followHIM - The Family: A Proclamation to the World Part 1 : Dr. Jenet Erickson

Episode Date: December 11, 2021

Our attitude toward, “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” is a test for this generation. Dr. Jenet Erickson joins us to discuss gender, the importance of Christlike characteristics, and the importance of familial ideals, and how we often don’t meet them yet, the Atonement covers all of our Heavenly Parents’ children. We discuss how we all belong to the eternal family of God.Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.co/episodesFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/FollowHimOfficialChannelThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Executive ProducersDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: MarketingLisa Spice: Client Relations, Show Notes/TranscriptsJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignWill Stoughton: Rough Video EditorAriel Cuadra: Spanish TranscriptsKrystal Roberts: French TranscriptsIgor Willians: Portuguese Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com/products/let-zion-in-her-beauty-rise-pianoPlease rate and review the podcast.

Welcome to Follow Him, a weekly podcast dedicated to helping individuals and families with their Come Follow Me study. I'm Hank Smith. And I'm John, by the way. We love to learn. We love to laugh. We want to learn and laugh with you. As together, we follow Him. Hello, my friends. Welcome to another episode of Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith. I'm your host. I'm here with my merry co-host, John, by the way. Merry Christmas, John. Merry Christmas, Hank. Yes, it's the most wonderful time of the year. I feel so joyful and triumphant. It's also the most stressful time of the year.

Oh, come ye, oh, come ye to our podcast. Thank you. John, fantastic week this week. We have a wonderful guest who's with us. Yes, we do. And I'm so glad we're taking time on our topic today. But first, let me introduce Janet Erickson. She is an associate professor in church history and doctrine in religious education

at Brigham Young University, where she teaches the Eternal Family Religion course, as well as the Introduction to Family Process course for the School of Family Life. She received a PhD in family social science from the University of Minnesota. Is that Go Gophers? It totally is. Go Gophers. Go Gophers. Okay. Her research has focused on maternal and child well-being

in the context of work and family life, as well as the distinct contributions of mothers and fathers in children's development. As a social science research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, she completed an extensive review of research on the effects of non-parental care on children's development for policymakers. She's a research fellow of both the Wheatley Institution and the Institute for Family Studies and has been a columnist on family issues for the Deseret News since

2013. She and her husband, Michael, have been blessed with two children. We are so delighted to welcome you, Janet, to our podcast today. Thanks for joining us. Thank you so much. Such an honor to be here. Thanks, John and Hank. We are just excited to have you with your expertise.

John, Janet comes highly recommended by her peers in the Church History and Doctrine Department. And that was a recent switch, right, Janet? Yes, yes. Just this fall, full-time in religious education. I had been full-time in the school family life for a few years. And then when we had children, I left and was part-time and now full-time in religious ed. Now, John, Janet, this is kind of a, we're going to have to take a different approach here because we're not looking at a passage of scripture where we can say, okay, what was Joseph Smith and what were his contemporaries doing? We're actually not going that far back.

We're going to go back to 1995. Now it is the 1900s. So there might be some people listening who are, whew, that is a long time ago, way back in the 1900s. I love thinking back to when that was given. I remember sitting and listening to President Hinckley give it. It was the women's broadcast. And it was striking that it was not reserved to be shared in general conference, the formal general conference on Saturday and Sunday, but it was the week before to the women. And I've thought often since then, there's a statement by President Oaks about the power of women being the voice for the family. And you might have heard President Kimball talk about the role of women in these last days and that they would be a tremendous power for good, that they would rise up like a sleeping giant, actually. And I think there's

something very significant about women and their connection to relationship that begins with Mother Eve in her willingness to take the fruit that a family could be born and that deep connection to the relational nature of our reality. There was a reason it was given to the women to bless all the families of the earth. So I'm grateful for that. I remember when this happened, senior in high school, I was in seminary. It was the beginning of the school year. And they said, wow, you know, the church issued a proclamation. I'm going, okay, wow, this must be a big deal. This hasn't happened in a long time. And I remember not, the most memorable

thing for me was the least how unmemorable it was. Because I remember thinking, okay. The most fascinating part for me, honestly, was the signatures at the bottom. I was a senior in high school. My brain wasn't fully developed, but I don't remember being shocked by what was taught. Maybe we weren't as aware in the church. In fact, I wrote a list of questions that I think were happening at that time to some degree and have certainly increased, like this one. Does marriage matter? How important is it? What about alternatives to marriage like cohabitation? Does it matter if people have sexual relations outside of marriage? Does it matter if marriage is between a man and a woman? Do children just need caring adults around them? Do they need a mother and a father?

Are they important? Are children important? What are children's rights in relationship to parents? What do parents owe children, if anything? What is the most important thing that parents do for children? Do fathers offer something different than mothers? And what is it? And does it matter? And just seeing how the pioneers would never have asked these questions that in our generation, these are questions that we have grappled with and we increasingly grapple with. And there's something powerful about that. There's something powerful about being forced in a sense to ask questions about the deepest

truths of eternity. This reality of an eternal family constructed of a heavenly father and a heavenly mother and children. And we've been asked really to deeply think about, do those things matter? And someday I think those pioneers will say, teach us, teach us what you learned in that search that was generated by significant cultural questions around these deep things that we took for granted. That's fantastic. I will mention, as I've been preparing this week, I was surprised to see that only five of the 15 men that signed that document are still alive.

