Mormon Quotes

Children

Brigham Young
I will now ask the sisters, do you believe that you are worthy of any greater love than you bestow upon your children? Do you believe that you should be beloved by your husbands and parents any further than you acknowledge and practise the principle of eternal lives? Every person who understands this principle would answer in a moment, "Let no being's affections be placed upon me any further than mine are on eternal principles ‑‑ principles that are calculated to endure and exalt me, and bring me up to be an heir of God and a joint heir with Jesus Christ." This is what every person who has a correct understanding would say.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 3:354
Brigham Young
Elders, never love your wives one hair's breadth further than they adorn the Gospel, never love them so but that you can leave them at a moment's warning without shedding a tear. Should you love a child any more than this? No.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 3:354
Brigham Young
I suppose that, if we were in the congregations of some of our Christian fellow‑countrymen, we would not hear any children crying. I believe they have none in some societies. I am very happy to hear the children crying when it is really necessary and they cannot be kept from it. One thing is certain, wherever we go there is a proof that the people are keeping the commandments of the Lord, especially the first one—to multiply and replenish the earth.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 13:300
Brigham Young
The very moment that persons in this Church suffer their affections to be immoderately placed upon an object this side the celestial kingdom, they disgrace their profession and calling. When you love your wives and children, are fond of your horses, your carriages, your fine houses, your goods and chattels, or anything of an earthly nature, before your affections become too strong, wait until you and your family are sealed up unto eternal lives, and you know they are yours from that time henceforth and for ever.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 3:354
Wilford Woodruff
And if any man mingle his seed with the seed of Cain the only way he could get rid of it or have Salvation would be to come forward and have his head cut off and spill his blood upon the ground ‑‑ it would also take the life of his children.
Wilford Woodruff, Wilford Woodruff's personal diary, 4:97
Heber J. Grant
Another of the great evils of the age is race suicide [the use of contraceptives]. This also is not consistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Providing opportunity for the spirit children of our Father in Heaven to come to earth and work out their own salvation is one of our sacred privileges and obligations. We teach that among the choicest of eternal riches are children.
Heber J. Grant, Prophet Heber J. Grant, Gospel Standards, p. 154
Heber J. Grant
There is no true Latter‑day Saint who would not rather bury a son or a daughter than to have him or her lose his or her chastity ‑‑ realizing that chastity is of more value than anything else in all the world.
Heber J. Grant, Prophet Heber J. Grant, Gospel Standards, p. 55
Ezra Taft Benson
Now what of the entertainment that is available to our young people today? Are you being undermined right in your home through your TV, radio, slick magazines, rock records? Much of the rock music is purposely designed to push immorality, narcotics, revolution, atheism, and nihilism, through language that often has a double meaning and with which many parents are not familiar.
Ezra Taft Benson, Strengthening the Family (Ezra Taft Benson, 1970 Semi‑Annual General Conference, Improvement Era)
Ezra Taft Benson
You who submit yourselves to an abortion or to an operation that precludes you from safely having additional healthy children are jeopardizing your exaltation and your future membership in the kingdom of God.
Ezra Taft Benson, Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, 1988, p. 541
Gordon B. Hinckley
I know what my mother expects. I know what she's saying in her prayers. She'd rather have me come home dead than unclean.
Gordon B. Hinckley, Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley, Conference Report, April 1969, pp. 52‑53
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: Never touch the intimate parts of your body expect during normal toilet processes.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: When in bed, if that is where you have your problem for the most part, dress yourself for the night so securely that you cannot easily touch your vital parts, and so that it would be difficult and time consuming for you to remove those clothes. By the time you started to remove protective clothing, you would have sufficiently controlled your thinking that the temptation would leave you.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: Put wholesome thoughts into your mind at all times. Read good books ‑‑ Church books ‑‑ scriptures ‑‑ sermons of the brethren. Make a daily habit of reading at least one chapter of scripture, preferable from one of the four gospels in the New Testament, or the Book of Mormon. The four gospels ‑‑ Matthew, Mark, Luke and John ‑‑ above anything else in the Bible can be helpful because of their uplifting qualities.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: Avoid being alone as much as possible. Find good company and stay in this good company.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: If the temptation seems overpowering while you are in bed, get out of bed and go into the kitchen and fix yourself a snack, even if it is in the middle of the night, and even if you are not hungry, and despite of your fears of gaining weight. The purpose behind this suggestion is that you GET YOUR MIND ON SOMETHING ELSE. You change the subject of your thoughts, so to speak.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Sex education belongs in the home, where parents can teach chastity in a spiritual environment as they reveal the facts of life to their children. There, in all plainness, the youngsters can be taught that procreation is part of the creative work of God and that, therefore, the act of replenishing the earth must be kept on the high plane of personal purity that God provides, free from all form of perversion.
