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  • Women giving blessings

    Perhaps this has been discussed to death on CG or even here, but I haven't noticed it and I haven't looked much.

    For much of the first 100 years of LDS history, Mormon women could lay their hands on the sick, anoint them with oil, and offer a blessing for their recovery. They felt a special obligation to bless their own children and other mothers during pregnancy “confinement” and childbirth. That all ended in the mid-20th century, when the practice became the exclusive realm of the men-only Mormon priesthood.
    At an April 1844 Nauvoo General Conference, the authors note that Young declared, “I want a wife that can take care of my chi[ldre]n when I am away — who can pray — lay on hands anoint with oil & baffle the enemy.”

    Young was such an advocate of female healing, Stapley and Wright argue, that in 1869 he chastized women who were seeking blessings from men, saying: “Why do you not live so as to rebuke disease? It is your privilege to do so without sending for the elders. ... ”
    http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/blogsfa...hurch.html.csp

    When I was a missionary we went one Sunday to an RLDS meeting. There were women blessing and passing the sacrament, but also there was a blessing in the middle of the main meeting in which a mother (accompanied, as I recall by other women) blessed one of her children who was sick. As foreign and peculiar as it seemed to a born and raised Utah mormon, the idea seems perfectly normal to me now.
    Ain't it like most people, I'm no different. We love to talk on things we don't know about.

    "The only one of us who is so significant that Jeff owes us something simply because he decided to grace us with his presence is falafel." -- All-American

    GIVE 'EM HELL, BRIGHAM!

  • #2
    My dad always invited and sometimes insisted on my Mom participating in blessings (both of healing and 'father's' blessings). I don't think I realized that this is currently unorthodox until I was on my mission.
    Ute-ī sunt fīmī differtī

    It can't all be wedding cake.

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    • #3
      Originally posted by oxcoug View Post
      My dad always invited and sometimes insisted on my Mom participating in blessings (both of healing and 'father's' blessings). I don't think I realized that this is currently unorthodox until I was on my mission.
      My father always stopped short of inviting her into the circle but would without fail start the blessing on her behalf.
      "Either evolution or intelligent design can account for the athlete, but neither can account for the sports fan." - Robert Brault

      "Once I seen the trades go down and the other guys signed elsewhere," he said, "I knew it was my time now." - Derrick Favors

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      • #4
        Joseph Fielding Smith, in his series "Answers to Gospel Questions" advocated the participation of women in blessings over children.

        I asked a religion prof. why it wasn't more common and he said, "I'd strongly urge you not to."

        If I asked my wife to join, she'd think I'd gone completely apostate.
        Jesus wants me for a sunbeam.

        "Cog dis is a bitch." -James Patterson

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        • #5
          Originally posted by oxcoug View Post
          My dad always invited and sometimes insisted on my Mom participating in blessings (both of healing and 'father's' blessings). I don't think I realized that this is currently unorthodox until I was on my mission.
          that's pretty cool.
          Te Occidere Possunt Sed Te Edere Non Possunt Nefas Est.

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          • #6
            I know of an instance where a SP had his wife give him a healing blessing with laying on of hands and consecrated oil when in the mountain wilderness. They were backpacking as a family and there were no other priesthood holders.
            “Not the victory but the action. Not the goal but the game. In the deed the glory.”
            "All things are measured against Nebraska." falafel

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            • #7
              So that's what they're calling it these days.
              τὸν ἥλιον ἀνατέλλοντα πλείονες ἢ δυόμενον προσκυνοῦσιν

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              • #8
                Originally posted by RedSox View Post

                If I asked my wife to join, she'd think I'd gone completely apostate.
                That's what I thought. Until I asked her, and she willingly joined.

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                • #9
                  http://mormonstories.org/podcast/Mor...AGiftGiven.mp3

                  Some might argue that the women were taking it upon themselves to do these blessings. However, even if they did they had the full support of early church prophets. It seems it really started to die out in the early 1900s, which is when women starting asking if it was okay. I learned early on in life to never ask someone in authority in the church if something is okay because it usually is....unless you ask first.
                  "Discipleship is not a spectator sport. We cannot expect to experience the blessing of faith by standing inactive on the sidelines any more than we can experience the benefits of health by sitting on a sofa watching sporting events on television and giving advice to the athletes. And yet for some, “spectator discipleship” is a preferred if not primary way of worshipping." -Pres. Uchtdorf

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                  • #10
                    Originally posted by RedSox View Post
                    If I asked my wife to join, she'd think I'd gone completely apostate.
                    Originally posted by Jacob View Post
                    That's what I thought. Until I asked her, and she willingly joined.
                    I actually tried this last fall when I gave my son a blessing. She absolutely refused. I tried to insist and she got very upset, so I dropped it quickly and apologized.

                    Originally posted by Blueintheface View Post
                    My father always stopped short of inviting her into the circle but would without fail start the blessing on her behalf.
                    I have been reading In Sacred Lonliness for the last month. I have been sharing with my wife all of the times in which women gave blessings to each other and to men, including Heber C. Kimball. She has seemed to soften on the issue.

                    I think the next time I give a blessing that I will follow your father's example and say something like "By the authority of the priesthood that I hold, and by the faith of your mother, we give you a blessing..." even if her hands are not on his head. Baby steps...

                    Edit: The reason that I want my wife to participate is not to be heterodox, but because she has more faith than me, and I honestly believe that the blessing would have more effect with her direct participation.
                    Last edited by Sullyute; 05-11-2011, 07:46 AM.
                    "Friendship is the grand fundamental principle of Mormonism" - Joseph Smith Jr.

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                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Sullyute View Post
                      I actually tried this last fall when I gave my son a blessing. She absolutely refused. I tried to insist and she got very upset, so I dropped it quickly and apologized.
                      She must have forgotten that time she covenanted to follow and obey you.

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                      • #12
                        There is no priesthood required to stand in the circle.

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                        • #13
                          I'll raise you one more. D. Michael Quinn asserts (with quotes from BY to back him up that I find persuasive to the extent I find anything from BY persuasive) that women are given the MP as part of the endowment already. He then remarks it is of little practical importance as they are not ordained to any office therein.

                          I'll see if I can find chapter and verse from Origins of Power when I get home.
                          Awesomeness now has a name. Let me introduce myself.

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                          • #14
                            Originally posted by Moliere View Post
                            http://mormonstories.org/podcast/Mor...AGiftGiven.mp3

                            Some might argue that the women were taking it upon themselves to do these blessings. However, even if they did they had the full support of early church prophets. It seems it really started to die out in the early 1900s, which is when women starting asking if it was okay. I learned early on in life to never ask someone in authority in the church if something is okay because it usually is....unless you ask first.
                            I actually read a piece on this a little while ago. On my Kindle I have a series of essays about historical bits of mormonism as it relates to polygamy, and one of the essays dealt with blessings by women. I'll see if I can reread and give the synopsis. I want to say this essay was by Quinn as well but it might not have been.
                            Awesomeness now has a name. Let me introduce myself.

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                            • #15
                              Originally posted by nikuman View Post
                              I'll raise you one more. D. Michael Quinn asserts (with quotes from BY to back him up that I find persuasive to the extent I find anything from BY persuasive) that women are given the MP as part of the endowment already. He then remarks it is of little practical importance as they are not ordained to any office therein.

                              I'll see if I can find chapter and verse from Origins of Power when I get home.
                              the language of the ceremony certainly seemed to imply that to me (as an admittedly new temple-goer). also, is the mp or ap invoked in initiatory ordinances performed by women?
                              Te Occidere Possunt Sed Te Edere Non Possunt Nefas Est.

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