Take Up Your Cross

So I think a fundamental truth in the Gospel is that if we want to follow God, there are things we need to give up.

I was reading in the Gospel according to Matthew the other day, and I was struck by these words of Jesus to the apostles: "Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves: for the workman is worthy of his meat." (Matthew 10:9-10) It seems to me there is a "travel light" ethic in the Gospel. The more we get weighed down by the things of this world, the harder it is to be responsive to the Spirit. Many of the sayings of Jesus express the principle of these two verses, which basically says, "Don't concern yourself with stuff. God will provide for you and that is enough."

I have a working thesis about gay celibacy. Liberals and conservatives both have things wrong and both have things right on this issue. What conservatives have right is they understand this principle of sacrifice that is in the warp and woof of God's way. They insist that God can and does ask hard things of us; sometimes extremely hard things. I think what liberals have gotten wrong is that they have run away from this principle. They often want to deny that God asks anything of us that isn't easy, fun and natural to give.

I think what conservatives have gotten wrong is that they often confuse societal prejudices or tradition with the divine order. So if blacks suffer because of systematic racism, or women suffer because of patriarchy or gays suffer because of homophobia, that's just the divine order of things. You just need to accept your cross and grin and bear it. They'll say to the oppressed other, "Well, that's what God is asking of you." And liberals have been right to critique that, to point out that society is wont to build and worship idols, and that the burdens that blacks or women or gays are forced to bear are the legacy of idolatry and of the kind of pride that the entire Book of Mormon is an indictment of.

Of course there are folks who identify as conservative who get that; just as there are folks who identify as liberal who understand that there are things we have to give up in order for there to be real justice and love. But I'd say there are liberal and conservative tendencies that end up distorting the true principles on either side of our political or theological divides. Conservatives really get the "serve the Lord with all thy might" (D&C 4:2) principle, while liberals really get the "thou shalt have no other gods before me" (Exodus 20:2) principle. If you can just put those two things together, what you really have is the first two Great Commandments ("thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind [and] thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Matthew 22:37-39), which transcends politics and theology, doesn't it?

So this still naturally begs the question, What does God ask us to give up? What do we need to sacrifice in order to build the Kingdom?

And I think finding the answer to this is at the heart of Christian discipleship. It's at the core of the individual encounter with God, which is at the core of everything else in spirituality and religion. It is in that encounter where we experience a call to service that can take us to very strange and interesting places indeed.

Once we recognize this, we come to terms with the fact that there will be a point in our relationship with Spirit (or with "the Spirit") when the rubber meets the road, and we just have to accept something difficult. That might be the moment when a soldier discovers that she really might die for her country. Or it might be the moment when a young man discovers the commitment of fatherhood. Or it might be when a public servant is willing to sacrifice an election for doing what is right. But when or what that moment is for each of us is something only we can recognize.

The daily path, I think, demands that we listen, that we open ourselves to that every time we get on our knees. "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily." (Luke 9:23) Then be prepared.

Feeling the Spirit... Teaching Islam

This year, for the first time, I've incorporated a unit on American Islam into my course on American religious history. In preparing to do this over the course of the last few years, I have really enjoyed studying Islam, and learning more about the history of Islam in America. I have been surprised to learn how rich and diverse the American Muslim community is, how old and well established it is, and how much American Muslims have contributed not just to American civic life, but also to Islamic thought throughout the world. I also have great respect for the courage it must have taken for many American Muslims to reach out to their neighbors in the wake of 9/11, in spite of the fear and hostility that arose in its wake. I'm very proud to live in the first U.S. congressional district ever to elect a Muslim to Congress. Keith Ellison has served our district with distinction.

There's an Islamic community center not far from where I live in South Minneapolis, that for a while was working with some local Christian churches to sponsor a series of potluck dinners. It was an opportunity for Christians and Muslims to meet and get to know each other. Göran and I attended two or three of these potlucks.

I remember asking a number of Muslims if they believed in the Holy Spirit. Some of them did not understand what I meant by that, so I had to explain the person, role and mission of the Holy Spirit. It was explained to me that, no, Muslims had no teachings about this. Over time, however, I have learned that devout Muslims do talk about the inner peace and the joy that comes from surrendering one's life to Allah.

Last night in class, we discussed Muslim teaching about God. Muslims are very careful to emphasize that no human constructs can even begin to approach God. We must be careful never to mistake our ideas about God for the reality of God -- lest our ideas, our "images," of God become idols. However, Muslims love to talk about God's attributes of mercy and love, and about all the ways in which God reaches out to us in order to draw us into the path of justice and compassion. We spoke of how, for Muslims, the first obligation human beings have toward God is simply to express gratitude for the goodness of creation, for all the gifts that God has given us. I am grateful. As I spoke of these things with my students, I did feel the peace and the joy that I usually associate with the presence of the Holy Spirit.

On Keeping the Spirit

This is the text of the talk I gave at the Affirmation convention devotional, delivered Sunday, September 18, 2011, in the Kirtland Temple.

We all already know everything that we need in order to have the Spirit in our lives. We need the desire to return to God's presence. We need the patience to face our old selves, our sinful selves, and to begin the day-by-day work of making a new us. We need the humility to accept that there are things we do not know, that we need to learn, that only God can teach us. And we need to trust that if we open ourselves to God, that he will teach us, often through those we least expect to learn from.

Most of us in this room know what it is to be split in two, split between the part of us that yearns for human intimacy, and the part of us that yearns for spiritual community. Many of us in this room have wondered if, perhaps even at some point decided that, life could not go on when we feel split in two that way. Too many of us not in this room, no longer with us, have acted on that decision to end life. We know what it is to feel utterly alone, to realize that those who ought to care most about our souls will never understand. We know what it is to feel the light of our faith flicker out and go cold.

