to establish a church that functions to maintain doctrinal authority based on scriptural truths and commandments. Those laws and commandments have protected me and brought me rich blessings. I see Him holding out His right hand to me to honor His covenant to save his people, even promising to reach me in great affliction. He does it through ancient rituals and ordinances that He invites me (me!) to be a part of. I love the right-handedness of Jesus, that through obedience to His commandments I can be gathered into his arms, both his arms, like a hen that is gathering her chicks.

We are His hands and we are His eyes. Because we are a predominantly right-handed church, for too long we have misinterpreted Jesus’ teachings to cut off our left hand and pluck out our left eyes whenever they offend us. (Matthew 5:29-30) Whether on the right or the left, it is our own sins that we should pluck and cut out, never each other!

Of course, left-handed members must learn to value and rely on right-handed brothers and sisters. But if we are currently living in a right-handed church, our focus should be on seeking out those who have been turned away because they do not fit the right-handed mold. They are desperately seeking Christ’s healing, too. By discernment, we can do this and still maintain doctrinal purity and prophetic authority. If we do not, all of us, both those who leave and those who stay, will find ourselves all the more blind and hobbled with missing limbs and missing eyes, having lost the full spectrum of gifts we need to fulfill our sacred mission to prepare the world for Jesus Christ. It is that age old Book of Mormon fragmentation into tribes. It is the disease we are facing now. It is spiritual leprosy in the body of Christ to lose members of our community whose gifts we so desperately need.

Luckily for us, the road to Zion is paved with repentance. The atonement brings wholeness, including wholeness in our congregations. Change is good. It will be alright. And perhaps in some church meetings, like I did in my Chemistry class, we can each try writing testimony with our non-dominant hand. It might feel awkward and your writing will be messy. But keep on trying! See where leaning into your weakness gets you. See the people you once considered enemies, and how they can help you with your wobbly hand.

You will learn to appreciate and love them in ways you never thought you could.

No One Should Be On the Menu

"Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.” Isaiah 55:1

Christ Healing the Paralytic
at the Pool of Bethesda
Bartolome Esteban Murillo, 1667

Almost twenty years ago now, I read a book called “Modernity and the Holocaust” by Zygmunt Bauman. It rearranged my brain. 

I was a university student getting the liberal education I always dreamed of, filling my mind with good ideas that I still believe are immensely important. But the nagging idea this book left me with, the one that unsettles me to this day, is that no knowledge or college degree is enough to settle questions of morality.

The book points out at length that the institutions that cure disease and foster great art and music can be the same institutions that commit atrocities with similar zeal and sleek efficiency. Nuclear technology can power millions of homes or wipe out humanity. Chemists can make food more abundant or use that same research in a gas chamber. A degree makes no moral guarantee about how a person uses their knowledge. 

Institutions alone, even ones with expertly crafted safeguards through bureaucratic process, are not enough to maintain morality. It cannot be outsourced to them.

Morality only exists within people.

It is generally frowned upon to talk about the Holocaust, in part because it is not pleasant, but also because, as most critics point out, we shouldn’t overdo the argument that so-and-so we don’t like is a Nazi, or that this civil rights violation or that is equivalent to genocide.

But at the same time, and this is the major point of the book, the Holocaust’s relevance will always be necessary so long as we have modern institutions that require moral guidance. As Bauman points out, “our anxiety can hardly abate in view of the fact that none of the societal conditions that made Auschwitz possible have truly disappeared, and no effective measures have been undertaken to prevent such possibilities” from happening again.

Today, this is even more alarmingly true.

Bauman, borrowing heavily from decades of Holocaust research, argues the Holocaust is not an aberrant blip in the steady triumphant march of progress that modernity pretends to offer. The Holocaust was a product of modernity.

He quotes Henry Feingold who made this chilling observation:

“[Auschwitz] was a mundane extension of the modern factory system. Rather than producing goods, the raw material was human beings and the end-product was death, so many units per day marked carefully on the manager’s production charts…Engineers designed the crematoria; managers designed the system of bureaucracy that worked with a zest and efficiency more backwards nations would envy. Even the overall plan itself was a reflection of the modern scientific spirit gone awry. What we witnessed was nothing less than a massive scheme of social engineering.”

And here’s a question for today: if moral safeguards in the 2030s were to fail like they did in the 1930s, what technology and institutional processes might we use this time to perpetuate atrocities against another undesirable group? 

Would there be an app for that? 

I don’t believe we are there yet, but I do think institutions meant to protect us from our more savage impulses are cracking at an alarming pace.

On the heels of a century of some of the greatest technological advances humans have ever known, we should be congratulating ourselves. We have a device that fits in a pocket containing the entire repository of human knowledge about art, philosophy, and scientific advances. From social networking to information sharing to hailing the arrival of artificial intelligence, we might think that at last we have done it. We have finally put to rest the animal within, smothered it with angry emojis and kicked it out of society via cancel culture until at last man’s evil nature is put in its place. We can now move into the technological utopia that billionaires like Elon Musk keep telling us about, where in twenty years we will become so enlightened that even work and money will be optional thanks to the shimmering new world they are ushering in. We might even colonize Mars.

Instead, what I see is the sliding morality of institutions that have degraded to a level of crisis. Not necessarily because deranged criminals and imbeciles exist in positions of power. They are not entirely new. What is turning this moment into a crisis is how woefully unprepared we, ordinary people, are in dealing with it. It is the unprecedented level of moral vacuum in not only the systems meant to protect us from these kinds of savage and lunatic tendencies, but in a significant portion of the population who are more than willing to put up with an immoral tyrant, even to the point of cheering him on. 

