Religious Freedom and Nondiscrimination News Conference

Pride, The Universal Sin

Over the recent weeks, and many times throughout my life, I have seen the extremely harmful effects of pride in the lives of human beings. It tears apart marriages, families, communities, and nations. Dieter F. Uchtdorf said this the best:

     "Perhaps there is no better laboratory to observe the sin of pride than the world of sports. I have always loved participating in and attending sporting events. But I confess there are times when the lack of civility in sports is embarrassing. How is it that normally kind and compassionate human beings can be so intolerant and filled with hatred toward an opposing team and its fans? 

I have watched sports fans vilify and demonize their rivals. They look for any flaw and magnify it. They justify their hatred with broad generalizations and apply them to everyone associated with the other team. When ill fortune afflicts their rival, they rejoice. 

Brethren, unfortunately we see today too often the same kind of attitude and behavior spill over into the public discourse of politics, ethnicity, and religion." (2010 October General Conference, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints)

Why is it that something that can be as good and character building as sports has become a battleground where we find every way possible to discredit an opponent and anyone associated with that opponent? Why can we not see the talent, hard work, and positives present in the other team and respect that, even if we don't particularly support that team. Support for a sports team does NOT say anything about the character of a person.

This same phenomenon also takes place in the political world. Democrats hate Republicans, Republicans hate Democrats, and everybody seems to hate the "Tea Party" activists. People stand up for what they believe in, we don't always have to agree with that. In cases where certain groups or parties are seeking power or advantage over each other or over the American people there comes a responsibility to fight it, but when the issue is merely opposing views of an issue, we must learn to respectfully let them have that opinion. This is the case even if we are relentlessly seeking to change their minds on the issue.

This is most true in the field of religion. Religion has been a clashing point for people since the beginning of time. Most likely because it involves something so close to people's hearts, it has been nearly impossible throughout history for different religions to get along. We all have to right to worship our own God or gods according to our own desires. We all have the right to try to persuade our neighbor to believe in our ideas. We do not however, have the right to force our beliefs on to anyone, and we especially do not have the right to demean another for their religious beliefs. This goes for Christians, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Atheists, Scientologists, and those who just don't care. NO ONE has the right to tell another that they are not allowed to pray in public, to speak the name of their god in public, to practice their beliefs in public. We need to learn to be able to push our cause without seeking to destroy others.

Let us all seek to be more humble, and seek to destroy the pride in all of us. Remember, when all is said and done, we are all brothers and sisters in humanity, and we all have to live with each other, even if we disagree with each other.

The Past Way of Facing The Future

Ronald Reagan, "I do not want to go back to the past; I want to go back to the past way of facing the future."

There is something about reviewing the lessons of the past to prepare us to face the challenges of the future. What a glorious legacy of faith and courage has been left behind by those who have gone before us. My admiration for them deepens the longer I live.

Mostly my thoughts turn towards early settlers of this Great Nation. These people invested all they had into their "American Dreams."

There are so many things that were present in the "old days" that would do us good today.

One of the biggest problems in the world today are distractions. We have so much evil that is so easily accessed. We have smartphones, tablets, magazines, computers, video games, social media, and infinitely easy access to videos and music. We do not have to do any more that tap our screens to be engulfed in wickedness and sleez. We cannot go anywhere, or do anything without having to have our guards up, and standing up for what we believe in. 

We are so busy with all the stuff we fill our lives with that we are tempted so much that we don't have time to do the things that we should such as speeding time with our families, getting involved in our communities, assisting our neighbors, invigorating our minds in the many ways that can be done. We instead spend our time posting to social media sites such as Facebook and twitter. The time we are not spending posting, we are spending following others' posts. Staying up to date with the world and friend is a wonderful blessing we have in the world today, but it has become one of our greatest distractions. Are we up to date with our social media but lacking in our relationship with our own spouses, parents, siblings, or children? The more these things steal away our attention the less attention we have for needed things.

 Those who went before us had mentalities that things that are most important stayed most important. Families worked together, ate together, prayed together, and played together. Distractions were less available and thus were less effective, but the good that resulted from the lack of distractions is a good that is sorely needed today.

Work spills over into the home life with emails that come to smartphones and calenders that are reminding us of work related problems. One cannot get away from the business of life unless they make it a goal to leave work where it belongs, at work. Work seems to be consuming the lives of people today, viewed as the purpose of life instead of simply a needed task to survive. Our predecessors had no problem with work spillover. Work for them work was to the degree and extent that it was needed to live, it was not what they lived for. It was a means, not the end. Sadly, we see less of that mentality today. 