As of the time of this recording, only five are still alive. You have President Nelson, President Oaks, Elder Eyring, Elder Holland, and President Ballard. And those other 10 are gone now. As I was preparing Hank and Janet, I found a talk from President Oaks in October of 2017. And in that talk, he mentioned he was one of seven that was still left. So since then, now it's down to the five. And he even talked about the fact that it may not have, I don't remember his exact words, but may not have seemed so significant at the time.

But this is what prophets can do. They see, they're seers. They see far off that we would need some clarity on these questions. Those questions were awesome. I can't wait to go back and write those down because I think it's such an art to have the right questions. And I love those questions you started with. As a graduate student, I remember thinking that this document, as I'm setting all this research, thousands of studies have been gathered over family. Does family structure matter? What do mothers and fathers do? All of that.

And to think within these nine paragraphs is more social science findings, the confirmatory findings than you could amass in hundreds of studies. Just so condensed what we have seen by experience through research, just composed so powerfully in this document. And at the same time, I think it's important to realize that the proclamation can sometimes be a source of pain because it holds up an ideal. And the truth is all of us fall outside that ideal. We all know the messiness of family life. I was thinking family life is so filled with messiness because of this growth process that it induces. Marriage is a profound growth inducing experience. Children are growth inducing. And then sometimes it can

feel like it's used as a baton to say you don't belong, right? Whether it's LGBTQ questions or a divorced family or whatever situations might seem that they fall outside the ideal, it can feel like we can use the proclamation to as a weapon instead of what it is, which is a light. And I think this blazing source of light that it provides for us to guide us, not to shame us, but to guide us and to help us understand when we do feel pain, these truths help us understand why there is pain, why there is pain connected to divorce, why there is pain connected to the struggles of family life, whatever those might be. These help us understand that and help us grow towards that beautiful ideal. It is a great story of redemption. It feels like when we have the proclamation and the living Christ side by side, that this is not a story of perfectionism. I love

Elder Christofferson's recent words in conference, but this is the plan, not the plan of perfectionism. I love Elder Christofferson's recent words in conference, but this is the plan, not the plan of perfectionism, the plan of redemption. And that the Redeemer walks beside us in this journey of family life to help us experience redemption through him as we walk towards this beautiful ideal of truths given to us. That's great. Thank you for bringing that up, Jenita. I've been studying the gospel of Luke lately in my classes, and you see the Savior going outside what some had put up as boundaries of who belongs and who doesn't belong. And in the gospel of Luke, he just walks right past those boundaries and says, these people belong, that you had kicked out, that you had pushed away to the fringes.

They belong. Come in, come in. We're all part of this big family. I'm glad you used that word ideal. I wanted to just state something that's right in the Follow Him manual. It's on page 215, where Elder Christofferson said, To declare the fundamental truths relative to marriage and family is not to overlook or diminish the sacrifices and successes of those for whom the ideal is not a present reality. Everyone has gifts. Everyone has talents. Everyone can contribute to the unfolding of the divine plan in each generation. And he goes on, but I'm glad you used that word, the ideal. And I put in my margin, I put Moroni USA, which usually isn't

words we put together. But what I meant by USA is Moroni is the ultimate single adult because his greatest contribution, his greatest work, I think we could say, is while he was a single adult. And our marital status does not diminish our capacity and our gifts to contribute to the world, to the gospel, to the church, you know. So I like that, yeah, this is an ideal to think of Moroni. There's this beautiful statement in actually the handbook of instructions. And it says around the family, the whole purpose of the gospel being to strengthen the family. And it says, in this life, many people have limited opportunities for loving family relationships. That's just reality. No family is free from challenges, pain, and sorrow. Individuals and families exercise faith in the Lord and strive to live according to the

truths he has revealed concerning the family. The Savior has promised he will bear the burdens of all who come unto him. And so you think of Moroni walking beside the Savior in that journey as he comforted him during that time of, right, outside of that ideal. Yeah. Janet, you mentioned that we're going to study the living Christ, or you put them side by side, and we're going to study this next week.

I like this idea of here's the ideal, and here's the Christ when you don't reach the ideal, right? Yes. And when, because you all, right? We all need him. Yeah. Are we not all beggars? Are we not all beggars? King Benjamin might remind us.

Yeah. I love that. Thank you. You know, the proclamation starts out with all of us as the family of God. That is the whole beginnings. It says, right? This is the plan for all of us. All human beings are created in the image of God.

Each is a beloved spirit, son or daughter of heavenly parents. And as such, each has a divine nature and destiny in this heavenly family that we are all part of. And I'll think sometimes this, the proclamation is about our heavenly family. So when we think of the great gathering, it's so beautiful that the teachings of the proclamation came in this dispensation of the gathering. And we have President Nelson speaking of the gathering as we are gathered into temples, the gathering of Israel into temples,

to receive and be endowed with the power that is part of that familial order of the priesthood, where we join the eternal family of our heavenly parents, sealed to the eternal family of our heavenly parents. And the proclamation is grounded in that truth. Every one of us belong to a family, beloved sons and daughters of heavenly parents. So no matter who you are, you fall into that category. Yes.

