Women And The Priesthood

[Tacenda]

Gay marriage in the temple would horrify me. Women being ordained to positions in the priesthood -- not so much. But I don't think it will happen. I don't want it to happen. But, since I think that there are ways that they already function in the priesthood, this is not horrifying to me. It would not actually -- in my mind -- represent as huge a change as it would appear. But gay marriage would require repudiation of multiple important doctrines.

I agree with you about women in the priesthood. I just don't need the mantle of the priesthood since I apparently already have it according to the wordage in the temple. And, I think I'm a follower and don't like to make decisions etc. But I do believe any woman has the right to bless her child in time of need, just like the women in the early church did, with the consecrated oil, btw.

[happy]

The problem would be why giving women the priesthood. Would that be because God wanted it? Or would it be because men are getting nervous about the numbers and make the change to maintain popularity.

[Deborah]

If women are ordained to the Priesthood in this life it would only be by revelation and because circumstances would make it necessary. I don't see that happening and I don't see the need for it. Priesthood isn't just an ordination but a power, one which created the heavens and earth. One doesn't need to have the ordination to benefit from that power or even to use it if one has faith.

[theplains]

Sending out the sisters on missions already places you on the slippery slope in my opinion - it won't happen overnight but by degrees. In addition, I doubt the LDS community is immune to the cultural impact of feminism and the changing of gender roles over the last 50 years.

When the LDS Church is pressured by feminism like it was in the civil rights movement in the 60's and 70's, then a declaration will be

forthcoming. [and that is not a prophetical utterance].

Regards,

Jim

[Deborah]

When the LDS Church is pressured by feminism like it was in the civil rights movement in the 60's and 70's, then a declaration will be

forthcoming. [and that is not a prophetical utterance].

How many times does this have to be refuted. The pressure and boycotting of the Civil Rights Movement was long before the Priesthood was restored. If the church were merely bowing to pressure it would have happened in the 60's but it wasn't until almost 1980 when there was no real pressure from the outside.

[Storm Rider]

How many times does this have to be refuted. The pressure and boycotting of the Civil Rights Movement was long before the Priesthood was restored. If the church were merely bowing to pressure it would have happened in the 60's but it wasn't until almost 1980 when there was no real pressure from the outside.

Yes, that's true Deborah, but if they repeat enough then it must be a fact. Besides, it sounds like it should be true to them and therefore it is. No guidance of the Holy Spirit (he does not really function in that way according to EVs), just the arm of flesh coming to the fore with a completely subjective declaration of those with itchy ears. It still clangs like a square bell, but it is obviously music to their ears.

[Traela]

Sending out the sisters on missions already places you on the slippery slope in my opinion - it won't happen overnight but by degrees. In addition, I doubt the LDS community is immune to the cultural impact of feminism and the changing of gender roles over the last 50 years. I visited the LDS visitors center in Kirtland a year or so ago and had this very conversation with the LDS priesthood man in charge - he was utterly confident that what happened in the RLDS church could never befall the LDS (and I certainly hope not) - but you may already have some philisophical seeds in place that may grow into some strange plants one day.

Mike Sanders

Book of Mormon Believer

Independence, MO

How so? Spreading the gospel is the duty of every member, not just those who hold the Priesthood.

[ERayR]

When the LDS Church is pressured by feminism like it was in the civil rights movement in the 60's and 70's, then a declaration will be

forthcoming. [and that is not a prophetical utterance].

Regards,

Jim

I think you misinterpreted cause and effect and have been led to false assumptions.

[onthepath]

Would bad things happen if women were ordained to the priesthood? I don't understand the antagonism toward the idea that I've seen on this thread.

If men can be fathers and priesthood holders at the same time, what damage could happen if women were mothers and priesthood holders at the same time? What if Dad baptized the kids, Mom witnessed the baptisms and they both confirmed the kids? What if Mom ordained her 12-year-old daughter to become a deacon and Dad ordained the 19-year-old elder? What if grandma sat next to grandpa in the witness chair at their grandson's temple sealing? What if sister missionaries could baptize the converts they taught?

[Deborah]

Would bad things happen if women were ordained to the priesthood? I don't understand the antagonism toward the idea that I've seen on this thread.

Where is the antagonism? Just because people don't think it will happen doesn't mean they are antagonistic. I don't care either way but I frankly am content not to have that added responsibility nor do I feel like I need it. Why some people are so adamant women be given the Priesthood escapes me and they are the ones who seem antagonistic that they don't have it.

