Women And The Priesthood

[LDSGuy]

Recently a friend of my wife has been posting comments about women in the church, some of which concern the priesthood. She feels the church treats women unequally. She made the comment that that "giving the priesthood to only half of the population is a sexist God indeed." This person also claims to not be a member anymore, and will be participating in a "women wearing pants to church day." I find it funny that the reason she comes to church is to protest it, but a part of me is glad that she is just showing up.

I don't think it has anything to do with sexism. I believe men and women have different roles within the kingdom of God, one being no less important and necessary than the other, or at least we shouldn't hold one in higher regard than the other.

So, what are your thoughts on women receiving the priesthood? Was there a time when women have held the priesthood (the scriptures speak of prophetesses and priestesses)? Will they have priestly authority at some future time?

Any literature or thoughts on this would be appreciated.

[Calm]

I think we should counterrebel by having a "Just come to Church" day.

I don't know about the past, but I think the temple is clear that it will be in the future. Am leaning toward it already being functional in temple settings.

Edited December 15, 2012 by calmoriah

[Erin15]

"giving the priesthood to only half of the population is a sexist God indeed."

The fact is that there is a lot we simply do not know about the eternities, partly because it has not been revealed, and partly because we are unable to currently comprehend the answers.

Given how little we know and understand, it would be a mistake to blame God of being sexist, or to even assume that sexism is a bad thing in the eternities to begin with.

Our mortal perception of fairness is almost always based on the concept of sameness, but that is not how God operates. Everything we know about Heavenly Father indicates that he tailors our talents, limitations, birthplace, life experiences, answers to prayers, blessings, etc. etc. In short, everything we experience in life is individually tailored for what we require to grow as individuals.

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, Saith The Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts higher than your thoughts." Isiah 55: 8-9

This scripture right here illustrates the problem that occurs when we apply our concepts of fairness and sexism to God's behavior. Compared to Him we are little kids, and we are simply unable to comprehend how things can appear to be unfair from our limited point of view, but be perfectly fair in the eternal sense.

This is where faith comes into play. We are assured and reassured that God operates under eternal principals and laws that not even He can change. We must all use our faith to come to a simple but essential conclusion: "I don't know why, but I trust my Savior and I will be patient until the day comes when I can understand."

[halconero]

I find those who have the greatest missperceptions about women and the priesthood are among those who understand the endowment and sealing the least...

Also...I find it ironic that a person claiming to have left the church will go to church to protest the distribution of something she doesn't even think the church has.

[sunstoned]

As it stands now, women are not allowed to hold most positions of authority in the church. This was the case with the blacks until 1978. It took a long time, but they finally got equality. The same will be true for women. They will get the Priesthood.

[sweetpotatoh]

I say give it to them. As long as they teach elders quorum, don't forget the homemade cookies and ice sculptures.

[Erin15]

The same will be true for women. They will get the Priesthood.

But, what if they don't?

What if the bretheren ask The Lord and He says no?

Can you change God's mind?

What would happen to you if you tried?

Here is a better route: Instead of forming an opinion about how The Lord should run His church, why not instead simply seek to follow Him and submit to His will? That is, after all, what being a disciple means.

[slamarwi]

If men didn't have priesthood responsibilities, we most likely wouldn't attend.

I really think there should be a pilot program...

[Rivers]

If women got the priesthood some day, I'd be all for it. But it is my understanding that most women in the church don't really want it.

I do think that there is some scriptural precedence for women having the priesthood. There are prophetesses in the Bible.

And women perform priesthood ordinances in the temple.

[Storm Rider]

This is a topic that has had several threads. Frankly, if someone wants to whine and complain and stop coming to church there is a plethora of reasons available. The bishop has a mustache is just as valid as I want to be a like a man. I hope everyone that whines, complains, about not having the priesthood, not being the bishop, not being a GA, not being whatever they think is so keen, would automatically be given the position they think is so great. In fact, may each of us that yearns for the green field "over there" be quickly plucked from our current situation and chucked "over there" for all time and eternity. The only thing I request at that point is that they are prevented for all time of being heard by everyone else. Or that their vocal cords are ripped from their body to prevent anyone else from having to listen to their whining. Go ahead, ask me how I really feel.