And, like the railroad that once transported raw materials for building a nation now used to carry undesirables to death camps, the technology we use to comment and read about the news is also assisting in the dismantle of public discourse and the erosion of basic facts. Anything you want to believe about whatever newest event, it's like a choose-your-own-reality. The loss of both morality and truth in our technology and media consumption is completely staggering.

But instead of blaming the technology for this sliding morality and truth, we need to start seeing the problem in ourselves.

We just don't have the strategies in place for when people no longer even care about right and wrong so long as their own team wins, or will lie to our face as the video plays and not even give it another thought. We know how to deal with law infractions and immigration issues and debates about infrastructure and health care. Not well, mind you, but at least there’s a manual. These issues and differences of opinion are expected, and escalating conflict is safeguarded against within that structure But when the moral foundation of an entire portion of people starts to evaporate before our very eyes, when neither facts nor morals no longer matter, it’s sheer panic from there on.

As we watch the buildings of government and scientific advancement become hollow and fill up like whited sepulchres with the institutional decay of washed up government officials, crackpot health officials, and flagrantly immoral elected officials, now might be a good time to pause and wonder if we, the people, have lost something along our way to find greatness.

What we are facing are glaring blindspots in our political and social discourse. We can see the obvious pathology that allows for atrocities and moral failures at home or abroad, but we still can’t see them as the product of the very systems we admire so much and expect to maintain and distribute moral authority and truth to us like pamphlets. We see the current breakdown as an aberration from an otherwise healthy system, and that if we'd just stick to the institutional script, everything would be fine. 

We think of secular institutions as guardians of morality, when in reality all they can do is package and distribute the morality of the people operating within them.

We are literally shocked by this, so we assume we must not be going far enough. Maybe if we entrench ourselves even more into better technology, as some urge us to do. Or perhaps if we lean even heavier into fighting for constitutional rights, maybe flip over some tables in the sacred temples of due process, or protest the abuses bigger and harder. But as important as all that can be, none of that succeeds in instilling morality into what is now a vacuous space in a growing chunk of people. In the words of Elijah when the people tried to call to their idols to send fire from heaven to consume their offerings, “Perhaps if you pray louder! Your gods must be sleeping!” (1 Kings 18:27, very paraphrased.)

All this brings me to say something about Prime Minister Carney’s comments. He has been an important first among global leadership to say the gig is up and we need to face the facts. Bless him for that. And really, he is doing well what he was hired to do, which is to protect his nation’s interests, the same as any head of state. After all, he isn't there to preach a sermon and restore the moral conscience of the world. He's there to establish international policy.

After the gaslighting we have been hearing for the past year from institutional powers (or the last three hundred years, depending on your skin colour) it feels, at least at first, like a breath of fresh air. “The rules based international order” is over, he says, and since nostalgia is not a policy, let’s take the sign out of the window and refuse to live within the lie. Either fight for your place at the table, or take your place on the menu. (And presumably, if you're Canadian, just make sure you say “sorry” first before you politely eat your weaker neighbour.)

But this outlook, however pragmatic or realistic, is not the moral high ground we think it is. After all, we are still maintaining that someone must be on the menu. We just need to make sure it’s not us. 

After the full meaning of such an ideology settles in, we might start to feel even colder at the bone.

As Dr Stacey Patton smartly points out, “Black and colonized people should hear something even starker [in Carney's address]: our people have always been the damn menu. The only difference now is that more countries fear being served alongside us.” 

This is where we are. As the appetites of global powers become more insatiable, as the bulging pockets of billionaires become an even greater obsession, the institutional powers that serve the few are starting to turn not only on marginalized groups, but on their allies, on their citizens, on their very own who thought they had an in with the cool guys. It is not the injustice against them that wakes us up to the lie. It's when the injustice begins to reach us.

If a group of leaders are nodding their heads in agreement that it’s time to activate survival mode and disengage from the game of rules that was, at last we say it, always a farce, well just hold onto your butts. We might start to see even more pragmatic hold-your-nose-and-swallow-in-the-name-of national-security kind of deals, not less, because, so the argument goes, this is the new world order. When the big boys stop playing by the rules of the game, you take what you can get.

One has to wonder, as we scramble to rearrange our economic and political alliances to accommodate the unhingement and lawlessness in primary global powers, who will take up the torch now? Who will “preach good tidings unto the meek, bind up the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to the captives, and open the prison to them that are bound?” Because it certainly isn’t the government or the technocrats. They aren't even pretending anymore. Perhaps a charity organization here and there, powered by the good will of an ever shrinking percentage of the population who can afford it, or even have the time?

But here is what I have come to believe, and I don't hear enough people saying it: morality cannot be adequately maintained by secular institutions. It is maintained by religious ones.

We should always work to improve and defend good secular institutions. We should protest, speak out, and fight to maintain the inspired institutions of liberal democracy. We absolutely should.

But when all this is over, don't expect the vacuum of moral authority to be filled by a simple restructuring or retrenchment into institutional law. As Carney acknowledges, we can't go back to living within the lie that global power structures are going to promise morality, or even basic security. Maybe they never even did.

Make no mistake. Fighting fascism is not enough. As Dr Stacey Patton explains, “the collapse of a lie does not automatically produce truth. It produces a vacuum. And vacuums are filled by power, not by conscience.”

So how do we resurrect our collective conscience for moral truth?

Like we learned in the Holocaust, the capacity for great evil is never neutralized within a modern institution. It remains baked into every single one of them. 

