I should warn you before we start that this lesson was fairly difficult for me. I'm not a big fan of Sister Beck's teaching style, especially as she relates to women's issues, so having to give a lesson on her talk on the history and work of the Relief Society was kind of like reverse Christmas had come early! And, as I expected, I found some things in the talk that I agreed with, and some that I didn't. I'm hoping that I don't offend anyone with my ideas. In the past, I've joked with Joseph that I was going to get myself kicked out of Relief Society. I wondered aloud once what the ceremony for that would be like, and he suggested that members of the Presidency come to your house and ritually break all your casserole dishes. ("You'll never make a Jello salad again!!") Hopefully it won't come to that! I will also apologize in advance because, while I usually love hearing as much as we can from you sisters, the nature of this lesson didn't seem to leave me as many opportunities to let you contribute. I do have one or two places where I would could use your comments, and of course your input and suggestions are always welcome, but I do apologize for so much of this lesson being my lips flapping!
Here's what I liked: At the beginning of the talk, Sister Beck contrasts the lives of two sisters: One is living in Brazil, surrounded by a husband and children. The family is poor, but they are trying to live the gospel. The other sister is living in Hong Kong in a tiny apartment on the 80th floor. She is the only member in her family, and she lives alone. However, like the other family in Brazil, she is striving to live the gospel, and she is a great source of strength to her branch. I like the fact that even though these two women are living in vastly different circumstances in two very different countries, they are valuable to the people around them because of their love for others and the gospel. I also liked her reminder that "Relief Society was organized to be a defense and a refuge," as she put it. I have heard time and time again, even from people who have had issues with the church, or have even left the church, that the best thing about being LDS is that you always have someone to watch your back! And the RS rocks at this! Break a leg, have a baby, have a family member die, or even if you just need advice on anything from how to change the oil in your car to how to cook a turkey, and the RS will be there to help, probably with something delicious to eat!
Here's what I didn't like: Sister Beck's entire section on warnings. She claims that there are "myths and misperceptions regarding the strength, purpose, and position of Latter-day Saint women." Now, personally, I don't think it's a "myth" that there are serious issues with equality for women in the church. It's a problem that I've been thinking a lot about lately. The history of the Relief Society that we've been encouraged to study can tell you even with a cursory reading that things are very different now for women than they were at the beginning of the church, and not always for the better. We'll talk about that in a minute, but maybe the best reason for studying our history is so we can take a good look at what has been lost. After all, Sister Beck admits that, "We study our history because it helps us change." Finally, sometimes I think that in general church talks tend to be addressed to a certain type of idealized person, and it can be isolating if you don't fit into that mold. Sister Beck talks about married women and young women who are "sober, discreet, and chaste." I don't know how many of you remember my lesson where I brought in Hershey's Kisses and demonstrated that it really doesn't matter which one you get, because they're all the same. We are not candies, ladies, even though we may be sweet! (Show picture of blond girl.) [There is a picture of a simpering blond young woman in the Ensign right in the middle of this talk. Just looking at her is enough to make a cat sick. She is the epitome of everything the church wants you to be in the worst possible way.] If you do not look like this, great! If you have made mistakes in your past, wonderful! If you are not married, we need you! If you are loud and opinionated, we could really use that! If you or your loved ones are having problems like drug use or struggles with homosexuality or morality or faith or depression or any one of a million human problems, we could use your perspective. Whatever your background, marital status, education level, or how much you earn a year, remember that RS connects us "to a great worldwide sisterhood," and we need every voice.
