Now that my children are all in school, I feel like I should be devoting my time to many worthwhile projects and especially things I have put off until a better "season" in my life. One of those is family history work.

Because Mormons believe in a life before this one and a life after, and because we believe in eternal families--families that will be together in the life after this, we do family history work. We believe that ordinances need to be done for a person to qualify for eternal life. Let's discuss eternal life versus immortality. All people will gain immortality because Jesus Christ atoned for our sins and was resurrected. We will all be resurrected. That's immortality--living forever with our body and spirit. Eternal life is life with God. In order to live with God in the same exalted state as Him, we must be obedient to his commandments and partake of the ordinances that will allow us to be with Him again. Those saving ordinances (outward sacred, formal acts performed by priesthood authority--God's authority given to man on earth--that show our inward commitment) are baptism, confirmation, ordination to the Melchizedek Priesthood (for men), the temple endowment, and the marriage sealing. When those ordinances have not been performed on earth before a person dies, those living can perform those ordinances in the temple in behalf of the deceased. Then the entire family--all posterity past, present, and future--can be eternally together or together forever with God.

Phew. That's some deep doctrine. So, Mormons want to search out our relatives and have the temple work done. We also want to learn more about our ancestors to feel connected to them.
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That's what I should want, but mostly I feel guilt that I'm supposed to be doing family history work and I'm not. Today I went to the Family History Center in Meridian to begin. And I'm still almost as confused about what to do as I was before. Now I need to pray for the desire and direction in helping me know what to do next.

Here's what a typical Sunday is like for our family. I sleep in until 7:30 am (which is really sleeping in because during the week I get up around 5 or 5:30 am). My husband is up before 6:30 am to attend bishopric meetings. He's a leader in our ward (the people who live in a geographical area that we attend church with). Our family rule this year is to be showered and dressed and ready for church by 9 am. We eat cold cereal. This is a big deal at our house because we eat cold cereal only twice a week. This is one way it's a day of rest for me. No cooking breakfast. We may or may not do anything productive until we leave for church. I would love for us to write letters to missionaries, write in our journals, or do family history in the time we have before church, but that only happens occasionally. Church is at 11 am this year. We are on a three year rotation for the time that we go to church--9 am, 11 am, or 1 pm--since there are three wards in our building and we share the space. Often we have choir practice before church at 10:30 am. On Sundays when we don't have choir we try to arrive by 10:45 am so my son can help prepare the sacrament. We say hello to my husband before he sits on the stand--the raised seats behind the pulpit. We chat a little with each other or the people in front or behind us while we are waiting, although we are supposed to be listening reverently to the beautiful organ prelude music. Church lasts three hours. There's a sacrament meeting where we partake of the sacrament--bread and water, sing, pray, listen to talks prepared by members of the congregation, and sometimes sing a choir number. That is 70 minutes. Then I attend an adult Sunday School class and Relief Society--a class with women. The children attend Primary. The youth attend Sunday School and Young Men's or Young Women's. After we visit in the halls, we get to our vehicle and are home about 2:30 pm. We eat a small lunch--usually leftovers--again another way for me to rest, and take a nap. When the children were younger, they played quietly while my husband and I napped. Because this was our routine, they played together better on Sunday than any other day of the week. Sometimes my husband gets to come home and take a nap too and some weeks he has more responsibilities after church like counting the tithing. Around 4 pm we get up and work on dinner or go to choir at 4:30 pm. The late afternoon and evening vary depending on meetings, choir, home teaching. We try to have a gospel discussion on a topic from Preach My Gospel--the missionary manual, and discuss our plans for the week. We might take a walk or talk on the phone to our married daughter who is in college. We eat dinner, usually a simple one. My favorites are the ones my husband prepares. Much of the time we have appointments with members of the ward for home teaching or visiting teaching or we are being visited. Sometimes we have meetings. I like to go to bed early.

We don't watch TV. We don't go to the lake. We don't picnic. We don't go to stores. Some families do watch TV. That's a choice that is up to each family.
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I don't know if that schedule sounds like a day of rest to you. My current calling or responsibility in the church is working with Primary leaders--those who teach children--in the stake. The stake consists of 11 wards. I get to visit their wards a few times a year. Then my day is busier. But what I love about the sabbath day, is the break from the regular stuff during the week. No homework. No playing with friends. No cleaning bathrooms. It's a day to rest and be with our family.

Yes.
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My children think it's gross when my husband and I kiss. But let's talk about kissing before marriage or teenage kissing. The goal for a young man and young woman is to remain sexually pure. The For Strength of Youth pamphlet says, "Do not have any sexual relations before marriage," and "Never do anything that could lead to sexual transgression." This means no sex before marriage, no sexual behavior that is disrespectful or leads to a situation where you feel out of control or are not able to feel the Holy Ghost--a form of personal revelation. The specifics in the Fort Strength of Youth are, "Before marriage, do not participate in passionate kissing, lie on top of another person, or touch the private, sacred parts of another person’s body, with or without clothing." As a youth I tried to read between the lines of specific standards like this. So...that means I can kiss and hold hands and give back rubs. Ask yourself, are you still in control of the situation? Can you stop? Will this behavior lead to a situation that you'll regret? And deciding in the passionate moment is too late. Decide on your standards before the moment because hormones and love are exciting and exhilarating and hard to stop when you get going. Did I kiss boys when I was a teenager? Yes. Should I have done less kissing? Yes. Do I think my children should avoid kissing until marriage? No. Kissing can be part of the dating experience.

Let's talk about the current dating situations in my community. You're supposed to not be exclusive with one person. No boyfriend or girlfriend. The reason for this suggestion from the prophet is because this leads to emotional closeness that should come when you are dating to get married--not when you are dating as a teenager with plans in your future like graduating from high school and a mission and college--and physical closeness can lead to transgression. But you shouldn't be making out with a different person every weekend. Or holding hands with a different partner each week. That's cheating and disrespectful. What I see is that teenagers expect that if a boy likes a girl and the girl likes the boy back, then they have to be "going out" or boyfriend and girlfriend--exclusive. It doesn't have to be that way. Go on dates with many different young people. Enjoy this time of life. Are you going to develop feelings for one of them? Probably. That's natural. That's what happens. And it's exciting.

This dating and kissing standard is confusing. Date lots of people. It's okay to kiss a little bit. But don't kiss everyone you date. If you like one young person in particular, then maybe that's the person you kiss occasionally. But if you're seen holding hands at school then everyone will know you're exclusive and then you won't be following the counsel to date many different people and no one else will want to ask you out because they don't want to violate the boyfriend/girlfriend policy. You could only hold hands in private or kiss behind the bushes where no one sees. That can lead to more temptation. It's a tricky balance.

Be prayerful. Read your scriptures. Attend seminary. Do personal evaluations of your purity and make adjustments as needed. Repent if needed. Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ want you to succeed, because having a family where the husband and wife are completely faithful and come to the marriage sexually pure, leads to trust and fidelity in marriage. Isn't that what you want from your parents? Isn't that the kind of home children should be born into?

Now that I'm old and married, I'm glad my husband and I can kiss whenever we want. He wishes we would more often. Don't peek behind the bushes.