Sunday, October 2, 2016

Leaked Videos Shows The Brethren Are Deeply Concerned About YSAs

Although the 2016 October General Conference has just ended a few hours ago, the biggest news about the LDS Church may not be about what was said during General Conference, but what the Church leaders have said behind closed doors away from public view. Someone has uploaded videos of internal discussions among senior leaders of the LDS Church on YouTube account called "Mormon Leaks." These videos show Church leadership being briefed on a variety of topics such as YSAs & Marriage, politics, and marijuana. After each presentation, they talk about the impact these topics could have on the LDS church.
Two of those videos will be of interest to those who are young single adults in the LDS Church. One video shows Church authorities receiving a presentation on the topic of single Mormons delaying marriage. Another video shows the Brethren sharing their concerns about the young single adults in the Church.
The LDS Church has quickly put out a response to today's leak. Their response is below. 
LDS church spokesperson Eric Hawkins said in a statement to 2News, "Most of these videos appear to be from briefings received by senior Church leaders between 2007 and 2012. In these committee meetings, presentations are routinely received from various religious, political and subject matter experts on a variety of topics. The purpose is to understand issues that may face the Church, and is in pursuit of the obligation Church leaders feel to be informed on and have open discussion about current issues. This is an informational forum, not a decision-making body."
The Brethren work hard to stay informed and current on the issues of our day. It appears that these meetings is just one way they work to stay informed about current events and issues that are of interest to the LDS Church.
The videos of the Brethren talking about YSAs are available below.
Talking about single Mormons delaying marriage



Sharing their concerns young single adults in the Church


Monday, April 4, 2016

Feeling Conflicted Over Elder Kearon's Talk About Refugees

Elder Patrick Kearon, of the quorum of the Seventy, gave a moving talk about the Church's call to help refugees during the Sunday afternoon session of the April 2016 General Conference. 
Many Mormons were clearly moved by his talk. However, there were many of Mormons who felt conflicted about his talk. I can see this conflict in debates among members of the Church after General Conference on social media sites.
Before I explain the conflict felt by many members in the Church, I want to make it clear at the beginning that we are all for helping refugees. We fully support the Church's efforts in mobilizing members to gather food, water, clothing, bedding, and bags full of sanitary items so that they can ship it to refugee camps in the Middle East and Europe. 
Elder Kearon's talk certainly pulled at our heartstrings. Elder Kearon raised the valid point that Christ himself, at one point in his life, was a refugee when his parents fled to Egypt when he was a little child. He talked about how Mormons were refugees when they were forced to flee from place to place by angry mobs and ultimately had to leave the United States to find peace beyond the western frontier of the United States by moving into what was then Mexican territory. We know that many in the Church were once refugees. We clearly heard the call to be compassionate and charitable towards refugees that are escaping war, famine, and economic uncertainty in their homelands. 
It was clear that Elder Utchdorf was moved by Elder Kearon's talk afterwards. Elder Uchtdorf talked about being a refugee prior to Elder Kearon's talk in General Conference.
However, many members couldn't help thinking about the ongoing political debate in America and in Europe about letting refugees into their homelands during his talk.  Many of us were thinking about how Europe suffered repeated terrorist attacks because they allowed people to come into their country without asking any questions about who was coming in. 
Elder Kearon didn't mention anything about opening the borders and letting as many refugees in as possible. His talk simply focused on the need for members of the Church to help the refugees. He explicitly stated in this talk that his desire was to focus on refugees themselves and not on immigration policy or the debates over the definition of a refugee. 
Yet, many members were torn between having compassion for these refugees and the desire for security against terrorism by refugees coming from certain parts of the world. Clearly, the hot topics of immigation, terrorism, and other issues came to mind to some people when they heard this talk even when Elder Kearon explicitly stated that he would be avoiding these issues.
Correctly or incorrectly, some people got the impression that we should sacrifice our desire for safety and security in the name of compassion. Many of us have a legitimate concern about sacrificing security for compassion by opening up our borders to people who wish to do us harm. The United States government, through both the FBI and DHS, have admitted that we have no way to verify who is coming into our country. Many members of the Church want to help the refugees, but they have a legitimate concern about their safety not being compromised while helping others.
We fully acknowledge that not every refugee is a terrorist bent on hurting as many as possible. Refugees do flee from all parts of the world to come to places of safety. Not all of refugees come from the Middle East. But some of the terrorists did come into Europe during the large wave of refugees who came from the Middle East last summer. And this fact certainly is still a presence in many people's minds.
Its clear that the recent events in Europe have affected some people's reception of Elder Kearon's talk. Under different circumstances or had the recent terror attacks not occurred, the response to his talk would have been more universally accepted. Instead, many people felt conflicted about his talk. Many debates erupted on social media sites about the issue of compassion versus security.
I don't know how to resolve the conflict between the call for compassion and the legitimate desire for personal safety while helping others. I don't know what the answer to that problem is. I felt this conflict while I listened to his talk. I confess to having participated in these online debates on various social media platforms.
I have been reflecting on this inner conflict and thinking about the points raised by both sides. I decided to write this post to ask the readers for solutions on this conflict. I don't want a debate. I want answers. I want to be Christlike but I also want to protect myself and others at the same time. 
How can members of the Church balance their desire for compassion and safety? Is such a balance possible? 

Saturday, April 2, 2016

The 2016 LDS Deaf Symposium Now Open For Registration

The LDS Deaf Symposium is a great way for Deaf and Hard of Hearing members of the LDS Church to gather together to be spiritually strengthened and to form connections with one another. Those who know American Sign Language are also invited to come. The dates for the 2016 LDS Deaf Symposium have been announced and online payment is now available.  More information is available in the flyer below.


Saturday, March 26, 2016

April 186th Annual General Conference Broadcast Schedule For Deaf Members of The LDS Church

General Conference is coming upon us again soon! As always, I am providing the broadcast schedule for Deaf and Hard of Hearing individuals who wish to watch Conference in an accessible format. See below for information on how to enjoy General Conference. 
If you have trouble viewing the infographic below, click on it and download it for better viewing.