Elder Oaks

[Tacenda]

54 minutes ago, Stargazer said:

So, do we hope that physicist Steven Hawking will be resurrected with ALS?  Or that a thalidomide child gets resurrected in the same armless condition as she had when she was born?  Or that a person born blind stays blind?  How about Ted Bundy getting resurrected with his psychopathy intact?  

I am quite cute and friendly, even with my Attention Deficit Disorder.  Must I put up with it for eternity, just because I manage to work around it well enough to get by, or that someone found it inspirational that I persevered in spite of my hindrance?

Every single human being born into mortality has literally infinite potential.  And some of us want those with inborn limitations to retain those limitations because we found them cute? Have we forgotten the purpose behind those limitations?  Those with limitations are there to help other to learn to be compassionate, and/or to be tests for us. Those limitations are not there to entertain the rest of us!  I have a brother in law with Downs syndrome.  He is a nice gentle soul, but he is a Son of God, and he has an eternal destiny that seems not to require him to be tested as we others are -- and the thought of him being resurrected with Downs syndrome is quite repugnant to me.  

An arm or eye isn't spirit or soul. Nor is ALS or psychopathy.

[Stargazer]

On 10/6/2018 at 10:42 PM, Tacenda said:

To the bold, not me! And I believe they should be allowed to be baptized just like everyone else. I guess it took me getting to know someone with it to have come to this conclusion. I think just as with a gay person, that they will stay the same in the hereafter as well. And they can have a family, or even without what is the big deal? Oh, yeah, exaltation and being able to procreate after this life, what so no single people can be with them? How boring will that be?

Do we baptize infants?  No.  Why not?  Because they have no sin.  Neither do those who are born unaccountable, such as most Downs children.

"Listen to the words of Christ, your Redeemer, your Lord and your God. Behold, I came into the world not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance; the whole need no physician, but they that are sick; wherefore, little children are whole, for they are not capable of committing sin; wherefore the curse of Adam is taken from them in me, that it hath no power over them" - Moroni 8:8

"Behold I say unto you, that he that supposeth that little children need baptism is in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity; for he hath neither faith, hope, nor charity; wherefore, should he be cut off while in the thought, he must go down to hell. For awful is the wickedness to suppose that God saveth one child because of baptism, and the other must perish because he hath no baptism."  - Moroni 8:14,15

I've known a few with this condition, too, and as I say I have a brother-in-law with Downs.  Also, Downs is an "edge case".  You cannot use edge cases to form general arguments -- edge cases must be handled individually.  For example, one family in my old ward had a daughter with Down's syndrome, and she was not baptized until she was in her fifties.  She came to the bishop and asked to be baptized.  He interviewed her and determined that she had become accountable and understood the gospel sufficiently well to need baptism.  So she was baptized.  And after a year, she was also endowed.  She was still very limited in her understanding of things in general, and still could not live independently, but she was a special case.  I don't believe that she could be the only such case, either.  I recall that many years ago there was a TV series in the US that featured an actor with Downs syndrome, who played a person with Downs.  It wouldn't surprise me if that person was accountable.  But not all are, and probably not most, but to repeat the principle: edge cases must be judged individually.

And as I asked earlier, if a gay person is to be resurrected gay, and a Downs person is to be resurrected Downs, then shouldn't a legless person be resurrected legless, and a psychopath be resurrected psychopathic?

When I was a little child, I thought that being grown up was going to be very boring, because I saw my dad going to work every day where he was told what to do, and couldn't play, and I saw my mom doing dishes, washing clothes, cooking, and cleaning, and it all looked very boring.  Now that I am grown up I find that I did not understand adulthood at all.  It isn't boring, it has been fascinating -- although sometimes I've gotten tired of certain things, and there are brief patches of bordeom, but  overall there has been so much more rewarding things to do as an adult.  So you're looking at eternity as boring?  Well, you can't be expected to understand, because you can't see it until you get there.  But you can have faith that God, who loves you, has provided for your future, if only you will take advantage of it.  You're a mother, so surely you appreciate that your children did not fully understand what they were going to be getting into.  What if one of them had come to you complaining that growing up was a bad idea and it would be boring.  Would you have agreed with them, or would you have told them that they didn't understand, but they would eventually?