Unfortunately, this includes the decay of religion into an institutional bureaucracy, which we have watched over the past century. For Christians, many have witnessed a hollowed out form of our religion, totally divorced from the teachings of Jesus to become a mere extension of the institutional power structure. Alliance with institutional powers to create the rise of what we call Christian nationalism is absolutely not the savior we are looking for. History is explicit about where that leads.

The way out of this mess, the only way out in my opinion, is to rebuild our collective morality. This will include revitalizing religious community building. 

It can't look like a talent show for modern day Pharisees who have made an art out of straining at gnats to swallow camels by disregarding the suffering of the marginalized. It will include something much more potent—a return to radical Christian love.

To offset the rise of demoralized institutional power, religious people of every creed, Christians and non-Christian alike, will need to work together to rebuild a moral foundation where everyone is at the table and nobody is on the menu.

"A Tale of Two Christianities"

I read this article recently and it helped me make sense of some events I have been mulling over trying to understand. There's a lot of nonsensical stuff happening in the news that I struggle to come to terms with, but this article, along with some good ol' Book of Mormon therapy, helped me take the fragmented pieces in my head and put them together to give me some clarity.

Empire Christianity

The central argument is that there are two versions of Christianity we have inherited. The first Christianity is the one that Christ lived and taught—that we love our enemies, (Luke 6:27) that we are willing to submit our will to God and His commandments and become like little children (Matthew 18:3) and that "he that is greatest among you shall be your servant." (Matthew 23:11)

The second version can be categorized as what the author refers to as “Empire Christianity.” In contrast to Christ's teachings, Empire Christianity is about consolidating power and influence. It is dogma focused rather than behavior focused. It is over-dressed, unusually fragile despite its flexing, and obsessed with its own image. It is eager to excuse itself for any bad behavior and quick to condemn it in others. While Christ rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, the author explains, Empire Christianity would ride in on a war horse with an extravagant military procession. It is less interested in a disciplined life, and more interested in maintaining and growing its own kingdom, by force if necessary.

It was this brand of Christianity that arose when apostolic teachings were amalgamated with conquest ideologies coming out of the Roman Empire. The merge was formalized around the 4th century AD, and though it is quite different from the original teachings of Christ, I think it would be unfair to say Empire Christianity totally replaced it. Much goodness was preserved as Christ's teachings spread across Europe in those early centuries, but Empire Christianity has been the tare growing alongside the wheat for a couple thousand years. A good portion of the drama playing out in our political and social landscape can be traced to that unholy union. It has brought up some serious points of tension in current events as a disconnect grows between Christ's teachings and how they're being used.

The Two Churches

"First Vision" by J. Kirk Richards 

Latter-day saints teach that there was a Great Apostasy in which Christ’s original priesthood was lost. Sometimes people talk about loss of authority, as if Christ's priesthood was just killed off when the apostles died, but I think it has more to do with wilfully giving in to worldly power structures, and the resulting corruption of Christ's original teachings. But whatever the reason, the situation was bad enough for Jesus Christ to say 1820 years after His death, as recorded by Joseph Smith, that all the different sects "draw near unto me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.” (JSH 1:19) 

God's power is priesthood, and priesthood is necessarily based on Christ's teachings of radical love. Through it God's kingdom is established "without compulsory means [which] shall flow unto [them] forever and ever." (D&C 121:46) In our current mess and latest "war of words and tumult of opinions," the counsel of Jesus Christ to Joseph remains the same: "join none of them, for they are all wrong." (JSH 1:19) This can be startling doctrine.

Jesus condemns the use of His power and authority to build up oneself instead of using it to bless others, particularly the underprivileged. He called out the religious leaders of His day, labeling them a “generation of vipers." His harshest words were not for the sinners, the heretics, or the morally unclean. It was the self-righteous churchmen, the "holy rollers" of the day, those who were charged with ministering to the one but instead made life more difficult for them.

The Book of Mormon doesn't mince words either:

“Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore, whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to that great church, which is the mother of abominations; and she is the whore of all the earth.” (1 Nephi 14:10)

It is important to recognize that this has little to do with specific churches being right or wrong, but everything to do with the way Christ's priesthood and teachings are used. No matter the religion, whenever God's authority is joined with worldly systems of power to exploit, gratify, or consolidate one's own control and influence, that is the scriptural definition of “the great and abominable Church." And whenever Christ's power is used to bless another, regardless of the individual's religious affiliation or lack thereof, this is the Church of the Lamb.

Why am I writing this? Because I think it is important, now as much as ever, that we recognize how pervasive Empire Christianity is in our current political and social landscape. I think we, including members of the church, are getting duped too often, because Empire Christianity arrives packaged to us in all the appearance of familiar traditional religious practice, with all the right political and social cues, and it gratifies us in all the ways that feel good as we divide into teams and fight against all our perceived enemies.

"And it came to pass that I looked and beheld the whore of all the earth, and she sat upon many waters; and she had dominion over all the earth, among all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people." (1 Nephites 14:11)

A fine description of our current state of affairs. Religion, something designed to be the conduit of love and connection between people from different backgrounds has, in some instances, becomes the very form of oppression and control. That is one meaning of whoredom anyway, to take that which is sacred and ought to be used to build a relationship, whether it be sex or religion, and using it instead to exploit another for personal gain or gratification. We hear that kind of corruption in the voice of political pundits and politicians. We hear it whenever groups try to blame another group of people in the name of Christ to concoct our latest enemy, hollowing out the foundation of Christian love. Wherever Empire Christianity goes, contention and division follows, "for behold, at that day shall he rage in the hearts of the children of men, and stir them up to anger against that which is good." (2 Nephi 28:20)

Priesthood vs Unrighteous Dominion

What is the solution to all of this?