[Cobalt-70]

When the LDS Church is pressured by feminism like it was in the civil rights movement in the 60's and 70's, then a declaration will be

forthcoming. [and that is not a prophetical utterance].

Gordon Hinckley was asked by ABC reporter David Ransom whether God could issue a revelation to change the rules to allow ordination of women like what happened with blacks. Hinckley replied, "He could change them yes. If He were to change them that's the only way it would happen." Ransom responded, "So you'd have to get a revelation?" Hinckley responded, "Yes. But there's no agitation for that. We don't find it. Our women are happy."

So there won't be a change unless women start agitating for it. As long as the vast majority of LDS women are happy to be blissfully subordinated to the power of men, the policy is not going to change.

[onthepath]

Where is the antagonism? Just because people don't think it will happen doesn't mean they are antagonistic. I don't care either way but I frankly am content not to have that added responsibility nor do I feel like I need it. Why some people are so adamant women be given the Priesthood escapes me and they are the ones who seem antagonistic that they don't have it.

"Antagonistic: Showing or feeling active opposition or hostility toward someone or something."

One can disagree without being hostile, as you have done, or one can disagree with hostility (or, if not hostility, then perhaps condescension or snarkiness). It's certainly easier to let barbs fly than it is to actually take the time to answer an honest question. Instead there have been several responses that are dismissive:

I think it is far more likely for Christ to make an account and post here than it is for either gay sealings or women to be ordained to the priesthood.

Some women are...I 'll say no more.

Sending out the sisters on missions already places you on the slippery slope in my opinion - it won't happen overnight but by degrees. In addition, I doubt the LDS community is immune to the cultural impact of feminism and the changing of gender roles over the last 50 years. I visited the LDS visitors center in Kirtland a year or so ago and had this very conversation with the LDS priesthood man in charge - he was utterly confident that what happened in the RLDS church could never befall the LDS (and I certainly hope not) - but you may already have some philisophical seeds in place that may grow into some strange plants one day.

Mike Sanders

Book of Mormon Believer

Independence, MO

But this last one is the one that brought my question to mind -

I think it would be a great handicap to families if fathers felt they could place their priesthood responsibilities on women's shoulders.

How would having a second priesthood holder in a home handicap a family? If both parents have priesthood responsibilities (and Abilities), wouldn't that lighten the load of the father and free him to be more supportive of the mother of his children? How does sharing a burden create a handicap for a couple that is equally yoked together? I have to admit it looks more like a shared husband-wife priesthood would create a synergistic effect, improving a family's access to the "power of God given to man."

Would the responsibility of holding the priesthood be too much for a mother to bear? I know some women aren't interested in the responsibility of priesthood ordination, but what, exactly, is the responsibility those women want to avoid? Time-consuming administrative or leadership callings? The responsibility to provide saving ordinances to humanity? Being the go-to presiding person who might need to make the final decision? Making sure there's bread and water and consecrated oil available when and where it needs to be? An explicit call to serve others? What part of the Oath & Covenant of the Priesthood is okay for men and boys to live up to but too challenging for women and girls?

[Calm]

I love that there is something I have to go ask my husband for, not only in regards to myself, but for our children. I love that there are others who seek him out for this form of service as well. I also know this is the ideal and that it is a great hardship for women who lack the presence of the priesthood in their home in this fashion, but I don't think the solution is to give the priesthood (or at least the current form) to women AND I do believe that those who lack the priesthood in their home will have the opportunity to experience blessings that those of us who have the priesthood won't have due to the trial of their faith, their obedience and sacrifice and their commitment to God without the benefit of the constant priesthood presence much like those who did not grow up in the Church have the opportunity to experience the blessings and love of God in different ways to those who did.

I don't want the Priesthood...at least not in the current mortal form it exists today. I want what is promised women instead, whether we are given it now or must wait until Christ comes again doesn't really matter. I believe there is likely a higher form which today's 'male-only need apply' example is a subset of and that women have or will have access to (as is promised in the temple) something unique to them that together will complete what Priesthood actually can be, that it is not only as "flesh" or "purpose" that men and women are to become one, but also in the Priesthood as they do so in Father/Motherhood. I don't see the need to duplication myself.

Edited August 11, 2012 by calmoriah

[Acris Venator]

If men can be fathers and priesthood holders at the same time, what damage could happen if women were mothers and priesthood holders at the same time?

