Interesting Bishopric Meeting today
Posted: Sun May 26, 2019 8:52 pm
A couple of things came up in bishopric meeting today that I thought were interesting.
1. We were going over the sacrament meeting agenda and the bishop saw that "Praise to the Man" was one of the hymns. There was some discussion about whether it should be left on there because evidently there was some direction by an area authority not to "use certain hymns" of which this was one as they may be "disturbing to some members". He ended up leaving it in the program. Any of you guys ever heard of this? I wonder if it was only direction given to our area or if it's a church wide thing.
2. We have a lot of black members in our ward, and the "Race and the Priesthood" essay is causing a bit of a stir. One sister met with the bishop about her concerns and it really affected him. Our bishop is a really great guy and I feel like he is really struggling with how to deal with this. The sister suggested a 5th Sunday meeting addressing this. The bishop wanted to address the concerns of the sister, but not shake the faith of others who don't know about it, but of course then what happens when they do find out about it and feel like they were lied to? When my opinion was asked I just said, "Look, there is NO good answer to this issue." I told him I felt like he did the right thing by not brushing her off and by really listening to her and admitting that he didn't know and had struggles with it too. They really didn't seem to know a lot about the history behind the priesthood ban, and one of the counsellors started going on about the curse of Cain.
It's interesting to see it from the side of the leaders discussing what to do about these issues, and honestly, they've got nothing. I really feel for the bishop, and for this sister. She is hurting from this, her family is hurting and the bishop wants to help and he really can't.
3. This discussion led to other topics (polygamy, prophetic fallibility, etc.) and it is amazing to me how little the leaders know about these issues. The bishop has an idea of my disaffection (I'm kind of their project) and I told him I wouldn't bring up difficult issues to damage anyone's faith, but that I wouldn't shy away from questions or attacks either. One of the counselors (curse of Cain guy) started in on the lame apologetics for polygamy, being pretty dismissive to one of my points. I finally just said, "Dude, you're killing me! You need to read the essays, then we'll talk." It ended with... wait for it... his testimony that he declared "will never be shaken".
The funny thing is he sounds like me 5 years ago.
Anyway, have any of you guys done or had a lesson on any of the essays, especially the race and the priesthood one? How did it go? Was it helpful at all or did it just stir the pot?
1. We were going over the sacrament meeting agenda and the bishop saw that "Praise to the Man" was one of the hymns. There was some discussion about whether it should be left on there because evidently there was some direction by an area authority not to "use certain hymns" of which this was one as they may be "disturbing to some members". He ended up leaving it in the program. Any of you guys ever heard of this? I wonder if it was only direction given to our area or if it's a church wide thing.
2. We have a lot of black members in our ward, and the "Race and the Priesthood" essay is causing a bit of a stir. One sister met with the bishop about her concerns and it really affected him. Our bishop is a really great guy and I feel like he is really struggling with how to deal with this. The sister suggested a 5th Sunday meeting addressing this. The bishop wanted to address the concerns of the sister, but not shake the faith of others who don't know about it, but of course then what happens when they do find out about it and feel like they were lied to? When my opinion was asked I just said, "Look, there is NO good answer to this issue." I told him I felt like he did the right thing by not brushing her off and by really listening to her and admitting that he didn't know and had struggles with it too. They really didn't seem to know a lot about the history behind the priesthood ban, and one of the counsellors started going on about the curse of Cain.
It's interesting to see it from the side of the leaders discussing what to do about these issues, and honestly, they've got nothing. I really feel for the bishop, and for this sister. She is hurting from this, her family is hurting and the bishop wants to help and he really can't.3. This discussion led to other topics (polygamy, prophetic fallibility, etc.) and it is amazing to me how little the leaders know about these issues. The bishop has an idea of my disaffection (I'm kind of their project) and I told him I wouldn't bring up difficult issues to damage anyone's faith, but that I wouldn't shy away from questions or attacks either. One of the counselors (curse of Cain guy) started in on the lame apologetics for polygamy, being pretty dismissive to one of my points. I finally just said, "Dude, you're killing me! You need to read the essays, then we'll talk." It ended with... wait for it... his testimony that he declared "will never be shaken".
The funny thing is he sounds like me 5 years ago.Anyway, have any of you guys done or had a lesson on any of the essays, especially the race and the priesthood one? How did it go? Was it helpful at all or did it just stir the pot?