I’m leaving at noon today to drive from Rexburg to Salt Lake City to attend General Conference. I’m suffering from my own case of GC anxiety, as I’m sure many unorthodox saints feel about this weekend. It’s a feeling only exasperated by the family traditions that surround this weekend. Last year I was at my parent’s house when Elder Holland delivered a blistering attack on those who want an “easy” loving Jesus and those who advocate for transgression. [1] The looks I received from my parents, who are on the opposite end of the political spectrum as me, and their reaction afterwards are why we decided GC will no longer be an extended family affair. A few weeks later I had my first guest post, General Conference Buffet. Last year I suggested that the orthodox members would do well to pay more attention to the Uchtdorfs and the unorthodox should listen more to the Packers. I encouraged each side of the divide to stretch and improve ourselves.
This weekend will be very different for me. It’s the first weekend attending GC that my 9 year old daughter can accompany us. It will be her first time in the Conference Center and her first time seeing the Prophet in person. She asked me the other day if she could go up and shake his hand afterwards and it broke my heart say no; she’s very excited. I want her to positively remember this weekend. I want her to feel the Spirit and be filled with love for our leaders and her fellow saints. I suppose that’s what I want for myself as well.
Since being diagnosed with lupus six months ago, I’m a little more attuned into the concept of self-care. So I give you other advice instead: there will be a message for you this weekend that you need to hear. If there are some talks that bother you, I hope you will let them go and focus on the one that brings you closer to Christ. I hope you find something where the Spirit will touch your heart and expand your love for your leaders and your neighbors. I hope you find focus on the Savior on this Easter Weekend. I hope your weekend is blessed.
I hope you can find a safe place to vent, but also still find the good. Please share your hopes and anxieties about the coming weekend.
I’ll go first:
I hope Uchtdorf shows up with a beard. I hope a wife of an apostle shows up in a gorgeous pantsuit. I hope Easter morning in a hotel room doesn’t suck. I hope our Easter dinner of Crown Burger in the car on the way home hits just the right spot.
Wheat & Tares 
Thanks for the post Kristine.
I hope there is less talk about how the prophet and apostles receive revelation and have them actually receiving some.
I appreciate the sentiment.
I don’t appreciate labels like “orthodox” because I am not sure what they mean, and there is no official definition as in some other faith traditions. They seem to be just a tool to separate us. Whereas I view the church as a mosaic, in which each of us bring different gifts and viewpoints as we walk along different paths in the same direction, thus making a richer color to the church as a whole.
Also, the footnote seems to be missing.
These are nice thoughts. I guess my approach will be to focus more on having an Easter weekend than a Conference weekend. I love attending a traditional Christian service on Easter. As for conference talks, if we miss a few, then we can get them during the next six months at church anyways. Also, I’ve been thinking that perhaps it’s OK to believe that Conference talks from the First Presidency carry more weight than talks from the Quorum of the 12. I have this impression that in the old days the First Presidency seemed to have more rank over the Quorum of the 12. This might be helpful to those of us who find talks from Uchtdorf to be comforting.
I used to love love love conference. Now I feel dread more than anything else. I think this weekend will be more circling the wagons of the base and “otherizing” liberal members. My husband and kids have suggested I stop watching it live–probably because they’re tired of me yelling at the TV–but I really miss not having that beautiful uplifting weekend twice each year.
I really like your ideas of beards and pantsuits. I would also add a (forlorn) hope that some of conference would be a celebration of Easter.
My problem with Conference this weekend is that I really want on Easter Sunday to have a proper church service with the choir singing and the Primary singing, little girls wearing new Easter dresses, and worshiping the Savior like all of the other Christians in the world. Why can’t Conference be moved to the next Sunday when it falls on Easter? I keep thinking “No wonder people think we aren’t Christian if we don’t attend Church on Easter?”
Can’t LDS still go to church on Sunday? Just because we’ll be watching conference doesn’t mean they need to look Un-Christian to their neighbors by staying home.
In fact, we’ll look even more Christian this weekend because our church will be 8 marathon hours spread-out over two days (10 hours for the men and for the women who want to watch the priesthood session).
Reminds me of a post I wrote back in 2008. It gets a lot of hits at this time of the year: http://mormonheretic.org/2008/03/22/why-dont-mormons-celebrate-easter/
I’m with Former Sheep on this one. I love General Conference. We go the the stake center and watch the broadcast and have a picnic lunch outside on the lawn between sessions with friends. My kids love conference too and have ever since they were little because of all the good feelings associated with it. BUT, not having services in our chapel on Easter seems really unfortunate. If the church is serious about us looking Christian, we need to have Easter services that we can invite friends to. And there’s nothing better than a really good Easter program with a sincere ward choir to celebrate Christ on Easter. It’s got to look bizarre to the rest of the world to have our churches empty Easter morning.
Kristine, I truly hope your conference weekend with your kids is wonderful, and I like your advice. It’s funny — even though I often don’t share the sentiments and resentments many do, just reading in the bloggernacle has made me sensitive to phrasing in conference that I know will set the internet abuzz. It detracts from the overall experience.
