Divine Potential for Women

[thatonemom]

I'm struggling with my Relief Society lesson for Sunday, which is (SPOILER ALERT!) all about our divine potential. The "Earthly Father, Heavenly Father" video is wonderful if you're a man, but really lacking in personal application if you're a woman. (Watch it again. Other than enjoying nap time, pointing out a few letters, and being at the dinner table, the mom is pretty non-existent)

I have no interest in trying to be controversial or edgy in my lesson, or in any way make the sisters uncomfortable. But does anyone have suggestions of quotes or something authoritative that's a little more applicable to the divine nature of women? The manual is nice, and of course will be the bulk of the lesson, but I wouldn't mind finding something to make it more relevant and personal to the sisters.

[Whistler]

so... maybe you can quote that line from "O my Father"* and ask them what they think it means. See if you can be totally upfront about Heavenly Mother--something like "We know She exists, and had something to do with making our spirits, but other than that we don't know much about Her." Then ask what kind of attributes she would have (most of them God should have too, so this shouldn't be too hard). I don't know, is that too edgy?

She's mentioned in primary lessons, so bringing her up has to be okay.

here's another quote I found (you've probably found it too?). It's full of assumptions that women are somehow inherently more spiritual than men, which I take issue with, but it might be a good conversation-starter.

http://www.lds.org/ensign/1987/11/a-cha ... +mother%22
"Women are endowed with special traits and attributes that come trailing down through eternity from a divine mother. Young women have special God-given feelings about charity, love, and obedience. Coarseness and vulgarity are contrary to their natures. They have a modifying, softening influence on young men. Young women were not foreordained to do what priesthood holders do. Theirs is a sacred, God-given role, and the traits they received from heavenly mother are equally as important as those given to the young men."


*"In the heav'ns are parents single?
No, the thought makes reason stare!
Truth is reason; truth eternal
Tells me I've a mother there."

[thatonemom]

That's not edgy. I was more thinking I didn't want to end up in a discussion of why we know so little about Heavenly Mother, with people volunteering various false doctrine/email forwards/personal opinions. (I hate having to say "we're not going to get into that" because it always ends up awkward and people get offended. But you can't let that sort of thing go on.)

And I'm with you on the assumptions in that quote, too. I don't think women honestly are any more charitable or obedient than men. I think we're just more regularly in circumstances where those qualities are valuable or essential.

Anyway, I do want to talk about Heavenly Mother, because that's who us women will become like. But I'm having a hard time coming up with good information on her, and what she's like, and what she does.

[UffishThought]

When I think divine potential, I don't even think gender. I think of it almost as a genetic thing. I have God-genes, which means that if I grow up right, I've got the potential to do and be someone so fantastic that I can't quite comprehend it. It's all about trying to grow towards that person that is patient and wise and powerful and everything I wish I could be.

[thatonemom]

That's a good point, Uffish. This is the quote in the manual that got me thinking about gender:

"It seems, after all the education that we had in things pertaining to the celestial worlds, that there are some Latter-day Saints who are so well satisfied with simply knowing that the work is true that when you come to talk to them of our great future they seem surprised, and think it has nothing to do particularly with them."

He's talking about being exalted and knowing who we can become in the next life, and I wondered if women especially felt like it has less to do with them, or is less real for them. (sometimes it is for me, but that doesn't mean I need to devote lesson time to it). In the end I want to try to make the potential we all have a little less abstract. But there are definitely ways to approach the same idea without bringing in gender.

[Katya]

If I was preparing this lesson, one thing I would keep in mind is that LDS women have a tendency to be very perfectionistic and hard on themselves, and I think this lesson could have the potential of reinforcing that, so I would try to approach the lesson in a way that was very encouraging and supporting. (Which is not really what you were asking about, but it's something I've been thinking about a lot, so it came to mind.)

Also, I think you can say "Heavenly Parents" a lot in place of "Heavenly Father" or "God," and I wouldn't consider that a very controversial substitution, but it does keep in mind that it's not just Heavenly Father who's out there.