In a world where divorce increases at a higher rate than does marriage, we must ask ourselves why, and then apply the lessons learned from the past, to help us solve our problems we face now. Something I saw the other day was about marriage. The moral was to explain how an old couple were still married after decades together, the reason was simple, we were taught that when something broke, you didn't throw it away and get a new one, you fixed it. Could not this mentality help cure us of our current divorce rate problem?

This list of challenges could go on for some time, the point is, these challenges are not easier or more difficult to deal with than those of the people of the past; but they can be conquered just the same, if we use the lessons we learn from their actions to conquer these struggles.

I repeat President Reagan's words:

"I do not want to go back to the past; I want to go back to the past way of facing the future."

There are so many aspects of our lives that this principle can be applied in.

I encourage and invite us all to take time to reflect on the past, our own pasts included, and use what we learn to help us to face the future.

True Friends

What is it that you think of when you hear the phrase "Best Friends" or "True Friends?" Do you think of a high school buddy or "bestie?" Do you think of a college roomate? Do you think of a long-time neighbor? Do you ever think directly of your spouse? 

Sadly, many don't. Our spouse is our lover, our companion, our help-mate, but are they our friend? The answer is most certainly.

There are two main aspects of a marriage relationship, love and friendship. I separate these two even though many would say they are the same. The fact is both are equally important in the marriage relationship, neither trumping the other. With both of them at full power marriage is bliss, it is strong and satisfying for both despite any circumstances. With either or both of these failing, marriage limps, even drags along until it can go on no longer. So then, what is the difference between the two?

Love hightens the joys of life. The word ecstacy is used so often in the context of love. Ecstacy refers to an amplified version of emotion, happy emotion. When we are happy and getting along and life is good, love toward one another is felt at such a strong level. Love fuels the passion in marriage. Love is the feeling you get when you see your spouse look in the mirror as they get ready for the day and you can't take your eyes off them. Love leads to romance and romantic outings. Love leads to late nights and travelling great distances to be with one another even for a moment. Love is when your hearts skips a beat when your spouse grabs your hand, or walks into the room. Love is beautiful. Love is essential. 

Friendship is equally as important as love, but sadly is not given the publicity that love is so frequenttly given. It seems love is always in the spotlight; in films, books, songs, and stories. Less revealed is the friendship side of marriage. Friendship is loyalty. If love is the icing and filing then friendship is the cake. A true friend is the side of you that comes out when your spouse needs to talk, when they are stressed and need a hug. True means constant, consistent, steadfast, honest, truthful, and ideal. What kind of spouse would one be without these qualities? Friendship is what pulls a couple through a difficult trial, particularly those that are between the couple. When one in the couple is offended, annoyed, or hurt, love typically is harder to feel, but the friendship that is so constant and unwavering is what gets us through that detour and back to the main road where love can take over once again. Friendship is the willingness to defend and support your spouse when their back is against the wall or in any cicumstance. Best friends are forever. Friendship always forgives and is understanding. Friendship take the person with all the defects. The Savior said that, "Ye are my friends...I have called you friends." (John 15:14-15) What greater love is their than true friendship? Let us not forget the power of friendship in our marriages, especially at such a time as now, when we need strong marriages and families in society more than ever.

Fighting the Norms

"...a long habit of not thinking a thing WRONG, gives it a superficial appearance of being RIGHT, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason."
-Thomas Paine, Common Sense

One of the greatest concerns of today and the future is the realization that the younger generation is raised in a world where socialism, immorality, and atheism are the norms. The world they will experience is one that will tell them that self is more important that others, more important than society. It is a version of the world that most of us strive to fight against, because it is foreign to us, we know of its being evil. The younger generation will grow up with this being the norm, they will be desensitized to it. This creates more room for decline, and more room for evil growth. We must rally together and cry as one, and never cease crying for the cause of righteousness and morality. This tumult must never be ceased, for the sake of all humanity.

Liberty is Earned

"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites, — in proportion as their love to justice is above their rapacity, — in proportion as their soundness and sobriety of understanding is above their vanity and presumption, — in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to the counsels of the wise and good, in preference to the flattery of knaves. Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters."
• Edmund burke-Letter to a Member of the National Assembly (1791).

"For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform, and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest..."
- Thomas Paine, Common Sense

We, the people, are responsible for our having freedom and liberty or going without. If we can control our own actions, without the need of a government stepping in, we can be free. Only those who can live being accountable to a higher Power and Being with or without an earthly power there to watch over us can be truly free. Successful society is based on eternal principles, principles that have proven themselves over time. Principles that not coincidentally coincide with principles found in religious views and moral circles. If a people can hold to those principles without needing a government to step in to force them, they can truly be free. More laws are not the answer. Evil must be rooted out from the inside, and then the outward actions can naturally turn good. Less self gratification breeds more liberty.