Abortion is probably one of the touchiest subjects that is brought up amongst the women in and outside of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But it’s also an essential topic of discussion, which should be gone over with every person.

Abortion, the taking of life, is one of the most grievous of sins. We have repeatedly affirmed the position of the Church in unalterably opposing all abortions, except in two rare instances: When conception is the result of forcible rape and when competent medical counsel indicates that a mother’s health would otherwise be seriously jeopardized. The Church maintains this stance thirty years later. Even when one of the rare extenuating circumstances arises, the Church counsel’s women that abortion is still a gravely serious matter which should be considered only after having consulted with local church leaders and after fervently praying to know if the decision is correct (President Spencer W. Kimball).

A few years ago, I was listening to a speech given by a political figure on the subject of abortion. His view as a father was that if his daughter had a child out of wedlock, he would not make his daughter suffer the consequences of her actions, that he would allow her to have a abortion if she so desired. There are several arguments about when a child is actually considered a living being. Most believe that someone is not considered a living being until they are born. The Lord has taught, through revelation to His prophets, that we existed as spirits before being born on earth, so our lives and identities are eternal. A human being has this unique identity even before it is formed, and once it starts to grow inside the mother’s womb, and eliminating a pregnancy is considered an act close to that of murder.

As it says in the above quote by President Kimball, there are only a few exceptions that can justify abortion. Even in those situations, prayer and thorough consideration is necessary. Adoption is a favorable choice for mothers to make and gives the child a chance to be raised in a loving and complete family. Even if they don’t get adopted, they can go on to live a full and prosperous life.

I had a friend a High School, who made a few poor decisions after High school and became pregnant, by a boy who was not responsible and did not have the greatest morals. When I found out, she and I had a long conversation about what she was going to do. She knew that her boyfriend was not going to do the right thing, and when she told her parents, they kicked her out of the house. She talked to me about the possibility of having an abortion. I told her “It’s not fair, that you should make a child suffer for something that was not its fault. Give it a chance to live, whether it’s with you, or with another family.” When I said that to her, she began to cry into her hands. Not another word was uttered that night. We didn’t talk for about two weeks after that. I was afraid that I had said something that offended her, or upset her. After those two weeks of silence between us, she called me and told me that when I talked about her child, she could see its smiling face and knew that it deserved to live.

That’s the view on abortion, in the Church and for me. Every being deserves to live, every being has a purpose in this world and it should not be decided to shorten that life, because of poor decisions that another made.

“Most abortions are performed on demand to deal with unwanted pregnancies. These abortions are simply a form of birth control. Elective abortion has been legalized in many countries on the premise that a woman is free to choose what she does with her own body. To an extent this is true for each of us, male or female. We are free to think. We are free to plan. And we are free to do. But once an action has been taken, we are never free from its consequences. To understand this concept more clearly, we can learn from the astronaut. Anytime during selection or preparation, he or she is free to withdraw from the program. But once the spacecraft has lifted off, the astronaut is bound to the consequences of the previous choice to make the journey. So it is with people who choose to embark on a journey that leads to parenthood. They have freedom of choice—to begin or not to begin that course. When conception does occur, that choice has already been made. Yes, a woman is free to choose what she will do with her body. Whether her choice leads to an astronaut’s mission or to a baby, her choice to begin the journey binds her to the consequences of that choice. She cannot ‘unchoose.’” (The LDS Perspective on Abortion, quoted from Abortion: An Assault on the Defenseless, Russell M. Nelson, Ensign — October 2008, 32–37)

Jane Elizabeth Manning, black Mormon pioneer

Jane Elizabeth Manning didn’t have an easy start in life. She was an African American when slavery was still legal. She had never been a slave, but she was sent away from home to work for a wealthy white family when she was only six years old. She lived in the home of her employer and the adult daughter in the home raised her—as a servant, not a daughter. Can you imagine being sent to live away from home and to work full-time when you’re so little?

When Jane was fourteen years old, she wanted to join a church. She chose the Presbyterian Church, but somehow felt it still wasn’t quite what she was looking for. One day, about a year and a half later, she heard that some Mormon missionaries were going to be preaching in the area. She mentioned it to her pastor, who ordered her not to go hear them, but she went anyway. As soon as she heard the things they taught, she knew it was exactly what she’d been searching for and she asked if she could be baptized. After her baptism, she went to work and helped many members of her family to join the church as well. Even though she was only a teenager, she was already showing that she had great leadership skills.

