Old conference talks are available from April 1971 to the present. Why not older talks? It could be that the older talks have things in them that we don’t believe in anymore (see Brigham Young’s talks as an example). The TBM answer would be we have plenty to study with our current talks that are more applicable to us in our time as it is modern revelation for us.
When will they purge the 1970’s talks? While they can remove them, they have been forever memorialized in the Wayback Machine, and online Internet archive. I can think of several talks that I’m sure current church leaders wish they could make disappear down a memory hole.
The one that really sticks out to me is one I remember, not from the actual meeting (it was Saturday Afternoon, and I was 17!), but the audio that was played for us in Priesthood a few months later. It was a talk from Vaughn J. Featherstone of the 70’s. This was a general session, not priesthood.
The first thing that caught my ear was he used the “M” word in open conference!
Now, my young friends, and I am sorry to say, many adults, how about all those of you who have a masturbation problem? If the names of those who had the problem were projected across this big, huge scroll, would your name be there, or would you be able to sit back confident and pure in heart?
But wait there is more! A boy raised from the dead!
I know of a great man who held his dead son in his arms, and said, “In the name of Jesus Christ and by the power and authority of the Holy Melchizedek Priesthood, I command you to live.” And the dead boy opened up his eyes.
But this great man was only able to do this because he didn’t look at pornography!
This great brother could not have possibly done that had he been looking at a pornographic piece of material a few nights before or if he had been involved in any other transgression of that kind.
Then more masturbation! Does anybody really believe this story?
We shouldn’t have a problem with masturbation. I know one fine father who interviewed his 11-year-old son and he said, “Son, if you never masturbate, the time will come in your life when you will be able to sit in front of your bishop at age 19, and say to him, ‘I have never done that in my life,’ and then you can go to the stake president when you are interviewed for your mission and tell him, ‘I have never done that in my life.’ And you would be quite a rare young man.”
The father again interviewed the young man, who is now 18 years old, and he asked the son about masturbation. The son said, “I have never done that in my life. You told me, Dad, that if I didn’t do that, I would be able to sit in front of the bishop and stake president and tell them I had never done it, and I would be a rare young man, and I am going to be able to do it.”
He lets everybody know one of his pet peeves.
Let me talk about another thing that keeps us from being pure in heart. We need to purge out of our lives the desire to come to meetings late and leave early. I remember last conference I attended in the Assembly Hall; I was at the priesthood meeting. At the close of our great and beloved prophet’s wonderful discourse and counsel to us, at least 200 or 300 men got up and just started moving en masse toward all the doors. The closing hymn hadn’t been sung, the prayer hadn’t been rendered. And these men, inconsiderate, lacking in discipline, simply got up and moved out of the Assembly Hall to save five minutes. … I believe it is an offense to God when we leave meetings early, and when we come late to meetings.
Next came the fat shaming.
Another problem: an overweight girl from Ogden went to see her bishop. In the purity and goodness of charity, trying to help the girl, he counseled her that it might be a good idea to lose a few pounds. Pitifully heartbroken, she went home and told her father. It had cankered her soul. The father, of course, negative toward the Church all of his life, waiting for something like this, sprung like a cat on the bishop’s back, and they came down to see me and wanted their memberships transferred out of the bishop’s ward. I asked them why, because I didn’t know all this background, and they said, “Well, our bishop suggested to our daughter that she might lose a few pounds and make herself a little more attractive.” Now I want you to know that I defended that great bishop. I said to this family, “You are wrong. That sweet bishop, out of purity and love for your daughter, felt and did that which he was impressed to do. I am sure it was a message from God to your daughter, and she let it canker her soul. The strange thing is that she was probably up in her bedroom the night before praying, ‘Heavenly Father, I am lonely. I need someone. Please help me. Help me to find someone so I won’t be so lonely.’” And yet oftentimes we are offended because a sweet bishop gives us some instruction which is hard for us to live.
If you were this girls father, what would have you done?
Next he makes up church doctrine
I was over in England a while back and a bishop asked me, “What is the Church’s stand on cola drinks?” I said, “Well, I can’t remember the exact wording of the bulletin, but I remember seeing the bulletin when I was a stake president. The Church, of course, advises against them.”
