Great response to Sister Beck's Talk

[Bishka]

President Beck said, “Mothers who know are nurturers. This is their special assignment and role under the plan of happiness. To nurture means to cultivate, care for, and make grow. Therefore, mothers who know create a climate for spiritual and temporal growth in their homes. Another word for nurturing is homemaking. Homemaking includes cooking, washing clothes and dishes, and keeping an orderly home.”
Here are my thoughts:
(1) Note that nothing in President Beck’s talk implied that homes need to be immaculate. I think that striving for an immaculate home is more likely to decrease the quality of family life than improve it. Immaculate-ness is unlikely to be reached in a home with children and the desire for it will only cause stress and resentment. Our home has three kids’ rooms and a playroom upstairs. We clean the upstairs top to bottom on Wednesdays. The rest of the week, no one cleans anything up there. By Tuesday, it kinda looks like a cyclone blew through. And (channelling Stewart Smalley here) that’s . . . OK. As President Beck said, “Mothers who know do less. They permit less of what will not bear good fruit eternally. . . These mothers choose carefully and do not try to choose it all.” It would take too much time, for too little reward, to pick up every toy and book every day of the week. So my first bit of advice is: set realistic standards for housekeeping. Corollary: if you have small children, immaculate is not a reasonable standard.
(2) President Beck did give two purposes for housekeeping: one was to create “a climate for spiritual and temporal growth in their homes.” I think this is a really important idea in that it can help us to determine what needs to be prioritized (or done at all) in terms of housekeeping. For example, I’ve yet to see dust interfere with spiritual growth. But crazed last-minute hunts for missing scout shirts or play scripts or overdue library books can interfere with spiritual growth (ask me how I know this). Hence, I prioritize organization over cleaning. I am a tad uptight about organization, but I do think that in a house with several children, lack of organization is likely to interfere with the peaceful development of family life. Let me give you a few specifics of organization that I’ve found most helpful:

In my particular opinion -- a pretty darn good article. Your thoughts?

Link here

 

[madhatter85]

YEs it is a good article, i;m glad someone agrees withme that her talkw as good, and that people (like the ones on this forum) are just overeacting.

 

[nutshell]

the article doesn't address the BMM2. that's too bad.

 

[madhatter85]

or you can lay off your overexaggeration of what she said. making comments every post about "bmm2" or "baby making machine 2000" certainly does not show that you aren't bitter.

 

[nutshell]

or you can lay off your overexaggeration of what she said. making comments every post about "bmm2" or "baby making machine 2000" certainly does not show that you aren't bitter.

I'm not bitter at all. I just find your reactions amusing.

 

[nutshell]

Besides, I don't think I'm overexaggerating. You're the one who defined capable as "if the plumbing works - USE IT."

 

[madhatter85]

YEah exactly, women have been having children since Eve, and if all women stopped having children the human race would die in a single generation.

and saying "then jst let them have babeit then" is just like if you were a pioneer and you had 4 peopel pushing a handcart and you deciding not to push because, well, theres 3 other capable peopel right? why do i have to contribute. It's like being lazy and selfish. so yes, if you are capable, you should have children. it's a blessing and a great privledge to have children, to have an eternal family, to provide tabernacles for spirits still waiting to be born.

 

[nutshell]

YEah exactly, women have been having children since Eve, and if all women stopped having children the human race would die in a single generation.

and saying "then jst let them have babeit then" is just like if you were a pioneer and you had 4 peopel pushing a handcart and you deciding not to push because, well, theres 3 other capable peopel right? why do i have to contribute. It's like being lazy and selfish. so yes, if you are capable, you should have children. it's a blessing and a great privledge to have children, to have an eternal family, to provide tabernacles for spirits still waiting to be born.

You're definition of capable is the problem - It's a total joke. All the spirits will get their turn.

 

[ladybug83]

Of course there are many women who are not ready to bear children, and some of the reasons for it include financial instability, lack of support, mental or emotional instability, etc, and women who are not ready for such a step can't be expected to bear children or to be mothers. Aside from those difficult situations, however, one should wonder about women who are not ready because they simply feel uncertain or inadequate about motherhood. Perhaps the real question is: Why aren't women ready?
Could the answer have something to do with a selfish outlook--one that promotes career over family, independence/"freedom" over parenhood? Could it have something to do with society's focus on temporal things and a temporal understanding of life?

 

[kadzbiz]

....and if all women stopped having children the human race would die in a single generation......so yes, if you are capable, you should have children. .....

I'll admit I didn't hear Beck's talk. I don't even know who Beck is. But reading this thread, I am amazed that you think it is a duty that capable women should have children. I've never heard such a crock. Everyone has their journey. Some women get pregnant, some don't, some can, some can't, some want to, some don't, some who can't want to and vice versa. If it was such an important thing, God wouldn't have made some good, honest, devout women in the world barren. Gees, one could almost take this further and say that all capable men should go out and plant their seed in as many single women as possible and we know how ridiculous that it!

As for the world population disappearing, well, the world population is growing at a rate of 85 million people a year. I think that a lot more women should be crossing their legs!

.....Why aren't women ready? Could the answer have something to do with a selfish outlook--one that promotes career over family, independence/"freedom" over parenhood? Could it have something to do with society's focus on temporal things and a temporal understanding of life?

