Thank you for posting YouTube clip, which is effective and slightly amusing in its simple objective. It’s clearly one of many useful and varied resources on LDS culture, beliefs, and worship ceremonies on YouTube.

Regarding making more time for families, how do LDS parents wrestle with the additional demands on time they experience as a result of their time-intensive church assignments or “callings”? For instance, many leadership positions require taxing hours away from their families primarily because they are “voluntary” (i.e, on top of full-time employment outside of church)? I imagine Sundays, in addition to multiple nights throughout the week, can be draining on some LDS families because of this reality. Is this lack of family time on Sundays facing certain LDS families one of the reasons for the existence of the LDS Monday night as “family night”?

On a related LDS family matter, many of us have been confronted by Mormon missionaries with a message, or even a free DVD, of “Families are Forever.” A sincere, respectful question: isn’t this motto a solution in search of a problem? That is, what Christian believes there is separation or division among the blessed in heaven? Of course, Jesus himself teaches in extremely plain and simple terms, and Christian history has always held, that there is no marriage in heaven as we know marriage. But, shared Christian belief realizes that the communion among believers in heaven results in a bond significantly greater in love than what we perceive in our knowledge of marriage. That bond is a consequence of the everlasting worship and praising of God. Why wouldn’t God be the focus of any discussion involving the word “forever”?

DJB,

I just want to share my personal experience. I have served in a variety of callings in the LDS church. Some were time intensive, while others required very little time. But I have to say that the good things that have come into my and my family’s lives as a result of my service, whatever my church calling, have totally outweighed any sacrifice of personal or family time. I am a better wife and mother because of my membership in the LDS church. Regularly, my husband, my children and I are taught things that help us to love one another and put each other first. And in my callings I have never felt a sense that I should devote more time to my calling and less time to my family. On the contrary, the people I reported to always asked me about my family and if I felt like I was able to give them the attention and time that they needed.

DJB,

Family Home Evening or “family night” began as a formal LDS practice in 1915. To my understanding, it came about in part because of the major shift from rural to urban living. On the farm, most every night was family night. But city living and ever-increasing discretionary time brought many opportunities for people to be out of the home. (And nowadays, with television and internet, we spend much time outside the home while inside the home.) I don’t think church leaders viewed urban living as inherently bad or inferior to rural life, just that important family time might be crowded out by activities outside the home.

The idea of Family Home Evening is that families will be stronger if they will designate a time each week as sacred: only for family-strengthening activities…no soccer practice, no music lessons, no club meetings, and, yes, no church meetings. It has been a great benefit to our family, and our kids love it and look forward to it (granted, they are very young).

Rosalynde,

I appreciate you sharing this clip. I was just telling someone this morning that these silly, simple “Family: It’s about time.” videos have, perhaps more than any other influence, helped me spend more time with my children. I often come home from work with my mind set on some task I need to accomplish or some recreation I want to get to, but then I see my girls, think of these videos and remember that childhood passes very quickly.

I don’t know If I said it already but …Excellent site, keep up the good work. I read a lot of blogs on a daily basis and for the most part, people lack substance but, I just wanted to make a quick comment to say I’m glad I found your blog. Thanks.

DJB, thanks for the comment. As Emily indicated, some callings are demanding, some are not, and most assignments last for several years at most. There is an effort to be sensitive to family demands when issuing callings, and there is frequent reiteration that “no success can compensate for failure in the home” and “the most important work you will ever do is within the walls of your own home.” That said, yes–for those who have demanding callings coupled with small children and busy professional lives, church service can take a toll during the period of intense service. You have to remember, though, that service in the ward strengthens and enlivens an institution that then gives back abundantly to families and children, both formally through church activities and informally through the strong social support network that develops in a ward. While I might spend several hours a week teaching other children in the ward, my own children are fortunate to receive the attention, investment and teaching of many other adults in return. And I have a network of trusted friends to turn to in moments of need. That kind of social capital is immensely valuable. So church service often redounds to the benefit of our families in the long run, even when there are temporary costs.

In addition to what has already been said about Family Home Evening, it’s part of a suite of home religious observances, including family prayer, family scripture study, and fathers’ blessings. All of this is predicated on the idea that the family is the most basic priesthood institution. (This idea isn’t unique to Mormons, of course; as part of my dissertation I looked at this idea in English Protestantism of the 17th century.)

As far as the “families are forever” motto, it is often communicated as a fairly bland traditional family values message to which few people would take exception. (Indeed, that’s part of its purpose: in addition to the overt message about the importance of families, there’s the public-relations message that Mormons are not strange, we share much in common with mainstream family culture, etc.) Mormons seem to have internalized and institutionalized the traditional family values message to a greater extent than other groups, however: compared to national averages, Mormons have less pre-marital sex, marry more and younger, divorce less (among temple-married Mormons, at least), have more children, and subscribe to more traditional gender roles. (One sociologist called these the “Four Cs” of Mormon family life: chastity, conjugality, child-rearing, and chauvinism.)

As you’re aware, of course, there’s a much deeper theological basis to the “families are forever” theme. In Mormon teaching, marriage (and parenthood, which is entailed in marriage) is the primordial social institution, and the only social institution that will persist in the hereafter. Because of its inherent capacity for procreative “enlargement,” marriage is central to the Mormon vision of eternal life and exaltation. It’s not just that exaltation is necessary for eternal marriage, however; eternal marriage is necessary for exaltation (although that marriage does not always occur during mortal life). In that sense, Mormons understand the teaching that families are forever to reinforce—not compete with—the glory of God’s majesty.