A survey was circulated around Facebook, and I can only assume other sites as well, regarding a woman's role in the church. One can only assume that such a survey was spawned in response to the widely publicized Ordain Women movement. I was finally able to sit down and take the survey and had a few comments that I wanted to post in response.
I do believe that women and men, girls and boys, are not treated equally in the church, with the benefits weighing heavily in favor of the male species. This has been a noticeable source of contention for me since I entered Achievement Days when I turned 8, but became more noticeable when I entered the Young Women's program at the age of 12.
For the sake of time and space, I'm not going to post every question and my response to it, but I am going to post a handful.
One of the first questions posed was: Differences between the roles of women and men in the LDS Church are... Cultural, A mix of culture and doctrine, or Doctrinal.
I selected A Mix. Religion is not the only area in which women are not treated equally. However, I think that is due in large part to the creation of religion. While I haven't done any research regarding the first forms of humans, my educated guess would be that males and females were assigned separate roles, mostly due to the fact that women bear children. I honestly believe that it is this biological fact that has created the belief that women are unequal to men. But despite my thinking that these gender roles were assigned from the beginning of mankind, religion/doctrine has not only perpetuated these differences, but has aggravated the inequality.
Another question is as follows: Have you personally experienced any of the following within the LDS community in the last 3 months? Women, young women, and/or girls... I checked the following options:
-being told that they should dress a particular way to help boys/men have pure thoughts. (Immodest clothing is any clothing that is tight, sheer, or revealing in any other manner. Young women should avoid short shorts and short skirts (the standard being it needs to be long enough to wear garments underneath, regardless of whether you wear them yet or not), shirts that do not cover the stomach, and clothing that does not cover the shoulders or is low-cut in the front or the back. Young men should also maintain modesty in their appearance. -Excerpt from the For Strength of Youth pamphlet) Did that paragraph seem a little one sided to you? No where in the pamphlet are young men asked to keep their hair trimmed, to not sag their pants, or to not walk around without a shirt on if a body of water is not near by. What about young men wearing tight girl jeans or short shorts themselves? I'd say they have more to expose wearing either of these fashions than a young woman does. This imbalance creates the belief that a young man is not responsible for "immoral" thoughts or actions he might have regarding women. The blame is placed on the woman's shoulders. It's like saying a prostitute was asking to be raped because she was wearing revealing clothing. No accountability is given to the male sex in either situation, regardless of extremes.
-feeling that they cannot express their opinions about how ward organizations are run. ( I experienced this while serving as President in Beehives, Mia-Maids and Laurels, yes, all 3 of them. On many occasions, my ideas for activities were not "suitable" or approved because of the way the Presidency is run. (More on this later.) I was president in name only. The Bishop always had the final say.)
-not being consulted about important ward decisions. (Generally the bishopric are the ones making any big decisions without consultation or opinion from regular ward members. Other presidencies might be involved. This is not exclusive to women.)
-limiting career goals to conform to cultural expectations. (Don't get me started. I think I've touched on this issue in a previous post. Basically what it comes down to is that a woman's role, as decided by the church, is to forgo completing her education, therefore never achieving a career, in order to have babies and stay home to raise them. The Church will argue that it promotes the need for everyone to receive an education, but as far as actual priorities go, they want the women to marry young so they can produce lots of kids.)
-feeling that they cannot ask questions important to them. (I think a lot of members, especially those with doubts, experience this on countless occasions. Questions about doctrine are frowned on. Everything is supposed to be taken on faith with the "promise" that all will be revealed in the next life.)
-feeling that they do not want to come to church because of the pressure to conform to cultural expectations. (These pressures can be great, especially in certain areas. You're supposed to look a certain way, act a certain way and have the same goals as everyone else. Anyone who differs, even in something as slight as coloring your hair blue, is usually targeted as a member in need and people feel the need to help you correct your non-conformist ways. Granted, this isn't always the case. Some members are much more lenient or accepting, but the general Mormon populace views deviation from the norm as deviant behavior and responds as such.)
I have not attended church within the last 3 months, but all of the above options were feelings that I experienced on a weekly basis when I attended church regularly.
There were a lot of questions that you were supposed to rate as: strongly disagree, disagree, neutral, agree, strongly agree, don't know, no response- For the sake of another lengthy post, I'm not going to include all of them, just the ones that I felt were the most poignant. For example: Women who feel unequal to men at Church don't understand the gospel. This is a very typical LDS response. If you don't understand something, it's your fault, not the doctrine. Ergo, I don't understand the gospel because I believe that women are not treated equally within the Church.
Others include:
-Eliminate language that suggests husbands preside over their wives. (I felt that this one was a little tricky because of the way the statement is worded, but I selected Strongly Disagree. It's my belief that by eliminating language that suggests any kind of dominance will be a virtual sweeping under the rug of the problem. It doesn't solve anything! Husbands will still dominate their wives, their just wont be any "evidence" to support that it's doctrine. The Church will be able to pass it off as a "choice" between spouses.)
