The Man [who visited] Earth

I can't identify how many times I've doubted the Savior. Not just whether he would be there for me, but whether the whole religion thing is necessary and, if so, whether Christianity is the "right" belief system in a world with so many views and experiences.

It wasn't until a few weeks ago, though, that I ever doubted the reality of Christ's resurrection. And, this time, the doubts were different. Not logical like before, when I'd safely considered Bible stories in the context of the things I was learning about atheism, Islam, Buddhism, and Judaism, etc. All of a sudden, because of an interesting idea I heard expressed in a movie, it felt like I'd been punched in the gut. Like, what if all the Bible witnesses were wrong? What if Christ didn't actually come out of that tomb on the third day? What if his miracles were all just stories, myths?

The thoughts didn't keep me up at night. I wasn't seriously doubting my faith, I thought. It was just a poorly-made movie, I told myself. Yet, the doubt persisted, and I didn't do anything my religious training has taught me to do. I didn't pray about it, search (any) scriptures about it, or even really acknowledge the doubt outright. As if, in ignoring it, it would just go away and I would magically return to being as sure about Christ's existence as I was when I preached His gospel in the streets of Guatemala or felt his healing power guide me to relief from a health problem as a young wife.

Thankfully, I also didn't do anything my religious training has taught me not to do in times of trials or uncertainty. I kept going to church, reading the scriptures, serving others, and talking to (sometimes, at) God in prayer. That was how my answer came.

One day - I think I was doing dishes or something, while a part of my brain passively reviewed those doubts about Christ's resurrection that had come from the movie - when, BAM, all of a sudden all of my brain jerked to alertness. I stood up straight and almost said aloud, "But Joseph Smith saw him!"

And, suddenly, I was filled with an exuberant gratitude for Joseph Smith for reasons I'd never considered before. That feeling came alongside with gratitude to God, for keeping his word: "In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established" (2 Corinthians 13:1).

That movie had made me question the accuracy of the Bible, and with it the testimonies of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, Paul, Stephen, and the hundreds at Pentecost who saw the Risen Lord. Had I faced the doubts it introduced head-on, I might have remembered Nephi, Jacob, Moroni, the brother of Jared, and the other Book of Mormon prophets who testified of, and in some cases gave their lives for, the Savior.

I didn't face my doubts head-on, though, and who knows where they would have taken me had the Holy Ghost not caused me to remember what I have worked hard to know is true: that God's true church began to be restored to the Earth in 1830. That 14-year-old Joseph Smith walked out into nature 10 years before that to say a prayer and came away with way more than he ever bargained for: an in-person answer from the Father and the Son. Say what people may about him, criticize his character though they might, no one can convince me that a farm boy in nineteenth-century New York wrote the Book of Mormon on his own. That book was translated. It contains scripture, and it comes from God. I know it.

I came to know it because I believed in Christ and I knew the Book of Mormon contained the Savior's words (2 Nephi 33:10-11). If anything, my testimony of Joseph Smith and the restoration had been weak throughout my life, buoyed up by my faith in Christ. Never before that moment in the kitchen had I felt that the later depended on the former.

But when it did, I was so grateful for both. For Christ coming to Earth at a time when his teachings, miracles, and resurrection could be recorded in a record that would be passed on to people for centuries, regardless of the number of translations that may have diluted the message. And for Christ coming back to Earth after a long apostasy to reorganize his Church and proclaim his testimony in the modern world, in civilization as we know it, at a time and in a place so much closer to my own, and for giving us access to another record, another testimony of his life and another account of his ministry.

Christ lives. If you doubt it, read the Bible. If you doubt that, read the Book of Mormon. If you doubt that, pray.

On race and hairdos

My bridesmaids accompanied me to a random strip mall in the middle of Indianapolis to get our hair done on the day of the wedding. I hadn't done a trial run, didn't have firm ideas on what kind of style I wanted, and didn't do any research on the beauty school other than to call and confirm prices, hours, and availability.

When we got inside, I kind of panicked.

There was loud rap music playing, not as many stylists as we needed on duty, and I realized I had no idea what I wanted my hair to look like. Plus, the place was sandwiched between a Big Lots and a taqueria. I worried what my friends would think about the beauty school not having the glamorous, luxurious feel that Pinterest suggests all brides and bridesmaids should experience on wedding days.