There came a point in my life when I decided that it must be some kind of sin to believe in God, that there was special virtue in forging ahead through life without him, finding my own meaning, free from the dilemma that came with devotion to a God and a Church that taught me someone like me couldn't truly exist. There came a point in my life when I believed it would be impossible to believe again, because I had seen too much, I knew too much, I had gone too far to believe in God any more. God was like Santa, and once you'd figured out he's not there any more, there was no going back.

But I have come to understand that my unbelief was a kind of blessing from God. I have come to learn that there is no faith possible without the grace of God. Faith is beyond our mortal grasp. It is too high for us. It eludes our best efforts to obtain it. Faith is a gift from God, such that when we receive it, we know from whom it comes. So the unbelief too is a gift. It is that state in which we must find ourselves before we can truly apprehend what kind of gift faith is.

After Moses spoke with God on the mount, “the presence of God withdrew from Moses, that his glory was not upon Moses; and Moses was left unto himself. And as he was left unto himself, he fell unto the earth. And it came to pass that it was for the space of many hours before Moses did again receive his natural strength like unto man; and he said unto himself: Now, for this cause I know that man is nothing, which thing I never had supposed” (Moses 1:9-10).

We each need to learn this for ourselves, in our own way. And our sojourn through faithlessness can be a similitude of our whole journey here below through mortality, outside of the presence of God. If we lack the gift of faith, we have a chance to see what we will do, to see what we are made of when we think we are alone, when we think we are not being watched. And it is a chance to come to our own appreciation of what our limits are, what our works are compared to the works of the Maker of the Universe.

When, after living for many years without faith, I found myself in the presence of the Spirit again, it was a bitter moment. I was confronted with the failure of my best efforts to make something meaningful out of my life and to find a true, meaningful love. But that confrontation was also a moment of pure joy and peace and hope; real hope, a completely new and genuine hope found on the other side; after the despair, after the darkness, after the struggling on my own and the failing. The Spirit presented me a choice: I could start to make the kinds of changes in my life that would allow me to have a more constant companionship with him, or I could continue to struggle on my own.

I resisted at first, because I did not know what kind of changes I might have to make. Would I have to leave my partner?

But the Spirit encouraged me, reassuring me that I would find joy and peace if I followed its promptings unconditionally, that I would find the strength and encouragement to do what I needed to do, and that I needed to learn to trust the Lord. Ultimately, I realized that this is what I needed and desired in my life, more than anything else. And so I began to build my life again on the principles of faith and repentance. And that has opened up in me a well of life everlasting.

I said that we each already know what we need to do to have the Spirit in our lives. And this is very true. I cannot tell any of you what you need to do to have the Spirit, partly because what you need to do might be very different from what I need to do. I now have a basic rule of thumb in my life which is that if something is driving the Spirit away, I need to stop doing it whatever it is, no matter how trivial. If something is enhancing my ability to feel the Spirit and receive personal revelation, I need to keep doing it. And I need to be attentive. I need to spend most of my prayer time listening to the specific instructions and commandments that the Lord has for me, for John, here in this time and in this place. And then I need to do them.

But if my relationship with the Spirit is very personal, I can still talk about three broad principles I've learned in trying to keep the Spirit in my life. I will be grateful if the Spirit can use my insights to give someone else here this morning some insight – even if our paths end up being very different from each other.

First, restraint, renunciation, and moderation are good things. Our ability to sacrifice is directly related to our capacity for love. Living the Word of Wisdom, honoring the Sabbath Day, and dedicating one tenth of our income to the work of the Lord can be living symbols, reminders to us and to others of our commitment to live close to the Lord and to follow him. Avoiding pornography, and being chaste in our thoughts, and in our words, and in our actions can heighten our sense of the sacredness of our sexuality and enhance our relationships with our significant others. Caring for our bodies through moderate eating and exercise habits; living within our means and spending less rather than more; being attentive to the impact our lifestyle choices have on the environment; can all be ways to practice attentiveness and sensitivity. And an attentive, sensitive life is a life open to the promptings of the Holy Spirit. Everything we do has an impact on ourselves and on those around us.

Second, if we are hungry for knowledge of spiritual things, we can be filled with the Spirit. If we make time each day for prayer and scripture study, we will begin to make connections, to see how, yes, every word in scripture has a direct relevance and meaning to us, to our particular circumstances. We will begin to know the truth as it applies very directly and personally to us, and the truth will begin to set us free. Most of us in this room have been deeply, deeply wounded at Church, so Church is a difficult place for us. Many of us are disfellowshipped or excommunicated. Church can be a frightening place for us. But if Church is more difficult for us, then so much greater are the rewards of facing our fears, and of cultivating the hope and charity and patience that it takes to wash our face and our hands, and put on our Sunday best, and show up in a spirit of love and reverence and humility, with a desire to learn. Though I have often sat alone in the pews, I have never been alone. The Spirit been there with me, by my side, a warm arm of fellowship around me, whispering truths of peace and love I never could have learned anywhere else. If we open our hearts, and have the courage to go, Church attendance can become the brightest time of our week. It can become something that we do not merely out of a sense of duty, but something we hunger for.

Third and most important, love is the beginning, the middle and the end of the law. There is no law, no commandment greater than the commandment to love. If our love is modeled after the love of Christ, we will not ask if those we love have treated us kindly, if they have loved us first, if they have understood us or stood by us. Even if those we love hate us, our love has the power to transform both us and those we love. Love shifts our view of the world around us, of the Church, of our neighbors, of our families, of ourselves. It teaches us to act into our greatest collective and individual potential, to above all seek Zion, the pure in heart.

I could not begin to be capable of this kind of love, until I experienced it firsthand from a loving Savior, who reassured me through the Spirit that whatever wrongs I had done, whatever sins I had committed, whatever anger and hate I harbored, he loved me perfectly and purely and completely. I was perfectly and purely and completely forgiven. In the warmth and light of that love and forgiveness, there was no wrong another could commit against me that I could not forgive. Whenever I have been tempted to hold on to anger or judgment or condemnation, I have remembered that pure love of Christ for me. I can only retain a perfect sense of his love for me, so long as I am willing to forgive, completely and unconditionally.

