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Maybe it's just me, but the OP seemed pretty clear about not getting an abortion. The extent of her mention of it was that it makes her sick, despite what she's been taught. I don't think she's entertaining the idea at all. To the OP: I'm going to take a different tactic here. (1) Are you taking a prenatal vitamin yet? The early weeks are the most important for getting adequate folic acid (as well as iron and other vitamins). (2) Have you seen a doctor yet? You should see one for the first time around 7-9 weeks at the latest. The doctor can also help counsel you (non-spiritually) on your options, and will likely (hopefully) respect your wish not to abort. (3) Educate yourself. My favorite pregnancy book is Your Pregnancy Week by Week, by Glade Curtis and Judith Schuler. (4) Make sure you have an adequate support network. Family, friends, church leaders. Don't try to isolate yourself and be alone in your trouble. Do your penance in other ways...you will need support. When you see your doctor, ask about local groups affiliated with the hospital.

I second the idea of talking to a lawyer in your jurisdiction. First, because knowledge is power; and second, because you're going to need a court order to establish custody, parent time, child support, etc. sooner or later (and if you do try to push the adoption thing without his consent--that's possible, depending on the states involved; but it's a legal minefield and you shouldn't trust an agency to walk you through it).

I agree with Pam, I don't think there's much to say until the actual numbers are published. After the study is published, it will be interesting to see: 1) If 6000 people, spread across multiple Christian/other religions, is large enough really draw the kind of conclusions he will claim. If religious affiliation is randomly representative, the LDS sample will likely be smaller than Catholic/Protestant. 2) Will the results also be correlated to some measure of "activity level." I have seen this effect in other studies -- often things are more closely related to activity level than to self-reported affiliation. 3) The usual rate of sexless marriage (10 or fewer sexual encounters per year) across the US is about 20%. If LDS really have a lower incidence, it will be interesting to see just how much lower.

First, hugs for you. This must be terrifying for you. Indeed, find yourself a good support network and counsel both religious and secular. And get that prenatal care! You have some big decisions facing you. My thoughts: Yep, take the abortion topic off the table. Don't even consider or the possibility of forgiveness.I, quite frankly, support states who support the rights of biological fathers. This is also your boyfriend's baby. He may not be marriage material for you, but that doesn't mean he doesn't deserve to be in his child's life. If you don't feel you should marry him, don't! But as soon as you can, bring up the pregnancy as well as your desire to break-up. The father should hae say.And, my goodness, take care of yourself. I can't stress the importance of a support network enough.

Everything will be ok, really. Heavenly Father is ready and willing to bless you and the little life you're growing. Be open to inspiration and take care of yourself! Being a single parent isn't the end of the world, and adoption isn't, either.

I have been bothered enough by this to speak up. Simply put, from a gospel perspective, this is not an option. Do not deceive yourself. You could be forgiven...but it is not guaranteed. This is not a cavalier thing and you run great, great risk. You know better. Forgiveness for intentionally ending a life when you darned well know better? Well...no one can say absolutely. It is the Lord's to judge. But the risk you are taking in approaching it with this as an "option" is beyond monumental. I cannot state this strongly enough. Take this option off the table!

You may enjoy this: Wikipedia - Jewish Ethnic Divisions Huh? We have the mummy of Rameses II--who was possibly the Pharoah of the Exodus and certainly lived within two or three hundred years of the event. He was blonde.

IN general, Coming down to us on our level in some form or another. However in terms of the gospel it would seem to me more about Christ becoming a mortal man, and having to go below us all to lift us.

Actually, it still took about 2 hours from the time we entered the endowment room until I was walking out of the temple. We did have a very small group though, so that probably was a factor.

My one interest in the article would be the opportunity to say "See? Mormons aren't a bunch of fuddy duddies in such matters!" if the difference really is significant. Though I think the tendency towards large families is enough of a clue as it is...

Hard to say until the actual study findings come out in September.

Woah, I thought this thread was really active because you guys were just discussing the article, hence why I didn't look into this thread at all. Had I known, I might have been able to be of some help here. I've just finished reading "A Perfect Brightness of Hope" by Phil Simkins. Perhaps some of you know it. It's one LDS members story about how he lost everything he cared about because of his drinking addiction. It, of course, also describes how he finally gets out of it almost completely. There were three very important things about dealing with addiction that I learned from this amazing story. 1. You must first admit that you are POWERLESS over your addictions. Some will know this as the first step of AA. 2. In order to truly fight this addiction, you must submit to God EVERY DAY. Every day, you pray to have the Lord help you overcome any temptations that you might run into. Every day, you renew your commitment to rely on the Lord. 3. No matter how much time has past, you must ALWAYS be vigilant. The day you stop relying on the Lord for any reason is the day that you become incredibly vulnerable. Your addiction can and will strike again, no matter HOW long it's been since you've last given in, no matter how much you've repented. BUT as long as you rely on the Lord, you can overcome it completely every day and find true happiness. Hopefully that will be of some help to you guys. Maybe not. In any case, feel free to ask me any question you guys would like, keeping in mind my current history.