Also, to be excruciatingly honest, I was worried because all the stylists were black, the two other clients were black, and the pictures on the wall featured black hairstyle models. The salon's website said they serve all hair types, but was I supposed to have picked up on some sort of unwritten clue? Had it been a mistake to bring five heads of white-person hair to a beauty school that apparently focuses on a different demographic? Had I committed some sort of social stumble? Would our hair even curl the same?

On my wedding day, I thought these thoughts. Sitting in a spinning chair smelling hair chemicals, I wondered why, despite having plenty of black female friends and acquaintances, I still couldn't say what was fact and what was fiction about our different hair types. And I wondered if wondering all this made me racist.

As the stylists began to transform mine and my bridesmaids' hair, I saw the good work they did and relaxed. It apparently didn't matter that our hair was a different texture than theirs. Of course it didn't.

But, why, then, weren't there more white - or, for that matter, Asian or Hispanic - clients visiting this beauty school?

And, so, on my wedding day, I thought about organic segregation. About how I see places clearly marketed toward different demographics, think, "that's not for me," and move on. Everyone does it. That's why companies make concerted efforts to include models of all races and ages in their ads when they're targeting their products toward the largest market possible. People gravitate toward places we already think we belong. I don't know how much of a beauty school's clientele comes from referrals vs. walk-ins, but I could see a lot of non-black walk-ins talking themselves out of visiting this salon.

Which is sad. Because the stylists did a wonderful job.

Presidential Contradictions, Sunday School Style

Today, the president declared that the U.S. will be protected by God.

He also said, "It is the right of all nations to put their own interests first."

Somehow, that second statement doesn't seem to jive with what I know about God. Scripture teaches us that "God is no respecter of persons. But in every nation, he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him" (Acts 10:34-35).

May I proclaim one simple truth? We are all children of God. We all bleed the same color and have souls of equal worth, no matter where we live in this country - or in any other.

If you are one of Trump's "forgotten" who feels an entitled right to pursue your best interests at any expense, may I remind you that every decision that puts "America first" puts someone else - perhaps many people living in many other American nations and feeling forgotten just like you - second, third, and last. And decisions that make you feel remembered and benefited are likely to marginalize others.

In any system of government with any economic system, there will be winners and losers. No amount of government bureaucracy - or the elimination thereof - will make life in this fallen world fair. The task that is given to each of us is to bear our burdens well and help lift others' at the same time.

As we watch our leaders make decisions of international and domestic policy, may we remember that "inasmuch as [w]e shall keep the commandments of God, [w]e shall prosper in the land" (Alma 36:1) but "all those who are proud, and that do wickedly, ... shall be as stubble" (2 Nephi 26:4).

And may we remember that the first commandment of God is to love one another - not just when convenient or easy or when others are watching, but always.

Finally, as many of us struggle to feel heard or find peace in these trying times, let us remember that the President isn't the only one who makes decisions. Senators and representatives send out surveys and accept calls and mail so they know what matters to their constituents. Beyond that, we have a Heavenly Father who is aware of all our frustrations and hears all of our prayers with complete attention. His ways are not our ways nor his thoughts our thoughts, but his timing is perfect and his plan supreme.

This dreary January day may not be the darkest of those to come but, in the end, the sun will shine brighter than we've ever seen.

#ComeWhatMayAndLoveIt

A Testimony, For My Mother

And for all the mothers who may never know how much they influence their kids for good. 

When we decided to marry in December, we knew we'd be making our final preparations during the Christmas season. What we didn't realize was that, before all the good cheer and charity decked society's halls, we'd have to get through the presidential elections.

"We’re going to build a wall.”

"Such a nasty woman."

"To just be grossly generalistic, you can put half of Trump supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables.”

Those kinds of words screeched from air and radio waves for weeks. We got used to flinching when we turned on the radio or walked by a TV. With the same gruesome attraction that turns heads toward an accident on the highway, we flinched as we glanced and listened to the constant messages of contention and distrust.

Then we came home and we planned: how we would raise our children, where we would live, what kind of Spirit we would invite into our family. But we were not free from the influence of the media and I, at least, began to see some of my worries about current events bleed into and poison the hope I had for my future family.

My heart hung heavy, heavier than it should for someone a month away from getting married.

Then one Sunday morning, lying on my roommate's white faux leather couch, listening through headphones to Gage reading every other verse of the 11th chapter of Nephi in the Book of Mormon, I got some solace from the words on my phone screen and the Holy Spirit that filled them with meaning for me.