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

The Pearl of Great Price and the King Follett Discourse restore the idea that the individual Intelligences which were sent to this world are all equally eternal. God, who did not have the power to create Himself nor any other soul, found Himself in the midst of fellow Intelligences and organized them socially so they could advance together. In Genesis, the (plural) Elohim organized both men and women after their image and likeness. This implies both Gods and Goddesses in the Divine Council. The Hebrew scriptures we have inherited in the western tradition are not particularly unique; there are shared elements in many related ancient cultures, such as the Canaanites who worshipped the Father-God El and the Mother-Goddess Asherah.

Asherah was represented symbolically by a sacred tree, as was the Lady Wisdom referred to in Proverbs, who was likely an epithet of the same Goddess (significant parallels to Egyptian Ma'at here; and remember that the writers of the Book of Mormon were versed in Egyptian, and include visions of the sacred tree). Jeremiah alludes to this multicultural complex when he condemns the insincere worship of the Queen of Heaven, noting that the people were relying on the rituals such as baking cakes to Her rather than reforming their behavior (the too-common reading of Jeremiah as being an anti-Temple, anti-Queen of Heaven polemicist is flawed - he compares the attempt on his own life with the cutting down of the Tree).

While the Old Testament propaganda was heavily edited by nationalistic Deuteronomist scribes who vilified Asherah-worship, the intertestamental literature such as the Books of Enoch give a wider context that make it clear that in the New Testament, Christ (the "Messiah", the "Anointed One", the High Priest) was restoring the ancient Temple-centered Wisdom tradition ("Wisdom shall be justified of Her children", etc.), most spectacularly in the Tree of Life vision of Revelation, another echo of the lampstand in the Tabernacle in the wilderness. Furthermore, the High Priest was anointed with olive oil from the sacred tree, symbolic of the Holy Spirit of (Lady?) Wisdom, and Joel records God saying that "I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy", implying that the Queen of Heaven had as much authority as the King.

(As Phelps wrote in his hymn: "Come to me; here's the mysteries man hath not seen, Here's our Father in heaven, and Mother, the Queen." Or his letter in which he says, "O Mormonism! Thy father is God, thy mother is the Queen of Heaven, and so thy whole history, from eternity to eternity, is the laws, ordinances and truth of the Gods!" Not to mention Eliza R. Snow's "Invocation, or the Eternal Father and Mother", which has strangely become merely "Oh My Father", as if the Mother is not worthy of being included in the title.)

Joseph Smith taught that both men and women would be anointed Kings and Queens. In the early days of the Restoration, there were prominent Priestesses such as Emma Smith and Eliza R. Snow. This is following in the pattern set by Christ, who wanted all people to become joint-heirs and share His throne as equals and friends. This is part of what the At-One-Ment is about: not ruling over others as infallible, unquestionable, tyrannical deities, but instead becoming servants to each other, Loaf-Wards who share the bread of life.

When the Lord says in Isaiah 55:8 "My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," I think He is primarily talking about the fact that God is equitable and fair when we mortals are so often not. "O house of Israel," He cries in Ezekiel 18:29, "Are not my ways equal? are not your ways unequal?"

"Therefore [...] Repent, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin."

(As the Book of Mormon teaches, God "imparteth his word by angels unto men, yea, not only men but women also.")

The current practice of only ordaining men to Priesthood offices is by definition sexist. It is a completely unnecessary and unjustifiable iniquity where the Lord has counseled us to be equitable. This issue, and our view of homosexuality, are the two things that caused me to wait so long before being baptized, and are the reason I have to continually reconsider my decision to stay in this church. It's frankly a mark of shame on us that this is still an issue in 2012; we should have been the first people in the modern age to continue ordaining women to the Priesthood, not the embarrassed last few who eventually bow to social pressure.

(Note that the bit in the Endowment speaking of women becoming Queens and Priestesses has had the word "hereafter" inserted in fairly recent times; the men's side has not been so altered. This relatively modern insertion has never been claimed as Revelation; nor has the Proclamation on the Family, which describes gender as eternal -- cf Joseph Smith's teaching that it is Intelligence which is eternal, and the ritual healing practices of the early sisters.)

