“They will have All the Power they have Wisdom to Exercise”

 

Talk I gave in the Winstead Ward of Boise, Idaho on 30 July 2024

I want to direct my remarks today to the Young Women. This was a talk I wish someone would’ve sat down and had with me when I was figuring out what my place in the Church was when I was a 16-year-old new convert. And I want to start by telling a story of an experience I had as a BYU student when I was about 19 years old.

I was in my best friends’ apartment. It was the day of one of the Relief Society general meetings, and I came to ask if anyone wanted to walk with me to go see it at the Marriott Center. We had a couple of young men on our couch (I’m convinced they come standard with the couch) who were waiting for someone to come out for a date. My friend asked if I would turn their television to the Relief Society meeting so they could watch it from home before I left.

As I did so, one of the young men made an unkind and immature remark by saying “Relief Society… isn’t that the meeting where all the women get together and cry?” His friend on the couch thought that was funny. I did not, but recognizing the opportunity for a teaching moment, I did my best to be gentle.

“Those are my leaders you’re talking about. If you wouldn’t talk about the prophet that way, don’t say it about them.”

It was the first of several experiences I’ve had throughout my eighteen years in the Church where I’ve encountered people who think that women don’t play an important role in what we do here. What men do is the “real work” of bringing salvation to others because they have the priesthood and perform the ordinances, and women are just ornaments to that process. I’ve heard men say that the Church could operate without women, but the Church would cease to function without men, going so far as to say that the Church should baptize fewer women because “men who are priesthood holders are where real growth comes from.” That was language I heard on my mission.

Young Women: as you serve in your callings, go on missions, date, and interact with others both inside and outside of the Church, you may encounter people who say these kinds of things to you. This may be one of the challenges you have to overcome as you go forward into your futures, wherever they take you. I want to talk to you today about the power and authority you have to speak and act in God’s name. I want to make sure you understand it, so that if you ever end up in a situation like this, you know the truth of who you are. I want you to be able to walk into every room knowing that God sent you, and never once have to question it, no matter what anyone says.

1 Corinthians 12, Moroni 10, and Doctrine and Covenants 46 all teach about the spiritual gifts of the Holy Ghost that God gives to all people. I’ve created a list I want to review with you briefly, which I invite you to add to in your personal scripture study. Let’s review each of the spiritual gifts the scriptures mention and look for examples of women using them, as a demonstration that God doesn’t withhold divine power from you based on your gender.

1. Teaching the Word of Wisdom: Emma Smith and her disgust with smoking and chewing tobacco and spitting on the floor in the Newel K. Whitney store during the meetings of the School of the Prophets. This led to D&C 89 and the Word of Wisdom being revealed.
2. Teaching the Word of Knowledge: the mothers of the Stripling Warriors teaching their children that God would protect them in battle if they kept their faith. (Alma 56:47-48)
3. Exceedingly great faith: the Lamanite Queen when Ammon calls her people to repentance. It was said of her that she had exceedingly great faith, more than any of the Nephites. (Alma 19:9-10)
4. To know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the reality of his Atonement: The Samaritan Woman at the well. (John 4:28-29)
5. To believe on the words of those who know: Sariah being comforted by Lehi. (1 Ne. 5:6)
6. Healing and the faith to be healed: the woman with the issue of blood, who healed herself through her own faith in Jesus Christ. (Luke 8:48)
7. Working mighty miracles: Esther when she saves her people from certain destruction.
8. Prophecy: Deborah when she foretells and ensures the conditions of a military victory in Judges 4-5.
9. Beholding angels and ministering spirits: Mary, the mother of Christ when she’s told she’s going to be the mother of the Son of God. (Luke 1:28-38)
10. Tongues and the interpretation of tongues: The women at Pentecost in Acts 2:17-18.
11. The Differences in Administration, which D&C 46 explains is the ability to know how to adapt in ways that please God, enact his mercy, and meet the needs of people in whatever their present conditions are: Mary and Martha of Bethany (Luke 10:39-42). Note: neither one of them were wrong in how they chose to adapt to the situation of having Jesus Christ stay with them. They each prioritized what was important to them. The only thing wrong was the judgment from Martha that Mary was doing something wrong.
12. Diversity of operations, which D&C 46 defines as discernment, to recognize the hand of God, and helping others to recognize manifestations of the Spirit: Mary Magdelene being the first one the recognize Jesus Christ after he was risen (John 20:11-17). She and many of the other women told the apostles they had seen angels who told them that Jesus Christ was resurrected. In Luke 24:11, we read of the apostles’ response to them, which was that “their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not.” Note: this is not a new lesson we’re learning together. Just because the apostles rejected the women’s gift of recognizing  manifestations of the Spirit doesn’t mean the manifestation wasn’t real.