Man, that's great. The family, a proclamation to the world, it's not just about your family, that's great. The family of Proclamation to the World is not just about your family, it's about the big family. The big family. We get very used to calling each other brother and sister, but it's a good reminder that,

no, this is really, this is who we are. We're brothers and sisters in this huge family and how differently we could treat each other if we really took those titles to heart that we get so used to. When I was on my mission in the Philippines, I remember this sister that we found, I think

she was less active at the time, and we kept calling her sister. And her two little kids were just giggling in the corner because it sounded so funny. Because we're like, hey, sister. And to me, I kind of stepped back and went, yeah, we say that. And we get really used to it. But the kids thought they were just giggling that we kept calling her sister. Because we get used to it. And maybe this is a good reminder.

It is literally true, right? Literally. This is a fact. Yeah. I wanted to just mention too, at the beginning, right, we hear that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that family is central to the creator's plan for the eternal destiny of his children. I was thinking about what it was like to sit in General Conference and hear Elder Christofferson talk about the four pillars of the plan of salvation. And growing up, right, I'd heard President Elder McConkie's words referred to lots. I, of course, all throughout scripture, when the plan of salvation is taught, it has three

core things. It has the creation, the fall, and the atonement everywhere. And here, Elder Christofferson said, there are four pillars and the fourth is the family. And he describes, right, the family is, it supplies the best setting for God's plan to thrive. It's the setting for the birth of children and the environment for the learning and preparation they will need for successful mortal life and eternal life in the world to come and how core to have the family be the setting for our physical birth and our spiritual rebirth. We could not have the plan, the creation, the fall and the atonement are all based in the truth of

the family and the central role of the family. Our biological families are mortal based in the truth of the family and the central role of the family. Our biological families are, right, our mortal families in which we grow and prepare for eternal life. So I thought he has just done something absolutely remarkable. He has not new, right, but just clearly stated, this is a stool of four legs. The plan of salvation rests on all four of these, the family being central to that. I just heard Sister Beck, this is a sweet experience. I was just with her a little while ago and I told her that we talk about her talk in our class on the proclamation. And we talk about a talk where she said,

we must teach the youth of the church that the family is central to the plan of salvation. And she said, the creation provided the setting for a family to live and the family to grow, the eternal family of God to go. The fall was that decision for the family to enter mortality, for children to be born. The atonement, its whole purpose is for us to be sealed to the eternal family of God and for families to be united eternally. And so the entire plan is about family. It starts with family.

The reason there is a plan is because we are children of loving heavenly parents who want to bring us home to them and enable us to become like them. The fall enabled us to come into a setting where families can be born. The atonement, the whole purpose of Christ's work is to seal us back to the family of God and enable us to become the kind of people that are like our heavenly parents, that can have that level of intimate relationship. It can have that level of closeness and deep capacity for joy and family life. So she said to me, as I was telling her that, she said, Janet, that talk was given to me by revelation.

And she just teared up. She said, I will never forget in the middle of the night being awakened and given that talk. Where's that talk again? I've got to write that down. It was given to the youth of the church. It was given to the CES, all the instructors of religious education throughout the church. Was it the CES symposium or something? Yes, 2006.

Yes. 2006. I remember. It was in the little theater of the conference center. I was there. I remember being there. And she said something so simple, but it really changed me. She said, if something is anti-family, it is anti-Christ. I remember being there. And she said something so simple, but it really changed me. She said, if something is anti-family, it is anti-Christ.

I remember that. And it's never left me from that moment. Would I like what you said here in that first paragraph? Janet, the family is central to the Creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children. One of the theories out there was that maybe God just made the world like a clock. I can't remember which philosopher this was. And then just kind of stepped back to see what would happen. Kind of disinterested, you know, instead of intensely interested. Just yesterday with my class, we referenced the vision that Enoch had where he saw God weeping and how he's not unaffected by us.

He's involved and wants to be in our eternal destiny. And I like just restating that this is about his family. He's involved. He wants our eternal destiny is part of his plan right there in the first paragraph. Well, let's pick up on paragraph two. As we were talking about this, our Heavenly Father, I was thinking there's something so plan right there in the first paragraph. Well, let's pick up on paragraph two. As we were talking about this, our heavenly father, I was thinking there's something so magnificent in the proclamation where it talks about our heavenly mother and our heavenly parents that we are sons and daughters in their image.

And then it says, gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose. We know that life comes from two, the union of male and female, God, the mother, God, the father. And Elder Porter, Elder Bruce Porter, who loved to talk about the proclamation, he once said, the differences between men and women are not simply biological. They are woven into the fabric of the universe, a vital foundational element of eternal life and divine nature. And cultures all throughout time, right, have, whether it's yin and yang or whatever different metaphors or images that capture this reality, that this male female is woven into the fabric

of the universe, that it is the essence of life. You have life created only through the complementary union of these two. Of course, we live at a time that experiences challenges around gender. I'll talk to my students about how for a long time, when we talked about male and female, it was the same as man and woman. You would use them interchangeably. And then in about the 1960s, there was a recognition that we should talk about gender as different from sex, from biological sex, from chromosomal makeup.