If we have experienced rejection and misunderstanding and hate, we are blessed! Because we can never know if we are capable of the kind of love Christ taught if we were always accepted and understood and loved by others.

The Spirit's mission is to sanctify and transform us, to make Saints out of us. And our ability to receive the Spirit and become Saints is not based on the acceptance we receive, either individually from Church or family members, or collectively from the Church as a whole. It is based on our willingness to enter into the path that Christ showed us.

We can be a light to each other, to our fellow Saints, and to the world. And we can experience a peace beyond all earthly peace, a love beyond all earthly love, a light beyond all earthly light, a joy beyond all earthly joy, and perfect companionship with One who loves and knows us perfectly.

That we might all enter into that perfect peace, love, light, joy and communion I pray,

In the name of Jesus Christ,

Amen.

Urim and Thummim

I've always been fascinated by the Urim and Thummim. Joseph Smith described them as two crystalline stones, through which it was possible to receive revelation and light from God. The Book of Mormon makes reference to them as well as playing a role in translating the records of the ancient Jaredites. In my own prayer and scripture study, it gradually became clear to me that the scriptures themselves are a kind of Urim and Thummim to us.

Alma refers to the scriptures themselves as "very small means [by which] the Lord doth confound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls" (Alma 37: 7). The scriptures are physically small, and -- with the benefit of modern e-book technology -- are getting smaller all the time! I've got a whole library of scriptures on my Kindle -- not just the LDS standard works, but the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Nag Hammadi Library, the Books of Enoch, the History of the Church, the Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, the Discourses of Brigham Young, and so on and on.

The scriptures are fascinating as physical, historical artifacts. They tell us much about the times and places that produced them, and offer a wealth of physical, material and historical information, if we know how to glean such information from their pages. Many scholars have, in fact, devoted their lives to studying the scriptures as historical documents. But to look at them solely in this fashion is, in essence, to reduce them to physical objects alone, having no more than mere physical interest.

The reason the scriptures are so vitally important to us is precisely for reasons that have nothing to do with reading them in this fashion. When we approach the scriptures in a spirit of prayer and faith and hope, the scriptures are able to transcend their mundane physical nature. The Spirit can use the stories, ideas and principles in the scriptures to open our minds up to heavenly and spiritual worlds previously inaccessible. Through the scriptures, the Spirit can help us to see humanity and creation in the context of their fullest potential; and to see ourselves in our own fullest potential. The scriptures, in other words, become a physical vehicle, a physical means by which the Spirit can open up wider understandings to us than are available just in the letter of the scriptures. In this sense, the scriptures are, like the Urim and Thummim described by Joseph Smith, translucent: light shines as much through them as from them.

In order for the scriptures to function for us in this translucent fashion, we too must, to a certain extent, be translucent. The light of the Spirit needs to be able to shine through us. Much in life of what I think of as "sin" are distractions, that cause is to forget what's important. Sin is like junk that clogs up our mind and body, preventing this light from passing through. Just like the actual Urim and Thummim, just like the physical scriptures, we ourselves are physical beings with transcendent capacities. If we think of ourselves as Urim and Thummim, as crystalline beings through whom the light of God can shine, then sin is basically like dirt on the windows of our soul.

I used to look at sin as a violation of some rule that God gave us; and so when we commit a sin, God punishes us by taking the Spirit away. But I realize now it isn't so much like that. It's not so much a sinful act per se that we're being punished for. It's that sin has emotional, mental and spiritual ramifications.

If I'm addicted to porn, for instance, my mind and Spirit, instead of turning to God, are looking for the next sexual thrill. So there's an aspect of dissipating valuable time and energy on things that won't lift me up. And there are the emotional after effects; the empty feeling that accompanies the impersonal, anonymous sexuality that porn offers; the disconnect that comes from looking at the body as a piece of meat rather than as the temple of our spirit and our intelligence; the cheapening of actual, real relationships that occurs when we start comparing our own bodies or the body of a loved one to the artfully posed and airbrushed and "perfect" bodies in the magazines and videos. These are all real effects I've perceived in my own experience with porn.

Recently, I've taken up the practice of yoga. In the last seven days, I've taken eight yoga classes and have experienced an incredible sense of well being through this practice. One of our instructors talked about a "detoxifying" process that is a part of yoga. The emphasis is on being silent, being present, being attentive to spirit through the vehicle of physical movement. The practice of yoga can be emotional. I've found that as I've practiced it, occasionally very strong emotions come up that have literally brought me to tears. The yoga instructors periodically remind us that when such emotions come up, we need to acknowledge them, then let them go, and then ground and center ourselves again in the present.

This practice is like the process of repentance. (I suspect, like any disciplined spiritual practice -- including prayer and scripture study! -- yoga can help us with the process of repentance.) Repentance is basically getting our life back into appropriate postures that enable life-giving light and energies to flow through us unhindered again. The various things we do as part of the repentance process -- asking forgiveness, making restitution, and then forgiving ourselves -- will help us deal with the toxic after effects of sin, help us deal with unpleasant emotions that darken the windows of our souls.

I don't think we can do this successfully in a judgmental way. In fact, judgment -- both of ourselves and others -- I would class as a sin. I dare say -- if I were to rank sins as superior or inferior -- that judgment is a worse sin than using porn. Porn is maybe a physical or emotional sin. Judgment is a spiritual sin -- far more weighty. Judgment darkens our minds more effectively, I think. It shuts us down and discourages us from moving just at the moment when we need to be moving freely. Judgment of others always leaves a residue of judgment on ourselves, and will ultimately shut us down more effectively than it shuts down others.