Today, Mormons stay wherever they lived before they were baptized. They live all over the world. But then, when the church was new, it was different. There weren’t that many Mormons and it was hard to communicate with them if they were spread all over the world. Since the church was new, everyone needed a lot of education to really understand what their church taught. It was easier to keep them all in one place. When people joined the church, they usually moved to wherever the church was in those days. Since Joseph Smith officially opposed slavery, black Mormons were welcome to live among the Mormons.

Jane had helped bring eight other members of her family to join the Mormon Church. There weren’t many Black Mormons then—they might have been the only ones in their area, since they were the only ones who traveled to the Mormons in their group. They started out in a racially mixed group, but when they reached the ferry, the company wanted the black Mormons to pay up front instead of at the other end as the rest did. Apparently, they expected to have money for the ferry at the other end of the trip—perhaps Mormons there paid it—and so they didn’t have the money to go on. Although the white Mormons were allowed on the ferry, the black Mormons were forced to walk the rest of the way. It was an eight hundred mile journey. Without question, that was a difficult trip, although, since Jane would later join the trek to Utah, it was probably good practice.

They had not come prepared to walk so far. They didn’t have enough supplies or the right clothing. Still, they never thought to turn back. They were determined to get to the Mormons. It was Jane, still a teenager, who led the group, even though many of the people in the group—including her mother—were adults. Since she began the trip about a year after her baptism, I’m guessing she was about sixteen when she led eight other people on a long journey.

It was October and very cold. Their feet starting bleeding so badly they could make a complete footprint in the snow that was covered in blood. They stopped and prayed until the feet healed. They didn’t have warm enough clothing and they were often very hungry. Instead of complaining about the conditions or the way they had been treated, they sang hymns as they walked.

They ran into a very scary and dangerous situation in Peoria, Illinois. When the officials saw a group of black people in ragged clothing traveling on foot together, they decided the people were runaway slaves. They demanded to see their freedom papers, proof that they had been freed from slavery by their masters. However, none of them had ever been slaves, so they didn’t have those papers. They tried to explain they were black Mormons traveling to Nauvoo, but it took a long time before anyone believed them and they were allowed to go.

Now they were scared. Every day they worried that they would be arrested again, maybe even made slaves, but they kept right on going, singing and praying. Finally they reached Nauvoo, the Mormon city. The little group of black Mormons was exhausted and hungry. The first person they saw told them to go right to Joseph Smith’s house. When they got to the house, his wife Emma was at the doorway. She saw them coming and asked them to come into the house. Joseph Smith was home and quickly added chairs to his dinner table and made sure they were fed their first good meal in a very long time. He moved his own chair to sit by Jane, because he had learned she was their leader. He asked her to tell him the story of how the group arrived there and what had happened to them.

Joseph and Emma invited the group to stay as guests in their home until they’d found jobs and homes of their own. It only took a week for everyone to find a job and a home—except for Jane. There seemed to be no jobs available for this teenager with so much courage and leadership. When she realized she was the only one left without a home or job, she began to cry. Joseph found her crying and reassured her she wouldn’t be put out on the street. Then he and his wife offered her a job with them. Emma asked her what she could do and she listed all her homemaking skills. (Remember she had been a household servant since she was six. It was her career.) She offered to start right away, but Emma insisted she rest and start in the morning. Since Jane liked doing laundry, that was what she was assigned to do first. In later years, when she found herself having to support herself and her children, she would take in laundry to earn money.

Jane continued to live with Joseph Smith and his family. When Joseph was murdered, the black Mormon woman moved into the home of Brigham Young and worked for him. Her brother would end up working for both Mormon prophets as well. When the Mormons went to Utah, Jane traveled in a lead group with Brigham Young’s household and would be one of the first people in the state. Her child would be the first Black Mormon born there.

Jane Elizabeth Manning was an amazing woman. She was always giving to help with special church projects, and when her friend had no food, Jane insisted on giving the woman half of her own, even though she herself had very little to feed her family. She became such an important person that she and her brother were given reserved seats at the front and center of the tabernacle for all important meetings. When she died, the prophet himself spoke at her funeral.

But it all started because Jane Elizabeth Manning was a teenager with courage, faith, and leadership skills. She stayed active in her church all her life and said at the end of it that her testimony was as strong as it had been when she was baptized. She was proud to be black, to be Mormon, and to be a black Mormon…a Mormon who has become a treasured part of Mormon history.

Well, it probably does. As a teenager, you’ve already decided how you feel about yourself and your body, but you are also making new decisions on these subjects and you have more control over what you wear. These attitudes you’re developing started shaping when you were younger and they’re affecting how you live your life and how you look at yourself right now. It also affects how other people see you.