"And it came to pass that I, Nephi, beheld the power of the Lamb of God, that it descended upon the saints of the church of the Lamb, and upon the covenant people of the Lord, who were scattered upon all the face of the earth; and they were armed with righteousness and with the power of God in great glory." (1 Nephi 14:14)

Priesthood power is the defining attribute of the church of the Lamb, and the Spirit which accompanies it helps us recognize the clever decoys that try to replace it. As we become familiar with how priesthood works, we will be better able to recognize its counterfeits.

"No power or influence can or ought to be maintained by virtue of the priesthood, only by persuasion, by long-suffering, by gentleness and meekness, and by love unfeigned; By kindness, and pure knowledge, which shall greatly enlarge the soul without hypocrisy, and without guile." (D&C 121:41-42) 

These are the defining characteristics of God's power, and though it is admittedly rare to see in practice (even sometimes in His church as we imperfectly hobble along) it is nevertheless unconquerable whenever and wherever it is found, for "charity never fails."

But priesthood power comes with a warning:

"We have learned by sad experience that it is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion" and when that happens, "amen to the priesthood or authority of that man." (D&C 121:37-39)

This is always a sobering scripture for me to read and recognize the ways it applies to me in all the wrong ways.  The more I try to follow Christ's example on how to work out differences, instead of my go-to weapons of cheerful manipulation, charming contempt, or friendly force, the more I realize just how difficult it is! But to be a disciple of Christ is to keep trying, and I am grateful to be given time, repentance, and God's patience as I figure this out.

The Book of Mormon Is Our Guide

On a political stage as much as a personal one, the Book of Mormon is the guidebook for the problems that plague us, to help us in our latter-day project to establish a world based on love instead of control and "unrighteous dominion." As it turns out, our problem is not very new. People were trying to figure this out before, even on the same American continent. 

When I read about the unraveling of the Nephites and the Lamanites, it opens my eyes to both the problem and the solution. The Book of Mormon gives away the whole plot. Spoiler alert! If we don't get to the heart of Christ's teachings, which is to love our enemies, everyone dies. Civilizations end. Empire Christianity, something that seems to offer so much protection and control, will fail us. 

The Book of Mormon breaks the spell we are living under as the world continues to hurl itself into the task of consolidating power, and the resulting tribalism as the project reaches its chilling conclusion. In the last days, as calamities unfold and as "many false prophets rise, deceiving many, and [as] iniquity abounds, [and] the love of many waxes cold" (Matthew 24:11-12) there is something new to try. 

Instead of sharpening our ideological swords, the revolutionary solution the Book of Mormon offers is that we bury them. It's the same principle Christ gave in the Sermon on the Mount, "blessed are the peacemakers" which is also one of our centenarian prophet's most recent pleas.

It was not the sword of Laban given as the pattern to fight against all our latter-day Lamanites that was dragged out of that hill Cumorah. (2 Nephi 5:14) Like the Anti-Nephi Lehies, Moroni leaves it buried in the ground and instead gives us something better: the word of God, more quick and powerful than the sword. The Book of Mormon is a book that cries to us from the dust and implores "that [we] might learn to be more wise than [they] have been." (Mormon 9:31)

Delivered

What a train wreck of a year. So long, 2023. And good riddance.

Today I’m thinking about the word “deliver.” What does it mean? Google says it means "to be set free" from the Latin verb "liberare," but now I am wondering what exactly I am being set free from, and why my spiritual deliverance sometimes feels like bondage. Google can't answer that question for me. It has been a brutal year for me, and I am left pondering if I am missing something. Singing Christmas carols and watching nativities has brought me more questions than answers this year. Will my faith in Christ's deliverance hold strong if I am born into yet another new year of heartbreak and challenges? "Oh come, oh come Immanuel," I sing with renewed fervour, but what if He never comes?

At Christmas, we celebrate two parallel deliveries in the birth of our Savior. The first is literal. Birth is called a “delivery.” Mary delivered her Son with her own flesh, and wrapped Him in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger. The second delivery we celebrate is more spiritual than physical. Christ delivers us spiritually with His flesh, swaddles us in the garment of His priesthood, and gathers us to His bosom the way a Mother receives her child, or like a hen gathers her chicks. It is an experience meant to parallel the birth of a child. Rebirth is as real an experience as our own miraculous birth from our mothers.

Delivery can also be a cruel experience, for both the mother and the child being delivered. I have witnessed it with my children, standing there like a helpless idiot at the suffering of my wife as my child remains too long wedged between worlds. All of my children ended up in the NICU because of the trauma of their birth, gasping on their own meconium. Some days I feel like I am also stuck in the birth canal, fighting for my life, choking on my own crap, heaved and contracted by the slow rhythm of days that shoves me out of the amnion and into what feels like a world of cold oblivion. 

Most weeks I am lost in the midst of my labor pains, unaware of the exceptional pains of my great Deliverer, the tearing of His flesh or the gushing of His blood that are required weekly for me to receive new breath, a new spirit, and a new life. But on New Year's Eve, I take a moment and recognize that Jesus and I have labored together through a lot this year, through another 365 circle around the sun in a timed contraction that brings me closer to the ever dilating cervix of my mortal exit. This has been terrifying for me, to face my own mortality and waning, but despite what it feels like, I have not been alone in my suffering. A mother in labor cannot be separated from her child. Neither Christ be separated from me.