So, you might be interested to know that I followed Sister Beck's advice to study the history of the Relief Society. If you go to the Joseph Smith papers website, you will notice a link at the bottom that will take you to the minutes of the original Relief Society meetings, between 1842--1844. I have almost finished reading the notes, and it reminded me a little bit of a quote I read once by Mark Twain, where he says something along the lines of he read the Old Testament once and promised God that he would never do it again! It wasn't that bad, but I did learn some interesting things that I thought you might like to hear about: For one thing, I found the best name in the universe: Talithacuma Garlick! Sweet, huh? Best name ever!! But in all seriousness, this was a tumultuous time for the church shortly after the Relief Society was organized. It's really complicated, but basically it involved a man named John C. Bennett, Joseph Smith, and polygamy. Much unhappiness resulted. If you want to know more, I would recommend Brother Richard Bushman's book on Joseph Smith, "Rough Stone Rolling." I was impressed, however, by how democratic the original RS was. Did you know that you had to be voted in based on your good character? And while the first presidency of the RS was set apart, that was after they had been nominated and voted for by the rest of the society! (Incidentally, it was a Sister Whitney who proposed Emma for the president, not Joseph.) I also thought it was interesting that the men didn't have an automatic veto! There was a bit of an argument at the first meeting on what exactly the society was going to be called. We were nearly the Nauvoo Female Benevolent Society, thanks to John Taylor, but Emma Smith and Eliza Snow won the argument! Taylor said, "Your arguments are so potent I cannot stand before them." The RS also functioned as a kind of court: If someone was presented as being unworthy of entering the society, that person had the right to face her accusers and to have someone speak in her favor. The society was also responsible for chastising wealthy men who failed to pay poor widows what they were owed: Joseph himself suggested that any man in this position should be "discountenanced by the Relief Society." I thought it was interesting that the women were given the authority to censure the men here! I don't know exactly how someone would be "discountenanced," but I'm assuming it involved social shaming somehow. ((Maybe they would knit him a big blanket that said, "Where's my money, jerk?" on it? Or maybe they'd toilet paper his house for Enrichment Meeting?) Of course, the main job of the Relief Society then, as it still is now, was to help the poor and afflicted, and it looks like they did an admirable job. Nearly every meeting includes a list of money or goods collected to help people who were sick and in need of work, food, and clothing. Sometimes the sisters could only afford to give a little money; sometimes they could only offer a pair of warm socks for the temple workers, but everyone tried to contribute. It was amazing to see how charitable they were capable of being, considering that the Saints had recently been driven to Nauvoo from Missouri, and new converts, many of whom were desperately poor, were coming from abroad at this time. The sisters also looked after each other. There was a lady named Clarissa Marvel who had been accused of making "scandalous falsehoods" about Joseph. Her case was discussed, someone defended her, and they resolved to talk to her in private and get her side of the story. Eventually Emma points out that Sister Marvel has no parents, and "she is under our care and observation--she needs friends." Joseph had some wise words about this for the RS that you may be familiar with: "Nothing is so much calculated to lead people to forsake sin as to take them by the hand and watch over them with tenderness. When persons manifest the least kindness and love to me, O what power it has over my mind, while the opposite course has a tendency to harrow up all the harsh feelings and depress the human mind." Would anyone like to give a personal example of when someone's kindness made a difference?
I think the most amazing thing that we often don't know or talk about is how much these women enjoyed the gifts of the Spirit. By a show of hands, how many of you knew that women used to be able to give other women blessings when they were sick? In fact, there's an instance in the RS minutes where Sisters Cleveland and Whitney administered to Sister Leonard for the restoration of her health. I've heard that it was common for the women to wash and anoint with oil other women who were about to go into labor. Joseph Smith defended this practice during a RS meeting, as you may know! And I also encountered several times in the notes instances where women would speak in tongues (while another woman interpreted) and prophesy! I can tell you that during one such meeting, Eliza R. Snow pronounced a blessing on a Mrs. Buel, and then Sister Cleveland spoke in tongues, and then Sister Sessions interpreted. The report of that meeting was, "nearly all of them arose and spoke, and the Spirit of the Lord like a purifying stream, refreshed every heart." I loved that image! We have some nature documentaries that we like to watch as a family sometimes, and there's a scene where some extremely thirsty elephants are making a long and dusty journey across the desert to get to the place where they know the rains will fall. When the rains do come, you can actually see the earth, in a series of time-elapsed photographs, turn from brown to green, and you have never seen happiness and refreshment until you have watched an elephant tumble into that life-giving water after its walk over miles of desert! Now, what about us? How many times do we come away from RS feeling refreshed and uplifted? What do we do well? What could we work on? Thoughts?