At this point in the story, Nephi (an ancient prophet who'd just followed his family out of Jerusalem prior to its 587 BC destruction) gets to see his father's vision of the tree of life. He's also shown visions of the future. He sees wickedness, illness, and destruction. He sees his own descendants grow mean-spirited, selfish, and cruel. He watches them fight each other to the point of extinction. Reading about that kind of felt like watching the news.

But Nephi also sees a preview of Christ's visit to the earth:

"And I looked and beheld the Redeemer of the world, of whom my father had spoken; ... And I beheld that he went forth ministering unto the people, in power and great glory; and the multitudes were gathered together to hear him; and I beheld that they cast him out from among them" (1 Nephi 11:27-28).

The words pierced through the soft shell of numbness I had been building around my heart. They carried the worry and fear and skepticism to the core of me, let me feel it strongly, and then washed it all away, leaving peace where before there had been the beginnings of despair.

I was reminded, with the emotional and mental strength that comes only from the Holy Spirit, that Christ lives. He has overcome the world. "The world" includes the people who were cruel to him then and the people who are cruel to each other now. It includes every scary politician and un-loving neighbor that was making me wonder whether I was prepared to raise my children to choose that right in an ever-darkening world. 

Those verses helped me remember - and more importantly, helped me feel - that "all that is unfair about life can be made right through the Atonement of Christ" (Preach My Gospel, Lesson 2).  

Later that day, anyone who wanted had the chance to stand and share a testimony at the end of Relief Society, a Sunday school-type meeting for sisters at church. The words I shared surprised me.

"You know how sometimes general authorities (church leaders) tell us we shouldn't be like the young adults they talk to who are afraid to get married because they don't want to bring children into this world? Well, I've always scoffed at that. Not because they're wrong, but because I never thought that was a good enough reason not to get married. Like, the world is a good place; what's the big deal?

"Well, now that I'm actually about to get married, and having kids is becoming a reality, I get how people can be scared about that. I wonder how I'm going to raise children to choose the right when there are a million voices that would seem so much more persuasive. 

"People are going to tell my kids that Jesus Christ never lived, or if he did that he was just a good man. They're going to say he's dead, that he lives on only in paintings like the ones on these church walls. They're going to say that his power is just a figment of our imaginations.

"And why should they turn to Christ for comfort when they could turn on music, or eat food, or watch TV, or, heaven forbid, turn to drugs and alcohol for relief?"

I thought back on that morning, reading the scriptures with Gage, and the rush of relief and peace it gave me. I told them about that experience.

"And so I know it doesn't matter how scary this world may seem, or how cruel people are, or who gets elected, or what happens in this country or others. Christ has overcome the world."

I glanced at the painting of the Savior on the wall above the piano. Then I thought about the similar depictions in my home growing up: the paintings behind my dad's living room chair, on the kitchen wall calendar, on the fridge, in my room. I remember staring into the imagined eyes of Jesus Christ and wondering whether he was looking at me from above, whether he really understood the saltiness of my tears and the trials of my childhood life.

Then I had a sudden, vivid vision of my mother. I glimpsed her head bent over the Book of Mormon she read with me when I was 7, waking up early before work to explain the hard words and tell about her favorite spiritual stories. I remembered her preparing with reverence for church lessons, reading scripture stories to my brothers before bed, and answering our questions with patience and love. 

I realized that my testimony of the Savior comes, in large part, because of hers. Before the skepticism of the world could corrupt me, she taught me the truth. And so I finished my testimony having learned something

"I am so grateful for my mother, who taught me to have faith. It's true what the general authorities say, that the world needs mothers who will teach their kids their truth. 

"How can I not have kids, then, if I know something that so few people in the world today remember? I know that Christ lives. He gave his life and was resurrected. He really is the Son of God we believe in. He gives us peace nothing else can offer. He is real. And his love is real."

I pray for God's help in showing my children his love, as my mother showed - and continues to show - it to me. 

The Man Who Sewed My Skirt

This morning, while I indexed family history records and we both listened to sweet Sunday music, Gage trimmed and hemmed my skirt.

That's right.

My sci-fi loving, mechanical-engineering, tool-wielding man sat down behind his grandma's 20-year old Bernina, changed the foot, inserted a new spool of thread, removed the pins he'd placed, used his steady hands to guide a straight stitch - and didn't think twice about it.

I did.