I've come to realize we can tell sin more effectively by its effects than we can by comparing our lives against the various laundry lists of sins we can find in the scriptures. What is sin to one person might not be sin to another. Only we, ultimately, are in a position to know what darkens us and what leaves us clearer.

It has really helped me to understand that our lives are less about accumulating things -- even accumulating intangibles such as knowledge -- than they are about becoming. When I remember this, it helps me to brush aside the distractions and focus on what is most important.

What the Spirit is Not

In numerous posts, I've described encounters I've had with the Spirit. I've taken extra care in many of these posts to discuss the nature of these experiences, partly because I regard it as being of primary importance to discern between what is actually the Spirit, what is just my own (for lack of a better term) wishful thinking, and what might be spiritual deception by (for lack of a better term) dark forces.

I was having a conversation with a friend the other day, and he was describing some important decisions he has made recently, and his own process of discernment. He has felt guided by the Spirit in these decisions, and I was impressed by his attitude. When he experienced a prompting from the Spirit, he explained to me, he gives it time. He waits long enough to properly discern whether it is a true prompting.

As I have matured in my spiritual journey, I too have learned that if a prompting is a true prompting, it will still be true after I've slept on it and given it some more thought. I have also learned that it is reasonable to seek validation, when possible, that a prompting is true. For example, last year when I felt prompted by the Spirit to bear my testimony in Fast and Testimony Meeting, the Spirit urged me to ask permission from my Bishop. My Bishop gave me permission to bear my testimony, and the following week he volunteered that he felt the Spirit confirming that that was the right thing to do. So the process of asking permission and my Bishop's prompting were validations that my own prompting was true. That makes sense, because the Spirit was essentially prompting me to do something out of harmony with the rules of the Church. Good order is a principle of the Gospel, and the Spirit will never have a problem with fact checking. We can seek more mundane validations as well. Objectivity (though frequently elusive) is a good thing.

There are situations -- urgent situations! -- where the Spirit might prompt us to do something now. We may not have time to sleep on it and think about it or validate beforehand. Or there may be situations where we will be called upon to act in faith, and have our faith be validated later, after we've done what the Lord has asked of us. In my experience, in those situations the prompting is clear enough and strong enough that we will know what is required of us.

It is important for us to learn to recognize the Spirit's unique personality at places like Church, where we know the Spirit is present, so that we can avoid being deceived. The more we listen to and follow the Spirit, the better we become at discerning it and distinguishing it from other influences we may feel, either internal or external. It's like anything else in life. Practice makes perfect.

The ultimate validation of spiritual promptings comes over the course of many years, as the fruits of the Spirit become evident in our lives.

I've seen a couple of statements by Mohohawaii, comparing the Spirit to a "rush of emotion." Whenever I've discussed the Spirit previously, I've tried to be at pains to point out that this is what the Spirit is not.

The best analogy I can think of in terms of how I discern the Spirit is to compare it to how I experience other, mortal personages. Different people have different personalities and project themselves in different ways. My husband has a very different personality from our son. Not only are their personalities different, they are also physically different. They carry themselves differently, they walk differently. If I am sitting at the dining room table with my face away from the stairs, if one of them comes down the stairs I can usually tell who is coming without seeing him just by hearing how the floorboards creak and the pattern of their steps. They walk differently. When I am carrying on a conversation with my husband, the quality of that conversation is different from the quality of the conversation with my son. They have different senses of humor, different approaches to problems, different ways of expressing themselves. If I were blind and deaf, and could only communicate with them in some more abstract manner, I would still be able to -- with enough interaction -- discern who was actually speaking to me, because of the differences between them. In fact, they are different enough that I would probably discern fairly quickly.

OK. I love my husband. My heart often does flutter in his presence. If he has been gone for a long time, I may even feel a "rush of emotion" when he shows up. Interacting with my husband, however, does not produce a single emotion every time I interact with him. Depending on the quality of interaction, I may feel levity, sadness, anger, delight, calm, etc. It all depends on what we are discussing and what is happening between us and around us. The feelings I experience in his presence are different from the quality of his personality, different from his presence itself. Furthermore, very many (though not all) of the feelings I experience in his presence I may experience elsewhere when he is absent. For example, I may see a movie or have a conversation or smell a scent that triggers a memory of him, and that causes me to experience a feeling that I felt in his presence. But all that is different from actually having him present.

It is the same with the Spirit.

Now I went for very many years without the Spirit in my life. During all those years, I would experience art or go to a movie or listen to music that would bring on a "rush of emotion." Frequently these rushes of emotion would trigger memories of spiritual experiences I had as a youth when I was active in the Church. But I now recognize that they were not the same thing as those spiritual experiences.

The reason I know that is because when I finally did feel the presence of the Spirit again in August 2005, I immediately knew A) that what I was experiencing in that moment was utterly distinct from the usual emotions that are often categorized as "spiritual," and B) that I had not experienced it in a very long time, in many, many years. Now people can tell me I did not know what I was experiencing, or I was mistaken, or whatever they want. I know what I experienced. It was as clear and unequivocal to me as any other sensory experience I might have of meeting a particular person at a particular time in a particular locale.

Am I saying it's not possible to doubt that what I experienced was really the Spirit? No, of course doubt is always possible. Doubt is possible about much more mundane things too. I'm so absent-minded, half the time I doubt whether I locked the front door behind me when I'm half-way to the grocery store. But the nature of what I experienced I could not deny. It was not just a "rush of emotion." I'm content to let the rest of my life be the validation of whether or not I did in fact meet the Spirit in at the Sheraton Hotel in downtown Salt Lake on that particular August afternoon in 2005.

