I am prompted this morning to say a few words about loving one another more fully. I posted online yesterday after a visit to the Mount Timpanogus Temple with Jeff for an endowment session, and I included our picture together.
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| Mount Timpanogus Temple |
Back came this response from an anonymous source: “I genuinely miss when we drove Mormon scum out of the states.” I am not just imagining the recent escalation of anti-Mormon hatred online over this perpetual debate about whether Mormons are Christians. When I see it in my relatively obscure timeline on “X”, then it becomes real and intensely personal.
However, when I see these attacks in my timeline I am reminded that anonymous sources are simply sniping from behind whatever electronic cover is convenient. And then I even go so far as to wonder if some of these responses are nothing more than automatically generated from some AI source beyond my capacity to comprehend. Hence, I ignore them rather than attempt further engagement.
President Dallin H. Oaks in his most recent General Conference address at the conclusion of the two days, including the Solemn Assembly, observed:
“Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
“But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you” (Matthew 5:43–44).
What a revolutionary teaching for personal relationships! Love even your enemies! But who are our enemies? The full meaning of enemies in the sources from which King James’s translators chose the word enemies includes military foes but even extends to any who actively oppose one another. Today we might say that we are commanded to love our adversaries. All mortals are beloved children of God. As President David O. McKay taught, “There is no better way to manifest love for God than to show an unselfish love for one’s fellowmen.” (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2026/04/49oaks?lang=eng).
Such vitriol coming from someone (or something) anonymous is one thing, but when it comes from one with whom we might be living under the same roof it is nearly unbearable. But for the saving grace offered by our Savior and Redeemer, we would be consumed and sorely tempted to fight back with all we have in retaliation. However, that is not the way of peacemakers, as suggested in President Oaks’ comments. His talk was entitled “Alive in Christ.”
… President Howard W. Hunter described this same love of God toward His children: “The world in which we live would benefit greatly if men and women everywhere would exercise the pure love of Christ, which is kind, meek, and lowly. … It has no place for bigotry, hatred, or violence. … It encourages diverse people to live together in Christian love regardless of religious belief, race, nationality, financial standing, education, or culture.” (ibid.)
It is so much easier to accept and try to live these principles on the wide stage of life in this electronic age that encompasses the broad expanse of the world at large. It’s easy for me to ignore the personal attacks like the one I cited above, but it is something quite different when we are faced with such hostility in our own homes and families.
I stood in fast and testimony meeting earlier this week to bear my witness of the divinity of my personal Savior Jesus Christ. I pointed out the simple symbols of the sacrament - the bread and the water - His flesh that was broken and tortured, producing a flow of blood from every pore in His body. His agony for the sins of those who had lived not only on this earth, but “on worlds without number” is truly mind-boggling to me. He voluntarily came to earth and surrendered, even as the Father withdrew at the height of His Son’s suffering. It was part of the Father’s plan for exaltation, including the sacrifice and the provision for a Savior in the premortal realms of the spirit world. We are instructed about those details with each endowment session we attend, as Jeff and I did yesterday.
Each of us can strive to follow our Savior in His teachings about how to relate to one another. This does not mean surrendering our values. The covenants we have made inevitably position us as devoted participants in the eternal contest between truth and error. We balance our various responsibilities.
This balancing is not easy. When we seek to keep all the commandments in our personal lives, we are sometimes accused of having no love for those who don’t. When we show personal love and support loving causes, we are sometimes misunderstood as implying support for results that contradict our other religious duties. But as followers of Christ, we should seek to live peaceably and lovingly with other children of God who do not share our values and do not have the covenant obligations we have assumed. In a democratic government we should seek fairness for all. In countless circumstances, strangers’ suspicions or even hostility gradually gives way to friendship when personal contacts produce mutual respect.
The Prophet Joseph Smith taught that we should “pour forth love” to all people. Speaking of our Savior, the Apostle John wrote, “We love him, because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). We can follow the example of Jesus Christ, who is our role model, by choosing to love others — even if they show little or no love toward us. He declared, “Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God” (Matthew 5:9; see also 3 Nephi 12:9). (ibid., emphasis mine).
“Peacemakers” is (or should be) endemic in our discipleship, if we are truly followers of Jesus Christ who can be accurately characterized as Christians. Our critics outside the Church seem to be unrelenting. I suspect they will persist in their attacks until the Savior comes again to put an end to it all.
I read again about the Israelite child king Josiah yesterday after the temple session when I returned home. He was ordained at the age of eight, a descendant of King David. King Josiah reigned as the 16th king of Judah from approximately 640 to 609 BCE, ascending the throne at the age of eight after the assassination of his father, King Amon (2 Kings 22:1; 2 Chronicles 34:1). Despite his youth, he became one of Judah’s most righteous kings, contrasting sharply with his predecessors, including his grandfather Manasseh and father Amon, who had promoted idolatry. He tore down the “groves” where idolatry was prevalent among the Israelites, and restored the sanctity of temple worship. He opposed wickedness, and established peace in the people who were constantly swinging back and forth in their discipleship from the time they had been delivered from Egypt.
Putting this all in context, let me simply say that we are living in the end of times, truly, when our faith in Jesus Christ as our Deliverer is being tested to the uttermost degree imaginable. Be comforted, therefore, that what we are experiencing right now is not without precedent from Old Testament times until now. Remaining steadfast in our discipleship is not only desirable, it is also possible.
We have not been abandoned simply because moral agency is playing out right before our eyes. Some will choose poorly, determined to “win” in this world at the expense of others, simply because their definition of “winning” is tainted and corrupted.
Winning was defined instead as submitting in exchange for the fulfillment of a higher purpose - exaltation in the eternal realms up ahead.
We will attain those higher goals one day, as improbable as it may seem today. Of that reality I am growing daily in confidence.
