The sacrament

I really liked how this week in my class we read about the sacrament during the Easter weekend. I enjoyed learning about the importance of it. I also liked to learn about the symbolism of it.

Its interesting to me that Jesus says that the bread and wine are his body and blood. I think I learned somewhere that when he said that to the apostles they were a little freaked out. Almost like that, it was his actual body and blood. I mean, after seeing everything that the savior could do it wouldn't surprise me that he could turn bread into flash. I think a lot of churches actually believe that when you take the sacrament the bread/wafer actually turns into Christ's body inside the person taking it.

Within the LDS church, we believe that the sacrament is symbolism for the sacrifice that Jesus did for us. The bread only represents his body and the water only represents his blood. You could essentially use anything as long as it represents the savior and his sacrifice.

LDS Family Services

In the textbook and in chapter 15 it talks about LDS Family Services and how it can help unwed parents and adoptive parents. I work with kids at a school and a lot of them are adopted. Many of them feel like they can't connect with their parents. For example, there is a small black boy with white adopted parents. The black boy feels like his parents can't understand his culture and his behavior because they aren't black. The boy makes poor decisions, is rude to his parents, and defies them constantly. the family would I think to be a good candidate for therapy.
90% of parents that adopt are pleased with their adoption and would want to adopt again. Many of the kids that get adopted have a hard time with a relationship with their parents in their teenage years. But it gets better as they get older.

LDS FS also helps with people put their children up for adoption. It is shown that a teenager that gives up their baby for adoption are more likely to graduate high school. It can be a blessing for both the person giving the kid up for adoption and the family looking for a child to adopt.

Boundaries

As a Parent, you have to set limits and boundaries for your children. Otherwise, they will walk all over you. Whenever you give into a boundary to your son or daughter you want to make it known to them that you are letting them break a boundary so that you can build a relationship with them. For example, if I said "dinner time!" And my kids wanted to finish their game really quick before they came upstairs to eat dinner, I would say "ok I will let you finish your game, but I'm letting you do this because I love you and I want to build a relationship with you. you are not getting out of eating dinner as a family."
That way your point is clear about why you are letting them play their game for a bit. They know that you aren't just afraid of the power struggle and conflict of them not wanting to come upstairs to eat dinner.

Communication

Marital Sexuality and intimacy

It is important to be intimate in marriage. Not only to have kids but to express love. A couple should have intimacy often in order to show their love to eachother. They should be willing to talk to eachother about what makes eachother comfortable and uncomfortable. If there is anything that they feel like they are lacking, they should seek hlep from a therapist. A therapist will not judge you and they are open to helping any problem you may have.
Its improtant to not get caught up in jsut being intimate whle married. there are many other aspects of marriage that make it great besides that. Just spending time with eachother is a great way to connect. Watch a movie, read a book together etc.

Equal Partnerships in marriage

I've been reading take back your marriage by Fowler and came across some great stuff about equality that I wanted to share with all of you today.

 Fowler said “the full measure of intimacy in marriage requires husbands and wives to be equal.”. The gospel principle that drives this virtue comes from the scripture first Corinthians 11:11  “Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.” This helps to show that man and woman are equal. They each play a part in the worth of each other.  There was an example of a marriage that was described in the book of a couple that split everything down the middle perfectly equally. Groceries, chores, time with children were exactly equal between each other. It would seem that this example of a marriage would be doing well because they are so just and equal with each other. That was not the case. This marriage was having serious marriage problems. This couple had to learn to trust each other and to relax about having everything equal.

Flowers says “Spouses who have confidence in the fairness of their arrangements generally perceive justice in their relationships in a global way and do not need to struggle over their equality on a daily basis.” This to me means that they don’t have to be so detailed about their equality. Only more as a general sense.

Examples that a marriage could apply this virtue of justice could come in many ways. One way is having separate but equal responsibility. The husband could be the one that provides for the family financially. That is a very big responsibility. The wife could take care of the children which is regarded by many as an equal responsibility but just different. If the couple doesn’t have children, the wife could still take care of the house or make dinner for themselves. That is also a big responsibility. 