One group of researchers showed adults pictures of  girls. The people who looked at these pictures assumed the girls who were dressed immodestly were less intelligent and less competent. Now, that might not seem fair to you and your answer might be that people shouldn’t judge you that way. You’re probably right, but that isn’t really the point. The point is that you don’t get to choose how other people see you. They’re going to see whatever they decide to see and you’re going to pay the price for it.

Whether you like it or not, there are times it will matter to you how other people see you. You don’t want your teachers to see you as less intelligent, for instance. If your grade is on the border between two grades, the teacher will decide whether to give you the higher or lower grade and you want to be seen as intelligent and competent. Their opinion of you might impact how they grade a paper. If you have a job, you want your boss to see you that as a competent person as well. For that matter, you would probably want everyone to know you’re smart and good at things.

Girls who wear immodest clothing are also at a higher risk for eating disorders and poor body image. They train themselves to think their job in life is to be physically appealing to men, and not in an appropriate way. It’s important for girls to understand their personalities, their character, and their intelligence are what are important about them. These are the parts of themselves they need to spend the most time developing. While it’s important to be neat and to take care of the body you were given, it is not really who you are. You don’t want people thinking your body is all there is to you.

When one of my daughters was a preteen, she had an eighteen-year-old teacher at church just for the summer. The teacher would be going off to college in the fall, but in the meantime, she had a big impact on those kids she taught. She was pretty and really smart. She had been a cheerleader and homecoming queen. She told the class she had never found it necessary to dress immodestly to be popular. She wanted people to like her for who she was inside. She wore fashionable clothes and had pretty hairstyles and nice makeup, but her hair, clothes, and makeup were modest and not attention-grabbing. She had a huge amount of self-esteem because she knew people liked her for all the right reasons. She put her energy into being a moral, kind, and friendly person, not a sexy one and people loved her. She was very popular with her own peers, but also with teachers, other adults, and children.

Grace, who is 13, says dressing modestly makes her feel comfortable. She doesn’t have to worry that she is showing parts of her that shouldn’t be showing. Like a lot of teens today, she echoes the popular phrase, “Modest is hottest!”

Lila (17) says she dresses modestly because it’s uncomfortable to be immodest. “It makes me feel like people respect me.”

How would it affect your life if you know people liked you just for who you were? Would the friends you have today and the boys you date still feel the same way about you if you wore modest clothes, or suddenly became poor and couldn’t afford the latest fashions? Would they still care about you if your standards were really high and you didn’t want to do some of the things they did because of it? What if you had an accident and it affected how you look? Would your friends stick around?

Mormon teens are taught to be modest in their clothing. That includes not wearing clothing that has sexy sayings or that is too tight or emphasizes the wrong things. It isn’t only about covering up. One speaker told teens if you’re dressed properly, people will notice your face first (assuming it isn’t because you’re wearing too much makeup or something.)

Being dressed modestly tells the world you feel confident about yourself and that you don’t need to show off your body to get attention. You’re worthy of attention just because of the amazing person you are.

Of course, modesty isn’t just for girls. The article I’m writing about was about girls, so that is where I’m focused today, but the same principle applies to boys. Everyone benefits from being dressed modestly.

Take a look at this quote from Silvia H. Allred. Notice what she says about the example God set for us:

The doctrine behind modesty begins with our knowledge that we are children of God, created in His image (see Moses 2:27). Our bodies are sacred gifts from Heavenly Father and have specific purposes that He has planned. As grateful recipients, we acknowledge this gift by treating our bodies as He has asked us to (see D&C 88:33). We learn to train, control, and bridle our bodies and their physical uses to become like Heavenly Father.

From the beginning, the Lord has asked His children to cover their bodies. After Adam and Eve partook of the forbidden fruit, their eyes were opened and they became aware that they were naked. Adam and Eve tried to cover themselves with simple aprons made of fig leaves. But the aprons were not enough, so the Lord made them more modest coats of skins. (See Genesis 3:7, 21.)

God had a higher standard then, just as He does now. His standards are not those of the world.” (See Silvia H. Allred, “Modesty: A Timeless Principle for All,” Ensign, Jul 2009, 28–32.)

Modesty isn’t about people trying to control you or about being ashamed of your body. It actually shows more pride in your body because when you know your body was created by Heavenly Father in His image, and you are proud of who you are, you don’t want to treat it in a disrespectful way. You don’t have any desire to invite other people to view your body in a disrespectful way, either. You are content to use it for the exact purposes for which God created it. You honor and respect yourself and you work to enhance your personality, your character, your spirit, and your talents because you know you are a child of God.

