Bishop

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Writer_Chick1213@Aug 1 2005, 09:57 AM

I've come to the conclusion that I just have to ignore the treatment and unless I absolutely need something from my ward i'll manage on my own. I know the church is true and that the members are just human so i'll just hold to my faith survive the next year and start fresh in a year. You know the saying kill them with kindness? Well I've decided i'll attend all my meetings with a big smile and try and do my best to live the gospel despite the fact that hurtful comments from others have shaken my faith in the past. The Lord knows i'm doing my best and that me and my mother are faithful so I guess thats all that counts.

Writer Chicks situation is one where she feels like an outcast based on the fact the she lives with her single mother. It is a fact the single women are treated differently within the church and this is something she can not change by looking into herself.

The only thing she can change is how she chooses to perceive the way she is treated.

Thats exactly how things are and you're right i'm just going to choose to change the way I think about it and focus on the gospel more than the members of the gospel.

Writer Chick you are wise beyond your years. May the Lord bless you in your faithfulness. :)

[begood2]

Writer Chick,

I'm so happy to see that your strong faith and positive attitude is allowing you to weather the trials of your present situation. :)

Just remember that if you have future blue days down the road, that there are people on the board willing to try and help!

May the Lord look after you and your family. Best wishes!

[Idacat]

Just a couple of comments in reply to specific folks, I don't actually have the time to specifically reply to individual posts or quote.

It isn't "the church"; it is the pride and predjudice of certain members. Had what I experienced in the church as a single mom in the '70's been atributable to church policy I could not have remained active.

There is also a geographical component here. I lived in Utah until 1989 when I moved to rural Oregon where I noted a world of difference in tolerance towards "the imperfect family". This might be the basis of the opposing views of Snow and Strawberry Fields. I don't think this attitude is as prevalent outside of Utah as it is in Utah.

Of course SF has it nailed when she relates this to the LDS emphasis on the "perfect family". There are programs and awareness now, but in past decades I truly do not think the church, and thus the members, quite knew what to do with single parent "imperfect families".

Along with the LDS emphasis on the perfect family goes the fact that most single parent families resulting from divorce have the mother as the head of the family and the father and priesthood holder moves on. Something about this scenario implicitly places "blame" for the dissolution of that perfect family on the mother, since it couldn't be that priesthood holding returned missionary father at fault, now could it? Ergo, prejudice against the divorced mother raising her children alone.

Divorced men are not and never have been discriminated against nor otherwise poorly treated by ward members.

IMO, this is because they hold the priesthood and cannot therefore be seen as the party at fault.

This was certainly true in my case. My ex divorced ME when he had his next wife squarely in his sights, although, during the course of our marriage he was criminally convicted of both spousal and child phyical abuse. He left and moved on just before I discovered I was pregnant with my third child and had remarried before she was born.

If he had not divorced me I would have stayed married to him until he killed me, because I also was a believer in "the perfect family".

If you want a real eye opener sometime, go to one of those LDS singles sites and read what the divorced guys in their fifties with five or seven children are looking for. They all want young slender active women in their thirties who enjoy camping, fishing and GOLF.Sometimes rock climbing, hang gliding, or sky diving.

A marriage firmly headed for eternity based on GOLF? Yeah, right.

[Guest bizabra]

Heh. ALL (most all, anyway) single men on dating sites want slender, youthful women.

TCHHH!!!!!!!!

[Ray]

I’ll assume that you’ve already talked with your parents to find out what they may have to say about your questions, and that your parents are the ones who told you that your Bishop and your home teachers are refusing to help you.

In that case:

Ask your Mom to Ask the Executive Secretary in your ward to make an appointment for her with your Bishop, and when she sees her Bishop, tell him that she can’t get help from her home teacher(s) and that she would really appreciate having some good home teacher(s). Your Bishop may then ask her about the instances when she formerly asked her home teacher(s) for help, so she may want to make sure her bases are covered by asking her home teacher(s) for help one more time.

If that doesn’t work:

Ask your Mom to Ask the Executive Secretary in your stake for an appointment to see your Stake President, to tell him about not being able to get much help from your Bishop.

And if that doesn’t work:

Ask Church headquarters for help.

The Church is a highly organized institution, and everything works like the chain of command in any other organized institution, so as members it is our responsibility to start Asking for help from the people who are assigned to help us, and keep asking for help until somebody helps us.

[pushka]

WriterChick, I wish you and your family the best of luck for the future, in your current ward and in the one to which you will be moving. It is a pity that some people are prejudiced against single parent families...

I think you are very brave in your decision to carry on attending church SMILING, in spite of whatever response or non-response you get from the other members you meet there...I hope that by seeing you smiling and saying hello to them on a regular basis, they might have their consciences pricked enough to make them think twice about their stereotypical judgements of you and your family...

Idacat...you have been through a terrible ordeal and I admire you for your strength at coming through it all as you have! Well done...

[Ray]

I too applaud your healthy attitude, WriterChick, but rather than simply tolerate the problem it would be better if you help to fix it, so please report people who may not be performing effectively in their calling so that other people may find the help they need.