For a minute I felt insecure. There I was watching uselessly while my partner, who can also run math and science circles around me, carried out a basic domestic duty. I'm not ashamed to have just quit a good job so I can move with my groom to wherever his job takes us. I don't feel relegated to, but rather honestly yearn, to fill the role of wife and mother and loving homemaker. But up to this point in our relationship, Gage has cooked more than me and, if we had kids right now, he'd be the one they'd run to for hand-sewn Halloween costumes.

Gage and I have talked about variations of this thought before. He points out that I have other talents, and he's right. I serve in the temple and write and speak Spanish and exercise and am largely content with how I spend my time. Sometimes Gage is even the one who says he feels insecure, and I try to assure him there's no reason to be.

Ultimately, both of us know that in each other we have found a healthy balance. Our individual talents combine to cover almost all the bases. Together, we feel that we will make a very happy home. We know that it doesn't matter if he's the one sewing and I'm planning the honeymoon, or whose savings pay for our dates out. What matters is that we "help one another as equal partners." 

So I brushed aside this morning's brief insecurities and instead gave thanks to be marrying a man who doesn't think himself above any type of work.

If only it were happily ever after.

A couple hours later, at church, standing at Gage's side in my freshly sewn skirt, I watched a well-meaning married man of 25 years put his hand on my almost-husband's shoulder.

"So you're getting married soon, are you?" he asked.

"12 days," Gage smiled.

"Well, just remember," the man chuckled, "She's always right." 

Gage and I exchanged a glance. 

"That's one of the first things I learned in marriage," the man went on. "You gotta get used to being wrong. I only made one right decision in all this time, and that was marrying her."

We didn't know how to respond. But the gentleman didn't seem to notice our shifting feet and forced smiles. 

It's wasn't the first time we'd heard something like that. A couple of weeks into our engagement, a group of strangers in their 70s joked that we must be newly married if we were still holding hands. Once before Sunday School, some women at church told Gage he better get used to saying "Yes, dear." When I protested that I wanted a husband to counsel with, they insisted I didn't know what I was getting into. They made marriage sound like I'd be training a dog.

Together, Gage and I marvel at this kind of language. We resolve to fuel the flames of our romance and retain the respect and admiration we feel for each other. And we wonder why. Why does this kind of "advice" get tossed around as if its funny? It's especially exasperating to hear it within the walls of our church, whose members are taught that both husband and wife are prized by God and essential in the family. 

Just this spring, the apostle D. Todd Christofferson gave an inspiring message about fathers in which he said "We call on media and entertainment outlets to portray devoted and capable fathers who truly love their wives and intelligently guide their children, instead of the bumblers and buffoons or 'the guys who cause problems,' as fathers are all too frequently depicted."

As a woman whose fiance sewed her skirt this morning, it is especially discouraging to hear baffoon-type stereotypes directed at the love of my life. Don't the people who say these things know that all too often Gage is the one gently (and ever so tactfully) correcting me? Don't they see the countless ways he serves me: filling up my water bottle before I know it's empty, giving me the bigger bite of the shared cupcake, even massaging my scalp as I write this? He hates it when I say it, but in so many ways, he's perfect. 

And that, maybe, is one of the reasons the kinds of man-minimization we heard expressed today is proliferated throughout society. This morning when Gage was sewing something I didn't know how to, it made me feel insignificant. That wasn't a pleasant feeling. If I hadn't had his encouragement and/or the critical thinking and self-esteem to understand and invalidate those doubts about my worth, I might have been taken in by the temptation to tease him about his ability to sew. Sitcoms even today might still label that something like "women's work." They'd poke fun at a man for sewing like they would if he wore pink.

In his talk about fathers, Elder Christofferson said, "For men, fatherhood exposes us to our own weaknesses and our need to improve." I can say the same about dating, engagement, and marriage from a woman's perspective. From any perspective. There are things I'm not going to know how to do that Gage is going to teach me (and vice versa). One of the tests of matrimony will be seeing whether we act with humility while both teaching and learning. Doing that means admitting our weaknesses instead of belittling the other. Doing that will "require sacrifice, but it [will be] a source of incomparable satisfaction, even joy." 

It's how we'll grow together. And I'm betting it's the only way to happily ever after. 

A Moderate's Resignation

She quoted scripture. Galatians 6:9. "Let us not grow weary in doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart."

Never have I loved her more than then while listening to her concession speech play live over NPR in my car as I drove to an event for Latino High School students where I'd hand them fliers about a program the new president could very well eliminate. It made me wish I had done more to fight for her when there was still a chance.

