Wednesday, June 25, 2014
How the Ordain Women movement helped me understand the truth about Gay Marriage
I've struggled a lot throughout the past several months with my thoughts about gay marriage. I've brought up as much with my husband and other really close confidants, and no one ever was able to help me definitively understand why gay marriage was so wrong.
My confusion stemmed from the following factors:
1. If God is a loving God (Which I absolutely know he is), why isn't it okay for people who have fallen in love with people of the same gender to have a relationship?
I've seen same-gender relationships that truly seem to be genuine, affectionate, loving relationships, and I couldn't wrap my mind around why that was wrong, so I prayed and tried to work that out in my mind. The closest thought I could get (at first) was simple logic. God made man and woman to physically fit together. Kind of like a puzzle piece. I know that's crude logic, but there it is.
Well, that led me to more conflicting thoughts:
2. Why did God make man and woman like that? Why is it so important to His plan that Man and Woman have to be together?
To this I could not get a satisfying answer. For a long time.
Whilst continually praying I received a semi-resolution the past couple of weeks that almost pacified my contention with my first problem.
God's love is not the same as the endearing affection we experience as mere couples. God's love is charity, a higher love that is completely and absolutely unselfish and always focused on Heaven.
That made me feel a little better, but I still felt discontent about my second question.
So a few months have gone by, and I kept hearing all of this stuff about the "Ordain Women" movement. These feminist misunderstandings have not bothered me at all. I have a very clear understanding that men and women are meant to do different things in terms of spiritual roles, but it wasn't until Justin and I were discussing the lady who got excommunicated that I realized how spectral my understanding truly was.
We were bantering back and forth of the same side of the argument, and Justin said (I'm paraphrasing),
"A lot of these people have such a one-sided focus about equality. They feel like being granted the priesthood is this one pinnacle right that will grant them ultimate equality."
We'd been going back and forth for a few minutes, and I just spouted off:
"I don't understand why women feel like that would make them equal. Man and woman were made differently for a purpose. They have different callings in life, and it's only together that they can actually be one and achieve that equality."
Not even one second after I said those words I felt completely overwhelmed by the spirit. I feel overwhelmed right now typing it out. As soon as I said those words I felt a powerful confirmation that it was the very reason Gay Marriage could never be a part of God's plan.
Man and Woman are different. We possess innate spiritual qualities that the other gender is not as easily predisposed to. Only together, through Christ can we work with those distinct differences to attain salvation.
I don't even know if I can type out the way I feel adequately.
All I know is that I now have a powerful understanding in my heart that Gay Marriage will never bring someone close enough to Christ to satisfy the plan our Divine Creator made for us to get back to heaven.
My confusion stemmed from the following factors:
1. If God is a loving God (Which I absolutely know he is), why isn't it okay for people who have fallen in love with people of the same gender to have a relationship?
I've seen same-gender relationships that truly seem to be genuine, affectionate, loving relationships, and I couldn't wrap my mind around why that was wrong, so I prayed and tried to work that out in my mind. The closest thought I could get (at first) was simple logic. God made man and woman to physically fit together. Kind of like a puzzle piece. I know that's crude logic, but there it is.
Well, that led me to more conflicting thoughts:
2. Why did God make man and woman like that? Why is it so important to His plan that Man and Woman have to be together?
To this I could not get a satisfying answer. For a long time.
Whilst continually praying I received a semi-resolution the past couple of weeks that almost pacified my contention with my first problem.
God's love is not the same as the endearing affection we experience as mere couples. God's love is charity, a higher love that is completely and absolutely unselfish and always focused on Heaven.
That made me feel a little better, but I still felt discontent about my second question.
So a few months have gone by, and I kept hearing all of this stuff about the "Ordain Women" movement. These feminist misunderstandings have not bothered me at all. I have a very clear understanding that men and women are meant to do different things in terms of spiritual roles, but it wasn't until Justin and I were discussing the lady who got excommunicated that I realized how spectral my understanding truly was.
We were bantering back and forth of the same side of the argument, and Justin said (I'm paraphrasing),
"A lot of these people have such a one-sided focus about equality. They feel like being granted the priesthood is this one pinnacle right that will grant them ultimate equality."
We'd been going back and forth for a few minutes, and I just spouted off:
"I don't understand why women feel like that would make them equal. Man and woman were made differently for a purpose. They have different callings in life, and it's only together that they can actually be one and achieve that equality."
Not even one second after I said those words I felt completely overwhelmed by the spirit. I feel overwhelmed right now typing it out. As soon as I said those words I felt a powerful confirmation that it was the very reason Gay Marriage could never be a part of God's plan.
Man and Woman are different. We possess innate spiritual qualities that the other gender is not as easily predisposed to. Only together, through Christ can we work with those distinct differences to attain salvation.
I don't even know if I can type out the way I feel adequately.
All I know is that I now have a powerful understanding in my heart that Gay Marriage will never bring someone close enough to Christ to satisfy the plan our Divine Creator made for us to get back to heaven.
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