Try for some vision.  You seem to spend a lot of time grumbling about things you don't understand, instead of working to try to understand them.  It's not that you can't understand -- I see your writing, and you are an intelligent woman -- it's not beyond you.  But I think that you're allowing the daily grind and the pitfalls of life to cloud your vision.  I know its hard.  But try to see beyond the mundane, and you may find things you never knew.  Or you may discover things you've forgotten.  And remember that just because we don't understand or agree with some fact or principle, that does not make it wrong.

I hope I'm not sounding condescending.  Calm mistook something I wrote earlier as condescension.  I apologize if anything I'm writing sounds like a put down or me being high and mighty.  And I sometimes fear I come across as a know-it-all.  Even if I do know it all, I should avoid sounding like it, I suppose. 🙂 

Edited October 8, 2018 by Stargazer

[Stargazer]

25 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

An arm or eye isn't spirit or soul. Nor is ALS or psychopathy.

And neither is Downs or gayness.  I see you get it.

[jcake]

There is so much we don't know.  We can have compassion for hermaphrodites, because they have visible evidence of a problem that could lead to gender identification issues.  What about the person whose differences are in their hormonal make-up or who have differences in the make-up of their brain, which cannot be readily seen but affect their gender identity as significantly as having the outward physical structures of both men and women?  I think we know so little that we have to be careful and compassionate in dealing with gender issues.  I believe that the spirit may be a specific gender, still, could the irregularities of nature that occur in mortality cause confusion or an appearance of one gender when the spirit is another?   

[california boy]

1 hour ago, jcake said:

There is so much we don't know.  We can have compassion for hermaphrodites, because they have visible evidence of a problem that could lead to gender identification issues.  What about the person whose differences are in their hormonal make-up or who have differences in the make-up of their brain, which cannot be readily seen but affect their gender identity as significantly as having the outward physical structures of both men and women?  I think we know so little that we have to be careful and compassionate in dealing with gender issues.  I believe that the spirit may be a specific gender, still, could the irregularities of nature that occur in mortality cause confusion or an appearance of one gender when the spirit is another?   

This is so right on.  If you see what a person has to go through to change their bodies to conform to their spirit, you would have noting but compassion for this process.  Just think for a moment the reaction from everyone you know including sometimes your own wife or kids when someone is so motivated to change their bodies completely and outwardly their gender.  

Being gay is difficult at times.  It means that I am different than the majority.  It means that many who don't even know me will just by the fact that I am gay will hate me and feel I am a spawn of Satan.  But all of that pales in comparison to someone who is fighting an internal battle with their physical bodies.  Personally, I am never going to judge someone put in that position in life.  I hope they find peace.

If you really want to understand this issue rather than just a knee-jerk reaction of prejudice, I would suggest the 2003 HBO movie Normal and perhaps the movie Transamerica.  Both of those movies changed my understanding of what it must be like to be transgender.  Those of us that don't have to deal with such a condition should at least try to understand what these souls are suffer with.  Being gay feels like most of the religious world is against who you are.  Being transgender must feel like the entire world is against who you are.

[california boy]

5 hours ago, pogi said:

I’m sure she is sweet.  My son has a rare genetic disorder too, he has albinism.  Cutest, sweetest kid you would ever meet.  I couldn’t imagine him any other way.  As parents and grandparents, aunts and uncles, etc. we naturally love and accept our children just as they are, but what about their wants and desires?  I wonder if your niece, given the opportunity to experience what it would be like to not have the genetic disorder, would want for herself.  Would she want the ability to drive, have more independence, intellectual capacity, etc., or would she be eternally content with her limitations?  My son may never drive either, or see the stars in the heavens as albinism severly affects vision.  I wonder if my son was given the opportunity to experience healthy vision if he would want it for himself.  It is cute that you think your niece is cute, but our children’s eternal potential will not be limited by what we think is cute.  I personally find great hope in the resurrection that all disability and disorder will find ability and celestial order.

My son will one day see the beauties of creation with his perfect eyes.