This is one of the most important lessons I feel I could teach you from my own experience: there will be times in your life when you will be given sacred information about yourselves, your families, your safety, and your relationships to other people that come directly from God. There will be times when those around you may not believe you in relation to what God says to you because they doubt the power by which you are led. Never let the doubts of others diminish what you know to be true about yourselves.

There will be times when you are in deep trouble and need rescuing from this world and its challenges, from other people, and from yourselves. Never go into those experiences believing you need someone else to save you, that you’ll be left alone and vulnerable if they don’t show up.

Because of the covenants you’ve made the commandments you’ve kept, even when the only commandment you can keep is to repent, you are entitled to powerful manifestations from God in your moments of greatest need. It is your birthright. Every time you call down the powers of heaven in the name of Jesus Christ for yourself or someone you love, you exercise priesthood power. You are authorized and able to bear the power of God in your own right. Your Heavenly Parents would NEVER leave you powerless, comfortless, or hopeless anywhere. No matter who does or doesn’t help you, who is or isn’t there for you, or how alone you think you are, they will always be there.

I testify with everything I have, with all that is in me, that Jesus is the Christ. I testify that the power by which he performed his miracles anciently, the authority to speak and act in the name of God the Father, has been restored again to the earth in our day. We have a church of prophets and apostles, who are fully authorized to act and speak in the name of God. This is what it means when we say the Church is true. I testify we also have a church full of powerful, holy sisters who are equally authorized to participate in the errand of angels with every gift and power God promised to us of old in the words of the prophet Joel:

“I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy… and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.” Joel 2:28-29.

I also want to repeat the words of Eliza R. Snow, one of the earliest presidents of the Relief Society when she taught this same lesson to the sisters in her day: “Tell the sisters to go forth and discharge their duties, in humility and faithfulness and the Spirit of God will rest upon them and they will be blest in their labors. Let them seek for wisdom instead of power and they will have all the power they have wisdom to exercise.”

Young Men, I have a challenge for each of you was well. As you study the rights and privileges that come with your priesthood offices, make sure you understand how those scriptures apply not just to you, but to the women in your lives. Make sure you can articulate the power women have to work beside you in the work of salvation. Make sure you are prepared to treat every girl, every young woman, and every Sister in this Church as a powerful, cherished daughter of God. Make sure you understand that women in this Church are every bit as capable of bearing divine power and sacred office as you are. You have much you can learn from them, and you will never be as effective in your priesthood service until you learn that lesson.

In closing, I want to teach you the priesthood language you Young Women need to know and recognize for what it is. It’s the most common phrase we say and hear in the Church—even more than “and then it came to pass.” It’s how we end every prayer, every lesson, every talk, and every testimony we give, and I hope you’ll feel the power in it every time you say it now. It’s the language that matters when it comes to speaking and acting with power and authority from God. It’s the phrase I’m going to use now, not just to end my talk, not because it’s the thing we’ve all been taught to say, but because I am calling down all the powers of heaven to give power and weight to my words. I am calling down the powers of heaven to bless each and every one of you with a deeper knowledge of the power and authority you possess as daughters of God. I leave these words and my testimony with you,

In the Name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

"Sister" as a Priesthood Office

Passing Favors, Caitlin Connolly

Maybe this is just me. But I am deeply attached to the idea that I don’t need to be ordained to have access to God’s power and authority, to act with priesthood. I want to see The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints lean into that more.

I want to see the idea of power separated from priesthood exclusively, rather than priesthood from gender. That’s what this idea represents to me. I think this lays the ground work for a more respectful and meaningful way forward in our relationship with LGBTQ+ members, men who never serve in leadership positions, as well as other religious people outside of our own faith. It acknowledges the sacredness in all people by virtue of their place in the human family, which we all possess from birth. Especially in the ways it challenges us to see God in others outside of our own.