First, a little about Shannon. Then I’ll tell you one of the things I find really impressive about her.

Shannon Hale is a Mormon who lives in Salt Lake City, Utah. She was the middle child in a family of five children and she always loved making up stories. At first, she’d act them out with her sisters, but in fourth grade, she learned how to write her stories on paper for others to read and that’s when she decided to become a writer. She was pretty sensitive, so she found the social part of grade school hard and ended up crying at home a lot. Things got better, though. In junior high school she was on the staff for the school literary magazine and met her first professional author, Dean Hughes. She was also in drama class, even though she never got chosen for the school plays.

She enjoyed high school a lot more. She felt her school was pretty diverse, which was interesting to her, and unlike most schools, it was not filled with cliques. Here’s something interesting she said about high school: “In movies and books, a teen’s life often involves drinking, sex, or drugs. It sure didn’t in mine. While I think it’s important to have stories about all kinds of people, I think it’s also important to acknowledge the other side. I did not drink alcohol or take drugs or have sex with boyfriends because I chose not to. I did have a lot of fun, though.” (See The Official Site of Shannon Hale.)

In high school, still writing and acting (but getting small parts now) she met her husband. She had a big crush on him, but he didn’t have a big crush on her. She went to school right near home, because she’d been sick for a long time during her senior year, and Dean went off to Washington State.

Shannon started out majoring in both drama and English. Even though she loved acting, she eventually decided she would rather be a writer, because you can’t act unless someone hires you, but you can always write. She loved books, and decided to become a writer. However, she hadn’t finished anything she started and she wasn’t sure what kinds of books she wanted to write. But she at least had a goal now.

She took a year and a half off to be a Mormon missionary. This is something she chose to do, not something she had to do. You pay your own way and you don’t choose where you will go, so opening the envelope is pretty exciting. She was sent to Paraguay and had to learn Spanish. She was assigned native companions (partners you share your apartment with and work with) and was determined to live like a native while she was there, so she could really learn the culture. She learned to focus on other people, not herself.

While she was on her mission, Dean wrote to her regularly. When she returned home, he was living in Utah again and they started dating seriously, but they broke up after about a year. She decided to go to graduate school out of state.

Here’s another interesting thing: The best writers got chosen to be teaching assistants and they got free tuition. She wasn’t  chosen and in fact, she was the only person who never did get chosen, meaning they thought she was the worst writer in the whole program. Despite that, she is the only writer in that group with a lot of best sellers and big awards. So, if you don’t seem like the best in your field yet, don’t give up. School isn’t the final decision maker in whether or not you can make it in what you want to do.

Even though the school didn’t think she was very good at writing, she loved her time there. She got back together with Dean and ended up marrying him. She started the book that would become The Goose Girl. It took her two years to get it written, starting over a few times and doing a lot of editing. Eventually, she got an agent and the book got sent to publishers, who didn’t like it. It was rejected nine times, but in the end, the same company that first published Harry Potter bought her book. And I’ll bet the other publishers are sorry they turned it down! It’s her most popular book.

I find Shannon Hale’s writing to be very elegant. I’d love to be able to write that way. But even beyond her amazing writing, what I really admire about her is that she has high standards and sticks to them, even in her writing. At the back of The Goose Girl there is an interview with Shannon. She said she sees a lot more racy books for teens and that her book was turned down because that stuff wasn’t in her books. She says she does not like writing about sex, so her books are sometimes seen as better for younger audiences, but she does have a few adult books as well. Sometimes people think they need to compromise to make it in the “real world.” Teens think they can’t be popular unless they lower their standards. One of my daughters came home from church one week telling me her eighteen-year-old teacher, who had been homecoming queen and head cheerleader, told them she never compromised. She didn’t feel she needed to compromise her standards to be popular, so she never did. I admire that in a person. It seems like Shannon Hale is that kind of person, so she is someone I admire, not just as a writer, but as a person.

Do you have a favorite celebrity who doesn’t compromise his or her standards?

Ammon, a missionary, was serving the king for a while as a shepherd. At the same time, Abish worked at the castle as well. She had converted to Christianity after her father had a vision, but no one else in her community or in that castle (or whatever the king lived in) was Christian. It wasn’t like it is today, so she had to keep quiet about her beliefs.

It can be pretty hard to live a good Christian life when you have friends and family around you who share your beliefs. It is even harder when you’re doing it all alone, privately and without anyone to encourage you. She couldn’t even go to church to get a dose of strength each week. She wouldn’t have had scriptures to read either. Her religion was whatever was in her head. In spite of all of that, she held on to her testimony and kept growing it stronger and stronger.

