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that they are willing to take upon them the name of thy Son Hi, My name is Jeremy and I am LDS. To day I will be talking about sacrament and children. Let me first say this: We declare before every other church that baptism of children before the age of accountability is an abomination before the lord. I am writing this because I feel the BAPTISM and SACRAMENT are equal. One is just as important as the other. And they should be done together in my opinion. I think we should use wisdom in making this decision. I feel the greatest wisdom is to do this in order. To me it looks odd that we tell other churches to WAIT for baptism and then go ahead with giving the child sacrament as if the child has not waited. It's pointless because children don't need sacrament or PRACTICE. How hard is it to eat bread and drink water? Here are some comments that I would like to address: 1. Sacrament prepares children for the real thing. If this is true then other churches that baptize CHILDREN are right, because baptizing children PREPARES them for the sacrament they will be taking right away. So that comment seems to make no sense to me. Baptism PREPARES us BEFORE sacrament prepares us. They are of EQUAL importance and should be treated as EQUAL. Thank you for your thoughts tough. (: 2. Church doctorine does not say children should NOT partake of sacrament. This is TRUE. The church also does not say any thing about the order that a child should become a priest. We institute the ORDER in WISDOM. We should also use WISDOM to know that children need to WAIT till they are accountable before taking a sacred sacrament. 3. Why then do we allow non members to partake of the sacrament? They are also not worthy. Two fold answer. First thanks to classylady for the first. General authority and not me, has made it clear that taking the sacrament is ok for the unbaptized because it is a representation of the sacrament they will take when they are older. That is his opinion and in other words he is saying that the church will not STOP any one from partaking of the sacrament. HOWEVER. The church will also not stop you from taking the sacrament if you are a less active and in transgression. It's up to YOU to decide if you are worthy. Or in this case if the child should take it. So Russell M. Nelson in the Ensign, March 1983 is simply saying, we won't stop you. This does not answer the question of where it's RIGHT it only answers the question of what people THINK. In most cases if you break the word of wisdom no one will do much either. We have to decide to do right. 4. Am I picking a fight? My purpose of this thread is to give comfort and assurance to those of you choosing not to let children under the age of 8 partake of sacrament. I try to back all my comments up with scripture and honesty. You can give me input and we can talk. That is what I am here to do. How you PROCESS this thread is YOUR business. You can make me any kind of MONSTER you want. But it's YOUR reality of the IDEA not mine. I don't let my children partake of sacrament, so don't feel bad. Here is why: Quote: Elder Dallin H. Oaks We are not grounded in the wisdom of the world or the philosophies of men-however traditional or respected they may be. Our testimony of Jesus Christ is based on the revelations of God to His prophets and to us individually. Ensign Jan 2011 What this is saying is that we do not run our church by a tradition system but by wisdom from revelation. So we don't baptize children because we know from the prophets of the Book of Mormon that children under the age 8 are not accountable. No where is there any doctrine that children under 8 should take sacrament. So to allow sacrament to an unbaptized child is a TRADITION or PHILOSOPHY Now some will say we prepare children to take sacrament by giving it to them. But this is not a PRACTICE run of blessing the sacrament. It's the REAL sacrament. This FORCES them to partake of the covenant of baptism and they do not require it. Ask a Mormon this next time he or she brings it up: Shouldn't we practice BAPTISM too? Why can't we simply practice sacrament at home with house bread? Why can't we simply explain the sacrament in primary? Why give the REAL sacrament to an unprepared child? What covenants are they renewing, since they don't have any yet? In truth, the only real answer is that Mormons giving the sacrament to children under 8 are committing a creed or philosophy, since no where in the doctrine of the church does it say children at 8 should not be baptized but SHOULD take the sacrament. Why do it in REVERSE??? It's backwards and confusing. If we are going to give sacrament to children we should be baptizing them since we feel they are ready to partake of the covenant of Jesus Christ! The TRUE Mormon would teach the child about Jesus as is the roll of the guardian of that child. Teach the child about what baptism is, teach the child about what sacrament is, and then tell the child that he or she must wait till 8 years and baptism and then that child may partake of the sacrament. But to do it BACKWARDS is truely foolish and makes our church look bad. Here we are telling all the other churches they don't need to baptize children and here we are giving our children the sacrament of Jesus Christ before they need it! If that's not the most backward hypocrisy I have ever heard. Sorry guys Here is why we need to stay away from doing things out of order and by our OWN intellect and opinion in GOD's church. Joseph Smith in History of the church 1:17 states: Creeds of the churches of that day "were an abomination in his sight" Now we declare to OTHER churches THEIR creeds are wrong and on the other hand here WE are committing CREEDS that are also an abomination before the lord. "For I am a God of order" In conclusion, children obviously should not take of the sacrament. In truth my children will appreciate it a LOT more and it will have a very special meaning for them because they are doing it in ORDER. First baptism THEN partaking of the sacrament. My children don't need to prepare to take the sacrament by indulging in the REAL sacrament at church an. They are educated right at home on what the sacrament is. My little boy has even practiced the sacrament in the kitchen with store bought bread. It was very sweet to see him bless it and pass it. And I felt wonderful knowing we were not offending the Lord. If Catholics can manage it then I think that the LDS church can manage it as well. So stand up for your belief to do it in ORDER and if you get questions just send them a link to this page! Hope this helps. -Jeremy What is the sacrament? Jesus Christ Instituted the Sacrament “Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to his Apostles, saying, ‘Take, eat’ (Matt. 26:26). ‘This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me’ (Luke 22:19). In a similar manner he took the cup of wine, traditionally diluted with water, said a blessing of thanks for it, and passed it to those gathered about him, saying: ‘This cup is the new testament in my blood,’ ‘which is shed … for the remission of sins.’ ‘This do in remembrance of me.’ … Renewing Covenants through the Sacrament - Liahona June 2010 Corinthians 11:27-31 – Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.