Like the Lord’s people waiting for deliverance from the Romans at Jerusalem, all the world has been taxed. The tax is at times grievous to be borne. We all live and work and scroll our phones in a world run by usurpers. The irony is that we worship a God that’s completely absent from the pantheon of our oppressors. This tests my faith to its limits, because my God seems so powerless here in a system run by whoever has the most soldiers. How can I put stock in a sacrificial lamb in such a place as this? How can this brother nailed to a cross save me in a world already boasting in their victory won with warriors and weapons? I am mocked for believing in a God who appears to have lost the war. My victors make merry that when I most needed strength, I am reaching for a God they are crucifying before my very eyes. They inscribe on his cross, “Behold, the king of the Jews.” Or perhaps in my case, "Behold, the king of this poor repressed bisexual Mormon." There is no victory for me here. Or so it seems.

Christ does not immediately deliver me from them, this nation of selfish despots and grandiose tyrants. His kingdom is not of this world. This is always frustrating to me, and so my suffering continues. Though I hold onto my belief in Christ's eventual victory, I am often unable to feel anything else except the daily ache that I must carry with me, the relentless loneliness—my deepest, loneliest of hurts. It is hard to praise God when all I feel are the pangs of a wound that does not heal. But this cross I carry connects me to Him. Sometimes the tenor of my worship is more of a lament than a praise, but my God understands this even better than I do. "Is there any other way?" "If it be possible..." and “How long, O Lord?” are as holy prayers as anything else in the scriptures. They are prayers the God of all has uttered Himself as He groaned beneath my load.

In years like this, carrying the burdens I have now, I am annoyed and desperate at the news that Christ’s deliverance will not take me out of the fire. It was a rude jolt for me in recent years to gradually fall out of the comforting faith of my youth in which obedience alone brought blessings and safety. But the truth cuts deeper. A baptism is not just a cleansing baptism of water, but a purging baptism of fire. In some ways, Christ's deliverance is an extraction out of the womb of my comfortable innocence that puts me directly into the birth canal of my great purging—the sanctification that comes when I pass through this burning, dilating ring of fire. That is one meaning of deliverance that packs a punch. Though covenants with Christ can bring comfort, they can also bring pain. Both those things are true. But in the crucible of my faith, I'll admit that sometimes all I can feel is the pain.

Deliverance. Delivered. De-livered. In the myth of Prometheus, his punishment from the gods for stealing fire from mount Olympus was to be bound to a rock while an eagle swooped down at him daily to eat out his liver until it grew back again the next day. The savage cycle of eagles tearing open his flesh daily feels disturbingly relatable. Like Prometheus, I am also bound to this rock, de-livered by the daily grind of discipleship that tears at my bowels. But that is not the definition of de-livery Christ is talking about. To be delivered is not just to be insanely mutilated. No one would continue on such a path. Chapels and temples dedicated to this God wouldn't have anyone in them at all. 

And here is my declaration of faith: Jesus Christ is the rock we are tied to, but He is not the torture. He is the Deliverer. Binding myself to Him is not a pointless ravaging, but the purposeful purging of my natural man. Sometimes it grows back just as quickly as it is removed by the eagles, but daily repentance and taking up the cross of discipleship brings me peace and reconciliation. It is a work I will continue to engage in willingly, (though at times "turning a rather steely eye toward heaven" as Elder Holland puts it.) It is the joy of the saints, the comfort of the comfortless, that which always looks like madness to those watching on the outside of it.

Prometheus, by Patrick Rasenberg

So passes another day being de-livered by the eagles. Another year closer to my delivery as a Son of God. This is a difficult process, but it is not without joy or devoid of meaning. What gives my suffering meaning? What makes "all the difference" on this "road less traveled by?" 

It is the love of Christ. I can feel Him here with me. This is the path toward love. He is de-livered and delivered alongside me, like a mother giving birth to Her child, or like a Prometheus at the sacrament table regenerating for another go with the eagles. He is here with me in the sacred spaces of my innermost heart. I would rather spend a lifetime of purging with Him here than face a lifetime of comfortable luxury without Him. His love is perfect. It dazzles me. I am drawn to it again and again. Learning to love the way He loves breaks my heart wide open again and again with my incompetence, but I tie myself to this rock willingly, because this is the rock that bleeds for me. This is the rock that delivers me, the only sure foundation in a world of fiery darts and tempestuous whirlwinds and reliable unreliability. (Helaman 5:12) This is the rock that delivers me from the absurdity of my inevitable death and sin.

So here at the end of another year, I am reminded once more that "the days are accomplished that [I] should be delivered." (Luke 2:6) And we all will be. So I say Merry Christmas to that, and a very Happy New Year.

Gathering Israel or Spreading it?

President Nelson said, “The Gathering of Israel is the most important thing taking place on earth today.”

I like the phrase "gathering of Israel" because it suggests that we are the ones out there searching, not everyone else. If we are out there gathering, then we are the ones with the deficit. We are called to gather the people and truths we are missing. We are seeking wholeness. This should invite greater humility in how we interact with others because they have something to offer us, not just the other way around. Relationships come into sharper focus, instead of PR and marketing campaigns and trying to maintain a certain image.

I sometimes think of it as "spreading Israel" instead of gathering it. Framing it this way, however, missionary work tends to give me intense feelings of anxiety and guilt as I try to spread myself around, but always bump up against my own pride. And while there are aspects of sharing in the gathering process (Christ still asks us to be the light, the salt, the city on the hill, etc.) that doesn't mean we are asked to be door to door salesmen. Though we may have an excellent product, if we are only there to sell and never to buy, we won't come away with any sort of lasting relationship.