But what if he doesn't want to be changed to "normal" as a condition to enter the presence of God.  What if he is so comfortable in his own skin that he feels it is just who he is.  Does everyone have to want to be just like everyone else?  In the Church it seems like it is a big deal if someone wears a colored shirt.  Why is that even a thing?

Personally, I am more than happy to walk a different path.  I have no need to conform to what others feel I should be.  I don't think your son should be forced to be just like everyone else to enter the presence of God if he doesn't want to be.  It should be his choice.  I don't think a Down Syndrome person should be forced to conform in order to enter the presence of God if they don't want.  And I don't think a gay person should be forced to become straight to enter the presence of God.

[california boy]

4 hours ago, Stargazer said:

There's a legal aphorism, "hard cases make for bad law".  That's what is being trotted out with the hermaphrodite question.  It reminds me of the questions little children sometimes ask, the ones that start with "What if...?" and as each question is answered, another "What if...?" follows, and then another.  

The exceptional cases are to be handled on a individual basis.  For the more common cases there can be an accepted standard that doesn't need to be precisely aligned with the exceptions.

Because if you can't answer that question then you have no idea how God feels about gender identity.  It is the hard questions that make us think about our assumptions.  

[california boy]

3 hours ago, Stargazer said:

I'm not talking about the Word of Wisdom and wearing white shirts to church.  I'm talking about family.  The world knows darned good and well that the creation of children requires a man and a woman, and that the raising of children requires parents who feed and nurture.  And yet we have some in our western culture who teach the contrary.  And most cultures on earth seems to know very well that things like theft, adultery and murder are wrong.  Those are eternal principles, too.  

The world (well most of the world) also knows that creating a child does not mean you are automatically a family.  Sometimes people are just a sperm donor or a birth canal.  Being a family does require parents who feed and nurture.  

[Stargazer]

52 minutes ago, california boy said:

The world (well most of the world) also knows that creating a child does not mean you are automatically a family.  Sometimes people are just a sperm donor or a birth canal.  Being a family does require parents who feed and nurture.  

This is what I mean by using edge cases to compete with the general case.  "does not mean you are automatically a family"  That's right, a one-night hookup might result in a child that is immediately put up for adoption by its mother.  But in human history, that edge case is in the minority, and in some cultures decidedly so.  Before the collapse of western morality, the vast majority of children were born to a mother and father who stayed together for the raising of the children.  Of course there were exceptions, edge cases, in which one or both parents were lost in some way.  But some people insist upon magnifying the edge cases.  For some reason.

 

[Stargazer]

1 hour ago, california boy said:

Because if you can't answer that question then you have no idea how God feels about gender identity.  It is the hard questions that make us think about our assumptions.  

What question was that?

I think God knows all about gender identity.  He created us, after all.  He clearly allows for two sexes.  But he has not said anything about the edge cases.  Apparently we are to be left to handle those by ourselves.

But too many people use the hard questions to deal with the non-hard questions.  Like I said earlier, there is the problem of intersex children, which requires exceptional handling to devise individual solutions, and sometimes it must be left up to the child itself.  And then because of the edge case, some make the unwarranted presumption that every child is supposed to be left free to decide upon what sex it is.  This is the social equivalent of the legal aphorism: hard cases make bad laws.

[Navidad]

8 hours ago, Stargazer said:

So, do we hope that physicist Steven Hawking will be resurrected with ALS?  Or that a thalidomide child gets resurrected in the same armless condition as she had when she was born?  Or that a person born blind stays blind?  How about Ted Bundy getting resurrected with his psychopathy intact?  

I am quite cute and friendly, even with my Attention Deficit Disorder.  Must I put up with it for eternity, just because I manage to work around it well enough to get by, or that someone found it inspirational that I persevered in spite of my hindrance?

Every single human being born into mortality has literally infinite potential.  And some of us want those with inborn limitations to retain those limitations because we found them cute? Have we forgotten the purpose behind those limitations?  Those with limitations are there to help other to learn to be compassionate, and/or to be tests for us. Those limitations are not there to entertain the rest of us!  I have a brother in law with Downs syndrome.  He is a nice gentle soul, but he is a Son of God, and he has an eternal destiny that seems not to require him to be tested as we others are -- and the thought of him being resurrected with Downs syndrome is quite repugnant to me.  