The most important advice I can give you is to give yourself permission to love your baby. I used to work with teen parents and saw that many times in an unplanned pregnancy women would feel that if they expressed love for the baby before he/she was born that others would think she tried to get pregnant. Women with religious backgrounds had difficulty seeing that loving their baby didn't mean they were unrepentant for the sex outside of marriage. Fornication is a sin, but being pregnant is not sin. Your options are adoption or raising your child alone. Even if you don't marry, the baby should still have the father in his/her life. Children raised without a father have a greater risk of dropping out of school, being imprisoned, becoming teen parents, living in poverty, etc... It is hard work raising a child in typical circumstances and even more difficult as a single parent. Adoption can bless another couple, but you will deeply grieve the loss of your baby and sometimes adopted children (sometimes, not always) wonder if they were unlovable or if their mothers didn't love them enough to keep them. Please get counsel from a reputable counseling center. Some agencies that provide adoption tend to push adoption through emotionally coercive means. Try to find a pro-life agency that will walk you through the decision process in an unbiased way. http://pregnancydecisionline.org/ will refer you do a crisis pregnancy center. God does love you! Through the Bible we see that Christ had a very special love for women in difficult situations like this. May I encourage you to read through Mark and John? This will bring you a ton of peace,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_tornadoes_and_tornado_outbreaks I wonder how we lived without wikipedia for all those years... :) M.

Had another thought. You mentioned how you see this with your mom's side of the family - are their 'personalities' similar? You don't have to answer that but just keep in mind that different types of people have different energy levels so don't compare yourself to those that are of a different nature. If you're naturally more like a river or the ocean, that will not look the same as someone who resembles a geyser or waterfall. It's all good so work with it, not against it.

In our stake, Bishops and Stake Presidents are expressly forbidden from attending addiction recovery meetings. They aren't even allowed to be in the same area of the building when the meetings are being held. I thought it was church policy but I could be wrong.

I know this is a personal situation--a tremendously difficult one. However, it only seems right to me that if the father were willing to take the child, that he should have that right. Abortion can be forgiven--just about anything can. However, planning to do something so terrible, with the idea that it could eventually be forgiven seeems to be dangerous spiritual ground. So, if the sticking point is difference in faith, and that's enough to keep you from marriage, then it would seem that the choices are to either let the father take the child, or keep him, understanding there will be interactions with the father. If you hope to raise the child LDS, then is there any choice? You keep the baby, and work out the child's exposure to faith with the father, and perhaps the family court system, if it comes to that. BTW, I affirm your instinct not to marry someone with such sharp spiritual differences. This is a difficult road, but God will strengthen and bless you and baby with every righteous choice you make.

In general, I would agree with your state, a father should have rights in these situations. Why do you say that he would never consent to an adoption? Is it because he is ready and willing to be involved in this child's life both financially and otherwise? Or is he planning on being one of those deadbeats? I know next to nothing about family law, so I would ask you and anyone here who is familiar with family law -- if marriage, abortion, and adoption are all completely off the table, would there be real value, before the baby is born, to sit down with a lawyer and start to discuss/negotiate: who will be the primary caregiver for the child? visitation/custody arrangements for both primary caregiver and the other parent? who will pay for what and how much child support each parent will pay? and so on. If adoption is off the table, then both of you, in one way or another, need to take responsibility for this child and figure out how you will together raise him/her. It seems to me that these things may be easier to start planning and preparing for before the child is born than after.

Yeah, but it's really a relative thing, isn't it. All Jesus would have had to appear is white relative to the ancient Lamanites for the tradition of the great white god to have been started. And we do not know how fair-skinned Jesus was or was not. Moreover, and this is important too, I think, the Book of Mormon described him as clothed in a white robe. It might also be a reasonable guess that He may have glowed (though just as reasonable that He may not have) with glory. There are a variety of reasonable ways to see how the tradition of a great white god could have been started.

As I understand it, the ARP has struggled with the role of a sponsor over the years. They currently recommend it and have a sheet, distributed through the service missionaries, to help guide the addict in choosing a sponsor. I presume the crux of the issue is that the church wants to make sure your bishop is involved in the process and you don't presume that your sponsor is a better counselor just because they've been through it. Another important thing is to realize that the ARP manual was vetted and approved by The Brethern. Since Step 3 is about completely surrendering to God, it would make sense to follow the text approved by His prophet, rather than the AA version which, even though I believe it was inspired, is missing the whole truth, so to speak. That said, it is more important to be sober than it is how you maintain sobriety.