He said, “Well, I have read the Priesthood Bulletin, but that isn’t what it says to me.”
And I said, “Would you get your Priesthood Bulletin? Let’s read it together.” And so we found under the heading “Cola Drinks”: “… the leaders of the Church have advised, and we do now specifically advise, against use of any drink containing harmful habit-forming drugs. …” (The Priesthood Bulletin, Feb. 1972, p. 4.)
He said, “Well, you see, that doesn’t mean cola.”
I said, “Well, I guess you will have to come to your own grips with that, but to me, there is no question.” You see, there can’t be the slightest particle of rebellion, and in him there is. We can find loopholes in a lot of things if we want to bend the rules of the Church.
What he conveniently left out of his talk was the part of that Priesthood Bulletin that said “With reference to cola drinks, the Church has never officially taken a position on this matter…”
Now he brings up Adam-God theory
Another case is the one of those who talk about the “Adam-God” theory; I guess when they are engrossed with all these different theories, and things in the Church, they don’t have time to study faith and repentance. Maybe they ought to get back to basics. And when they understand everything about faith, then they can move on to the next principle.
So what did he mean here? It was OK to study the Adam-God theory after you finished studying the basics?
This speech was all over the place!
There are lots of other weird/strange talk in General Conference, like the time Pres Kimble said the word “orgasm” in the Oct 1974 session in the same sentence with steaking!
So what do you make of these old talks? What others do you remember that are now cringeworthy? (Little factories anybody?)
Wheat & Tares 
I think what Elder Featherstone was trying to convey is that masturbation is not righteous behavior. I can’t disagree with that. While it might be normal by the world’s standard, righteous men and women of the church are decidedly NOT of the world and should be striving for the best of behaviors.
Cringeworthy, but perhaps valuable as a demonstration of GA opinions, attitudes and cultural influences as a part of their preaching.
Awareness of those influences and changes in teachings of church leaders can be valuable. Cf., e.g., the audio and the edited “transcript” of BRM’s “Seven Deadly Heresies;” or the 1978 end to the temple/priesthood ban and BY’s 1852 speeches on when that could happen and when it would not happen. I think the Brethren are by now well aware that purging the historical record can be as counterproductive as such awareness can be counterproductive for those who want the illusion of consistency and infallibility.
BTW, isn’t the M word now “Mormon”? 🙂
Mormons vs Mullets last night; BYU at Coastal Carolina – t-shirts were available for purchase.
I couldn’t figure out what “steaking” was. So I clicked on the link to find the sentence.
“We live in a culture which venerates the orgasm, streaking, trading wives, and similar crazes. How low can humans plunge!”
I think that in about 30 years RMN’s Sad Heaven talk will be one we want to forget.
Also I think I remember in the 80s that Pride was the “p-word” we couldn’t say. One time Thomas S Monson said the pride word in conference and got chastised later in conference for it.
Been discussed here before. Bruce R. McConkie’s talk to BYU students in 1982.
https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/bruce-r-mcconkie/relationship-lord/
McConkie declared “We do not worship the Son.”
(This is in stark contrast to his lyrics in “I believe in Christ.”)
Even though McConkie’s talk was given to BYU students rather than general conference, there was a generation of hardened high priests who took it as carved-in-stone doctrine. Sometimes the older generation needs to pass away….
A unsuspecting Utahan sits down at his computer with a cold can of Diet Coke, and the next thing you know he’s suddenly, inexplicably … LOOKING AT PORN!!! How did this happen???
Interesting that this never happens with coffee.
Hoo boy that fat-shaming story makes my blood boil. And it illustrates one of the big problems with a fundamentalistic view of “inspiration.”
As a young man, I was taught that when you live righteously, you have an open conduit to the Holy Ghost and virtually every good thought that comes to your mind is Inspiration. That was a great comfort to me at the time, as I had often wondered about the difference between The Spirit and my own thoughts. Turns out, though, that’s actually a pretty effective way to turn off your critical thinking and moral reasoning and justify every emotional impulse you have as a “prompting.” Among our people, how much bad advice has been given, how much judgment has been dispensed, how many promised blessings have gone unfulfilled because someone was “prompted?” Case in point: my in-laws don’t wear masks or practice social distancing because they’ve “received personal revelation” that they don’t need to.