Ok Pile on! I have never thought of this before. It is a whole new subject for me. Entirely new. As someone who spent most all my life defending and supporting those with disabilities I find the idea that God will fix them for eternity a new belief. And I thought Mennonites were the best at laying guilt on people! I hope some of the lack of tolerance among Mormons is fixed in heaven as well.

 

[bluebell]

16 hours ago, SouthernMo said:

But now we do know. We’ve been taught that gender is an essential, unchanging, god-given part of our identity.

What is a parent of a hermaphrodite to do?  What is a hermaphrodite to do?

No, we don’t know that choosing a gender for a hermaphrodite child is a sin.  Knowing that gender is essential and eternal doesn’t mean we automatically will know what gender a child born with a birth defect is eternally. 

[SouthernMo]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

No, we don’t know that choosing a gender for a hermaphrodite child is a sin.  Knowing that gender is essential and eternal doesn’t mean we automatically will know what gender a child born with a birth defect is eternally. 

What would you do if you birthed a hermaphrodite?  Would you choose a gender for them to live by?

[Tacenda]

9 hours ago, Stargazer said:

And neither is Downs or gayness.  I see you get it.

What?? I don't see Down's Syndrome or being gay to be anywhere near a medical condition, such as having only one arm or being blind. 

[cinepro]

20 hours ago, SouthernMo said:

While it only affects 1/20,000, I wonder what guidance church leaders would give on hermaphroditism?

 

Wow.  That means there are probably more "hermaphrodites" than active members of the Church!

[Tacenda]

I just read this on another board. I didn't know about Oaks' grandson, he's never mentioned him in talks that I know of. Well he's gay, and here's a letter from someone that posted it on FB addressed to Oaks. I think it was perfectly stated, and I wish Oaks had better insight before giving the talk that he did. I know I'm walking a thin line here but I've lost respect for Oaks, that I can't even bring myself to say his full name. I can't believe I once was so excited to have him speak in our stake once, and the only thing I remember is him talking about getting away to go fishing.

Dear Elder Oaks,

I watched your General Conference address this morning. You stated, “in our view, the ultimate treasures on Earth, and in heaven, are our children and our posterity.” That made me think about the experiences I’ve had with your children and grandchildren this past week.

Last Sunday, I sang at an interfaith service in the Ogden Tabernacle where your daughter Jenny and four of your grandchildren played such a stirring arrangement of Amazing Grace on the violin, piano, cello, and guitar that it made my heart want to leap out of my chest from the sheer joy of it.

During the service, which included Buddhist blessings, Laotian dances, Baptist prayers, Presbyterian bell-ringing, and all manner of praise through the universal language of song, Jenny said she wished we could all worship together every week. I felt that way, too.

We clapped along to a rousing rendition of This World Is Not My Home by the Hill Air Force Base Inspirational Gospel Choir, who only had four of their nine members present because of the recent deaths of some of the choir members’ loved ones. The song took on a certain relevance and poignancy because of that fact. It was like the entire audience’s hands (clapping in perfect time to the beat -- a rare feat for a crowd that size) were filling-in for the vacancy left by the missing choir members’ voices. You could feel the energy of the audience buoying the remaining members up. And you could sense the gift of vulnerability they were extending by allowing us to be a part of their grief, which transformed into an urgent plea for healing.

I watched from the choir loft as Clay Christiansen, former Tabernacle Choir organist, crescendoed his way through Mulet’s Thou Art the Rock. It was thrilling to see his nimble fingers make the organ keyboards sing and his deft dancing feet cause the organ pipes to reverberate their way up from the wooden floor, past my now-rumbling green velvet seat, and throughout every inch of my body until my fingers and toes were vibrating along with the music. There was a piece of divinity in that performance. I could feel it in my bones.

I share that deep love of music with your grandson, who I texted yesterday to congratulate on his recent promotion to musical director of Ballet West. I’ve known your grandson since our days singing in BYU choirs together. He is one of the most gifted accompanists I’ve ever heard.

We bonded over our shared passion for music-making. I became a friend and a confidante. He called me late one night during those years of all-night studying. I’m glad I answered. I could hear a sadness in his voice that concerned me.