This being the case, it would not require some major Revelation on a 1978 scale to change the current practice of denying women Priesthood. Certainly the usual objections to women receiving the Priesthood are entirely without merit; Motherhood is not comparable to Priesthood, it is comparable to Fatherhood. It's inconsistent to teach men to aspire to be worthy of the Priesthood and then turn around and accuse women of being power-hungry for that same aspiration. Dismissing others by characterizing their sincere concerns as mere whining and complaining is not in keeping with D&C's guidelines for exercising the Priesthood, which states quite clearly that our Priesthood is only valid insofar as we attempt to influence others only through persuasion. There is no place here for authoritarianism, since that violation of agency is the very point at which we say "Amen" to the validity of our Priesthood. (And, uh, 'ripping someone's vocal cords from their body' might just fall under the "unrighteous dominion" category, methinks.)

We believe that "Melchizedek was ordained a priest after the order of the Son of God, which order was without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life. And all those who are ordained unto this priesthood are made like unto the Son of God, abiding a priest continually." Priesthood, then, should not be based on Patriarchy, Matriarchy, or Race/Lineage. It is a cosmological order of adopted Shepherds who are willing to serve the flock and take on the name of Christ ("Anointed One" -- anointed with oil from the olive tree of life).

Women belong to that group as much as men.

Edited December 15, 2012 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[yootaw]

If the priesthood is the authority to act for god, then I think many women and men are exceptionally qualified.

[yootaw]

This is a topic that has had several threads. Frankly, if someone wants to whine and complain and stop coming to church there is a plethora of reasons available. The bishop has a mustache is just as valid as I want to be a like a man. I hope everyone that whines, complains, about not having the priesthood, not being the bishop, not being a GA, not being whatever they think is so keen, would automatically be given the position they think is so great. In fact, may each of us that yearns for the green field "over there" be quickly plucked from our current situation and chucked "over there" for all time and eternity. The only thing I request at that point is that they are prevented for all time of being heard by everyone else. Or that their vocal cords are ripped from their body to prevent anyone else from having to listen to their whining. Go ahead, ask me how I really feel.

There are definitely people who leave the church over this issue. However, there are also plenty who see the inequity but want to stay. For many, the fact that women can't hold the priesthood is just another symptom (perhaps the most visible) in a long list of symptoms highlighting gender inequity in the church.

[Maidservant]

I have priesthood.

[teddyaware]

Hasn't it been made quite clear (to anyone with eyes to see ears to hear) that women will hold the 'Priestesshood' in the eternities and not the Priesthood? In heaven, exalted females will hold a sacred power of authority as priestesses, not priests -- apparently, there is a difference. In fact, isn't it obvious many worthy women exercise some aspects of this sacred authority and power already? How could anything be be presented to the human mind any more clearly than it already has?

It may be only yours truly who thinks this way, but I believe many of the feminist "activists" in the Church are pride-filled ignoramuses who can't see or understand the truth on this matter, even when it is taught clearly and unambiguously. These unfortunate souls have allowed the wisdom of a fallen and corrupt world, taught mostly by athiestic secular humanists, to cloud their minds and darken their souls to a knowledge of the holy mysteries of godliness. 'Husband' and 'wife,' 'father' and 'mother' are the most sacred roles in time and in eternity, but some of our sisters would rather have unenlightened, worldly-wise women like Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan and Hilary Clinton teach them how to go about being fulfilled as women. As for our prophets, seers and revelators? I presume they think they're just a oligarchy of stodgy quasi-misogynists with minds from the Stone Age.

"But it is the living prophet who really upsets the world. 'Even in the Church,' said President Kimball, “many are prone to garnish the sepulchres of yesterdays prophets and mentally stone the living ones.' (Instructor, 95:527.)

Why? Because the living prophet gets at what we need to know now, and the world prefers that prophets either be dead or worry about their own affairs." (Presidents Spencer W. Kimball & Ezra Taft Benson).

[pogi]

"giving the priesthood to only half of the population is a sexist God indeed."

God is good, or he is no God at all.

[yootaw]

pride filled ignoramuses? unfortunate souls? It seems to me that you are labeling them in such a way as to entirely discount their position.

[yootaw]

The idea that God want's things the way they are works out very well for those in power speaking for God.

[Erin15]

The current practice of only ordaining men to Priesthood offices is by definition sexist. It is a completely unnecessary and unjustifiable iniquity where the Lord has counseled us to be equitable. This issue, and our view of homosexuality, are the two things that caused me to wait so long before being baptized, and are the reason I have to continually reconsider my decision to stay in this church. It's frankly a mark of shame on us that this is still an issue in 2012; we should have been the first people in the modern age to continue ordaining women to the Priesthood, not the embarrassed last few who eventually bow to social pressure.