We should talk about gender, which is our social understanding of what it means to be a man or woman. What are the expectations of what it looks like to be a woman? What are the expectations of what it it means to be a man or woman. It's what are the expectations of what it looks like to be a woman? What are the expectations of what it looks like to be a man? How do they act? What colors do they wear? What preferences do they have? That kind of, and so appreciating the social understanding of gender, of sex. And that was important, right? Because you have cultural ideas that can be distortions of that idea of male and female. So we get caught up in different ideas about restrictions about what a woman needs to do or be like, or what a man needs to do or be like, that are conformities that are unhealthy. I love the story of Charlie Bird, who was Cosmo at BYU and experiences same-sex attraction,

would identify as gay. And he describes as a young man, very faithful Latter-day Saint, but describes as a young man being in church. And he knew he was different, which is so often what an individual who experiences LGBTQ questions, they'll just feel different. And it was painful for him. And he stopped going to young men. He would go to sacrament meeting, but it was uncomfortable. He was made fun of and felt different. His sister follows him one Sunday to figure out where he's going after sacrament meeting. And he just tells her I'm different. And she says to him, Charlie, Jesus made flowers.

And then she describes how the traits that he has that are his gifts are the same ones that the Savior had. And so she says to him, the question you should be asking is not whether or not this characteristic is male or asking is not whether or not this characteristic is male or masculine, but whether or not it is Christ-like and teaches him a whole new understanding of what gender means. And we just have the gift in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's Hank you were referencing. He breaks open some of those problematic gender stereotypes by the way that he was.

He calls himself, he refers to himself as a mother, right? As a hen gathering her chickens. He gives himself characteristics that we would associate with femininity to teach us what a true man is like. And so I appreciate that. And then at the same time, I'll tell those students, the proclamation does something very powerful for us at a time when gender today has moved from social understanding of gender to psychological, meaning whatever I feel is what defines my gender.

It grounds us in biology because President Oaks has been really clear in saying that when the reference to gender is made in the proclamation, it is referring to biological sex at birth. And so the proclamation, it takes the confusion. If we were left with just psychological understanding of what it meant to be, whatever we felt, then there would be non-ending ways of being, ways of understanding oneself. And the proclamation just pulls us back into a grounded place to understand our responsibilities, our stewardships, where we will find joy. And certainly there can be experiences that feel dysphoric from that, right?

That individuals can feel like, I don't feel like what I think I should feel. And yet the Lord tells us there is gender. You have gender. It's important to your path eternally, and it will bring you meaning and joy as you understand it. And then it grounds us in the role of biology and understanding ourselves in the body, that our bodies matter, that the soul is made up of the body and the spirit, and that this biological founding to our gender is, is important in the plan that doesn't answer all the questions, right? It doesn't answer all of, all of the issues that that might bring up, but it helps ground us in seeking, um, and appreciating the role of

biological gender in, in this eternal plan. I thought, you know, equate that with Nephi's what is forward. I just thought it was a good way to say we're trying to move toward Christ and he is our true north. I think when we think about gender, in mortality, we have probably shadows of what eternal gender looks like, but we don't know all that that is. And I think the Redeemer's plan is to help us understand that, right? Help us that pointed to Christ, we can understand what that eternal gender means. Recognizing that mortality is not the source of that eternal gender. It likely contains shadows of it, right? We don't see perfectly what that eternal gender looks like, but keeping our hope in Jesus Christ, Christ's word will teach us, right?

He can reveal to us what that means. It reminds me of this statement in the proclamation. I'm moving maybe too far ahead but he it does say happiness in family life is most likely to be achieved when founded upon the teachings of the lord jesus christ our true north christward sorry to jump ahead though there no hank i i don't know if if there's any more powerful place you know in that the new proclamation on the restoration there's a statement that says this church is founded upon the cornerstone of the living Christ. And I have often thought, if we said this family, this life is founded on the cornerstone of the Lord Jesus Christ,

that's what he's teaching us. My life founded on Jesus Christ, my family founded on the Lord Jesus Christ and this church founded on the Lord Jesus Christ. I'll never forget sitting amidst a group of religious representatives, people from different faiths. And as I was talking about the plan of salvation, we'd all just been asked to share some. And all of a sudden before I was going to present, I thought, I'm the only one here who knows that I will be resurrected as a woman and that I existed as a woman before and that I have a mother in heaven who has a body and I am in her image. Our belief just at once dignifies half the human race, right? It establishes the reality that we as women, our gender matters, that it is divine, that we are embodied as our queenly heavenly mother. And it establishes that beautiful maternal relationship that we have that

is eternal. You walk by the primary and they're in there singing, I am a child of God and not even knowing what theological dynamite that is, that it's not a metaphor, that it's really a father and mother in heaven. And I think we're unique in that. I don't know everything about all of the different denominations and beliefs, but the idea that God is an exalted man and mother in heaven and exalted woman is, I think, unique to us, isn't it? And wouldn't Satan want to make that kind of fuzzy? Yes, so much, John. It means everything to literally come from them, to literally have

that eternal relationship of child and mother and father, daughter and son. The next part that we get to in the proclamation talks about how spirit sons and daughters knew and worshiped God as their eternal father and accepted his plan with that eternal divine destiny as heirs of eternal life. It is the most glorious story to think. That's my destiny, right? That's the plan, each of us. And that's the work of families. Families play such a central role in enabling that process. We depend, unlike all the other species on the earth, human beings are born totally dependent for a long period of their life. They've got to be fed, clothed, cared for, right? And nourished and nurtured. And that reality means so much that

our physical setting for birth has so much to do with this developmental process that enables us to experience spiritual rebirth. That's what Elder Christofferson is talking about. This is the setting for physical birth and preparation for spiritual rebirth. If you ever see just any, almost any other animal born within a couple of hours, they're able to run away from predators, right? Yes. And a little infant, little human infant.