Putting it all together

John 7:24 I can judge if I judge righteously.

A lot of people think that they should avoid judging anything like the plague. I have heard many times where I would say something about someone and they would say "don't judge her/him!" but I feel like it is ok to judge things. I think the scriptures just mention that we can't make a final judgment. there was a missionary on the mission where I served who would always yell at people and say "Terrestrial!" if we did anything wrong. It was quite annoying. And in his case, he was condemning people to a final judgment. He should not do that. But if I had a guy that had tattoos, cuts on their arms, obscene language and pictures on their clothes apply to babysit my kid compared to a girl who is a child development major, then I would choose the girl. Most likely she would be the better candidate to babysit kids. But I can't know for sure who would be a better babysitter. The guy with the tattoos might have grown up with 12 other siblings and might be a great babysitter while the girl in the child development class might have homicidal tendencies.  But chances are those would not be the case. I appreciate that our church is not a stickler for judging. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I feel like we are pretty reasonable and logical people and just want to do the best we can. I don't ever hear from people in the church I attend that "I shouldn't judge them." But I also don't judge people out loud very often either. 

I feel like that we are left to judge for ourselves many things. But the final judgment of someone should be left to only God. I feel like the blessings of my church (LDS) giving us the ability to judge had helped me a lot in my life. I can judge what restaurants would be better, what friends I should hang out with, and schools that I should attend. 

The Family FAML 100

Blog post on finding an Eternal Companion.
First off, you have to understand that no one is perfect. That you have to be able to understand that people all come with their own skeletons in the closet. some of those skeletons might be a little too much to handle or they might be ok to handle. It depends on you and what you can deal with. I remember thinking to myself that no one would want to marry me because of some mistakes that I made in my life. I would go on these dates and I would tell the girl the 2nd date about some struggles I had had in my life. Almost every one of those girls never talked to me again. Except for one girl. She was ok with my struggle and decided to marry me. It was the best thing that I ever did. She saw the potential in me and knew that I was a hard worker and that I wasn't going to let my flaws bring me down. Marry potential not perfection.

Gospel Topic: 3 Separate Beings.

This week in my class we read in the new testament. Some thing s that stuck out to me was when John the Baptist was baptizing Jesus. It seems obvious to me that God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are 3 separate beings. You have Jesus going into the water, God speaking from above, and a dove flying around during the baptism that represents the holy ghost. I talked to a lot of people during my mission about the Trinity and it was all just so confusing. I like how Joseph Smith saw God and Jesus Christ as 2 separate beings. It made our way of discussing the Godhead much easier. It just seems more logical. There are many scriptures as well that prove that Jesus and God are separate beings. But for some reason, people still believe that they are all one. I know that there are a few scriptures that seem to mention God being one, and some creed made that doctrine official hundreds of years ago. But I just wish people would be able to open their hearts more to the possibility of God being separate.

Related Gospel Topic: Missionary Work

I served my mission in the Canada Toronto Mission. It was probably one of the hardest things that I have ever done. I remember thinking to myself "there has got to be a better way to spread the gospel instead of knocking on doors all day." Because most of the converts you get from knocking on doors are also on welfare. That's what it seems at least in my experience. I know that we are some of the few churches to go out and spread the message of Jesus Christ and the only church to spread the message of the restored gospel. So it makes what we do very important for everyone to come and hear the message. There are a few things that are being done right now to hasten the work like facebook, and social media. But I wish that there was more. I wonder what missionary work will be like in 30 years. Will we keep knocking on doors? Will all missions be paid for by tithing money? Will we not do missionary work the traditional way and just do missionary work from our computers? there is a lot of room for more possibilities on how to hasten the work. I'm curious what the church has in store for the next 30 years.