Instead, we are seeking our own salvation outside of ourselves, which is precisely what love makes us do. "He that thrusteth in his sickle with his might, the same layeth up in store that he perisheth not, but bringeth salvation to his soul." (D&C 4:4)

Thinking of ourselves as spreaders of Israel rather than its gatherers, we might miss the most exciting part of the gathering—the miracle of our own redemption that comes from participating in the gathering process! The part where we get to repent and change, not just everyone else. The primary indicators of success for the spreader are numbers of baptisms or likes on social media, but the indicator of success for the gatherer is simply an increase of love and a change of heart.

Our efforts at gathering Israel may bring healing and conversion to others from time to time (which is always a joyful bonus we can expect) but most importantly the work of gathering heals and converts us, the laborers in the vineyard. As we learn in Jacob 5, grafting branches not only gives new life to others by connecting them to Christ through the ordinances of the priesthood, but it also brings new life to our own very old and VERY high maintenance olive tree, saving us from the inevitable decay and death of our own stagnation and pride.

Gathering Israel should bring a spirit of life, flexibility, and newness to our congregations. It should invite humility and sharing, rather than smugness and salesmanship. It is the pathway to love. I will admit that I say all this to console myself because I am actually a terrible spreader. If God's missionary work really follows a business model that focuses on marketing and statistics (like it sometimes did for me as a full time missionary in the mid 2000s) I know I would flunk the program (and probably not be that unhappy I did.)

But as it turns out, I am actually a pretty good gatherer. Not that I am not still awkward and clunky and full of flaws, but that when I try to gather I am forced to face up to my own deficits, and so I end up picking up more truths than I was initially trying to spread. Gathering gives me the opportunity to learn how to carefully (and with the Spirit) find new ideas from all kinds of people and weave them together with the truths I already cherish. This alone makes it worth it for me. From my Latter-day Saint bubble, I once left on a mission as a 19 year old kid thinking I was going out to save the world, but I ended up finding the missing pieces I needed to save myself. While I did help some people come unto Christ through faith, repentance, and baptism, the main story was that the people I met as a missionary saved me. That was the miracle.

So what are we gathering? Everything and anything good! New ideas, new truths, new kinds of people that fit into the body of Christ. This requires a change in US as much as in THEM (whoever THEM is supposed to be, anyway.)

As we learn to gather Israel and unlearn the work of spreading it (or worse, scattering it!) the process becomes a collaboration instead of a transaction. We form friendships instead of treat people or groups as "projects." Marketing and PR are no longer our biggest concern, and honest dialogue and relationships become foremost in our minds. Our hearts are more open to recognizing our flaws, both as individuals and as a collective, and we repent of them because we know it's a process of change in ourselves to gather those people we need, along with their fresh perspectives, in order to be made whole. (And that includes everyone.)

So for me this year, that's my goal. To gather the truths and relationships that I need in order to be made whole. This time, I am doing it for me and my own salvation. I may still be awkward at it, and my own pride and fear will certainly keep getting in the way, but for me it's worth the effort.

It probably still won't convince me to buy a "gather" sign for my kitchen, though.

"How Long?" Bringing Back the Lament

As a registered nurse, I sometimes work with patients that have been diagnosed with a terminal illness. One of the most common questions from them is also one that takes a fair amount of courage for them to ask out loud: How long?

It is also one of the most difficult to answer. How long depends on a lot of things. Some patients outlive their prognosis considerably, others may pass long before the estimated time. It's often a guessing game. All we know is that there will be an end, and that it won't be long.

Unlike most medical treatments, in palliative care the focus is not on curing the disease. Rather, we focus on symptom management until the end. Comfort care we call it. All medical treatments focus on providing comfort for the patient rather than removing the actual causes of affliction.

In a sense, we all are terminal. There is no cure for mortality, except through death and the promise of an eventual resurrection. We all have been designated as "comfort care measures only." There are some spiritual diseases that can be cured, certainly. Repentance does wonders, for one thing. But generally speaking, we are here to experience for ourselves spiritual and physical death. Spiritually, we are in a fallen world that has limitations on what we can do, and we face mortal challenges that cause us pain, suffering, and sorrows. If we are in tune to this reality at all, we might, in anguish of spirit, ask our Lord and Physician, "How long?"

How long must we suffer? How much time do we have? How long until this is all over?

This is usually asked when circumstances are such that we are forced to face our diagnosis in some way because we are in great pain. We might spend a lot of time and energy not facing our mortality and sins, of course, avoiding our spiritual disease until at last something happens and we have to confront it in ourselves. Trials come to all of us, and sometimes the symptoms of the disease of mortality can be pretty severe. 

The question, "How long" is very scriptural. It is a normal, even necessary step. The lament is a part of our journey towards our Physician, the Savior Jesus Christ. When we ask that question we are in good company.

For example, when Joseph Smith was in Liberty Jail in perhaps the lowest point in his life, he asked the Lord that question. "O God, where art thou?...How long shall thy hand be stayed, and thine eye, yea thy pure eye, behold from the eternal heavens the wrongs of thy people and of thy servants, and thine ear be penetrated with their cries?" (D&C 121:1-2)

Alma asked that same question "How long shall we suffer these great afflictions, O Lord?" (Alma 14:26) after seeing the people he converted thrown into a fire and was himself imprisoned and suffered great cruelty at the hands of his oppressors.

Job asks his unhelpful friends, "How long will ye vex my soul and break me in pieces with words?"