I’m all for seeking inspiration from the divine in concert with critical thinking and moral reasoning, especially when making important decisions. But using the gift of the Holy Ghost as carte blanche to justify every emotional impulse is morally irresponsible.
As recent as 2004, I was in an institute class in which the teacher quoted at length from the same Featherstone talk, sincerely and unironically, as if it were part of the unchanging gospel canon. Including the stuff about masturbation. It was a cringe-fest, for sure, but also an exercise for a bunch of 18-to-22-year-olds to stifle chuckling and keep straight faces.
I’m so glad my kids won’t have to grow up with this talk, “little factories”, Miracle of Forgiveness, Mormon Doctrine and other now-discredited sources. But as much as I understand the Church’s desire for these embarrassing writings to disappear, I would rather they not try to wipe them from the historical record completely. They have value as historical curiosities and cultural time capsules. They remind us of how far we have come as a Church, especially now when it feels like we are regressing in some ways.
The 1971 cutoff year for the archive was probably chosen because it automatically excludes the earlier talks by Ezra Taft Benson, which were highly political and controversial, even by the standards of the day. From what I understand, before the age of global satellite transmission, General Conference was much less a scripted, pre-programmed event and a lot more free-wheeling and off-the-cuff. Speakers often went off-script (or sometimes used no prepared notes at all) and said things that were non-doctrinal, non-canonical, or otherwise personal opinions but framed as “revelation”. There was no real-time fact-checking or cross-referencing back then. Unfortunately, many of those off-the-cuff teachings still persist in the minds of some devout older members. In recent years, I’ve sat through EQ lessons taught by older members about such things as taking the sacrament with the right hand and not allowing temple garments to touch the floor. Their only sources of these “doctrines” were obscure talks and Ensign articles from the 70s or before that were no longer searchable, but were memorable enough to be repeated for decades.
I used to be the kind of member who listened to every single GC talk (and then read them after-the-fact) looking for any pearls of wisdom I could fine. My mentality was oriented around the idea that these men speak for God and I need to hear their wise council. So I understand the mentality of members who do this.
But I now realize that 99% of what is said in GC is the philosophies of men (and women) mingled with scripture. Sometimes the ideas we hear are enlightening and positive. Sometimes what we hear at GC (“sad heaven”, etc.) are negative. But almost always, what we hear at GC is the opinions of the speaker, PERIOD. So you have to decide whether someone else’s opinion is more important than your own.
If you are humble and teachable, you’ll find those pearls of wisdom. But in my opinion you’re foolish if you consider every word of GC to be modern day scripture. There are just too many examples (like post above) of unhealthy opinions.
What @Josh H said. This just shows why it’s so dangerous to treat these men like what they say is more important than what we might think or what others say. It’s just their own baggage and opinions packaged as some super special inspiration we humans aren’t privy to and it’s so very dangerous and gross.
@Observer not interested in debating masturbation here except to say that based on conversations I’ve had with men who have been bishops and mission presidents, and information I’ve read from LDS therapists and others, our masturbation-shaming has been incredibly destructive to boys especially and has turned it into a much bigger problem than it otherwise would be. You should do some research here.
This is perhaps tangential, but you ask “Why not older talks?” 1971 is when the Improvement Era, Relief Society Magazine, the Instructor, and Millennial Star were retired in favor of the Ensign, New Era, and the Friend.
When I was HP group leader, I realized that too many of the brethren were stuck in the 70s, particularly when it came to women. (Trust me, it was worse back then.) I could have made a stronger case if their views were not so easily dredged up on the main Church website. So if it were up to me, I would keep conference talks back to when the current president of the Church joined the Q12 and archive everything earlier at the church history website.
Uh oh – I guess I should rethink listing orgasm and streaking in the hobbies section of my resume.
“The TBM answer would be . . .” More and more when I read this in posts, I ask myself how W&T is going to pigeon-hole, mischaracterize, or oversimplify the mind of an active Latter-day Saint this particular time. I’m increasingly convinced authors are just as much out of touch with TBMs as the TBMs are with them and other less orthodox members.