In the past I’ve heard things that weren’t quite right, but because I’ve always tried to listen past the actual words to the feelings and promptings that motivated the speaker, I’ve never gotten hung up on unfortunate phrasing or even somewhat askew interpretation. For example, I’ve never felt women were spiritually superior to men, but whenever the brethren would imply it, I’d naturally focus on the gratitude they were expressing and it didn’t bother me. Now, it really bugs me. Not only is there no scriptural support for it, it’s also patronizing and clearly not true. False doctrine! Have I lost the Spirit yet? Well, at the very least, I’ve been distracted from the purpose of the talk. I feel like I’ve been trained to cringe, to not give the benefit of the doubt, to not be able to see past a rough edge, and I have to admit I don’t like it.
Yeah… just spending a lot of hours in church is not actually the same thing as celebrating Christ’s resurrection, which is what Easter is about.
Couldn’t agree more with those who are concerned that we don’t look Christian when we let Conference fall on Easter. It seems like an obstinate nonsensical mistake.
Right — cause they don’t talk about Jesus, His resurrection, or living a good, Christian life during conference. Lol.
Talking about Jesus, His resurrection, and living a good, Christian life is not actually the same thing as celebrating His resurrection, which is what Easter is about.
I agree kullervo. I dont understand why celebrations in general are considered so tawdry in lds culture.
I’ve been to Easter meetings at a variety of other churches before I was LDS — and I think you’ve got an overly-romanticized view of the whole “they celebrate” versus “we talk” aspect.
As much as I’m all for bashing the church for teaching incorrect traditions as doctrine and for leader-worship, etc. — I just don’t see how having conference talks about Jesus and His resurrection and encouragement for living a Christ-like life, punctuated by me spending the time in between sessions with my wife and kids would seem like an “un-Christian” Easter weekend to my non-LDS colleagues/acquaintances.
When I hear or see Mormons defend Mormon Easter, I just want to invite them to, well, really almost any Christian church on Easter to see how different it is, and how far Mormon observance of Easter falls short.
Oh, we talk too.
Well, it’s not really celebrating Easter.
Well, that’s one opinion.
I thought we were supposed to be having a blessed weekend, not getting into verbal fisticuffs over the meaning of Easter.
I think if we dig just a little deeper we can come up with some common ground about Easter that we all agree on. Reese’s Peanut Butter Eggs. Enough Said.
My ward is celebrating Easter next week on April 12th, which happens to be when Eastern Christianity celebrates it. No need for us to stick with the Western liturgical calendar!
I think of it as our Easter Conference.
Concern yourself less with whether a member of the First Presidency sports a goatee or beard (it was ok up until George Albert Smith, who looked ‘dignified’ with the goatee, so I see nothing wrong with an old ‘tradition’ being revived), or if a GA’s wife isn’t going completely ‘Molly Mormon’ (my guess is that SOME GAs feel no need to ‘control’ their spouses), and more with what YOU and your daughter will get out of attending Gen Conference ‘live’. In some 36 years of Church membership I’ve never had the reasonable opportunity to do same. As well as you DO have the Lupus thing which you’re learning to contend with. My dear step-daughter (yes, I know, the only ‘steps’ were the ones leading up to her bedroom, but alas I wasn’t blessed to be the one that ’caused’ her, but I’ve been blessed to be her (step) Dad for fifteen years) has dealt with it as well and I’m quite aware of its challenges. My best to you in living with it.
Regardless of the faults, real and/or perceived of the Conferences speakers, or the controversies involved (gee, ever wonder WHY no other major denomination in the U-S-of-A gets this sort of attention?), I resolve that for the trouble of making conference so readily available (cable and/or internet), I’ll do my darnedest to get SOMETHING from it. And if the counsel seems repetitive, perhaps I’ll see what I can do to get mine own self in line and/or convince others (“come, let us reason together”) to do likewise, if for no other motive than they’ll give it a rest and move on to another topic!
After all, it’s up to each of us what sort of weekend we’ll have, let alone the year, or mortal lifetime, or eternity…
One good thing about Conference being televised and/or being sent out through the internet, since I have to work I can watch every session at my leisure and when I have time. If we were having Easter services at our chapel I would miss them. For that reason, I feel blessed. Also, now that my cup is half full, our Ward is having an Easter service next Sunday. The choir will sing, the primary children too with their little cherub faces. I don’t have to work next Sunday so I am blessed again. Last but not least, I am a jelly bean freak. The peanut butter eggs are great too. Happy Easter everyone!
Robin Eggs here. We’re on our third bag already.
Hawkgrrrl, Save me some. I’ll stop by Monday on my way to the airport. My kids hate Robin Eggs. What is wrong with kids these days?
#26 – when YOU (and presumably) Hawk were “kids”, you were watching MTV and ‘bad-mouthing’ your country (at least according to the fictional GySgt. Foley in “Officer and a Gentleman”). In my ‘yute’-hood, I o’d on Saturday Morning cartoons, the likes of the Wacky Races and Jonny Quest. Kids nowadays scarcely look up from their cell phones even though several times in conference the speaker(s) admonished same to give their texting and social media a rest in Church.
I’d rather have some jerky than any sweet but won’t turn down a robin egg or a Cadbury if proferred.