So the corollary to that being that Brother, not Elder, would be the most important title a man has in the Church. It gives recognition to the holiness in what men do when they’re not in a position where they would officiate in ordinances or serve in leadership. I’ve often wondered at the general malaise I’ve witnessed from just about every Elders Quorum I’ve ever seen, and I think this is part of it. They don’t know what it means to use and wield divine power and authority outside of presiding and performing ordinances, which means they view everything outside of those realms as being without that power and authority. They don’t know what it means to see the power and authority of God in caregiving tasks, rather than administrative ones. So when they’re helping someone move, or doing yardwork for someone, or cleaning the building, or (fellas, you need this one) making treats for their lessons, they don’t see the divine influence or intervention when they do those tasks. Those tasks are relegated to women because they allegedly don’t need priesthood to do them. But at the same time, “women do it better” because they can take a simple caregiving task and make it into a holy thing in a way they’ve never been able to replicate. They reason that it comes to women through their gender, rather than the power of God. Caregiving is woman’s domain because it doesn’t require priesthood, but ask any of them what good priesthood leadership looks like and they will inevitably describe a caregiver.

Sisters do nothing that is necessarily connected to their gender because love is not a gendered experience. Brothers can do it equally as well when they’re allowed and care enough. And one of the worst consequences of the divide between Elders Quorum and Relief Society is how it deprives caregiving from men, not just administration from women. While women pass around sign up sheets for meal assignments, drives, service projects, and what to bring for various parties and activities, men rarely get to participate. I remember in my last ward, the idea of passing around the dinner calendar for the missionaries in Elders Quorum was some kind of new revelation. Why? Is it really such an alien notion that priesthood has a necessary connection to caregiving? That those with priesthood and no one to care for because we’ve outsourced all those tasks to the Relief Society could be the reason men are unmotivated and checked out at church?

Men allegedly have all the priesthood, but women do all the messy and exhausting work of taking care of others in the unit? But we don’t consider what women do powerful, inspired, or prophetic enough to call what they do “priesthood,” even though the ward would cease to function without them? Why? The same efficient and engaged caregiving that would make men model priesthood holders ceases to be priesthood when women are doing it? God forbid.

Caregiving is included in the first lessons women learn in life because it’s what being a Sister is. I’m the eldest sister of one sister in my family, and this wasn’t something I was taught. It’s a position I decided upon for myself from the moment my sister was born. Sisters take care of each other. Sisters love. Sisters teach. Sisters share what they have. They keep everyone safe. They make sure everyone is fed, clothed, healthy, and happy. They stop fights. They help with chores. Sisters stand in for their parents when their parents aren’t at home. What is any divine authority but the same familial trust that is placed in the hands of women from their earliest years in almost every family structure that exists?

My lived experience of wielding power at church has always looked like the caregiving of a Sister, and I’ve been called the same thing the entire time. When I served my mission, when I’ve worked in my callings, when I’ve shared my testimony, taught lessons, spoken in church, performed in assignments, served in the temple, and in any other function I will ever have, no matter where it is in the church hierarchy, I am always a Sister. That’s who I’ve been since before I was married. That’s who I am to the Church now that I’m married, even though I don’t have children. Wherever I go and whomever is with me, the title of Sister goes with me.

Sister, to me, is a priesthood office. To the extent that I operate at all in God’s name and with divine power, I do it as a Sister. And even if I were ordained, I don’t think that would change. That’s still what I would be called.

Women in the Church have complex feelings about ordination. Do we need it? Do we want it? What would we get from it if we had it? There are women who have said for years they don’t feel like they need it and wouldn’t welcome it if it’s was offered to them. They perform the work they do just fine without it. They don’t want any additional responsibilities, just recognition for how much they’re already doing. And some, perhaps, would find the potential of administrative leadership over an entire ward or stake to be intimidating and overwhelming. They want to lower their odds of it ever happening to them. But is that not what women in church leadership ultimately experience? Caring for women and children has always meant caring for families. Caring for families means administering to the entire unit. This is what women in leadership already do. But for some reason, we’ve accepted the conditioning that the work we do is lesser in power and importance—to the point of titling it differently—because women are doing it.

I wonder how much of that feeling in women comes from the recognition that so many men in the Church are unprepared to do the caregiving tasks we’ve been doing for so long. If it all fell to them, would we end up doing everything when the learned incompetence kicks in? Women don’t want that. I think that’s the biggest reason many of them push back against ordination. And my question for many to consider is: are they wrong? And if they’re not, what are we doing with that recognition? If the idea of ordaining women would create such an unacceptable power imbalance because of how much women are already doing, what are men going to do to start pulling their equal share of the caregiving weight? And when are they going to do it?