Habakkuk asks, "O Lord! How long shall I cry and thou wilt not hear!"

Numerous prophets were very familiar with the lament of How long?

Out of all scripture, however, it is the Psalms that use the phrase How long? the most.

Traditionally, we know the Psalms are hymns of praise, but we sometimes forget that they are also hymns of lamentation. The Psalms blur the line between lamenting and praising God. In fact, the two opposing ideas can actually happen in the same prayer. Can we really learn to lament the reality of our circumstances and praise God at the same time?

We live in a culture that eschews the lament. "Don't be so dramatic," we say to the person who is in process of rending their garments and covering themselves with sackcloth and ashes. "Don't you know things will be alright?" "If you just had more faith, you could see the hand of the Lord in your life." We conceal suffering, teaching our primary children: "No one likes a frowny face. Change it for a smile!" "Scatter sunshine all along the way!" We call honest, soulful anguish the "ugly cry." The lament is pushed away in our interactions with each other. We hide our deepest sorrows, our most painful wounds, from each other.

Sometimes, the lament needs to come first before we can rejoin the ward choir praising God. In my experience, a stifled lament will always get in the way of our journey to Christ. I am convinced that faking joy will eventually make our worship hollow. God does not want us to pretend away our suffering. That will deaden us spiritually as much as anything.

Christ, our perfect example, taught us how to truly lament: "My God, my God, why has thou forsaken me?" In Gethsemane, in the act of atonement, Christ did not kneel down to praise His Father. He knelt down and lamented to Him. 

Telling someone in their own personal Gethsemane to praise God instead of allowing them to lament goes against Christ's example and, unless we allow a friend or family member the appropriate time to lament, could become spiritually toxic. Continuing to hide our sorrows will divide us from each other instead of knit our hearts together in love.

As much as I wish we could, we cannot skip the lament on our path of discipleship. We cannot praise God without first recognizing and acknowledging the sorrow, the pain, the anxiety, and the human weakness that He delivers us from. He does this in His time, not ours. 

That does not mean we turn away from Christ in our sorrows. On the contrary, looking to Christ in our suffering is the very essence of the lament. We turn to Him when there is no one else to turn to. It is a part of looking to His suffering and beholding His wounds, weaving our narrative of suffering with His. Remember the Nephites lamenting because of the loss of their loved ones in the destruction in fires, earthquakes, etc. When Christ came down, He first asked them to behold His wounds. We can behold His suffering even before He heals us of our own wounds, because His wounds are our wounds. Having faith in Christ means connecting our suffering to His.

Do latter-day saints know how to lament?

I have a six year old daughter who is an expert at lamenting. It is not a skill I have. To my detriment, I am more of an expert at concealing and discounting negative feelings, but I have learned this is not helpful when someone is truly sorrowing. If I come in armed with explanations and resolutions and sunshine to shine on her problems while she is still lamenting, I make the problem worse. The howls get louder because obviously I can't see her suffering. I have learned that I need to get down in the sorrow with her, even if I think things will be alright. I have to mourn with her. I have to support her in her lament, to validate the six year old sorrow she is feeling. The lament is a part of healing, and trying to taking it away from her does more damage than good.

In my limited experience, more often than not I see us hiding the lament from each other. We skip that part. We bear our testimonies about how Christ is with us in the resolution of our problems. That part is obvious. But it is harder to bear our testimonies that Christ is with us while we are still in the thick of it, when He is silent, when He seems invisible to us, when it feels like we have to trudge our path alone, and we are mired in the mud. (Psalm 69)

Perhaps we fear that if we are not feeling peace and joy in the gospel, we are doing it wrong. Or that we are somehow unworthy of the blessings. Sometimes we feel alone because there must be something wrong with us if we feel this way, especially when we feel like we are the only one who isn't having a nice time at church. When everyone else is wearing their Sunday best faces, how can we show up at church with a face full of sackcloth and ashes? Or worse, maybe we fear the the Lord has really abandoned us after all.

Is our suffering even welcome at church?

Each of us made a covenant at baptism that we would mourn with those that mourn, and comfort those who stand in need of comfort. We made a covenant to share each other's burdens. (Mosiah 18) 

Can we do this when we consistently hide our burdens from each other?

Perhaps our culture could use an adjustment. In my opinion, I think we need to learn better how to mourn with those that mourn. "Blessed are those that mourn." We need to restore the lament as a vital, holy part of our worship. "How long," should not be seen as a lack of faith, but as a sacred prayer.

Sister Amy Wright in this last General Conference states:

"Oftentimes we can find ourselves, like the lame beggar at the gate of the temple, patiently—or sometimes impatiently—“wait[ing] upon the Lord.” Waiting to be healed physically or emotionally. Waiting for answers that penetrate the deepest part of our hearts. Waiting for a miracle.

"Waiting upon the Lord can be a sacred place—a place of polishing and refining where we can come to know the Savior in a deeply personal way. Waiting upon the Lord may also be a place where we find ourselves asking, “O God, where art thou?”—a place where spiritual perseverance requires us to exercise faith in Christ by intentionally choosing Him again and again and again. I know this place, and I understand this type of waiting."

"Waiting upon the Lord can be a sacred place."

Some of my most sacred prayers I have offered in my life have been angry prayers. Prayers that came from a place of intense suffering. Those hot angry tears when the heavens felt like brass and when the suffering continued in spite of my best attempts to live the gospel—when I felt forsaken and downtrodden and forgotten and left in extreme anguish of spirit. Looking back, it was in those moments that I have connected with Christ the most, when I have tasted in some small way the bitter cup of Gethsemane and known that He understands what it is like to suffer. He suffered so that "he may know how to succor his people in their infirmities." (Alma 7) Like Paul, my allotted suffering has become holy to me because it was in it that I understood better what my Savior suffered for me.