Of course listening to the Spirit is not a "golden path" to truth in the sense that we don't have to work at it, or in the sense that there's no possibility for human error. Of course people make mistakes and do terrible things in the name of God, claiming to be guided by the Spirit. Of course. That's why I discussed at the outset the importance of training oneself in skills of discernment, and validating whenever possible. But to point out that people can make mistakes in discerning the Spirit doesn't invalidate the principle. Discerning the Spirit has become an essential component of my life path, one that I have validated to my satisfaction time and time again. The Spirit steadies me, comforts me, and gives me vision, insight and strength. It makes no more sense to me to dispense with the Spirit because of human error in discerning the Spirit than it makes to dispense with scientific method because scientists make mistakes.

I have always encouraged (and will continue to encourage) everyone I meet to follow whatever path seems best to them, the only requirement being that they do so with integrity. That's what I've tried to do.

On the Gift of the Holy Ghost

I must begin to address this topic by confessing that I am a sinner, and that much of my life I have been in the dark. Some memories of my own wrong-doing have been weighing heavily on me lately. I'm aware of my weaknesses, and the way past failings have contributed to present-day struggles. It would be easy to get discouraged, to become ungrateful, and/or try escaping into denial. And I probably would have shipwrecked long ago but for the comfort and sustaining guidance I've received from the Spirit.

I understand and accept LDS doctrine regarding the Gift of the Holy Ghost. Mormons believe that while the Spirit is at work in the world and can and does inspire people of every nation, kindred, tongue and creed, only those who are baptized and confirmed members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are entitled to the Gift of the Holy Ghost, which they understand as the right to constant companionship of the Spirit so long as they keep their covenants and remain worthy.

Last Sunday I was very moved -- as I believe was everybody in attendance -- when a member of my ward told the story of his brother who had been excommunicated for the past seven years, and who was finally in recent weeks able to be re-baptized and received back into full membership. He wept as he told how his brother testified of the Gift of the Holy Ghost that had been restored to his life, of the difference that he could feel. As an excommunicated man who hungers to be restored to full membership in the Church, to say that I was moved and humbled by this story is an understatement.

I have no basis for denying the truth of the LDS doctrine regarding the Gift of the Holy Ghost in principle. I believe in it, and I affirm it. However, I admit that some aspects of my own experience may seem contradictory.

I experienced the presence of the Holy Spirit from the time I was quite young growing up in the Church. I sought and received gifts of the Spirit as a young priesthood holder and later as a missionary. I enjoyed the Gift of the Holy Ghost as a member of the Church. The reason -- after nearly twenty years away from the Church -- that I have begun attending the LDS Church again, and that I have begun living the gospel as fully as I am able, is because when I experienced the presence of the Spirit so powerfully in August 2005 telling me to "come home," I recognized that the Spirit had been missing from my life for most of the time I had been away from the Church, and I desperately wanted it back.

I recognized that the Spirit is more than "just a feeling." It's presence is discernible and unique, unlike any other presence. When I felt it, I immediately recognized it because I had been so familiar with it once as a member of the Church, and it filled me with the most indescribable joy and peace.

At first I didn't know what to do. I couldn't imagine leaving my husband, with whom -- at that point -- I'd been in a relationship for some 13 years. I assumed that the only way to have the Gift of the Holy Ghost in my life again would be to become a member of the Church, and I knew that the Church would not baptize me again unless I left my husband. So for a good month or so after my encounter with the Spirit, I tried dismissing it, rationalizing it away, and otherwise ignoring it.

But the Spirit was insistent. It kept coming back to me and reminding me of the encounter I'd had with it, and kept reiterating the same message again and again. It was time to "come home." Whenever I felt the Spirit gently prodding me in this way, I was always grateful for the profound peace and joy I felt in its presence, but I was also worried about what it would mean for my life to give in. I brought my anxieties and concerns back to the Spirit, and essentially said, "OK, I need to do this. I will do this. But what do I do? I don't know how to proceed." And the Spirit told me that I did not need to worry about the future, that everything would work out, and that for the time being, all I needed to do was to take one step at a time.

So gradually, I made changes in my life. I started attending Church in October 2005. Shortly thereafter, I also stopped using pornography, and started applying the principles of the Law of Chastity more fully to my relationship with my husband. In January 2006 I started praying daily and reading the Book of Mormon. The following March I began living the Word of Wisdom again, and so on.

Once I accepted the challenge of the Spirit to come back to the Church and start living gospel principles (some time in September 2005), I began to feel the presence of the Spirit in my life frequently. Once I began praying again in January 2006, I began to feel the Spirit's presence daily. This was a very emotional time in my life. I would get down on my knees to pray, and immediately the Spirit would descend on me and I would just start weeping tears of gratitude. I would just thank my Heavenly Father. I had been so unworthy, I had been such a sinner. I didn't understand why He would care about me or reach out to me when I had done so much to alienate Him. And all I ever felt was more love, more comfort, more reassurance.

Because I believed (still believe) in the LDS doctrine regarding the Gift of the Holy Ghost, every morning when I knelt down to pray, I would begin with an acknowledgment that I knew I was not entitled to the Gift of the Holy Ghost, but that I needed the Holy Spirit in my life to help me stay on the path. I was very aware of the precariousness of my position. Still, every single one of those prayers was answered.

There were times when I did not feel the Spirit as immediately or powerfully. Sometimes I was definitely aware that the Spirit was not there. In those situations, I would reach out to God in prayer, asking for help. And then I would patiently wait. I would still my heart, calm my thoughts, and keep doing what I knew I was supposed to be doing. I would keep doing what I had been told, the best I knew how on my own. And eventually, I would become aware of what it was I was doing wrong, how I had driven the Spirit away, and what I needed to do to correct course, and the Spirit would be back in my life again. Gradually, the absences of the Spirit were rarer and rarer. They still occur occasionally, and then I need to repent.