-Provide equivalent budgets for the Young Women and Young Men organizations. (Being President throughout the entire duration of my Young Women's career, I was always involved in the planning of Mutual night activities and camping excursions. The Young Women's budget is considerably less than the Young Men's. Most of our activities involved cheap arts and crafts because that's all we could afford. The only time we ever had an activity that involved being somewhere other than the church or one of our leaders houses was if it was a joint activity with the Young Men. I had guy friends whose groups would get ice cream after every activity because it was in their budget. Any treat we got to eat at the end of an activity was provided if we were the ones to make it. No, I don't know what the budgets are in comparison, but even our camps weren't equal. The young women's stake property didn't provide any sort of activities such as archery, zip lines, ropes courses or even any kind of body of water to go canoeing on. Every camp that my guy friends went to provided at least 2 of these activities at any given time. While my guy friends were swimming, shooting bows and arrows and climbing ropes, I was doing a "Faith Walk" or a 2 mile hike. Snipe hunting was as exciting as it ever got for me.They were also allowed to go further distances for their camps. While I was in Young Women's, the stake implemented a 300 mile limit for "all camps", meaning we couldn't choose a campground outside of that 300 mile radius. One year I put forth the idea to go to the Grand Tetons National Park. I wanted to go white water rafting like the boys did and a handful of other girls did as well. The idea was turned down. The reason I was given was that the National Park is further than 300 miles away from where our church building was located. The Young Men's organization, in my same ward, was able to go to the National Park that very same summer. I was furious, but drawing attention to what I deemed as an unjust and very unequal decision was met by deaf ears. This still infuriates me. Want to know how far the Tetons are from where I lived at the time? 319 miles! The exception was made for the boys because it was barely over 300 miles and they had gone there in previous years. The exception was not made for the girls because of 19 damn miles!)
Eventually the survey introduces questions revolving around ordaining women to the priesthood. Questions like: Do I personally think women should be ordained to the priesthood? If the First Presidency were to receive a revelation allowing women to hold the priesthood, would I want to be ordained? I want to stop here for a moment and focus on If the First Presidency were to receive a revelation... I have a sneaking suspicion that if a revelation comes out, whether in favor of ordaining women or not, it will be based heavily on the results from this survey. It would be too obvious for the revelation to happen within the next few months, but I honestly think that any conference talks for letters written to the members will be based upon this survey. It wont be a "revelation" (surprise), but the Church will spin it as such and faithful members will believe it. The survey was "inspired" by God, after all.
A follow up question later actually asks what the primary reason behind this change would be: a revelation from God; a response from God to inquiries by the leaders of the LDS Church; A response from Church leaders to pressure from inside the LDS Church; or A response from Church leaders to pressure from outside the LDS Church. I selected the last one, although it could be a mixture of that and pressure inside the Church as well.
One question that I found interesting was: Church leaders have indicated that each congregation is responsible for conducting its own disciplinary courts. If a member of your LDS ward were to publicly express his/her support for the ordination of women to the priesthood, what would your response be? The options were to do nothing, encourage him/her to express their views, encourage him/her to express their views but remind him/her to refrain from trying to persuade other to accept them, acknowledge his/her private beliefs but discourage him/her from publicly expressing them or refer the individual for formal disciplinary council. In my opinion, a large number of members would do nothing. A handful of others would take it upon themselves to try to persuade that person that their views are wrong while simultaneously telling them that's it wrong to persuade others to think as they do. There would be a lot of discouragement from publicly expressing beliefs, at least until a "revelation" was had and suddenly that persons view lines up with the Church. I don't think that there are enough people in the Mormon church who express their views on doctrine and there needs to be more.
An entertaining question was in regard to the likelihood of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in receiving a revelation that would ask members to gather in Jackson County, Missouri in order to prepare for Christ's return. The options were given in percentages from less than 1% to 100%. I chose less than 1% for obvious reasons. Given the Church's track record and pattern for revelations, I'd say that they'd rather not risk the outcome that the 7th Day Adventist's experienced years ago.
The final question asked about the likelihood of a revelation being received in regards to allowing women to be ordained to the priesthood. In my opinion, a lot depends on this survey and the members response to the idea of women receiving the priesthood. This movement isn't new. Many women over the last century have called for receiving the priesthood, but there has been a resurgence and a larger media appeal in recent years, especially this past year. I think that if the hype were to die down, the Church wouldn't find it in their best interest to disclose a "revelation" allowing for the ordination to be given to women. However, if there becomes a bigger outcry and push for it, I think the Church is more likely to allow women to receive the priesthood. All in the guise of a "revelation".
At the end of the multiple choice survey they give you the option to end or to continue with a few long response questions in which you get to type out your own responses. I volunteered to continue but will only provide one of the questions and part of my response to it:
Men and women are treated differently in the Church. Some of these differences are considered cultural, others doctrinal. Please describe these differences and why you feel they are beneficial or not beneficial. (I'll tell you right now that I probably didn't exactly answer the question.) I responded thus:
The only legitimate gender difference is the fact that women can bear children and men can't. This is a biologically prescribed difference that should not lead to a woman's perceived inferiority. For obvious reasons, the difference in who can bear children is beneficial to the growth of the human population, but for centuries it has been forced on women as their only worthy role in the world. The creation of gender differences is least beneficial to females because they receive a lesser education, they find it more difficult to support themselves, and they are viewed (and quite often view themselves) as only being worth something if they can and do bear children. Within the Church, a woman is expected to put aside her education, to marry early in life and start a family while spending her time nurturing her children. While the female's capacity to nurture is a wonderful thing, it needs to be understood that every woman is different. Every woman cannot, and should not, be expected to accept the same role as women before them, and that is what is currently expected, especially in religious institutions. Because of religion, many women are led to believe that they must defer to a man's opinion and reason, which, in most cases, creates unhealthy and hostile environments. Many women develop the inability to think for themselves. What kind of example is that for her children?
I firmly believe that women are unequal to men to religious institutions. Women have gained a lot of equality in other aspects of the world, but for some reason, equality is not believed to be a necessary aspect in advancing the human race as far as religion is concerned. It's sickening to me that the Church needs a survey to gauge where their members stand as far as wanting equality among the sexes.
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