Yes. It's gonna be a long time. Not so much. Yes, a long time. It's gonna be a while. Okay, this beautiful next part is, the divine plan of happiness enables family relationships to be perpetuated beyond the grave. Sacred ordinances and covenants available in holy temples make it possible for individuals to return to the presence of God and live in families eternally. you are part of an eternal family. This is your divine destiny. I've given everything, right? The Lord's saying, I've given everything possible to enable you to experience joy in eternal life and

families. Remember President Eyring, President Holland saying, it wouldn't be heaven if Pat weren't here. It wouldn't be heaven for me. President Eyring talking about what would a child, if you ask them, what would they want more than anything? I want to be with my mom and dad. I want to be with my family. That's what eternal life is in those relationships. The next part, and Hank, maybe, do you mind reading the first commandment? No, not at all. That paragraph? The first commandment that God gave to Adam and Eve pertained to their potential for parenthood as husband and wife. That paragraph has a whole lot.

I wanted to stop for just a second about this idea of children. There's this interesting account of the founder of Harvard sociology program. There were two co-founder, Sorokin and then Carl Zimmerman. And Carl Zimmerman ended up writing a book where he looked across civilizations, ancient Egypt, Babylon, starting with Syria, Babylon, Greece, Rome, the European empires. And he's looking at the rise and fall of nations. And his question as a sociologist was, what was the role of families? What was their place across this rise and fall? And one thing that he just was so striking is that at the peak of their creativity and progress, and all of them had this cycle of rising and falling, the family was so central.

And it was a particular way of viewing the family. It was an orientation to the development of children within families. So he would say that at all civilizations, at their peak of creativity and progress, the orientation of society was to the nurturing of children within families, that there's something powerful when a society is oriented around the development of children that facilitates the best in that society. And it's made me think a lot about what is it that children do for us? What is it that this looking towards nurturing life in families, having children, bearing children, what is it that it does for us? And you can just see, right, if you just looked at, first of all, what it means to the GDP, like we really depend on life

to sustain economies. There's no question. So just kind of those goods, right, that enable survival are really around children. How our policies are changed, how we think about alcohol laws and movie ratings and just all the things that are shaped by concern for the most vulnerable. And then it betters us. We see data that it's in having children that parents return to church, right? They'll leave religion. And in having a child, they want to go back because they want, they remember, they want what was better for their children. They want that setting. So it just invites better. So Sorokin, who was with Zimmerman, says this powerful thing. He says, whatever may be the virtues of age, they cannot compensate for the vitality, vigor, courage, daring, elasticity, and creativity of the young. A nation largely composed of middle-aged or elderly people enfeebles itself physically,

mentally, and socially, and moves toward the end of its creative mission and leadership. That's Harvard's founder of the sociology program. But he's just saying, he's commenting on our culture, right? Of dramatic decreases in fertility rates and other things. And what it says about a society that is not looking to the future and the nurturing and development of children and what it means to its own stability, creativity, generativity, productivity. So children do a lot, do a lot for us. Yeah. Thank you.

Wow. And you wouldn't even think of that. I never even thought of it. Yeah. But dude, try to think of a world of – that's so funny. Think of a world where everybody's middle-aged or seniors. Yes. And feebles itself.

Yeah. People are leaving their blinkers on all over the freeways. You know, it's just – Well, that's interesting, though. As we focus on raising these young people, it brings out the best in all the adults. Yes. Yes. He, Hank, I loved, and I, and you referenced before we even started this podcast, you referenced, you know, what it meant to have children and how they bring out, they expose you to yourself in the most powerful ways.

I've got this great quote about that, but I, but I was just thinking there's something so remarkable about the marriage. Sorokin calls it the marriage family school, that this cultivation in children, he'll say it stimulates married persons to release and develop their best creative impulses. For surely the mission of molding their own is as ennobling as the creation of a masterpiece in the arts or sciences. So you just think Elder Hales once gave a talk and he spoke to the women. He just said, we often think about children as a trap for development. That's kind of the cultural, right? Your life ends in the nurturing of the young. And I believe strongly that women need to develop their gifts and talents,

their capacities, their education. I believe so strongly in that. And that may mean doing things simultaneously, education as well as children, or some contributions community-wise or professionally as well as children. But we cannot diminish the power of development that comes in the nurturing of children. So Elder Hills just says, motherhood, and I would add fatherhood, is the ideal opportunity for lifelong learning. It is exponential, not linear. Just think of the learning process of a mother throughout the lifetime of her children because the needs are so varied and far-reaching. In the process of rearing her children, a mother studies child development, nutrition,

healthcare, physiology, psychology, nursing, medical research, and educational tutoring in many diverse fields, math, science, geography, literature, English, and foreign languages. She develops gifts in music, athletics, dance, and public speaking. The learning examples could continue endlessly. And thinking about what children can bring out in us because we care so deeply about their growth and development. That's incredible. That's a huge takeaway that I've never thought of because by far the most I've worked at pushing myself to become better is in my marriage and in being a parent. Not in my career or my church calling, even though those bring out good things, I think, in me. By far, being a parent and being a husband have pushed me to try to be something better. I've had to relearn algebra. I thought it was done.