From your post it appears that you are experiencing cognitive dissonance between your discipleship to Jesus Christ and your political beliefs about tolerance and equality. That in and of itself it not a problem, in fact it is a challenge that many face at one point or another. What IS a problem is that you appear to be resolving that dissonance by concluding that it is the church that needs to change to fit your political views, instead of molding your political views to fit your discipleship. In other words, your discipleship should have come first in your priorities, but it didn't.

This is problematic for in three ways:

1) Tolerance and equality may be mistakenly championed as universal virtues in western culture, but in the eternities tolerance is only a virtue under the right circumstances, and if over-applied it becomes an evil thing. As an example, God may provide forgiveness of sin, but he is not tolerant of sin in the slightest degree.

2) This is His church, not ours. We are invited to become a part of it, but we are guests, we do not own it, nor do we have a say in how He chooses to run it. Our agency provides us the freedom to join or not join His Kingdom, but at no point do we get a vote in how He chooses to run it.

3) If The Lord wants changes made to His doctrine or His church, he will do it through His chosen prophet and apostles. He has given to them the authority and stewardship to do so. You, as an individual, have neither the authority nor the stewardship to recieve revelation for the church as a whole. So, when you say one thing and The Lord's anointed say another, it is painfully obvious who we should listen to.

Edited December 15, 2012 by Erin15

[Calm]

Erin, you might want to reconsider your post due to the board's guidelines:

2. Be respectful of each other. This should be a matter of common sense, but we have a detailed list below of the kind of behavior that won't be tolerated......

• Psychoanalyzing others
  

I am not trying to tell you what to do, just giving you a headups in case you were unaware or had forgotten.

[theplains]

The Pearl of Great Price and the King Follett Discourse restore the idea that the individual Intelligences which were sent to this world are all equally eternal. God, who did not have the power to create Himself nor any other soul, found Himself in the midst of fellow Intelligences and organized them socially so they could advance together. In Genesis, the (plural) Elohim organized both men and women after their image and likeness. This implies both Gods and Goddesses in the Divine Council.

Was the God who created Heavenly Father (of Earth) and Heavenly Mother present at this

council?

Thanks,

Jim

[Erin15]

I am not trying to tell you what to do

Yes, you are. You are just being passive-aggressive about it.

For the record, I am analyzing his position and argument, not the individual

Edited December 15, 2012 by Erin15

[bluebell]

Yes, you are. You are just being passive-aggressive about it.

For the record, I am analyzing his position and argument, not the individual

I think if you knew Cal and were more familiar with her posts, you would realize that she's not passive/aggressive at all but is trying to save you from getting dinged by the mods-which will happen if you break the rules.

It appears she assumed as a new poster you might not be aware of some of the rules and was trying to help. She frequently does this for new posters.

[Calm]

I think if you knew Cal and were more familiar with her posts, you would realize that she's not passive/aggressive at all but is trying to save you from getting dinged by the mods-which will happen if you break the rules.

It appears she assumed as a new poster you might not be aware of some of the rules and was trying to help. She frequently does this for new posters.

Thank you, bluebell, for explaining what I was doing. You are exactly right. I also do it at times for longer term posters because it seems a shame for them to be dinged just because it appears they have forgotten about some of the board's guidelines or maybe weren't aware of them but just never had an issue before. If one has been around enough, it is pretty easy to tell what posts are going to be problematic in a moderator's eyes and why not let someone know they might want to modify the post a bit to allow them to continue to contribute to the conversation rather than risk being banned from it? It's a habit I probably developed from being a long term mod on another board.

add-on: I am not saying that you are the least bit wrong in what you stated, honestly the only thing I remember about your post at this point is that you invoked "cognitive dissonance" so I can't judge its accuracy or profoundness anyway....lack of sleep tends to play havoc with my memory and I've been awake all night and rather medicated due to the worst twisted ankle I have ever had...missed the bottom step and took a nasty header besides completely wrenching my ankle. It is just that in the past when someone has claimed someone has "cognitive dissonance" a mod generally starts fluttering around.

Edited December 15, 2012 by calmoriah

[Calm]

For the record, I am analyzing his position and argument, not the individual

Isn't cognitive dissonance a state of mind? If you are using it another way (which is certainly possible), it is not the technically accurate usage.

http://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-dissonance.html

Edited December 15, 2012 by calmoriah