So I have a question for whoever can answer it. I’ve talked to a lot of people who I feel can’t give me a good answer, and I really want someone to put my mind to ease with this because it really has me bothered. So here’s the situation, my brother and sister in law are getting sealed on Friday. My sister in law was previously sealed to someone for only 5 months before she met my brother. They got married and had a child, all while she was still technically sealed to this other man. Her sealing to the previous man is now canceled which is why she and my brother are getting sealed on Friday. However, my 2 year old nephew cannot join in the sealing ceremony because he was already born under the covenant. Can someone please explain this to me. Does this mean that my nephew is sealed to my sister in law’s ex husband, because he was born under the covenant of their sealing?? My heart breaks for my brother that he can’t have his child sealed to him on Friday. So if someone could explain to me why this is, or give me some reassurance that this doesn’t mean that my nephew is sealed to another man who isn’t his father, it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time for reading this 

Hello everyone, my name is Diane and I live in Sunny California near Santa Barbara , at the Beach. I was baptized in 1995 along with my two girls and my now ex husband was baptized a week later. We were sealed in the Los Angeles Temple 1 year and a week later with our girls and our then 2 year old son. I recently re-married ( 2 years ago) to my Jr High/HS sweetheart, an amazing man, 30 years to the date after we first " dated" ( with our parents on an outing, as we were both only 15! ) We kept in touch after I was married for all but 10 years, and then he found me on Classmates in 2000. Our families were always friends, and it was wonderful hearing from him again ( he had married and divorced after only 6 years of marriage, I was married for 25 years to my first husband) Our Wedding was beautiful, he gave us both the wedding of our dreams, but not in the Temple as he was not a member at the time. He has always been interested in the church and investigated off and on through the past 11 years that we've been back in touch. We were always the best of friends, he also with my former husband. He began taking the discussions again right before wedding, but with a serious smoking habit, baptism committment took a while before he was completely ready and able to give cigarettes up completely. He surprised me a few weeks before his baptism by setting his date as the day before our First Wedding Anniversary, and was confirmed on our First anniversary! ( What more could I possibly want or need for my wedding gift? ) This year, on March 27th, his 1st Baptism anniversary date, he was ordained an Elder, and we celebrated our 2nd Wedding Anniversary the next day! We are now in Temple Prep classes and he is getting ready to receive his Endowments while I await my Sealing Cancellation ( which I will posting questions on, for any who know the process involved, please help! ) We have 5 children between us from 15 to 27, and 2 wonderful Granddaughters. Heavenly Father brought us back together again after 30 years, after many of life's experiences, celebrations and tragedies and both of our divorces ( his after 6 years, mine after 25 years! Both of our former spouses cheated. My ex stopped attending church only 2 years after we were sealed, and hasn't had anything to do with the church for 10 years now. He was not able to baptize our son, who waited on him to BE able to do so, but finally gave up 4 1/2 years ago at age 14 and was baptized by our bishop. This year my Husband will be ordaining my son to become an Elder, which is just one of the greatest blessings that Heavenly Father has given to our family! ) I am a Family History Consultant for my Stake ( if anyone needs help with your family history I am happy to help! Just ask! ) and attend the Temple as often as I can, usually at least once a month if not more. My husband went to the Temple to do Baptisms 2 weeks after his baptism!He is very excited to be able to go to the Temple with me soon, and it will be SUCH a blessing to have him there with me. I"m very happy to have found this forum, and very Thankful to Heather for starting it. I've looked at many postings the past couple of years but never posted anything, now I plan to become an active member here, and post a lot of questions I have, hopefully all of you who can answer, will! Thank you for allowing me the honor of introducing myself , I hope to get to know many of you here! Diane

