What Relief Society Means to Me

I'm not one for making any statements that assert the Church is "true"—mostly because I think it's semi-nonsensical, poorly articulated phrasing best used by children and promptly abandoned when a person achieves the capacity for more nuanced thoughts.

However, to the extent that there is any part of the Church that is unquestionably, undeniably true to me, it's the divine calling of the Relief Society.

I deeply love Relief Society and everything it represents. It has kept my head above water so many times.

The women I've met through it have had such an important impact on my life and faith. They have been the hands of God in my life too many times to count.

When people talk about the ministry of Christ, the miracles he did and the ways he cared for people individually, I don't think of the prophets and apostles. 

I think of the Relief Society.

I think of the women who have been taking care of me since I joined the Church as a teenager.

Even when there were some truly obtuse people who turned out to be the exceptions, I cannot say that they weren't trying, in their own way, to be good in the only way they knew how.

All of the best impulses of the institutional Church are present in the Relief Society. 

I think the Church would be a better place if the men just came to Relief Society and got to enjoy real, organized, consistent practice in being effective and engaged.

You cannot change my mind.