Ammon saved the king’s flocks from enemy attackers and the king was so impressed he asked to see Ammon. Ammon, being the good missionary he was, managed to work things so the king let him teach the gospel. The Holy Ghost became so strong in the room during this unexpected missionary lesson that the king passed out. He stayed unconscious for several days and in fact, most people thought he was dead. Only his wife, who knew him best, believed he was still alive. She called Ammon to come see her and she told him she was sure he was still alive because he didn’t stink yet. She asked Ammon to check it out.

Ammon went to the king and he agreed. The king was not dead. He prophesied that the king would, in fact, wake up the next day and then he asked the queen if she believed him. She said she did. She hadn’t been a Christian (or what would be known as a Christian someday), but at that moment she gained a testimony of prophets and of God. Ammon praised her for this. Again, the Holy Spirit became really, really strong. This time the queen and even Ammon passed out. (Passing out is not a normal reaction to feeling the Holy Spirit. These were unusual circumstances.)

Now we get to Abish and her moment of fame—the decision that put her in the history book. Remember, Abish already believed in God. She knew the reason people were passing out was because of the power of the Holy Ghost, which she, as a believer, could feel. She sensed that miracles were about to happen. Because she had so much faith, she wanted other people to see the miracles. This was a great moment. It might convert other people!

She ran and spread the word to everyone she could find. But things didn’t go quite the way she planned. People did gather but they started yelling nasty things about Ammon, calling him a Nephite monster. Calling people names is a popular way to get people to ignore truth or to think about an issue and it was as common then as it is now.

Abish was heartbroken. She cried, hating that they were calling this good man of God names and that they were there to do it because of her. She went to the queen and took her hand, hoping the queen would wake up. This worked. The queen, filled with her new testimony, called on Jesus Christ to have mercy on her wicked people. Then she took her husband’s hand and woke him up also. The king, a brand new convert, began to teach his people what Ammon had taught him.

Now Abish was getting her miracle. Some of the people—not all, but some—stopped yelling and actually listened. Of course, some people didn’t want to be converted and they left, but the others stayed and some were converted. The newly converted people also began to teach the gospel. Those who were converted asked to be baptized.

Many people were converted that day, all because a young servant girl had kept her testimony all those years when it wasn’t easy and because she had enough faith to bring people to witness the miracles and hear the preaching. Not many people pay attention to Abish. She’s a quiet hero, not quite as noticeable as Ammon, but none of the people would have been converted if it hadn’t been for Abish, a quiet hero.

In what ways are you a quiet hero for Jesus Christ?

Read the story of Abish in the Book of Mormon.

You have to see this!

It is important for Mormon men and women to understand that, when men are ordained to the priesthood, they receive a power to serve others. They are given hard work to do, and the power to do that work; there is no inherent blessing in holding the priesthood, only in using it. A man can never use the power of the priesthood to bless himself, but he can receive blessings from using it to serve God. Women do not miss out on the blessings of service, since women are blessed with many inherent abilities and talents with which they can serve God and receive the blessings of service.

Women themselves are not without power of God from God. God’s amazing power to procreate is given to women, and the vast majority of that creative service lies solely with women. They receive blessings from providing bodies and nourishment for God’s spirit children on earth. The job is not easy, nor does it receive much recognition, but these injustices equal out in the next life. One might ask: If women held the priesthood, what would the men do? They would play a small part in the procreative power, and little else, spiritually. Men cannot do what women do, and they need a job to do in the Church, to grow and to serve, and that’s the priesthood.

God’s division of his power to work and serve on Earth cannot be completely understood. But in the Mormon Church, we must trust that God gives us the jobs we have because they are the best ones to help us grow and make us better. Men need the duties, hard work, and service of priesthood responsibilities. Women need the sacrifice, nurturing, and selflessness that come with motherhood.

It is not necessary for women to have the priesthood for them to receive all of the blessings of the priesthood. Women have the same opportunity as men to enter into all temple covenants, serve God in the Church as leaders, as teachers, or as Mormon missionaries. This week’s Youth Gem tells us:

I hope our granddaughters and grandsons grow up knowing that they are not and have never been third-party observers of the priesthood. The blessings of the priesthood, which ‘are available to men and women alike’ (Dallin H. Oaks, “Priesthood Authority in the Family and the Church,” Ensign, Nov. 2005, 26), are woven in and through and around their lives. Each of them is blessed by sacred ordinances, and each of them can enjoy the blessings of spiritual gifts by virtue of the priesthood. (Julie B. Beck, “An Outpouring of Blessings,” Ensign, May 2006, 11)