When we sing, "Who, who can understand?" we find the answer: "He only One." (Hymn 29 Where Can I Turn for Peace) Christ's words to the lament of Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail was this: "The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than thee?" (D&C 122:8) Our physician is the only one who knows how to provide "comfort care" in our long, slow, painful palliation. But He is with us to the end.

If you are lamenting, let yourself. Lament to the Lord. Connect your suffering to His. Without any resolution on your horizon, still mired in the mud and sinking, waiting for the miracle that doesn't seem to arrive, when all your faith feels vain, let yourself lament. Cry unto the Lord. "How long!" This is a sacred prayer. Your lament is a vital part of faith in Christ. You are in a sacred space. You are connecting yourself to Him in a way that is every bit as meaningful as any prayer of praise because you are connecting directly to Christ's atonement. He is a man despised, rejected, and acquainted with grief. (Isaiah 53) This is your path to become like Him, and you do not have to walk it alone because you are never closer to Christ than when you are walking the lonely path He trod.

Father's Day and Finding Balance

Last month for Mother's Day, I shared my opinion that the greatest gift men could give their wives and mothers for Mother's Day is to wake up and behold their suffering. This Father's Day weekend I am wondering if there's a corresponding invitation for men.

I have to conclude that maybe it's the same one: to wake up and behold our OWN suffering, and and see the trouble that comes when we see each other as a role instead of as a person.

With the social pressure men already feel, that "true" masculinity never shows weakness or is emotionally vulnerable (or even admits there is a problem at all) it takes courage to speak about ourselves in ways that aren't considered overtly masculine. It takes courage to acknowledge our own suffering as men and seek support in it. While masculinity is a good, crucial, and even divine part of who we are, there are some aspects of cultural masculinity we have inherited that hurt us, both men and women. It is especially problematic when false binaries based on gender stereotypes highjack a sacrament meeting or Sunday School class.

Now I am going to say something a little bit controversial here, but I think sometimes our gender role fixation built up around post World War II American middle class family dynamics is akin to a modern day golden calf.

Don't get me wrong, I believe in the Proclamation to the World on the Family, and I embrace the teachings of modern day prophets about marriage. I believe that "gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose." But the model for men AND women that should be lifted up for us to behold, on Father's Day and Mother's Day (and always) should not be based on any particular cultural gender construct. There is nothing in the scriptures that convinces me of that, and plenty of real life experience to convince me otherwise.

Instead, the model that should be lifted up is Christ.

Christ showed us that a person can develop a balance of "masculine" and "feminine" characteristics in oneself without having to rely on a complementary opposite sex spouse to be made perfect/complete. In Christ, we all can learn to become whole individuals, to be "at-one" with ourselves through Christ's at-one-ment, rather than turn into lopsided men and women who can't hardly function without the other one filling in the gaps. And this actually happens. It makes for terrible relationships. The way we make that balance work for us will be as unique as we are, but it must always be a balance.

I will be quick to point out that it is never helpful to judge individuals or leaders when we fall into this kind of idolatry and lose focus on Christ as our model as men and women, but it is helpful to call out the wicked systems that make it happen. We can start by recognizing that a lifetime spent in patriarchy hardens men and encourages toxic masculinity, abuse, addictions, and shame. This is because the feminized traits that we ALL need as men to be made whole are devalued and even feared. This leads to a myriad of social ills.

Christ's invitation is to help heal all that. His invitation is for men to receive His priesthood and exercise it in order to become more tender, to witness suffering and minister to it, to weep, talk about feelings, show affection, nurture youth—to become what some social constructs might define as "feminine." Through priesthood service, we can learn how to balance feminine traits in ourselves while still holding onto our masculinity with an appropriate sense of balance. For those who are fathers, being an active part of raising children can also help us develop those traits naturally.

While so much of patriarchal systems teach men to focus on efficiency and productivity over feelings and connection, to dominate in social hierarchies at all costs, or to amass wealth and seek after individual accomplishments, many men choose to reject that model and reorient themselves towards a balance of masculine and feminine qualities. Fatherhood can help make that happen, but it doesn't happen automatically. It isn't even instinctive. The natural man has always been "an enemy to God." 

And that's why I honor the many men, especially my own father, who deliberately work to protect a space for community and the feminine collective spirit to flourish. I am grateful to know men who know how to do this very well, and even wear out their lives trying to make it happen.

No father is perfect at this. "We have learned by sad experience that it is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion." (D&C 121:39) We know Christ's priesthood "cannot be controlled not handled, only upon principles of righteousness." (vs 41) This is a near impossible task in a power structure that is totally invested in encouraging men to do exactly the opposite of what Christ invites us to do. But we keep on trying, anyway. 

I see the suffering of men as they try to provide for their families without getting consumed in the process. I see the struggle of men who confront a system that attempts to turn our divinely ordained diversity into 9-5 drudgery,  making us a cog in an economic machine that everlastingly tries to separate us from our wives and families. I see the suffering of men who are taught by the devil to fear emotional vulnerability and to run away from beholding our own weakness.

But I also see the many good men who have chosen fatherhood in the fullest sense of the word: men who use their privilege in a patriarchal society to sacrifice and serve to help foster a place for families to flourish, transcending nonsensical gender labels in order to restore masculine/feminine balance in our communities, in our marriages—and most of all in ourselves.