How difficult is it to find talks before 1971? When the 2008 recessing hit, my Bishop at the time looked up conference talks from the Great Depression. He found a few interesting and valuable insights. Not sure where he dug for them but they were available on some level. And if the Church was worried about the cringe factor only, 1978 would have seemed like a more likely candidate to stop at.
One thing I’d say in defense of so-called cringe-worthy talks is that given how often current talks spark a thought process in my mind that leads to something seemingly altogether different from the subject matter at hand, only to have the Spirit teach me something seemingly altogether different from what I’m hearing or reading, I can only imagine that something of the same happened with these talks at varying levels. Additionally, what may seem cringe-worthy to me may very well be life-changing to another.
I suppose steaking could refer to not following the WoW through excess meat. I find it kind of catchy actually. Thank you BB.
@Elisa, you might not want to debate the merits of mastubation/pornography, but that is the premise of the original post of which I was responding to. As an example from the post, we’re asked not to believe or mock the notion that there is a correlation between looking at pornography and the efficacy of a priesthood blessing. Of course there’s a correlation. A big correlation! We at least know that a man can perform no miracle unless he is cleansed every whit from his iniquity (3 Nephi 8:1). I would think this would cover lustful behavior at a minimum. I believe that is the standard that Elder Featherstone was trying to convey to his audience. Those who hold the Priesthood and have made sacred covenants are held to a higher standard.
When my boys are of age I will tell them there is nothing wrong with masturbation, that it is natural and healthy, to avoid it in excess, to avoid looking at porn, but not to beat themselves up if they look at porn and masturbate to it, and will accompany them to each and every visit with the bishop. I will make it clear with all bishops ahead of time that they will never ask my boys if they masturbate and that I consider that question highly inappropriate from a person who is not the boys’ parent trained and licensed therapist.
@Observer, you’re making my case. Making boys feel unworthy and unclean because of a normal and natural behavior is destructive to their emotional and spiritual well-being. And shaming those behaviors tends to actually *increase* them.
I’m all for boundaries and teaching about healthy sexuality but ask any expert (Featherstone isn’t) and they will likely tell you that this kind of approach to sexuality does more harm than good. That’s entirely my point – that priesthood leaders take on topics they have no expertise on and make problems worse. If we want to actually help, we will approach in a healthy and effective way. This is not that way.
There was a talk, in October 1969, I think by the prophet, saying missionaries next responsibility, was to get married. On the way back from the chapel I stopped at a phone box and proposed to my girl friend. We were married a month after I was due to get home, from mission,but I was sent home 2 weeks early, so 6 weeks. Education, employment, etc. were not to be excuses to not obey.
At the same conference it was also taught that birth control, was satans way to undermine the Lord telling us to “multiply and replenish the earth.” That did not register as a problem at the time.
Because of our obedience to these teachings, we lived in poverty for the first 10 years of our marriage. Consequences of unquestioning obedience. Had we not defied the council my wife would have died in childbirth.
Climate change. Australia this year is having heat waves. Today it is expected to be 35c (95) here but in the outback of our state many places have highs of 48c ( 118) and low close to 30c (86), and this has been the case for days on end. Fires not forecast to be as bad, but Fraser Island now.
In Tasmania they are having snow.
These extremes are not normal.
Haven’t heard much about climate change in conference. Prophets
Bishop Bill, the “little factories” talk by Elder Packer has already been memory-holed. It was given in the Priesthood session of the October 1976 conference, but it no longer appears on the Church’s website. And the related pamphlet, “To Young Men Only”, was discontinued in 2016, after Elder Packer’s death. (I know this only because I was in an online discussion about the Church’s stance on masturbation, I asked for some kind of authoritative proclamation, and was directed to this talk only to find it had been expunged from the Church’s website.) I don’t know when the talk was removed, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was also after Elder Packer’s death. The problem with this approach, which others have pointed out, is that too many members still hold on to these backwards, harmful beliefs. Until the Church finds the guts to actually disavow some of these teachings, we’ll continue to see them taught in our wards.
Elisa writes: “Making boys feel unworthy and unclean because of a normal and natural behavior is destructive to their emotional and spiritual well-being. And shaming those behaviors tends to actually *increase* them.”