When your child is sick or injured or hurting you, and you've gone through that, you would trade places with them so quickly. Just give this to me, you know, and helping them through suffering is quite an experience, as I'm sure you both know, and I'm sure our Heavenly Father knows, and thinking about God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son, and whoa, and the suffering that happened there, those all contribute to, you know, being a parent. I love that whole thing, especially going through school all over again with your kids as they go to school and parent-teacher conferences. I think I learned this once. I know of someone who's been a single adult all her life, never married, but is a world-class auntie, you know, that is an aunt too and gets involved in their lives and helps them and nurtures them as well in her place where she is. John, you and I both know I was single a long time.

I think you were too. And I think it's remarkable what a special role you can have in your family. What an important role all of these individuals, these relationships that we have sharing the nurturing of life. I need the village of everyone who helps me with my children so much. And we depend on one another in that work of nurturing all together. You know, it was so cool to have my son, Andrew, come home from Iceland, and suddenly it wasn't just mom and dad saying, let's do scriptures. It was Andrew, all right, who's in charge?

Okay, I want you. And his younger brothers going, looking at their older brother going, wow, Andrew loves this. And it was like, I just felt this relief, like, look, we're all in this together and look, now they're helping and teaching each other. And I shouldn't just say Andrew, my daughter, Ashley too, same thing, coming home from a mission and being so fired up, all helping us with each other in a family setting. You want to take home evening tonight? Okay, great.

I'll just buy the pizza. You take over. Hank, I have to go back to, I love your just comment about like this, Michael Novak, he says, the raising of children brings us each breathtaking vistas of our inadequacy. And I think he captures that. I mean, this incredibly brilliant Catholic scholar who's just saying here, this brings me breathtaking vistas of my inadequacy. And then he says this, my bonds to them hold me back from many sorts of opportunities. You get that as a single person, there's some freedom that's very different, right? And yet he says, these do not feel like bonds. They are, I know, my liberation.

They force me to be a different sort of human being in a way in which I want and need to be forced. And I think even if we're not mothers and fathers, whenever we are given to the development of others, that is goodness, that is Godhood, then we doctors told us she was on the scale. You know, you'd go in and she's on the 107th percentile for her head size. And you're thinking, wow, we're great parents. Right. But she was always on the very, very bottom off the chart on the other side. And it was called failure to thrive. And so every time we took her in, you know, she's still in the failure to thrive zone. And we're going, oh. And I remember one time she got dehydrated

and they said, we've just got to get her drinking. You just got to do anything you can to get her drinking. Here she is, just a- Tiny. Kind of a newborn, tiny little thing. And you're just holding her. And I remember I had a little dropper, right? And I would get a little,

like not even an eighth of a teaspoon. And I'm giving her a little drop, hoping it stays down, right? Just a little at a time. Here I am doing this for hours, right? And it's such a, it's a fond memory now, which is odd. But it was just me and her, you know, Sarah was able to get some sleep. And I've got my little dropper. And I'm trying to get, you get- Trying to keep her growing. Yeah, just get a couple of teaspoons to keep her down and she'd lick her lips or whatever

and then occasionally spit it all back up and we start all over again. And who would you do that for? I remember getting up over and over again with our baby and thinking, who would I do this for? And yet I cannot stop myself. Literally every part of me has to respond, right? Sorokin calls that, he'll say, that fountainhead of unselfish care and spontaneous help is the foundation of moral life. It's just that this sacrifice,

it begins at home in the cradle of the helpless baby that we learn the art of selflessness of giving right for the life of another. It's a, it's a special relationship. John, when you reference the, the Lord weeping in Enoch, right. And, and thinking I've watched my parents, right. That, that my mom will say to have a child is to have a heart walking outside of your body all the rest of your life. You care so deeply for their wellbeing. When they suffer, you suffer. It is a very atonement-like experience. And just what the Lord is teaching us in this process is such a gift. It's why we need them so much. We need those relationships so much. And you know what? I was so grateful this year.

For a long time, there's been commentary, oh, kids make you less happy. And you know what? I was so grateful this year. For a long time, there's been commentary, oh, kids make you less happy. And because you'd see like in the marital happiness, when we're looking at sociologists or psychologists, you'd see this dip after people have kids, like marital happiness goes down. And you get it because you're 2 a.m. in the morning and you're wondering, are we even married anymore? Like, where are you? Right? And yet it's so beautiful that consistently people would say, but children are meaning. They're the essence of meaning. And so 2021, guess what happens? The data shows something entirely different. It says children mean greater happiness. We knew that was true

for fathers. We knew it was true for mothers to some degree, but more meaningful lives, less lonely, deeper and more connections, happier. Parents find childcare to be much more exhausting and much more meaningful than their professional activities. They rate parenting as their greatest joy and believe the rewards of watching children grow are worth the cost. It doesn't come without cost. It brings tremendous meaning. And now we see that happiness measure, right? It's people with children that are less lonely, experiencing greater happiness. They're a gift. game and uh he got in for two plays his last game second yeah in the second play he uh is a defensive back and he is covering his guy and he he goes up and one-handed intercepts the ball

and falls down with it and there was this crazy man in the stand screaming, Timothy! Timothy! And then I realized it was me. Who is that? Who is this crazy man yelling his name? And I was just beyond. It was so fun to see and see his teammates jumping around him and look, it's making me emotional. Just that's my boy, you know, and I think hopefully there's heavenly experiences that

are like that. Jenna, I'm looking at this paragraph. Husband and wife have a solemn responsibility to love and care for each other and for their children. Parents have a sacred duty to rear their children in love and righteousness. Further down and for their children. Parents have a sacred duty to rear their children in love and righteousness. Further down, husbands and wives will be held accountable before God for the discharge of these obligations. And it seems like such a sacrifice in that paragraph, right? That this is duty and obligation and, you know.