I recently started a website called Scriptures 4 Kids . The purpose of the website is to provide parents with the tools that they need to make daily scriptures a reality for all children no matter where they are or how much time their parents might have. The site provides reading on four different reading levels so that the book can grow with your children. It also has audio narration for children that can not read or who just are not in the mood. Since I got the site up, my children have not missed reading once. In our family we use it as a reward. "You get to go read your scriptures when your responsibilities are done". We want our children to learn that the scriptures are a fun and wonderful thing that should be a part of their daily lives. Prior to getting the site up it was not feasible to read individually with all six of my kids. My favorite part of the site is the "question to ponder". After each story there is a question. The question is intended to teach the children to learn to apply the scriptures to their lives. In our home I ask my kids, "What was your question today?" This frequently leads to thoughtful discussions between me and my children. I want my children to make gospel conversations a part of their daily routine. I just barely got it up 2 weeks ago. It took me 5 years to do all the art and text and to get the site coded. I hope that it will be used to teach our tech savvy kids true gospel principles. Kids are so inundated with technology these days. I hope that Scriptures for Kids will help to make sure that some of that technology helps to teach them about Jesus Christ. I would love to hear what others think about the site. How do you make DAILY scripture reading a reality for young children? Is this a priority for other mothers out there? Thanks for letting me share!

I teach two year olds at a Christian preschool and one of my kids says this all the time. In fact it is one of the only phrases I understand. I tried replacing it each time he says it with "Oh my stars!" it worked, but he says "stars" very similar to "God" (he talks like a 2 year old). Any ideas for something similar to say instead? "oh my ______"?

My ex-wife and I got divorced about 10 years ago. We have been living in different states for several years now, and I am looking at moving to live near her so that I can be close to my child. She has been telling me that it would be best if we were not in the same Ward or even the same Stake. Does anyone know of anything that the church has published, or any talks by the general authorities that would support or refute this? To me it seems that for my daughter, it would be best if she didn't have to jump from ward to ward and from Stake to Stake. Didn't have to create two separate groups of friends, and deal with separate teachers. We have all gotten along very well. Please someone give me some information that I can use to research this. I want to do what is best for my daughter, regardless of whether it is comfortable for me. Thanks much in advance. Bean

It is imperative that you talk with your children and those that you may have some influence on about avoiding pornography. A recent news story was way to close to home for me. Here in Happy Valley (the term used for Utah County) porn was viewed at school by 5th graders who used a term the filters could not block. One child is saying it is difficult to get the images he saw out of his head. The fact-of-the-matter is that he will never get those images out of his head. He will now have to learn how to deal with those images. I hope and pray that the parents use this time to educate their children on what to do if they see porn and more importantly to come home and talk about it. This is why it is so important to learn about and understand pornography addiction. This is a multi-billion dollar industry that is out to get your friends, family and children addicted so they can increase their profit. Here is the full story if you are interested: ksl.com - 5th-graders to be charged for showing porn to classmates

