This
past Christmas, we received a lot of Christmas cards and Christmas
letters. It was good to hear from friends, to catch up a little on what
was happening in their lives. And in those Christmas letters, my wife
and I could hear voices of those we used to converse with. What an
exercise in nostalgia!
But everyone will understand, I think, when I say that there was one Christmas card that stood out above all.
My
older daughter, Emily, delivered it by hand. We had been hearing about
it for some time, since the making of that card had been her big
project for the weeks leading up to Christmas.
Titled
\"For Unto Us ... ,\" it consists of thoughts and tributes to the
great-but-humble participants in the Christmas story and, above all
else, testimonies of Christ.Usually I have great resistance to
commercial Christmas cards that attempt to say something \"spiritual.\"
Mostly because the Christ they talk about has so little to do with the
Savior we love and teach about and try to follow in our lives as
Latter-day Saints.
The group that
created \"For Unto Us ...\" consisted of the members of the singles ward in
the Santa Monica Stake. Under the impetus of Bishop Larry Eastland, a
group of young unmarried women and men got together and created
something moving and beautiful.
When
I read it, I decided at once that instead of our normal Christmas Eve
scripture readings, this time we would read the testimonies and look at
the moving, artful photographs.
You
can look at them, too, and read what they wrote and see all their
names, by going to the Web site of the photographer, Rachel Thurston: snipr.com/forunto.These
young, creative people poured their testimonies into the work, and
without knowing anything about them, I think you'll find it moving and
filled with truth and beauty.
But
I do know something about them. Not necessarily about each individual
who wrote, but about their generation of Saints, and about the young
singles in that ward. I can tell you: They have earned the right to
speak of the Savior and others in the Christmas story, because they
have sacrificed for his sake.
These
young people, though themselves as yet unmarried, were asked by the
church to devote a considerable amount of time in the fall of 2008 to
contact people and work for the passage of Proposition 8 — the proposed
law banning a legal redefinition of \"marriage\" to include anything that
is not, in fact, marriage.
Their
generation is the one that we raised to rise above the prejudices of
the past. Almost all of them were born after the 1978 revelation on the
priesthood; they grew up in a church that no longer gave bigots any
cause to think that they would find shelter among us.
Many
of us in the baby boomer generation — their parents — went to great
lengths to teach our children to reject bigotry. They went to
integrated schools and refused to join with those who rejected others
because of any of their outward attributes.
Now,
living in the Los Angeles area, many of them work in the entertainment
industry, and most of them have associates and friends — often very
close friends — who are either gay or have very strong feelings about
the urgency of allowing marriage to be redefined so that gay couples
can have the same social support as married people.
It
is a very hard thing to explain to such friends why you believe that
this should not happen — that it would be a bad thing for society as a
whole to remove from reproductively oriented marriage such remnants of
support as our decadent society still gives it.
To
their friends, these young Latter-day Saints seemed like any other
bigots, and friendships ended or were severely damaged. Sometimes
harder to bear was the self-questioning, for during their many phone
calls to strangers, they ran across vehement supporters of Proposition
8 who were haters and bigots.
What am I doing on the same side of the issue as these pitiable people, these young single Saints asked themselves.
Yet
they had faith in the gospel, in the prophets, in the \"Proclamation on
the Family.\" And they acted on that faith, at great personal cost.
I
am not wrong to compare them, or some of them at least, with Abraham,
who was asked to violate everything he had fought for by sacrificing
his son, or with the early church members who were shocked to find that
they were expected to practice plural marriage.
The
world saw their position as bigotry, though they knew it was not; they
had to bear the slings and arrows of the hatred of the most fanatical
of the Prop. 8 opponents, and the disappointment, grief, or anger of
many of their friends.
But they did it. And, partly because of their sacrifice and service, marriage was protected, at least for a little season.
Yet
the wounds in their lives from their sacrifice needed healing. They
longed for an affirmative message, and in \"For Unto Us ...\" they were
able to give voice to it.
This is
what we believe, they say: In love, in trust, in faith, in atonement,
in God's promises fulfilled. Here are some of the talents the Lord has
given to us: We give them back now, magnified. They had almost no
budget for the project. They donated their own services, their own
money, and begged favors from friends in order to make the book as
beautiful as it could be.
It
was the spirit of the early temple-building Saints: They had a vision
of what they were making, and did every worthy thing that was required
to make it come true.
So when you
go to the Web site and read their testimonies, realize who it is that
is speaking, and that they speak for many, not just in their ward, but
of their generation in the church, who have done what was asked of
them, at great cost, and came through it stronger in the faith, and
brimming over with love of Christ, and with a yearning for their hearts
to be understood by the world around them. When you come to the last
page of the booklet, look closely at Jared Purrington's design. It
contains the spires of many of the Latter-day temples, and speaks to
the aspirations of all Latter-day Saints who must live in the world,
yet try to keep themselves unspotted by it.