Honoring mothers with a story about 2,000 young men

Despite their love of pointing out all the "weird" things about Latter-day Saints, our Christian neighbors never mention one legitimately weird thing: On Mother's Day every year, we talk about men.And not just any men, but 2,000 warriors.We all know the story, and Arnold Friberg's painting of a mass of young Native American Schwarzeneggers is iconic of our admiration for these 2,000 "stripling warriors" who came to the rescue of the Nephite nation when it was under threat of conquest by their Lamanite cousins. I actually prefer the newer, more realistic paintings that show more typical skinny teenagers, who are not going to get through a war without the help of God.These young men were acting in lieu of their fathers and older brothers, who could not fight. After their conversion to Christianity through the efforts of Ammon and his brothers, those men had renounced their culture of casual killing by burying their weapons deep in the earth and taking an oath never to take up arms even in defense of themselves or their families, lest they fall victim again to the blood lust that addicted them.How bad was that addiction? So bad that they played brutal games of stealing the king's sheep, knowing that the shepherds faced the awful choice of either being killed trying to stop it or being killed by the king for not stopping it. So bad that despite repeated experiences of being defeated by smaller but more technologically adept Nephite forces, their anger would still push them into stupid wars.The unconverted Lamanites, egged on by murderous Nephite dissenters, mounted a rebellion against their newly Christian king. But rather than have his people fight to defend his power, the king said: "And now, my brethren, if our brethren seek to destroy us, behold, we will hide away our swords, yea, even we will bury them deep in the earth, that they may be kept bright, as a testimony that we have never used them, at the last day; and if our brethren destroy us, behold, we shall go to our God and shall be saved" (Alma 24:16).On a day when the unconverted Lamanites were marching forward to kill them and their families, these fathers and older brothers went out to meet them, armed with nothing but prayers. And after the attackers killed 1,000 of them, the killers were overcome by remorse, stopped their attack, and more than 1,000 repented and took the same oath of renunciation.Ammon saved his converts by leading them deep into Nephite territory, where the Nephites promised to shield them from further attacks. But with the passing years, the Lamanite armies, manipulated by Nephite rebels, had the badly outnumbered Nephites fighting a two-front defensive war. And so the young men who had been too young to be warriors, who had never killed in anger, never taken the oath of renunciation, stepped forward to take a different oath to defend the freedom of their families and the Nephite nation. Like the oath of their fathers, it was "unto the laying down of their lives" (Alma 53:17).At one point these 2,000 "little sons" of Helaman found themselves in a desperate battle. They were exhausted from being chased by a much larger Lamanite force for a couple of days, and hot on the heels of the Lamanites was a Nephite division under Antipus. But on the third day the Lamanites had stopped the pursuit. Helaman didn't know if the enemy was occupied fighting Antipus or was simply drawing his small force into a trap. So he asked his battalion what they should do."Now they never had fought, yet they did not fear death; and they did think more upon the liberty of their fathers than they did upon their own lives; yea, they had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, God would deliver them. And they rehearsed unto me the words of their mothers, saying: We do not doubt our mothers knew it" (Alma 56:47-48).When did their mothers teach them this lesson? Was it at a family home evening, as they passed the popcorn? I think, rather, it was on that terrible day when their fathers walked out, unarmed, against the Lamanite armies, and every one of their mothers, as they embraced their younger sons and their daughters, volunteered to become a widow because of their testimony that their families would be reunited in a glorious resurrection.So we tell this story every Mother's Day to honor righteous mothers. But we should remember that this story — of young warriors miraculously saved by the faith their mothers taught them — sets a high and terrifying bar for us.Are we ready to put our lives on the line for our testimonies, so that our sons and daughters can say "We do not doubt our mothers — and fathers — knew it?"(Retired Air Force Lt. Col. Raymond Takashi Swenson is an environmental attorney and Sunday School teacher in Idaho Falls, Idaho.)