At a certain point I had to confront the issue of my relationship with my husband. From the beginning I had acknowledged that it was possible the relationship would have to end. I had never felt the Spirit prompting me in any way to end it. But logically, my renewed testimony of the Gospel and of the Church seemed to point to that. I knew the Church was true. I knew that the present, modern-day leaders of the Church are called and ordained and inspired by God, and I knew what they taught about my relationship. I knew that my path of reconciliation with God -- in light of my testimony -- must lead to membership in Christ's Church. So logically, it seemed that my relationship would have to end. But at no point in the various promptings I had received from the Spirit, was I being prodded to address this.

I had at various points prayed about it, and when I had, the Spirit had very calmly and clearly told me that I was not to leave my husband. Occasionally, in some of the discussions I had with my husband, this would come up, and I would reassure him that my understanding was that I was not to leave him. But there was always a grain of doubt in my heart, and I wondered if that was only "for the time being." This came to a head about a year after I had been attending Church regularly, in October 2006. (On my birthday, actually!) Wrestling with the logical process had caused me to become quite emotionally labored about the whole thing. I was feeling under tremendous stress. And finally as I was riding my bike down Chicago Avenue in south Minneapolis, I cried out to God, "If my relationship eventually needs to end, I need to know!" And that is when I received a clear and definitive answer, I should not leave my relationship with my husband, ever. To do so would be a sin. And I should stop asking about it. That was a commandment, and so I have kept it, and stopped asking about it.

In May 2008, when the news hit that California would be legalizing same-sex marriage, I received a clear, unequivocal and very powerful prompting. My husband and I should travel to California and be legally married. I've posted elsewhere at length about that experience, and about some of the pain and subsequent wrestling after Proposition 8 was passed with heavy Church support. I don't have much more to add to what I've already written, but through the experiences I had in connection with our marriage it was made extremely clear to me that deepening my commitment to my husband was something God expected of me. Furthermore, deepening my commitment to my husband through our legally contracted marriage resulted in many rich spiritual blessings, all of which I can't enumerate here. And it resulted in a deepened, more powerful relationship with the Spirit.

Last spring, I received a number of very clear promptings about a few more changes I needed to make in my life and some specific things I needed to do. After obeying those promptings of the Spirit, I received a very clear prompting that, after more than three years of pleading every day for the Holy Spirit to be granted me as a temporary gift, I no longer needed to do that. Rather than asking for the Spirit, I should pray for help to be obedient, to be faithful, to be loving, to be patient, knowing that so long as I did what I was asked, I would be entitled to the continuous presence of the Spirit in my life. I was reassured that I need not worry any more on account of my exclusion from the membership of the Church. That was not something I had control over; if it had been possible for me to be baptized, I would have been a long time ago. The Lord had looked on my heart and had accepted my offering, and was rewarding me accordingly.

I realize that this will deeply offend and anger certain people. In the last couple of months, I've already been accused several times of being under the control of Satan, told that I'm deceived, that I'm in the gall of bitterness, that the Spirit can't possibly be in my life, and so on, and so on. These folks are entitled to believe what they want. I can't really argue with them, because they will dismiss everything I say on this count anyway. And I really don't want to or feel the need to argue with them... My only concern is that other readers of my blog not engage with these kinds of commenters. I tried explaining my position to some of these folks, just to preempt defensive comments from some of my other readers/friends. But at this point, I'll just ask you to respect my wishes not to engage with these folks. It doesn't serve any purpose.

I don't see my personal experience as proof that the Church's doctrine on the Gift of the Holy Ghost is wrong. At best -- if I were trying to resolve contradictions between my experience and the teaching of the Church -- it would be that I see myself as the exception that proves the rule. I don't take the presence and guidance of the Spirit lightly, as I hope this post makes clear. In order to have the Spirit in my life, I have had to be attentive, careful, faithful, and obedient. And I have prayerfully had to ask day after day after day, and work and wrestle. I still don't -- and don't imagine I ever will -- take it for granted.

The reassurances I have received have allowed me to enter into a deeper, more trusting relationship with my Father in Heaven. I still yearn for, and look forward to, and pray for the day when I can be baptized as a full member of the Church and have priesthood-bearing hands placed on my head to confirm me and formally bestow upon me the Gift of the Holy Ghost.

Wine and Fragrance

In response to my recent post The Role of Trust, boskers posed a series of questions relating to how we tell the difference between the Spirit and what could best be described as just run-of-the-mill "good feelings." I started to answer this question and then realized that this deserved a separate post of its own.

There's a text in the so-called Gnostic Gospel of Philip that I think provides a useful analogy. Here, the intimate relationship between the believer and the Holy Spirit is described as a kind of marriage, the bond of that relationship being described as "spiritual love":

Spiritual love is wine and fragrance. All those who anoint themselves with it take pleasure in it. While those who are anointed are present, those nearby also profit (from the fragrance). If those anointed with ointment withdraw from them and leave, then those not anointed, who merely stand nearby, still remain in their bad odor.

This analogy is helpful to me, because it clearly distinguishes between the feelings that accompany the presence of the Spirit (the "fragrance") and the anointing of the Spirit (the "ointment" of "wine") which is the source of the feelings. This text also draws attention to the confusion often experienced by those who do not recognize the source of the Spirit's fragrance. All they know is that when those who have been anointed are gone, they can't "smell" it any more. The only aroma that remains is "their bad odor."

Members of the Church frequently describe the feelings of peace and joy they experience in the Spirit's presence. But those feelings are not the Spirit. I have experienced a range of very different feelings in the presence of the Spirit. When the Spirit spoke to me in August 2005 prompting me to begin the questioning that eventually led me back to the Church, I felt anger and dismay. But, yes, I also experienced the Spirit as a peaceful, comforting, beautiful presence. The complexity of feelings I experienced helped me to realize that the presence of the Spirit could evoke different feelings, depending on what the Spirit is telling you, and depending on how you relate to what the Spirit is telling you.