Where did Observer say anything about making someone feel unworthy or shameful? I risk derailing things again, but I often feel statements like these show a greater lack of faith in the strength and willpower of young men than it does a lack of faith in any Church leader or practice, and an additional lack of faith in the ability of Latter-day Saint parents to teach their kids about fulfilling sexuality. But having said that, I was not a perfect youth. Shame, emotional destruction, and spiritual destruction never entered the equation. Quite the opposite. However, it often seems a repeating theme among commenters here is that “The Church didn’t work for me (or A, or B) with regards to principle Z, therefore there must be something inherently wrong with it.” Although there are some genuinely bad experiences out there, sometimes we just need to accept something within us can change. Also, does Mosiah 3:19 just get suspended for certain areas in which modern therapists and teenage development experts might mildly disagree? If so, I’d be interested to see how the cherry-picking applies elsewhere. The Church system has flaws because it is made up of flawed people, but to say it simply doesn’t work, especially in this area, simply does not ring true to me. I have no doubts some improvements can and should be added through the Spirit, but I don’t want to see the baby thrown out with the bath water.
I can’t see where any of the above statements by Elder Featherstone say or imply anything in regards to beating yourself up and to think of yourself as a bad person if you’re less than perfectly chaste. But he is calling a spade a spade. Maybe he didn’t sugarcoat it enough for some people. I’m pretty sure looking at pornography and masturbating is not something that will be found amongst the inhabitants of the Celestial Kingdom. We won’t reach perfect, Celestial behavior in this life, but we need to at least be making a serious, sustained effort. That’s partially what leaders are for, to set the bar high and lead us in the right path so we can build righteous character.
@Eli since I’ve never been an adolescent boy this is not a case of “this didn’t work for me personally.” This is a case of me hearing many, many accounts from bishops and others about the damage they saw done to boys thinking they were unworthy based on masturbation, and reading and listening to many therapists – including LDS therapists – on the best ways to teach kids healthy sexual behavior and chastity.
I’m totally comfortable saying that much of the Church’s approach to sexuality and moral purity has been well-intentioned but in some ways harmful and destructive, that I trust a therapist (many therapist) over Featherstone or Oaks when it comes to human sexuality, and that we in general over-rotate on issues of sexual purity at the expense of the much broader morality we could be teaching people.
@Observer maybe we didn’t read the same words above. I have a hard time interpreting things like the following as non-shaming:
“If the names of those who had the problem were projected across this big, huge scroll, would your name be there, or would you be able to sit back confident and pure in heart?”
If you think that’s a good way to teach kids about sexual purity good for you but it’s not how I plan to approach with my children and I won’t have leaders using those shaming techniques either.
Observer, “there is a correlation between looking at pornography and the efficacy of a priesthood blessing. Of course there’s a correlation”
Really? On what grounds are you making this assertion? 1)I have every reason to believe that priesthood blessings are regularly given by males who masturbated to porn not long before the blessing (porn sites are in the top ten of most viewed websites, you can’t tell me that believing active Mormons, including leaders, don’t regularly look at porn). 2) I’m pretty sure that there are people who received priesthood blessings from blessing givers who had recently viewed porn who found the blessing to be efficacious. Imagine the bishop, home teacher/minister, or a father who occasionally looks at porn. It is much less painful for him to just remain quiet and carry on business as usual and give blessings when asked than to say he can’t give the blessing because of some sort of “problem.” I have every reason to believe that this quite common.
There are two kinds of liars. Those who say they’ve never masturbated and those who say they’ve stopped.
I am not sure young men look at women the same way previous generations did, and certainly not the way they did in Utah. My grandsons aged 17 to 27, don’t seem phased by women in very brief bikinis. Certainly not relating masturbation to it.
My wife and I went for a walk on the beach last week. There are about a dozen steps up to the top of the sand dune behind the beach, from the carpark. A couple of beautiful young ladies on the stairs ahead of us were wearing t-shirts that came down to their waists, over their swim wear. From the back below the waist they appeared naked (g- string bikini bottoms). Perhaps 20% of girls on the beach like this this year. Beautiful. The others wearing whatever they are comfortable with.
I have only been to the beach with one of my grandsons this year but he wasn’t phased, didn’t seem to give second look.