Your statement presumes that fatherhood and motherhood are equal. The problem with that is that motherhood encompasses three basic elements: Conceiving, birthing, and raising.

Granting that fatherhood entails a partnership in two out of the three, what exactly can men do to answer the third element that they absolutely cannot do? You know... births performed by women?

Answer: rebirths. As in Hymn #209: "Born to give them second birth." This is precisely why Jesus has his argument with Nicodemus. Can a man crawl back into his mother's womb? No. He must be BORN AGAIN through Christ's sacred ordinances. Both baptism by water, and then baptism by fire.

So in reality, men are given the Priesthood by God to create gender equality. It is the ability to perform ordinances that allows men to finally answer the births that all of these mothers around us perform. In fact, ordinances are the only adequate answer to births that has ever been offered. It is little wonder that Christ is the author of those ordinances.

I know that's not the way it is explained by the church, but that's the symbolism that is apparent in the Atonement. Christ's work tips its hat to mothers at every turn. That's why he performed his first miracle (changing water to wine) for his mother. That's why his final decision was made in a garden (like Eve). That's why he bleeds both blood and water when he is stabbed: it is a reference to the only orifice on the body which normally discharges those two fluids.

Re-read Moses 6:59 and you will more clearly understand that there are two main powers given to us by God. They are a) the power to endow us with a body, and b) the power to exalt the whole soul. Both require blood, water, and spirit. These powers are distributed by sex. They are not the same, but they both involve passing from one world into another.

Kinda like temple work.

Edited August 11, 2012 by Acris Venator

[Tacenda]

Your statement presumes that fatherhood and motherhood are equal. The problem with that is that motherhood encompasses three basic elements: Conceiving, birthing, and raising.

Granting that fatherhood entails a partnership in two out of the three, what exactly can men do to answer the third element that they absolutely cannot do? You know... births performed by women?

Answer: rebirths. As in Hymn #209: "Born to give them second birth." This is precisely why Jesus has his argument with Nicodemus. Can a man crawl back into his mother's womb? No. He must be BORN AGAIN through Christ's sacred ordinances. Both baptism by water, and then baptism by fire.

So in reality, men are given the Priesthood by God to create gender equality. It is the ability to perform ordinances that allows men to finally answer the births that all of these mothers around us perform. In fact, ordinances are the only adequate answer to births that has ever been offered. It is little wonder that Christ is the author of those ordinances.

I know that's not the way it is explained by the church, but that's the symbolism that is apparent in the Atonement. Christ's work tips its hat to mothers at every turn. That's why he performed his first miracle (changing water to wine) for his mother. That's why his final decision was made in a garden (like Eve). That's why he bleeds both blood and water when he is stabbed: it is a reference to the only orifice on the body which normally discharges those two fluids.

Re-read Moses 6:59 and you will more clearly understand that there are two main powers given to us by God. They are a) the power to endow us with a body, and b) the power to exalt the whole soul. Both require blood, water, and spirit. These powers are distributed by sex. They are not the same, but they both involve passing from one world into another.

Kinda like temple work.

This is so close to what my mother told me. When she told me women have the babies so men need something like it so they were given the priesthood. But all these years I thought she said it in case I felt jilted out of not having it and she may have told me during or right after the ERA movement. Now I think my mother may have been more in tune than I gave her credit for. Btw I never felt like I needed to hold the priesthood.

[halconero]

Do they not hold the priesthood? I have mixed feelings on this one.

They perform ordinances in the temple and are annointed to become priesthood holders....

[Acris Venator]

This is so close to what my mother told me. When she told me women have the babies so men need something like it so they were given the priesthood. But all these years I thought she said it in case I felt jilted out of not having it and she may have told me during or right after the ERA movement. Now I think my mother may have been more in tune than I gave her credit for. Btw I never felt like I needed to hold the priesthood.

I think a lot of women understand this distribution of power on an intuitive level. Hence, most don't really complain about a perceived 2nd-class status until they embrace 2nd wave feminism, which demands that they go to war with patriarchy in the church.

[Acris Venator]

IMO, women are never given the Priesthood. A "setting apart" is not the same thing as an ordination. Males can't even sniff at the entrance of a temple without first being ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood.

But the temple is more about unifying male and female authority. It is only in the Celestial room that we are allowed to mingle sexes, and that is at the end of a very deliberate series of "worlds" where the sexes are segregated. The whole thing seems to infer a cosmic meeting of male and female.

Women are anointed, yes, but not by men and not by Priesthood authority. It is merely done by "authority" that is not specified.