My feelings were complex, because on the one hand, I felt like in order to follow the prompting of the Spirit, it would require me to completely re-evaluate my life and completely change course. And that was very upsetting. But at the same time, the Spirit was there just saying, "It's OK. You can do it. Things will work out. Just trust and everything will be OK, and you will be happy beyond your ability to currently imagine." I received from the Spirit a foretaste of the peace that I would experience if I followed the path the Spirit was prompting me to follow. And so, yes, it was simultaneously very peaceful and comforting. The presence of the Spirit left me feeling so incredibly joyful too. I felt so incredibly happy, and realized that I always wanted to be in the Spirit's presence and always experience this profound, pure happiness.

I could not deny the reality of this experience, though believe me, I tried. There was part of me that was working very hard to dismiss the Spirit as "just a feeling." But in the deepest part of my soul, I couldn't deny the reality of it. I knew that if I did deny it, I would lose something so profound I would literally regret it for all eternity.

Boskers described how throughout his life in the Church, he never really had any extraordinary manifestations of the Spirit, never anything more than just a "this feels right" kind of feeling. This is not unusual; I think this is very typical of many, if not most, members of the Church. Though I had a number of extraordinary spiritual experiences growing up and serving my mission, most of the time my experience of the Spirit's presence was of this more mundane order, the "this feels right" kind of feelings. I never fully appreciated the nature of the Spirit until, having been away from it for so long I suddenly experienced its presence again in a gathering of Latter-day Saints. This is why the "wine and fragrance" analogy from the Gospel of Philip struck me so profoundly when I first read it a few years back.

I would say that during the periods of my life where the Spirit was absent, I didn't think of myself as an unhappy person, nor did I think of my life as devoid of meaning. I did my best to find happiness and meaning, and succeeded to varying degrees. I had many friends and good family relationships, and I had my husband. I was not lonely. But looking back I see clearly now how I was what I would now describe as "lonely" or "alone" in spirit.

Existential philosophers often describe the condition of man as a state of profound loneliness or aloneness. No matter how many friends or family you surround yourself with, human communication is imperfect, and we can never completely overcome the aloneness that is an existential consequence of the fact that we are separate individuals. I was alone in that sense. And experiencing the presence of the Spirit as I do now, I am no longer alone, and I know that I never again could be truly alone unless I willfully drove the Spirit out of my life. That I could never do. Now I know far too much ever to do that again.

I can look back now and say that I was happy, but true happiness eluded me. I found meaning, but true meaning eluded me. I was not lonely, and yet I was profoundly lonely. And I can say that the existentialists were right, but only partially. True communion with God and with others is possible. It is not only possible, but it is the end and purpose of our entire existence. It is the "joy" for which we were created, of which the scriptures say we are, that we might have it. But that true happiness, meaning and communion are possible only in the Spirit. Men and women in and of themselves, without the Spirit, are exactly what the existentialists describe us to be: lonely in our nature.

I presently am blessed in many ways, but the blessing that is most profound, without which all the other blessings would mean nothing to me, is the blessing of having the Spirit in my life again. I can feel its presence now very powerfully as I write this. But if there is a physical place where I can say that the Spirit's presence is most powerful, I would say it is every dedicated chapel and temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I can't go into the temple, but I love being on those grounds. I can go into my local ward meeting house, and I do as often as I can because I love being in the presence of others anointed in that fragrance of the Spirit, and because the channels of communication between me and the Spirit there are always clear and pure. The people of the Church are imperfect, sometimes painfully so. They can be ignorant. They can make mistakes. They can and have done and said things that have hurt me deeply. But the Latter-day Saints have the gift of the Holy Spirit. That is my testimony not only of the Gospel but the Church.

I have been to many other churches, and I have nothing bad to say about any of them. They are good, loving people. Many of them are far better people than many Latter-day Saints. In terms of their attitudes toward gay people and gay rights issues, some churches are far ahead of the LDS Church. The Spirit is at work with those people and in those churches, of this I have not the least doubt. But all I can say is I know where I feel the Spirit most powerfully and consistently, and it is at the LDS Church.

I know that the Latter-day Saints will come to understand and see homophobia for what it is. The Spirit will be their greatest asset in overcoming their own homophobia and in coming to fully embrace and love their gay and lesbian brothers and sisters because the Spirit -- and only the Spirit -- permits the kind of perfect communion between a gay brother or lesbian sister and his or her straight brothers and sisters. In that true and perfect communion we will all -- gay and straight -- find our purpose and happiness.

In the meantime, homophobia, like any other worldly, sinful attitude, will block that communion and be an impediment to the Spirit. Homophobia can be a form of pride (the pride of feeling you're somehow superior because you're attracted to the opposite sex, or the pity you feel for those who somehow aren't "like you"). It can be a form of hate (projecting all your anxieties about sexuality and sin on gay and lesbian people, blaming them for the downfall of civilizations and seeing them as "destroying the family"). The Spirit winks at our ignorance. But we can't hold on to those kinds of attitudes indefinitely and still keep the Spirit.

The possibility for perfect communion and understanding as regards this issue hangs -- for better or for worse -- on those Saints who are gay or lesbian. The opportunities and blessings, if we can find the courage and the patience to give love instead of hate, are incredible. We can be the light in the darkness.

But that is not just hard but impossible to do on our own. We need the Spirit in our lives. At some point -- as soon as we are ready! -- we need to make that fearless inventory of our lives, and push aside whatever obstacles are keeping us from the Spirit. And we need to ask for the Spirit, and then wait for it. If we do that, if we get grounded in the Spirit, we will know what we need to do, and we will find a spring of living water in our souls, flowing up and giving us all the love and patience and light that we need in order to do it.

I Brought My Scriptures to Gay Pride

In order to keep my marriage on an even keel, I am not able to attend Church as often as I would like. One week ago last Sunday was one such occasion. I don't feel bad or guilty about missing Church under these circumstances. Sometimes the right place for me to be is Church, and I need to do whatever is necessary to be there. But the Spirit has indicated to me that strengthening and taking care of my family is one of my main missions in life, so taking time off from Church once in a while to show my husband that I love him and to spend quality time with our son is sometimes also the right thing to do.