I asked what was troubling him. It pained me to hear someone whose talent was so luminous weighed down by such despair. He paused for a long time and said he wasn’t sure how to talk about what was in his heart because he hadn’t talked about it with anyone before.

I stayed on the phone with him for several hours. There was a shared sense of safety as we kept talking. Eventually he told me that the sadness I could hear in his voice was because he was gay, and he didn’t know what to do.

I told him what I was certain he must have already surmised by that point: that I was gay, too. I told him I didn’t know what all the answers were (I still don’t), but I did know one thing: he was unalterably loved, that it was important for him to stick around, that the world needed his gifts and his sass and his quirky personality, and that somehow, we were both going to make it through this.

We’ve each struggled to find our way over the intervening years since that night. It’s hard to know where your place is when you’ve come to believe you may not have one. But we’ve remained in contact. We’ve continued to mourn one another’s heartaches and champion one another’s successes.

You can imagine the elation I felt, then, when I saw the news of his promotion at Ballet West and realized that the rest of the world would soon discover what I’ve known about your grandson all along: that he is extraordinary.

I know you know that, too. I’ve shaken your hand after concerts in which he’s performed. I’ve seen the expression of pride on your face as the audience leapt to its feet in response to his musical artistry. Your daughter shares the same gift. I think we would agree that level of mastery comes from a power beyond our understanding.

It is the same power I felt when I was singing at the Ogden Tabernacle last Sunday under the divinely-inspired direction of our conductor, who is also gay. It is the same power I felt as we sang transcendent arrangements of Teach Me to Walk in the Light and All Creatures of Our God and King, both composed by men who are gay.

The sadness I could sense on the other end of the phone as your grandson confided in me fourteen years ago is the same sadness I felt as I listened to your general conference address this morning. I understand the doctrines of the church. I know there is a sense of immediacy in declaring and defending the values you espouse.

But there is something fundamental missing when I hear you talk about being LGBTQ -- especially when you frame it as being a grave threat to the stability of families and society. I don’t believe that. I believe it is a gift. I believe it imbues us with a sensitivity, a bright creative spark, and an understanding that is inextricable from the ethereal beauty emanating from your grandson’s fingers every time he sits down at the piano to play all the things which cannot be expressed in words, but must be felt with the heart.

The rest of the story is his to tell -- and yours. But that is the missing piece when I hear you talk about us. And I think it’s a good place to start. Being gay or bi or trans doesn’t have to be something that is othering. It doesn’t need to be regarded as a divisive influence in the world to be condemned or feared.

Like all the variegated pieces of who we are which could separate us if we allow them to, those patchwork places can also be the cracks that let the light in -- dispelling the darkness and filling what we once regarded as our brokenness with the healing power of understanding. Understanding begins by sharing our stories. I hope you will start by telling the world the story of your grandson. It is a story of heartbreak and triumph, of loss and reclamation.

As is true of your story, and mine, and all our stories, his story deserves to be told.

In peace and hope,

John

Edited October 7, 2018 by Tacenda

[carbon dioxide]

15 hours ago, Navidad said:

So can I assume that Saints teach that Down's Syndrome is a defect from which my niece will be "free from" in heaven? I hope not, she is really quite sweet just as she is.

Pretty much all Down syndrome kids are like that.  A genetic defect does not mean that there is something is "wrong" with them.  Even you would agree that Down Syndrome kids do have areas of limitations.  I am absolutely confident what your niece will be even more good and sweet without having the effects of Down Syndrome.   It would be the same with Autism and plenty of other disorders. 

[Tacenda]

2 minutes ago, carbon dioxide said:

Pretty much all Down syndrome kids are like that.  A genetic defect does not mean that there is something is "wrong" with them.  Even you would agree that Down Syndrome kids do have areas of limitations.  I am absolutely confident what your niece will be even more good and sweet without having the effects of Down Syndrome.   It would be the same with Autism and plenty of other disorders. 

I feel like Down's Syndrome, is even different than Autism. I truly do, especially after meeting someone and becoming close. Some of her characteristics far surpass those of us that are not. 