Going back to Sister Beck for a moment, she says, "As we have studied the history of Relief Society, we have learned that the Lord's vision and purpose for Relief Society was not of a sleepy meeting on Sunday. He had in mind something much, much bigger than a women's club or special-interest entertainment group. He intended Relief Society to help build His people and prepare them for the blessings of the temple. He established this organization to align His daughters with His work and to enlist their help in building His kingdom and strengthening the homes of Zion." She's right! So how can we do that? Is part of the problem how we think of ourselves and our role in the church? Claudia Bushman (wife of Richard Bushman of "Rough Stone Rolling" fame.) said something that caught my ear the other day: "Mormon women have always had opportunities when they were willing to take them. What we lack is vision." Even back in the early days of the RS, they were worried about overstepping! There was a Sister Spencer who was appointed to be on a committee whose responsibility was to assess the needs of the poor and to collect food, clothing, and money for them. She expressed her fears that they were usurping, as she put it, the bishop's place by doing this work. However, later in that same meeting, Elder Reynolds Cahoon spoke and said they shouldn't be fearful. He said God had organized the RS through Joseph and Emma, and I'm quoting here, "the objects and principles of this Society are vast, not fully understood. The organization of this Society and the Church is similar according to the mind and order of God in it every want may be supplied. Every one has their duty and their place. How long will it be before this society will want a store house to store their goods... The time will come when all persons will find relief through this Society...this Society is raised by the Lord to prepare us for the great blessings which are for us in the House of the Lord." Isn't that great? And I'm happy to report that the minutes record that after this speech from Brother Cahoon, "The Committee all seemed to have gained new courage, desired to remain in their places and do with their might all they could do." Sisters, I have to ask: Are we really doing all that we can do? Are we too used to giving the responsibility for our salvation over to the priesthood holders? Have we stopped thinking about ways that we could lead, even if the overall structure doesn't change? I know women may never hold the priesthood, and as disappointing as that is to me, I'm willing to concede that there might be reasons for this that we just don't know about yet. But I recently heard someone say this: "When I hear women say that they don't want the priesthood because they don't want the responsibility, that's a sin! If there are practical reasons for it, fine. But since when do Mormons shy away from responsibility?!" I thought she had a good point! I've heard several people suggest different ways that we could take more responsibility and be more involved even with the current priesthood structure. And for the record, I'm not saying these things should happen, just that it's a possibility. I think we're afraid to talk about these kinds of things, and I wish that weren't so. For example: Women could pray in General Conference, have representatives sit on the stand with the brethren, be a Sunday School president, an Institute director, a mission zone leader, an assistant to the president, a college president, and be judges in Israel, like Deborah in the Bible. (She sounds like she was pretty awesome, incidentally! A judge, and a prophetess, and the king wouldn't go into battle without her!) No one is asking us for battle advice lately, but there might be other ways where we could help with judgment that doesn't require a priesthood authority to be present. Women have a unique perspective that has an equal, not inferior, role to play in building the kingdom of God. Just something to think about.
In conclusion, sisters, I hope you will always find, in your experience, as Sister Beck said, that "Relief Society, when it operates in an inspired way, can replace fear, doubt, and selfishness with faith, hope, and charity. As we move the Lord's work forward, the history of Relief Society will continue to be written by faithful sisters throughout the world. The Lord is strengthening Relief Society in the living present and preparing a glorious future for His daughters." Those strong and faithful sisters are you! And I think Sister Beck is right: Our history is still being written! I bear you my testimony that we are capable of great things, just like the women that came before us, and I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
Incredible!
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