Complimentarianism is the issue here, which isn’t the same thing as gender being the problem. Genders, like emotions, are morally neutral. It’s what we do with them that’s the problem. Sequestering skills and tasks by gender means none of us get to fully develop as people. Getting rid of the sequestering of skills and abilities is the only viable way towards non-gendered ordination, if it ever happens. But even if we don’t ever have a more universal form of ordination, the Church would be a more pleasant space for everyone if we created more of a cultural expectation of everyone pulling their own weight, and letting them do that independent of their gender.

I’ve had one truly phenomenal home teacher/ministering brother in almost 18 years of church experience. After my husband had a serious accident in our car, he picked it up from the scene of the accident and cleaned all of my husband’s blood out of the upholstery. I never even had to see it in that state. I never even had to leave the hospital for any of that. In the worst experience of my life, he took care of something I had no idea how to handle. It was done without me having to ask for it, in coordination with everyone else who watched over us and came to see us in that experience. When I think of a man using his priesthood for good, that’s what I think of. It’s not just the blessing of healing my husband got in the hospital. It’s the caregiving to discern a person’s genuine need and showing up to fill it exactly the way they need it done. That’s a spiritual practice, not just a practical one.

Caregiving is priesthood. Priesthood is caregiving. And if Brothers are priesthood holders when they are caregivers, then so are Sisters. If ordinances are the pearls on a necklace, and all the caregiving in between them is the strand, let’s get rid of every notion of one being more important than the other. It’s all priesthood, and ordination isn’t necessary for so much of it to be acceptable and pleasing to God. All of it together is necessary, and it would be incomplete without the offering that each person makes, no matter what their gender is. And rather than saying this is a post-gender perspective, it’s simply a human one. Much of what I’ve said is inseparable from my experience as a woman in the Church, but it’s not exclusive or unique to women. I’m part of a community that includes all genders, whether the Church likes it or not, and we’re all essential.

Every human in the Church is essential to God’s plan. And I think we should be more open to and honest about the implications of what that truly means. We’re all caregivers with care and service that only we individually can give. God won’t always be able to raise up another in our stead if we bow out and stop showing up. There is love only we can give and we will have every power on earth and in heaven at our disposal to give it if we ask for it, no matter who we are.

So go show divine love to someone today that could move mountains. Even if that person is yourself. You have the power of God, regardless of ordination status. Go see what miracles you can do with it.

I’ve had one truly phenomenal home teacher/ministering brother in almost 18 years of church experience. After my husband had a serious accident in our car, he picked it up from the scene of the accident and cleaned all of my husband’s blood out of the upholstery. I never even had to see it in that state. I never even had to leave the hospital for any of that. In the worst experience of my life, he took care of something I had no idea how to handle. It was done without me having to ask for it, in coordination with everyone else who watched over us and came to see us in that experience. When I think of a man using his priesthood for good, that’s what I think of. It’s not just the blessing of healing my husband got in the hospital. It’s the caregiving to discern a person’s genuine need and showing up to fill it exactly the way they need it done. That’s a spiritual practice, not just a practical one.

Caregiving is priesthood. Priesthood is caregiving. And if Brothers are priesthood holders when they are caregivers, then so are Sisters. If ordinances are the pearls on a necklace, and all the caregiving in between them is the strand, let’s get rid of every notion of one being more important than the other. It’s all priesthood, and ordination isn’t necessary for so much of it to be acceptable and pleasing to God. All of it together is necessary, and it would be incomplete without the offering that each person makes, no matter what their gender is. And rather than saying this is a post-gender perspective, it’s simply a human one. Much of what I’ve said is inseparable from my experience as a woman in the Church, but it’s not exclusive or unique to women. I’m part of a community that includes all genders, whether the Church likes it or not, and we’re all essential.

Every human in the Church is essential to God’s plan. And I think we should be more open to and honest about the implications of what that truly means. We’re all caregivers with care and service that only we individually can give. God won’t always be able to raise up another in our stead if we bow out and stop showing up. There is love only we can give and we will have every power on earth and in heaven at our disposal to give it if we ask for it, no matter who we are.

So go show divine love to someone today that could move mountains. Even if that person is yourself. You have the power of God, regardless of ordination status. Go see what miracles you can do with it.