[carbon dioxide]

11 hours ago, Stargazer said:

So, do we hope that physicist Steven Hawking will be resurrected with ALS? 

Good point.  Is he going to be resurrected with the same limitations.  Will he be given an eternal wheelchair to drive around in the Celestial Kingdom.  We learn to love people with their flaws and problems.  That is good thing  but all of use would rejoice if we saw them to be without those physical flaws.   Joseph Merrick known as the "Elephant Man" probably was a very nice person who we as people could have loved if he was around us but clearly why would God resurrect him with the same condition?       The great blessing and hope of the resurrection is that we will have a perfect body free from these problems.  

[carbon dioxide]

9 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

I feel like Down's Syndrome, is even different than Autism. I truly do, especially after meeting someone and becoming close. Some of her characteristics far surpass those of us that are not. 

They are different as they are caused by different things and affect different things.  My son has ADHD and other issues associated with development of parts of his brain.  I love him very much even though he drives me crazy.  He is driving me crazy right now and if there was a cure for his condition, I would move forward to helping him free himself from it. 

[carbon dioxide]

8 hours ago, california boy said:

I don't think a Down Syndrome person should be forced to conform in order to enter the presence of God if they don't want.  And I don't think a gay person should be forced to become straight to enter the presence of God.

God does not force anyone to do anything.  God never denies agency though agency used in the wrong way results in consequences.  To enter the Kingdom of God, one must be made clean by the atonement and confirm to the laws that govern that kingdom.  If one is not willing to follow those laws, they can not enter and they will be put in another kingdom they are more willing to accept to comply with.  Perhaps a Down syndrome person who wants to retain all the effects of Down Syndrome in the resurrection might be given that request if they desire.  I don't know why they would choose that.  However artificially made alterations of the body in mortality will not be retained.  Whether sex reassignment surgury or breast implants, these will not pass on. 

[pen sunshine lover]

The answer to this question is quite simple we chose our own gender in the pre-exisence maybe some people just could not choose or changed their mind. We are all still loved. The question of kingdoms however is very difficult for those who cannot qualify themselves. whether they be single or trans gender it is the same we lose those we love, as they have succeeded and we have not. I am single and now elderly. Boohoo I will never accept polygamy. Cannot would not work, so elderly widowers out of the question. This talk has unwittingly chucked the baby out with the bathwater. AS the Celestial Kingdom does not accept stragglers what ever their sexual preference.

[carbon dioxide]

13 minutes ago, pen sunshine lover said:

The answer to this question is quite simple we chose our own gender in the pre-exisence maybe some people just could not choose or changed their mind.

This does not make a lot of sense to me.  So some spirits could not make up their minds for for an untold amount of billions of earth years and then decide in mortality what gender they are?  Our gender was reflected in our spirit bodies.  All spirits have form and one can tell the difference between a male and female spirit simply by observation.  Same it true today.  I am willing to accept the idea that transgender people have issues in the brain going on.  The brain is the most complex organ in the body and even minor issues in the brain can have wide ranging effects.  Consider "Parrot man". 

 

Who knows what is going on his his head.  Perhaps he really believes he is part bird.  I give him the right to do to his body whatever he wants but regardless of what he identifies himself as, I am not going to go down the road with him and say what is believes he is true.  I have my limits on this stuff.

 

 

Edited October 7, 2018 by carbon dioxide

[pen sunshine lover]

I have just read the comments of people with children with learning difficulties. I have 2 Autistic grandchildren lost children to neonatal death. So this topic has been researched. LDS church believes that allchildren and people who do not reach the age of 8 years in the mental capacity sense are choice spirits will automatically be accepted into the celestial world. The reason for this disability is because they faught so valiantly in the pre earth life that they are protected in the world from the adversary, If you get to the celestial world they will be there waiting for you. And we all receive a perfect body after resurrection. They are simply sweet and good people anyway, this will not change.

[SeekingUnderstanding]

1 hour ago, cinepro said:

Wow.  That means there are probably more "hermaphrodites" than active members of the Church!

His numbers are off. Actual intersex noticeable at birth is 1 in 1500 to 2000. http://www.isna.org/faq/frequency

Assuming 5 million active members, that’s about 1 active member per 1500 people world wide.