I guess I just always thought it was a given she was going to win. Trump said too many offensive and ignorant things. How could people take him seriously?

I read his platform points for the first time today. Went to his empire's website and looked at a picture of him sitting in a claw-footed chair surrounded by candlesticks and marble everything. And wondered how it is that he connects with the working class people who came to all his rallies.

Because Hillary said we owe him an open mind and a peaceful transition of power, I tried to find something I could agree with. He wants to put term limits on congressmen and women. That's wise. He wants to let local school districts have more control over their education. That's good. He won't draw a presidential salary. That's only fitting.

I'm still wary of the man who has verbally abused women and belittled minorities. And no money of mine is paying for any idiotic wall.

But I'm also not blacking out my Twitter pic, or protesting in the streets, or filling social media with sensational and rare (if very, very unfortunate) racist reactions. We don't need to foment any more fear.

When Donald Trump sat down to tell the press about his meeting with President Obama today, he looked humbled and subdued. There's a reason all the presidents go gray-haired within their first few years in office. Let's hope the president-elect is starting to get a real good feeling for the solemnity of what he's signed up for.

Besides, "the assumption of good faith in our fellow citizens is essential to a vibrant and functioning economy." President Obama said that in his remarks about the outcome of the election. It reminded me of what the current Latter-day prophet has said: "We must develop the capacity to see men not as they are at present but as they may become..."

Of course, President Monson ended that statement with "...when they receive testimonies of the gospel of Christ." I'm not sure that will happen for Mr. Trump within the next four years, but if I truly believe "the gospel will save the world from the calamity of its own self-destruction," I better start living it. And that means supporting what I can about the president-elect's upcoming administration, respectfully and appropriately protesting as necessary, and, more than anything else, living a kind, moderate, and good life in my own sphere of influence.

Who's with me?

In Honor of the Honors College Dean

When he called me into his office to defend my beliefs, I had the nervous knees of a freshman going against the wishes of the dean of the Honors College.

Besides being the dean, Dr. James Ruebel was one of the people who'd given me the scholarship I so badly needed in order to come to Ball State. And he was the distinguished co-professor of my six-credit classics course, the professor who was truly a teacher, who explained the Odyssey in such a way that somehow Homer's words made sense. He was the professor who asked the kinds of questions that made you think deep thoughts that made you want to keep thinking. He was the kind of professor you automatically respected, the kind of person you wanted to please.

But he wanted our class to watch a film whose ratings for violence and language conflicted with my conservative standards for media. I didn't want to watch it, and I told him so, and why. Of course, I did this in an email, the least confrontational medium of all. I hoped for an easy answer. 

The reply that came was an invitation to meet him in his office in the second floor of the Honors College. He said he would respect my feelings, but he wanted to hear them explained.

And so I went: a nervous 19-year-old prepared to be peppered with questions about my faith and lifestyle. What I remember of our conversation is that it was far from accusatory. Dr. Ruebel asked questions to hear their answers. He listened, and though he didn't agree, he respected my beliefs. I left his office eager to do the make-up work we agreed on.

It has only been recently, as I've pondered this experience from 5 years ago, that I realize how precious Dr. Ruebel's behavior in that situation was, how characteristic it is of him, and how badly needed it is in the world today. 

Though we viewed movies and morals very differently, and though he was far my superior in every way, Dr. Ruebel did not wield his authority like a weapon. Instead, he listened. He respectfully questioned. He explained his perspective. He showed his frustration at times, but he did not impose his will on mine. 

Dr. Ruebel knew that thinking amounts to something, and lasts longer than the words that communicate it does. When conversations are kept civil, grounded in an appropriate balance of verified facts and analyzed feelings, they allow their participants to learn in ways that no other kind of discourse ever will. 

Because of Dr. Ruebel, I thought about what I might have been missing by not watching that film. I honestly re-evaluated my standards and ultimately learned how to better articulate them. I also pondered his perspective and what it might be like to live life in his shoes. I learned. I grew.

And, so, Dr. Ruebel accomplished his calling. Even without the content of whatever the rest of the class saw in that film, he gave a classical training. He taught me - and so many other students and people over the course of his tenure as teacher, professor, and leader - to consider, and to be considerate. 

I share this story in honor of my Honors College dean, along with a plea for a more peaceful planet: As we go about interacting with people and ideas that are different from us, may we remember Dr. Ruebel and strive to emulate his critical thinking, tolerance, and love.