Divorce

This week we talked a lot about divorce. America has the highest divorce rate in the world. This would seem shocking to people and some people might think that this could be because couples might not have proper marriage skills here in the US.  That's what I thought. But, Brother Williams, my teacher in class, said that "the reason we have the most divorces is because we also have the most marriages." that made sense to me.
People should do their best to not get divorced. If a couple have children involved and want to get a divorce they should seek help from counselors and do everything they can to stay a family. But if being divorced actually helps the children, then they should get divorced. I was reading that nowadays many reasons for divorce consist of "we don't get along anymore, he has changed, I'm bored, etc" Those are very soft reasons to get a divorce and can be helped very easily. Hard reasons to get divorced would be anything that consists of the 3 A's. Adultery, Addiction, and Abuse. If any of those 3 A's is involved in a marriage, the divorce is justified.
After a marriage has been through many years together, it is easier to gain more loyalty to each other within the marriage. The most vulnerable time within a marriage is within the first 2 years of being married. There is a lot of adjustment within that time and any conflicts or pressure can cause a lot of stress for a newly wed couple. People have to understand that when they get married that things take time to get used to. Believe that if challenges come up within a marriage to not think about getting a divorce but to work through the problems together.

Fathers and Finances

It is common to think that the father provides for the family financially and the mother takes care of the children. In the discussion that I had in class this week and the readings, I learned that it is very important to have these roles be played in the family. From the readings, it showed that a mother who forgoes education to stay home with the kids is just as important than a woman who goes on to get an education. Because the kids that she raise are the future generation and can help generations to come.  I know that in my family, my mother stayed home with us for most of our lives. We were brought up very well. But I think we could have been raised better if my mom had continued to stay home with the family rather then go out and get an education. I think it was a sacrifice, my mom has a great education and job that really helps the family now. She now is a counselor/therapist and really is able to help with any personal problems that I may have. My father has always been such a hard worker and has provided much of the family with the financial income. He has been a great example to me on how to be a great father.

Stress in the Family

Something that was taught this week in class that I seemed to learn really well was the teacher taught about how stress on an individual affects everyone in the family. He had a few volunteers in the class go up and hold hands in a circle.  The teacher would then pull on one of the volunteers and say stuff like "work was hard today.... you don't have enough money to pay the bills....etc." and then he would go and pull on someone else in the circle and say stuff like "that girl at school is such a bully.... you failed that class.... etc" all the while pulling on that person in the circle. It showed that when one person is going under a lot of stress in the family, everyone else can feel stress too.

I feel like in my family we seem to handle stress very well. Or we just don't have many things to be stressed about. We don't do drugs, No one has any significant diseases, And I think we do pretty well financially as well which helps not have too much stress. A lot of times it's good to talk about the stress you are having with members of your family. sometimes they can help or they might be able to understand some of the difficulties you are going through.

Sexual Intimacy and Family Life

In class, I learned a lot of stuff. It was great. I honestly have the best major in the world. We covered a lot of info on sexual intimacy. Most of the time I feel like the stuff we cover about this subject or the stuff we hear about this subject doesn't apply to much to LDS people. There were plenty of statistics wich described the sexual involvement of college kids and teenagers. It was very surprising to hear about how many people would have sexual relations outside of marriage. That definitely is not the case here in the LDS community. I guarantee it is a lot less. I would assume LDS sexual relations are different than people that are not LDS.I feel like in marriage it would be hard to live with someone of the opposite gender. We discussed how males and females are extremely different in so many ways. My mom is a therapist and she told me of this LDS couple that got married. When they first got married, the wife loved to be intimate with her spouse. But after the first month of marriage, she didn't really want to be intimate anymore. This really made the husband stressed and frustrated. Part of it was the LDS upbringing, but most of it was that the wife was abused in her life and didn't feel comfortable being intimate. It sounds like there has to be a lot of talk and open discussion within a marriage and a couple regarding intimacy. Parents should be able to teach their children effective sex education. Children should be able to talk to their parents about sex and not get their information from unreliable sources like the internet or friends their age.