But what I'm hearing from you is you're saying these are commandments, but they end up, yes, sacrifices that end up becoming investments. Yes. And blessings to us. Right. That pay dividends. Yes. Oh, Hank, I love that. I'm glad you tied that together. I have this wonderful colleague, he talked to me one time about this idea and he just quoted section 132 and he said, look at what the Lord teaches us about children. He promises us glory, right? And what is the glory of God? Children are the continuation of the seeds. They are the glory of God. They are the way God glorifies himself. And then we're

taught, except you abide my law, you cannot attain to this glory. So cultures that are abiding by law, what that means is the capacity to bring children into this earth in families that are nurturing and the growth and development of that society. It's this beautiful, right? What we see in 4th Nephi, they were given in marriage and you just see this growth and development of a culture rising to its fullest in this orientation to development of children within families, marriages, and that is abiding by law and it is God's glory eternally. So we need them. Hank, I don't want to skip the part that you also talked about. You also read about, we declare the means by which mortal life to be created is created to be divinely appointed,

that the sacred powers of procreation. As a graduate student, I was at the Heritage Foundation. I had been asked to read a book that was talking about some of the implications of the sexual revolution. When we talk about sexual revolution, it was essentially this idea that people should be free to express themselves sexually just as individuals outside of whatever kind of constraints. And in some ways, it was women reacting to a reality that men had been able to have sexual relationships outside of marriage without any implications for them. It was labeled liberating, right? And yet I was reading what had happened. I was reading about what had happened to the sexualization of women, reading about what had happened with out-of-wedlock childbearing rates going from 6% to 41%, now

nearing 50%, and in some demographics, more than 50%, 73% in some low-income demographics. And what that had meant to women, to children, And it was deeply painful. And I went into this mentor that I had and I said, this is hard. He was Catholic. And he said, when Eve took the fruit, she took both sides of the fruit. We are learning about what this precious instruction about, about where we use sexual powers, being within bounds God has set, why that is so important, why that matters, because we've seen the fruits of when that does not happen. And so when you think about women, what's happened to women because of that, rape on college campuses, just all of the tragic consequences when that beautiful sexual power is used outside of those bounds,

what it has meant for women and children and men. There's an author recently who published a book called Cheap Sex. It's kind of a hard title, but he's a fantastic scholar. And he was just looking at the languishing of men. We have a time when men are not attaining college degrees at the same rate as women. There's a big growing gap that started in the 80s and has grown, just kept growing with women more likely to obtain college degrees. And also working age men who aren't working. It's like you have this massive increase in just men not attaining, not achieving. And he was describing what it meant to have a time period prior to this, when a woman would say, I'm not going to engage sexually with you until you are marriageable, which meant you're going to be able to provide for me. And you're

going to be able to be a certain kind of person that I'm going to want to entrust my life and the children who come from that life to. And when that breaking apart of sex and marriage and children happened with the sexual revolution, where they were literally broken into pieces, these three cores that had been bound together are tossed apart, then you have a languishing of men. He would say men have languished. There isn't the structure that invites their best development. It's why when men are married, they earn more, they save more, they're less risky in their behaviors. And there's just a purpose to their life that is part of that beautiful structure. And John, as you described that love for that child, you'd do anything, you'd develop anything. You'd work as hard as you could to provide for them. You'd sacrifice and grow. And that is protected. We haven't

appreciated enough how that's protected by the structure where sexuality happens. That when it's reserved for marriage, it invites better. It invites growth. It protects both children, women, and men. Yeah. I've told my students that in New Testament times, you'd have an arranged marriage and you have about a year.

And if there's no house prepared. There's no marriage. Wow. This young man has to create a home for his new family to live in or else the marriage does not happen. And that prompts the best in you, right? Yes. To move forward. It incentivizes you. One of my heroes in this world is Elder Bruce C. Hafen. And he gave a talk at the World Congress on Families in 1999. I was there.

Remember this. Oh, what? Yes. Oh, my goodness. Yes. And I heard he got multiple standing ovations in the talk. And one of the things he said which was like um was where you were going and i i'm going to roughly paraphrase something about the women's liberation movement had in fact

liberated men from responsibility yes and and that hey if we want to be as sexually promiscuous as the men are, that didn't help anybody. Yes, yes. And anyway, that talk, I think you could Google World Congress on Families in 1990. Was it Geneva? Was it Switzerland? In Geneva, yeah. And Elder Hafen's talk is, and he's, I think, a family law attorney, right? Yes, that's right.