[Storm Rider]

IMO, women are never given the Priesthood. A "setting apart" is not the same thing as an ordination. Males can't even sniff at the entrance of a temple without first being ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood.

But the temple is more about unifying male and female authority. It is only in the Celestial room that we are allowed to mingle sexes, and that is at the end of a very deliberate series of "worlds" where the sexes are segregated. The whole thing seems to infer a cosmic meeting of male and female.

Women are anointed, yes, but not by men and not by Priesthood authority. It is merely done by "authority" that is not specified.

Me thinks that you are far too ignorant of what actually goes on in the temple to make such strong delclarations. You might want to sit down with a member of a Temple presidency and ask some questions. Suffice it to say that you have a far from accurate understanding of the temple whether one "sniffs" at it or not.

[altersteve]

In my view, women are not ordained to priesthood offices, but they still hold the power (priesthood) that comes from being God's daughters.

[DonBradley]

Mike,

Joseph Smith sent out the first sister missionaries in 1843 (e.g., Olive Frost), and one of the New Testament apostles wrote of how they had power to take their wives with them on missions.

So this slippery slope must be a gradual one indeed.

Don

[Aspasia]

What part of the Oath & Covenant of the Priesthood is okay for men and boys to live up to but too challenging for women and girls?

This takes me back to when my oldest daughter was a teenager...she could not understand why a 12 year old boy was considered more capable of holding a the priesthood that a mature woman three times his age could not. It's a logical question and one we fail to answer well, in my opinion.

[Aspasia]

In my view, women are not ordained to priesthood offices, but they still hold the power (priesthood) that comes from being God's daughters.

Every time the issue of women and the priesthood is raised, I come to this same conclusion - I don't feel any less a daughter of God because I cannot hold the priesthood. I also don't have the priesthood in my home as my husband is not a member of the church. However I have never felt that I'm somehow missing out - and this is because I have a deeply held assurance that the blessings of the priesthood are available to me in all aspects of my life. I've always found it difficult to articulate, but I don't feel like I'm lacking anything by not holding the priesthood - in fact I feel that by virtue of my membership in the church, I already have/feel priesthood power in my life...if that makes any sense. My middle daughter is being baptised in a few weeks, and a very good friend who was also my former bishop will perform the ordinances of baptism and confirmation. His wife and their five children will also attend the baptism. Of course it would be wonderful if my husband could baptise our children, but that's not possible right now. In the meantime is my family missing out on any priesthood blessings? Not at all...it's right there when we need it. While I know these blessings may be magnified when my husband joins the church (hey, gotta be optimistic), I also know we will not lack in the meantime.

Having said all that, I also understand women who desire to hold the priesthood, not because they seek for unrighteous power, but because they feel they shouldn't be denied something that men automatically receive in the church simply because they were born male. For women, especially from recent generations, who have lived in western society where they are used to being treated as equals in the workplace, academia, etc; going to church on Sunday and being subject to an almost entirely male ecclesiastical system can seem a bit like taking a backward step. I know women and men who have left the church for these reasons, and while it's not a choice I'd make, I do understand their perspectives.

[Deborah]

If both parents have priesthood responsibilities (and Abilities), wouldn't that lighten the load of the father and free him to be more supportive of the mother of his children?

Why would the father not be as supportive of the mother even as the only Priesthood holder?

Time-consuming administrative or leadership callings? The responsibility to provide saving ordinances to humanity

Hmm, you obviously have never been a RS or Primary President. Have you been to the temple?

You keep talking about the responsibility of the Priesthood being a burden. Shouldn't it be a joyful responsibility and privilege?

What part of the Oath & Covenant of the Priesthood is okay for men and boys to live up to but too challenging for women and girls?

Once again, have you been to the temple?

[Deborah]

I don't want the Priesthood...at least not in the current mortal form it exists today. I want what is promised women instead, whether we are given it now or must wait until Christ comes again doesn't really matter. I believe there is likely a higher form which today's 'male-only need apply' example is a subset of and that women have or will have access to (as is promised in the temple) something unique to them that together will complete what Priesthood actually can be, that it is not only as "flesh" or "purpose" that men and women are to become one, but also in the Priesthood as they do so in Father/Motherhood. I don't see the need to duplication myself.

I couldn't agree more. I think so much of what we have in mortality is a pale imitation of what's ahead. That's why I don't concern myself with things like Priesthood or polygamy or any of these other things that people get so uptight about.