I generally try not to miss Church two Sundays in a row. That presented a challenge, because yesterday was Gay Pride Sunday in the Twin Cities, and as I have posted previously, there's a strong expectation on the part of my family that I be at Gay Pride and not at the Mormon Church on Gay Pride Sunday. This time I managed to negotiate a compromise. I would attend Sacrament Meeting, which in my ward takes place from 9 AM to a little bit after 10 AM. Then I would head straight home, change out of my Church clothes, and we would head downtown in time to find a place to watch the parade, which began at 11 AM.

I'm glad I didn't miss Sacrament Meeting. I didn't have the usual opportunities to renew friendships in Sunday School and Priesthood Meeting. But I felt the Spirit so strongly, and the messages about faith actually helped me find some resolution to a little problem that's been gnawing at me lately. There was a particular moment when Bro. B. was reading some passages of scripture in his talk, and the Spirit gave me a key insight through the text as I read it in my own set of scriptures along with him. I was blessed!

But Sacrament went a little late, and so I arrived home a little late, and we were a tad rushed moving on to the next activity, and I left my scriptures in the pannier bag of my bicycle, a fact that went unnoticed until we arrived downtown and locked our bikes up. There's lots of petty thievery downtown, and as unlikely as it seemed to me that someone would steal my scriptures, believe it or not they are valuable to me and I didn't want that. So I had no choice but to bring them along with me to Gay Pride.

When Göran saw me taking them out of the pannier bag, he said, "Why did you bring those?" "I forgot to leave them at home," I said. He rolled his eyes and moaned, "I have nothing to say." So off we went to Gay Pride, me with my scriptures.

Of course I had no real use for them there. But having them made me aware that, metaphorically at least, there is no place I actually can go without my scriptures. In some sense I carry them everywhere in my heart. Having them there physically with me was, of course, a more-graphic-than-usual reminder of who I am and what I believe.

The Saturday before Gay Pride, there was a rather important, frank fathers-to-son talk that Göran and I had to have with Glen. And the subject of the talk was, what things about Gay Pride are good, and what things are bad. In the good category was: the affirmation that being gay is nothing to be ashamed of, the affirmation of the positive things that the gay community has accomplished in the forty years since the Stonewall Riot in 1969, and the affirmation of the diversity of the gay community, which includes support groups, PFLAG, Rainbow Families, and religious groups. Much of what we see at Gay Pride is a visible reminder of the efforts ordinary people have made and are making to improve their lot and to become better people and a better community. All very, very good, and more than enough justification for being there to witness it and support it.

In the bad category: the ever present "easy sex" mentality, the superficial emphasis on physical beauty that, I've decided, has a deleterious effect on our spirits and our culture, the numerous scantily clad boys bumping and grinding... You get the picture. It's not that I've become a prude. Sex is a very, very good thing and an important part of life. But there's something to be said for maintaining a kind of propriety in public; there are valid psychological and social and emotional reasons for doing so, I think.

Last year at Pride, our son met up with some friends of his from District 202 -- a support group for gay youth -- and they wandered around the park together, periodically checking in with us. This year, our son stayed with us. Some friends of his from school (Glen's "girl posse") met up with us, and we all toured the various booths in the park together. And I think it was a good thing. I think Glen was actually grateful to have his two dads with him this year keeping an eye on things (one of whom was carrying his scriptures!). I actually enjoyed interacting with his friends too. That was a bonus.

I ran into a number of my students from the Seminary there. (In the past two years, I've had about a half-dozen students who are gay.) I enjoyed introducing them to my family, and my family to them.

The high point of pride for me though, was visiting the "J-Pride" booth. "J-Pride" stands for Jewish Pride. It's a small thing, I know, but it made me deeply happy to see so many people in the park -- people of all races and ethnicities -- sporting "J-Pride" stickers. I thought of the long history of anti-Semitism in America (which is part of what I teach about in my course) and I, of course, thought about the Holocaust and the time when the world stood by while millions of Jews were massacred. And my recollection of the horror of that in contrast with the sight of so many non-Jews wearing Jewish Pride stickers made me profoundly happy. Never again, I thought. Never again should they -- or anybody! -- stand alone. And that, my friends, is what Gay Pride should be all about.

While I was at the booth getting my own "J-Pride" sticker (it was the only sticker I chose to wear), I ran into a very old friend from my days in campus ministries at the University of Minnesota, Rabbi Sharon Stiefel, who has been the interim rabbi at Shir Tikvah, a local synagogue. We hugged and exchanged news. Those friendly exchanges with old friends -- by the way -- another of those things that falls in the "good" category at Gay Pride.

As I walked away from the J-Pride booth, I actually felt the Spirit. It was quite strong, quite amazing. And the Spirit brought to my mind one other thing of great importance about the Jewish people besides the fact that we should never, never again let anything like the Holocaust happen. It is that the very existence of Jews as a people is -- like the presence of my scriptures at Gay Pride -- a visible, physical witness of the justice, mercy, and love of God. We should all be such a people, a people who by nature of our existence testify to the reality of God and of God's justice and love.

Happy Pride!

The Spirit Doesn't Solve Your Problems

But if you ask, and listen, the Spirit helps you discern your problems' true nature.

The Spirit helps you know when you need to hold your tongue, and strengthens you when you need to speak. The Spirit gives you the confidence to be humble.

The Spirit lets you forgive, freeing you for the business you need to be about. The Spirit encourages you to keep trying, and reassures you that there is always the possibility to do better.

The Spirit grounds you in the infinite love of God, and makes you a conduit of that love. It reminds you to do the things and say the words and make the changes that say "I love you" to the people around you.

But you still have to solve your own problems.