The moral force of woman, the moral power of women. Yeah. An amazing talk to go back and read. But I was struck with that idea that the sexual revolution, instead of the best outcome, men should be more responsible should not you know instead of trying to say let's all be promiscuous that was even worse you know i thought it was a fascinating observation that elder hafen made yes it wasn't liberating right that it's interesting in that there's a wave of feminism prior to the 1960s in england you might see it, right? Mary Poppins votes for women. And one of the mottos, right? One of the mottos was votes for women, chastity for men.

Isn't that interesting? They realized the best, the most powerful place is within those bonds of marriage, sexual relationships, and rights for women to own property and vote as well, right? That's the strongest kind of dynamic that we can have for women. And it's true. The safest place for women and children is within the bonds of marriage. That doesn't mean every marriage is that way. But when we look across broad swaths of sociologically, the greatest likelihood of her being protected from other forms of abuse is within marriage and children as well. That gift of that instruction, though, I just think the sacred powers of procreation.

And it also tells us how beautiful that they are divinely appointed, that sexual relations are intended to bring tremendous joy, connection, relationship, growth, development to couples. They're divinely appointed. Brigham Young brought that up when the great evils of the world, one of the great evils was labeled polygamy, and they were trying to throw these men in jail in Utah. And he said, how many men in Congress have their mistresses, right? See, that's okay. And that's okay. You're creating laws of the great evil over here of polygamy when you have the most promiscuous life of all.

And it's just, he called out their hypocrisy, the blatant hypocrisy of what they were trying to say. Let me throw out a name that probably most of our listeners will not remember, but do you remember Elder Mark E. Peterson? Quorum of the 12th. He, 1969, so before you were both born, but I was around, and I don't remember this from conference, but I love short, powerful quotations, because then I can memorize them with my limited brain capacity.

But Marky Peterson said, humanity will rise or fall through its attitude toward the law of chastity. Wow. Yes. And we're seeing that here in that last paragraph four. Employed only between men and women, lawfully wedded as husband and wife. Yeah, Janet, as you were bringing this up, I just thought the damage done by unchaste men

on this planet has been just astronomical. Yeah, go read Jacob chapter two and three in the Book of Mormon, right? Really lets the husbands and fathers have it in those two chapters. He says you're beginning to labor and sin in your thoughts. Maybe some had turned thoughts into behavior, but he really lays it. Those are powerful chapters and very, I mean, if the Book of Mormon was written for our day, that was a good one to save for us. Yes.

Jacob 2 and 3. That reference to the tender hearts, right? Of the women and children. He's so sensitive. You've come up here. Yeah, you've come up here to hear the pleasing word of God, which healeth the wounded soul. I'm so sorry. I have to enlarge the wounds of those who are already wounded. It's just, oh. I do want to say, I think as we talk about the challenges around sexuality, right? And Hank, as you highlighted, right? This, what damage is done that we can develop a lot of anxiety and fear around sexuality and not realize that right in here in this same paragraph, the Lord is teaching us, right? The power and gift of sexuality within those bonds. We have these statements from Elder Holland, such an act of love between a man and a woman

is or certainly was ordained to be a symbol of total union, union of their hearts, their hopes, their lives, their love, their family, their future, their everything. Sexual intimacy is not only a symbolic union between a man and a woman, it is the uniting of their very souls, but a symbolic of a union between mortals and deity. And they are in mortality, one of the ultimate expressions of our divine nature and potential and a way of strengthening emotional and spiritual bonds between husband and wife. The adversary would want to taint sexuality, would want us to fear it, would want us to feel anxious about it, would want us to not talk about it, would want us to keep us in the dark. And I think the Lord

is saying, pull this powerful gift into the light, teach about it so that it can be what it's intended to be in marriage. And there's growth around that, right? There's growth for couples in understanding the gift of sexuality in marriage, the complementarity between men and women, the uniqueness that pressures growth and development. And it is intended to be what Elder Holland so powerfully describes, this symbol of total union, hearts, hopes, dreams, this gift of divine sexuality, pleasure in its most beautiful form given to us by God within these beautiful bonds. And when it is outside of that, it's destruction to the very core of the souls who would be so blessed by its beautiful use.

Thank you so much for saying that. Yeah, we could do a better job uh absolutely all of us could in teaching our youth uh not so much bad bad bad but timing timing timing yeah yeah and i think president monson said that it's not because it's bad it's because it's so good that that you're to wait to alma to shiblon bridle your passions you didn't say destroy your passions bridle them and i love to emphasize with the teenagers bridle your comma, that ye may be filled with love. It's not, you got to squelch that, but just like you said, timing. John, I've often told my students that it's about, it's like drinking orange juice and brushing your teeth. They're both good. You just have to get them in

the right order, right? Or else you're going to have a bad experience. You drink orange juice after you brush your teeth and it's not as good. So sexuality and marriage, if they come in the right order, are both wonderful experiences. Well, I love, Janet, the words you use. Boy, I mean, I want to go back and read on the transcript some of these beautiful ways you've put these phrases together, how bonding and beautiful it is. And I think you are quoting from, is it Elder Holland's talk of soul symbols and sacraments? Is that the talk? That's the talk, John. Such a powerful talk.

He gave a shorter version in General Conference called Personal Purity, but they're one in the same. procreative act that is the problem it's when where how it's being cheapened degraded commercialized sold like a product you know that's that's the issue yes captured so powerfully please join us for part two of this podcast