Perhaps Utah church culture? Perhaps in a culture where women are more equal, they can just wear what they are comfortable in, and be respected.
I can’t help believe I used to think conference talks like this were God’s truth
Can we agree that any man about to put his hands on someone’s head to pronounce a blessing really really really should wash his hands first?
The part about the bishop who fat-shamed the young woman is very disturbing to me. The mindset in this talk is that 1) a girl who is “overweight” is at fault if she hasn’t attracted a boyfriend because women are only judged based on our looks (nevermind the fact that people of all sizes are in relationships), and 2) all these adjectives used to describe the bishop totally exonerate him and cast him in the best possible light, while excusing his poor social skills outright. He’s “sweet” and “great” and acted out of “purity of heart and love.” She’s “overweight” (by what standard?) and has a cankered soul that she has allowed to canker because she doesn’t change her life to meet the standards of attractiveness that this bishop holds. The father is knee-jerk reactionary just waiting for any old thing to set him off, according to the story. How is Featherstone even making these judgments? He says he didn’t know anything about the father and daughter’s history before leaping to the bishop’s defense.
Basically, he’s just giving total benefit of the doubt to the bishop, and zero benefit of the doubt to the people the bishop offended with his unwelcome observations and assumptions about her appearance. My interpretation of the bishop’s comments, as a woman, is totally different, BTW from his. What I heard was that a creepy old guy with authority feels that it’s appropriate to comment on a young woman’s appearance in a disparaging and blaming way based on his own arbitrary standards of attractiveness. Why would it ever be appropriate for a bishop to talk like this to a woman he’s not married to (and if he talks to his wife this way, that’s also at his own peril)? Callister has literally made remarks like this in the last 5 years to contemporary young women in the Church, and I will just say, the misogyny runs deep. The male gaze runs to the highest levels in the Church. And as usual, the women are objects for men to judge based on appearance, and then to decide whether or not to consume / acquire. Women aren’t people to these guys.
@Angela C one of my comments to my husband during the most recent conference was just, “I watch and listen to [this person] and deep down I just feel that he does not see me as an equal.” So yes. Women aren’t people to these guys.
With all deference to the late Elder Featherstone, he was kind of a weird guy. He spoke at my stake priesthood meeting years ago and told an odd story about his son breaking curfew and how he (Elder Featherstone) waited for his son sitting on the porch of their home wearing nothing but his garments. He made a big production out of that fact and got a lot of laughs. I found it a bit cringe inducing personally. (Of course the son was doing something noble which led to his lateness). He also bragged how he was able to identify a man who was committing adultery out of a large congregation of priesthood leaders. He was a big personality and, in my opinion, atypical. The vast majority of GAs give talks that will never disappear “ down the memory hole” simply because they are a bit dull. (Did I say that? Bad anon, bad bad anon)
Elisa wrote “This is a case of me hearing many, many accounts from bishops and others about the damage they saw done to boys thinking they were unworthy based on masturbation . . .”
I think some level of “The squeaky wheel” applies here. How often do you hear about stories where a Bishop did exactly what little he was supposed to do to point an adolescent to the Savior and enable him to turn around? That’s more or less my story, but as much as I appreciate it all, I never felt the need to broadcast it. I repented, then I moved on. I have little doubt that for all the “many, many” reports of adolescent boys who had a terrible experience there are many, many more like me who did not. I’ll not easily have others shove that aside. I do not want to dismiss some of the genuinely bad experiences out there. Some of those squeaky wheels hit valid rough patches and pot holes of misguided Bishops and undue family pressure. Rather than simply grease the wheel by telling them their experience was rare, or even worse by rationalizing or justifying the wrong later on, we need to smooth out the rough patches and fill up the pot holes. I do feel that’s happening. More Bishops seem encouraged to utilize professionals than I can remember previously. More families place the Savior above honor (or maybe I’m just lucky to be around some good families). Progress may be agonizingly slow at times, but again, I don’t want to see the baby thrown out with the bath water.