Transitions into marriage

In class this week we discussed transitioning into marriage. Some of the major things that a couple goes through in adjusting to marriage boundaries. I would think that a difficult part would be to leave your friends behind after you get married. I wouldn't want my wife to continue to talk to boys she knew before our marriage. If she did though, She would have to run by anything that she would think is questionable to communicate to someone of the opposite sex. It is better in my mind, to have a marriage have appropriate tight boundaries rather than lenient loose boundaries. Other aspects of a marriage transition that might be hard would be having to deal with the in-laws. You don't want to spend too much time with them and you don't want to not spend not enough time with them. It's important to find a balance. Many people think that its ok to talk to your family about personal trial or problems you might be going through. So the spouse might tell their mom or dad about their husband's drinking habit or how bad of a day at work their husband had. When the husband wouldn't want other people to know about that stuff about his life even if it is family members that would know.
Before a couple gets married, they should have some serious sit-down meetings about what is ok and what is not ok when they get married. That way there won't be any surprises when they get married and there would be fewer problems.

In my Family Relations class, we learned about family rules and boundaries. The rules in my own family consist of reading scriptures, doing chores, feeding the animals. Those are some common rules families seem to have. Rules and boundaries help a family remain more stable. I know that families that let their kids be free and do what they want tend to be more chaotic. Children in a home love the sense of security and boundaries. there is another set of boundaries that is related more to personal space. Between a couple, there could be walls that separate each other from coming closer together. We did a scenario where a man, his wife, and their son went to counseling. Their son had a problem with asthma and it brought a lot of stress into the family and into the little boy's life. The therapist did his best to bring down the boundaries/walls that the family had. He had them be open with their feelings for one another, and he made them feel comfortable. One particular technique that he had the family do was to comfort each other physically during their son's asthma attack. It brought them closer together and helped their son during his asthma attack. I thought the scenario was super fun and interesting! If there are any conflicts within a relationship, talk about it and be open with each other. IT can really help to bring down boundaries/walls.

There are many myths related to marriage and family relations. I've always liked this quote in regards to marriage. I feel a lot of people expect the person they marry to be perfect. No one is perfect. It's always better to look at the good in someone and to overlook mistakes they make. No one is "the best" or "your soulmate". Simply look at the potential of the person and believe that it will all work out. 

Within family relations, people might also think that their relationships with their children, spouses, and siblings should be perfect. That is not true. I know that my own family is pretty great. But we are not perfect. We have to learn to get along and do the best we can with what we've got. 

Classmate Blog Addresses

• https://agirlwithafuture.blogspot.com
• http://alittlebitaboutfamily.blogspot.com/
• http://fightingforfamily18.blogspot.com
• http://everything-and-anything-plus-more.blogspot.com
• http://ajolleylife.weebly.com/
• http://lotsoflittlethings17.blogspot.com/
• http://eternalroads.weebly.com
• http://the-ramblings-of-a-young-mind.blogspot.com/
• http://thoughtsaboutfamily.blogspot.com/
• http://theneedtoknowthings-family.blogspot.com/
• http://kaylaguy4.weebly.com/blog
• Family2me.blogspot.com
• http://laurynannettemcclain.blogspot.com/
• http://kenziekate3.wixsite.com/mysite
• http://kayleerene.blogspot.com/
• http://www.myyoungwildandmarriedlife.com
• http://waywheeler.wordpress.com
• http://amberleakay.blogspot.com/
• https://lipglossplusflipflops.wordpress.com/
• http://www.garnstar.blogspot.com/
• http://shelbiefamilyrelations.blogspot.com
• http://emilymarriageandfamily.weebly.com/
• http://bonniefamilyrelations.weebly.com/
• http://morgansfamilycoursereflections.blogspot.com/
• http://familyrelationsbykarlyb.blogspot.com/
• http://myfamilyrelationsjournal.blogspot.com/
• http://ryanfamilyrelations.blogspot.com/
• http://skfamilyrelations.weebly.com/
• http://relationsfamily.blogspot.com/
• http://familyrelationsb.weebly.com
• http://relationsfamily.weebly.com