There has already been a lot of great information given here. I add only a couple of additional comments. Read through the instructional materials and follow their outlines precisely. It may seem awkward, at first, to read the welcome and instructions verbatim, but the consistency is important. If you are curious about exactly how the meetings work, The Mormon Channel has audio recordings of actual meetings. (http://www.mormonchannel.org/addiction-recovery-program) and there are live meetings you can attend over the phone. Lastly, I understand the thought about dressing down to avoid setting yourself on a pedestal, but It's also important for attendees to know who is hosting the meeting. In the "missionary" run meetings, the group leaders and the facilitators wear Sunday dress. The issue with being too "Molly Mormon" is in the way you interact with others. Never indulge judgmental thoughts. As you go through the steps, and you should go through them yourself, you will find that they are helpful for anyone and you will gain an appreciation for what the addicts experience. Also, you need to have an addict who has been successful in their recovery acting in the role of Facilitator. They are the one who brings legitimacy to the meeting, not you.

I agree. However, there are two things to consider. First, a lot of the issues at hand are based on social conventions and the natural culture of the church. As the church grows this becomes more and more difficult to manage and keep in line, so to speak. Many complain about the authoritative bureaucracy that the church has become. Would we risk pushing that further for the sake of curbing these sorts of problems? Or should we teach the membership at large to be wise, be forgiving, study, pray, etc.. (Note that this is the current approach as to sex). Secondly, and more importantly, we run the risk of throwing out the baby with the bathwater, as they say, when we push back on concerns like this. We see this in discussions like the recent one surrounding Tad R. Callister's morality/modesty talk. The responses, even if, perhaps, based on a semblance of right thinking, are so extreme so as to be the devil's advocate for discontinuing modesty, chastity, and morality all together. The prevailing liberal expression tends to account to the equivalent of "Don't teach your children to be righteous because it might make them feel bad when they sin."

See... This is where we go super complex. In ONE example of a sexless marriage: WHY is PartnerA choosing to disengage? There are hundreds of possibilities. 1-100 can be things that their spouse has done which are creating a cause & effect relationship 100-200 can be PartnerA physical problems 200-300 can be PartnerB physical problems 300-400 can be PartnerA mental, or emotional, or spiritual, or logistic problems Et cetera. And that\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'s STILL only one example. Because the prerequisite is PartnerA CHOOSING to disengage. There are a gazillion other examples where PartnerA isn\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'t choosing to disengage, but instead is _______ (a ton of other possibilities... From loss of libido to decreased situational awareness to time management to prioritizing to, to to, to... But just to pick one of dozens of causes...the most common causes of loss of libido are - sleep dep - depression - medication - stress / illness) So if partner A is undergoing chemo, and as such has suffered a loss of libido are they obligated to fulfill their spouses sexual needs? If partnerB has been deployed, If partnerA has been raped If partnerB hasn\'t slept in 3 days If partnerA is suicidal If partnerB is working 4 jobs If partnerA is suffering for dental pain Gazillions of Long term issues just like the group where they\'re choosing to disengage But there are even more groups than choosing to disengage vs suffered a loss of libido or logistical improbability. ____________________ Yes. No. Maybe. Depends ENTIRELY on the individual couple in question, and the individuals within the couple. I really don\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'t think that there is a blanket answer that should even generally apply. If you were asking about LITERALLY one couple,mans their specific circumstance, then yah sure. We can come up with a very good answer for THEM. But that answer doesn\\\'t translate to every (or even most) other couples and their marriages. Because there are too many variables at play that change the \\\"right & best\\\" answer. Yes, no, yes, maybe, in time perhaps, never, absolutely... It really all depends on the couple in question and their exact circumstance. Q

So you are seeing "needs" as referring to the things needed to keep a person alive. As you say, clearly sex is not needed in terms of someone surviving from day to day. Pres. Kimball is often quoted as saying that the most common cause of the divorces he was seeing was disagreements over sex -- "not getting along in the bedroom." Therapists say that by far the most common "sexual dysfunction" they see is differences in libido. An individual husband or wife can certainly continue living without sex, but if their marriage is dying because of a lack of sex, does that make sex a "need" for the marriage? (Because singles/unmarrieds are not in such a covenant relationship, this need would still not apply to them.) Analogous to the "real needs" you describe (a person needs to eat to stay alive and healthy), many claim that marriage "needs" sexual fulfillment for the marriage to stay alive and healthy.

The word that doesn't work is "needs". Very strong desires? Very, very strong desires? Very, very, very strong desires? Sure. But not needs. If it were a need, no one unmarried would be able to keep the law of chastity. Compare to real needs. Eating. Breathing, Sleeping. Shelter. Etc. No eating unless you are legally and lawfully married. See how that doesn't work? Even within marriage. If your wife doesn't feed you then going out and getting food from somewhere else is adultery. That cannot work. It clearly can work with sex however. The law of chastity only works if sex is not a need.

I dunno, this is a very sensitive and intimate topic, might be closed. I'll just say, there is NEVER a valid reason to engage in infidelity, period. Don't care if you're married or otherwise in a long term committed relationship, it is WRONG.