Since joining the forum and wandering around a bit I have noticed that there are more than a few women who have problems with infertility. As my husband and I have been dealing with this problem for eight years now I thought I might see if I could start a discussion on it. On our first year anniversary we were notified by the doctor that Faded had cancer, again. This was the second instance of it and it was the same type of cancer that he had before. The first bout of cancer came around the time he returned from his mission. He had gone through Chemotherapy and was currently in remission. He had almost hit the 5 year mark which marks the time where they usually don’t see cancer return. When it came the second time he was only 26. Because it was a reoccurrence of the original cancer the doctor wanted to pull out the big guns to fight the disease. So he decided that Faded would need to go through Chemo, Radiation and a Bone Marrow Transplant. For those who don’t know what is involved in a Bone Marrow Transplant I will elaborate. During a Bone Marrow Transplant (BMT) they give the patient chemotherapy that is 40 times the concentration that they usually give regular cancer patients. They give three types of chemotherapy separated by a day to give the body time to recover. The chemo goes around and kills everything, all of the rapidly dividing cells in the body and this also means bone marrow. After giving the last batch of chemo they wait a few days and then insert the new bone marrow, then everyone prays that the bone marrow is accepted by the body. One problem behind this procedure is that it results in a 99% chance of sterility. So before going through any of the chemo Faded banked some “opportunities” for us. Currently Faded is in remission, it has been 7 years and he is doing well. However we are currently battling the infertility problem. Our current option is In Vitro Fertilization (IF), however if that does not work then we will look into adoption. Though we have options I still go through times where I feel sad about it all. It often hits home whenever I see a baby or when someone asks when we are going to have children, but it hit hardest when my little sister, the youngest in our family, had her baby this last August. I am happy to have my newest niece and I am happy for my sister, but my arms are still empty. Throughout this all I have talked to many other women who are going through similar situations. They struggle at having children or are completely unable. All of them are saddened by the fact and often ask, “Why me?” I have seen many of them blame God, get angry, or hurt, and have seen quite a few grow inactive as Mother’s Day is a painful experience and hearing about new babies in the ward often makes them feel sad rather than happy. It causes me to wonder, those sisters in this forum who are struggling with infertility, how do you feel about it all? How is sacrament for you? Mother’s Day? New babies? How do you react to the question from well meaning people, “So when are you going to have babies?” What are your thoughts on your situation? Do you blame God? Or have you found a way of viewing things that puts things in a different perspective?

The reason I chose that for my ID is that I am a Mormon, for much of my adult life (I'm a convert), and I am a Mema! I have six wonderful grownup children, and nine wonderful grandchildren. I spent most of my adult life in VA, but moved to AR five years ago, when my younger daughter and her family moved here. I like it here, but sometimes I miss the Atlantic Ocean. I also miss my family back in VA. My favorite hobby is blogging, and I'm an Internet addict. I'm also a great fan of the Internet because of the good it can do. I've discovered it's a great missionary tool. It's also very helpful in my calling as a church bulletin designer. When I'm not eating and sleeping at my computer , I also like reading and music. This is just a very brief intro to me, and of course there's much more I could tell. I'm looking forward to getting to know people here, and sharing the light of the gospel and the love of community with you. I have a very strong, and vibrant testimony. I know it's true. :)

I have searched for answers and prayed about this but am at a loss. My daughter, 23 years old is involved with another woman. Before I knew that they were involved, I had a developed a great relationship with the other female. Once I was told they were in love is when the problems started. I didn't even know they were lesbian. My problem lies with total rejection of a gay lifestyle. I can't support or condone their relationship and they know this. I love my daughter and treat her no differently than I ever have. This is something that we don't talk about. I am not sure of how to deal with the other person. If I keep the friendship going, will it be like saying that I think it is ok? I can't figure out how to deal with all this. When I first found out, I was angry, sad, worried, and I cried a lot. How do I accept these girls without accepting their lifestyle? I don't feel that I should shun the other girl as I know she is a good person. I just don't know what to do. If the relationship continues, do I let her come to family get togethers? Maybe someone can shed some light on this.