I’d also reiterate the fact that simply saying it’s natural and normal shows a lack of faith in the strength and willpower of adolescent boys, but I think it also shows a lack of faith in the preventative power of the Atonement. I think it’s as real and as important as the redeeming aspects of it. Even before reading through all the comments of this thread, I already knew it would be naive to believe masturbation and porn didn’t have some level of prevalence among members, but I think implying it’s nearly universal , as some here have, shows an even greater naivete.
Not all these GA talks are going to do it for everyone, but they’ll do it for many. I also can’t help but wonder that if so many of them get brought up here from time to time, maybe they had other unforeseen purposes.
Elisa wrote ” . . .we in general over-rotate on issues of sexual purity at the expense of the much broader morality we could be teaching people.”
I don’t know that this is true either. For one, we’re one of the few organizations left who even speak about it in these regards at present, which makes it stick out like a sore thumb. It’s also a subject that stands out to humans in general. I’d bet honesty and service make more appearances.
A religion with a history of middle aged men marrying and impregnating teenage girls is NOT a religion where middle aged men should comment on teenage girls’ appearance.
Truth is truth no matter how coarsely spoken. Error is error, no matter how eloquent the language. Conference talks are short (10 to 30 minutes) and, therefore, a single talk cannot fully cover both sin and God’s infinite patience with and grace towards sinners (though there are certainly examples where the speaker could do better). All that said, to me, it ultimately comes down to discerning truth for myself. Do I believe what the speaker (Elder Featherstone in this case) is teaching to be true?
Masturbation? Is it a sin or not a sin?
Is coming to meetings late/leaving meetings early a sin or not?
If I’m single, is “unattractiveness” (as defined by my immediate culture, generation, and society) a sin or not a sin?
Is it a sin to drink cola (or other caffeinated) drinks?
Is it a sin to walk a mile on the Sabbath?
Is oral sex in marriage a sin?
Is it a sin to freeze rather than fight when sexually assaulted?
Is it a sin to pay tithing on net rather than gross?
(Delving into a couple that are more about belief than sin)
Does it make one a heretic to believe in organic evolution?
Is race an indicator of premortal valiance?
(I’m sure I can keep going if I keep thinking about it)
When I see these kinds of talks, ultimately I run it through my personal sense of right and wrong (as fallible as it is, it’s the only one I’ve got). The things talked about in the OP don’t seem “true” to me, so I am inclined to dismiss Elder Featherstone’s talk and hope it finds a quiet place deep in the memory hole where it will be nothing more than a historic curiosity (“Look at the silly things they believed in the 1970s!”). Because, as we have noted in past blog posts, the Church rarely explicitly declares something spoken in conference “wrong”, this kind of thing only happens on an individual level, which leads to the “crisis” that is at the heart of so many faith crises — “what do I do when my personal sense of truth does not align with Church leaders’ sense of truth?”
I was never comfortable with the adjective “little” being used in reference to my “factory.”
I served a mission in the early 80’s when the very mention of the word ‘masturbate’ was taboo and associated with being unworthy. The best counsel I ever received from a church leader came from my mission president, when, after struggling for a brief period with masturbation, I met with him to repent and be counseled. He simply said: “Elder… 95 % of men in the church have masturbated and the other 5% lie about it,” There was no chastisement or guilt but just a reminder to focus my energy and do my best. Surprisingly, that approach worked and it didn’t seem to bother me anymore. I have never forgotten that meeting!
With regards to a PH being worthy enough to give a proper blessing to another person–it doesn’t sound right to me the Lord would punish the recipient based on the worthiness of the PH holder.
If that were the case, we’d only want certain PH holders that we know well to administer to us when any of them should be fine.
well, this whole discussion is making me think this is a great argument for ordaining women! fewer masturbators = better priesthood blessings from them! Someone tell Featherstone!
Maybe so, Elisa, but on the other hand I’ve had a bishopric member complain about talks like Featherstone’s because they were always followed by a flood of widows coming in to confess to masturbation. I’m left to wonder!
@Wondering true and I was definitely joking. I actually think the stereotype that boys masturbate and girls don’t is harmful to girls. Didn’t intend to play into that stereotype but then again that’s why the oppression of women is a double-bind. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
How mortifying for those widows to have to go talk to their bishop about their private and probably somewhat painful sexual lives. Since I just finished Carol Lynn Pearson’s The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy I am particularly sad for those widows. Unconscionable.