Oh boy ladybug83 - apart from my above quote, women have as much right as men to be able to pursue a career, have their independence and freedom. There is more in the world than raising a family. One has a journey of self discovery too and it all depends on your inner feelings and desires, or non-desires as buddhists might say, you shouldn't force your life into one of raising family if it goes against your internal feelings as you would only be doing and injustice to the offspring. I know thru personal experience that there are many many people who should never have had children, because it's the children that are suffering.

 

[ladybug83]

Kadzbiz, by focusing my response on women and motherhood I wasn’t disregarding men and the importance of fatherhood. The idea isn’t to keep women in the home while men pursue careers and ignore their family. As far as men and careers go, I believe the goal is simply to do well enough to adequately support your family. And yes, self-discovery is very important…however, I don’t think it’s vital to spend most of your adult life focusing on yourself.
Like I said, not every woman can be expected to bear children because of whatever issues such as those I mentioned, but once a woman looks past her fears and her selfishness, the general inclination is to view family and motherhood in a different way.

 

[madhatter85]

Of course there are many women who are not ready to bear children, and some of the reasons for it include financial instability, lack of support, mental or emotional instability, etc, and women who are not ready for such a step can't be expected to bear children or to be mothers. Aside from those difficult situations, however, one should wonder about women who are not ready because they simply feel uncertain or inadequate about motherhood. Perhaps the real question is: Why aren't women ready?
Could the answer have something to do with a selfish outlook--one that promotes career over family, independence/"freedom" over parenhood? Could it have something to do with society's focus on temporal things and a temporal understanding of life?

finally another person who agrees with me, you put it better than i could.

 

[kadzbiz]

....... but once a woman looks past her fears and her selfishness, the general inclination is to view family and motherhood in a different way.

I don't think they fear and I don't think they're being selfish. There are those women who HAVE children out of fear and out of selfishness. There are women who have children for the purposes of munchausens(?) by proxy which is a disaster for the child. I think women who chose not to have children have good reason not to and are being totally unselfish IMO. There are plently who have an inner urge to have children, we don't need every single capable women to have children. There are more than enough people on this planet already. Enough that we could be called pests or vermin ourselves. Look what happens when every capable mouse or rabbit or fly or cockroach has a child. For pity's sake, we need the population to level out, even decrease.

 

[madhatter85]

Kadzbiz, this is the LDS DIR, you do not share LDS viewpoints and are debating them here.

Not that i don;t mind a good debate but the point is that our viewpoint is this way and your is different. let's agree to disagree in this forum and if you want to debate it we can start a new thread.

 

[Bishka]

Like I said, not every woman can be expected to bear children because of whatever issues such as those I mentioned, but once a woman looks past her fears and her selfishness, the general inclination is to view family and motherhood in a different way.

No offense, but for many LDS women it's not selfishness. LDS women (in the area of child-bearing and motherhood) are some of the least selfish women I know.

 

[Bishka]

Kadzbiz, this is the LDS DIR, you do not share LDS viewpoints and are debating them here.

He wasn't debating, he was just addressing, if you'd like to make a debate thread about (since you seem so eager to prove people wrong about it), go ahead.

 

[nutshell]

I'm LDS so I'll say it:

I don't think they fear and I don't think they're being selfish. There are those women who HAVE children out of fear and out of selfishness. There are women who have children for the purposes of munchausens(?) by proxy which is a disaster for the child. I think women who chose not to have children have good reason not to and are being totally unselfish IMO. There are plently who have an inner urge to have children, we don't need every single capable women to have children. There are more than enough people on this planet already. Enough that we could be called pests or vermin ourselves. Look what happens when every capable mouse or rabbit or fly or cockroach has a child. For pity's sake, we need the population to level out, even decrease.

 

[Bishka]

I'm LDS so I'll say it:

I don't think they fear and I don't think they're being selfish. There are those women who HAVE children out of fear and out of selfishness. There are women who have children for the purposes of munchausens(?) by proxy which is a disaster for the child. I think women who chose not to have children have good reason not to and are being totally unselfish IMO. There are plently who have an inner urge to have children, we don't need every single capable women to have children. There are more than enough people on this planet already. Enough that we could be called pests or vermin ourselves. Look what happens when every capable mouse or rabbit or fly or cockroach has a child. For pity's sake, we need the population to level out, even decrease.

In addition to that, there are so many neglected and unwanted children out there. We need to worry about them before we try to push out ten babies. They don't have parents who care about them, or people who want them. They should be coming first, they are every bit one of God's children as our own.

 

[madhatter85]

I'm LDS so I'll say it:

I don't think they fear and I don't think they're being selfish. There are those women who HAVE children out of fear and out of selfishness. There are women who have children for the purposes of munchausens(?) by proxy which is a disaster for the child. I think women who chose not to have children have good reason not to and are being totally unselfish IMO. There are plently who have an inner urge to have children, we don't need every single capable women to have children. There are more than enough people on this planet already. Enough that we could be called pests or vermin ourselves. Look what happens when every capable mouse or rabbit or fly or cockroach has a child. For pity's sake, we need the population to level out, even decrease.

you should know that purposely declining the world's population is against god's plan, and besides who are you to judge that the world has too many people?

 

[Bishka]

you should know that purposely declining the world's population is against god's plan, and besides who are you to judge that the world has too many people?

Who are you to judge that it doesn't have enough?

God's commandment was to multiply and replenish the earth. Multiply is one reproducing, replenishing is another. They are not one in the same.