Mark E. Petersen, Apostle Mark E. Peterson, Improvement Era, June 1969, p. 7
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: When you bathe, do not admire yourself in a mirror. Never stay in the bath more than five or six minutes‑‑just long enough to bathe and dry and dress AND THEN GET OUT OF THE BATHROOM into a room where you will have some member of your family present.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: Never read pornographic material. Never read about your problem. Keep it out of your mind. Remember‑‑"first a thought, then an act." The thought pattern must be changed. You must not allow this problem to remain in your mind. When you accomplish that, you soon will be free of the act.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
Overcoming masturbation: If you are associated with other persons having this same problem, YOU MUST BREAK OFF THEIR FRIENDSHIP. Never associate with other people having the same weakness. Don't suppose that two of you will quit together, you never will. You must get away from people of that kind. Just to be in their presence will keep your problem foremost in your mind. The problem must be taken OUT OF YOUR MIND for that is where it really exists. Your mind must be on other and more wholesome things.
Mark E. Petersen, Overcoming Masturbation: A Guide to Self Control
Mark E. Petersen
It does not matter if they are one‑sixth Negro or one‑hundred and sixth, the curse of no Priesthood is the same. If an individual who is entitled to the Priesthood marries a Negro, the Lord has decreed that only spirits who are not eligible for the Priesthood will come to that marriage as children. To intermarry with a Negro is to forfeit a nation of Priesthood holders.
Mark E. Petersen, Race Problems ‑ As They Affect The Church, Convention of Teachers of Religion on the College Level, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, August 27, 1954
Boyd K. Packer
Performing that thing that is of most worth for a woman in this life to live the gospel, to be the wife and the mother of the children of a worthy holder of the priesthood.
Boyd K. Packer, Priesthood Power in the Home
Boyd K. Packer
There is; however, something you should not do. Sometimes a young man does not understand. Perhaps he is encouraged by unwise or unworthy companions to tamper with that factory. He might fondle himself and open that release valve. This you shouldn't do, for if you do that, the little factory will speed up. You will then be tempted again and again to release it. You can quickly be subjected to a habit, one that is not worthy, one that will leave you feeling depressed and feeling guilty. Resist that temptation. Do not be guilty of tampering or playing with this sacred power of creation. Keep it in reserve for the time when it can be righteously employed.
Boyd K. Packer, 1976 General Conference, speech entitled To Young Men Only
Boyd K. Packer
I have been very careful, and am very careful, to treat my wife with that respect and reverence that is due her in performing that thing that is of most worth for a woman in this life to live the gospel, to be the wife and the mother of the children of a worthy holder of the priesthood.
Boyd K. Packer, Priesthood Power in the Home, Boyd K. Packer
Melvin J. Ballard
The greatest mission of woman is to give life, earth‑life, through honorable marriage, to the waiting spirits, our Father's spirit children who anxiously desire to come to dwell here in this mortal state. All the honor and glory that can come to men and women ... is but a dim thing whose luster shall fade in comparison to the high honor, the eternal glory, the ever‑enduring happiness that shall come to the woman who fulfils the first great duty and mission that devolves upon her to become the mother of the sons and daughters of God
Melvin J. Ballard, Sermons and Missionary Services of Melvin J. Ballard, comp. Bryant S. Hinckley [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1949], pp. 203‑4
Dallin H. Oaks
[Satan] seeks to undermine the principle of individual accountability, to persuade us to misuse our sacred powers of procreation, to discourage marriage and childbearing by the worthy men and women, and to confuse what is meant to be male or female... [2 Nephi reads:] 'In all of this, the devil, who has no body, seeks to persuade mortals to corrupt their bodies by 'choos[ing] eternal death, according to the will of the flesh... which giveth the spirit of the devil power to captivate, to bring [them] down to hell, that he may reign over [them] in his own kingdom.'
Dallin H. Oaks, Same‑Gender Attraction, Ensign, October 1995
First Presidency
Birth parents who do not marry should not be counseled to keep the infant as a condition of repentance or out of a sense of obligation to care for one's own. Additionally, grandparents and other family members should not feel obligated to facilitate parenting by unmarried parents, since the child would not generally be able to receive the blessings of the sealing covenant. Further, unmarried parents are generally unable to provide the stability and the nurturing environment that a married mother and father can provide. Unmarried parents should give prayerful consideration to the best interests of the child and the blessings that can come to an infant who is sealed to a mother and father (see First Presidency letter, June 26, 2002).
First Presidency, Church Handbook of Instructions, section 21.4.12
First Presidency
Parents have primary responsibility for the sex education of their children. Teaching this subject honestly and plainly in the home will help young people avoid serious moral transgressions. To help parents teach this sensitive and important information, the Church has published A Parent's Guide. Where schools have undertaken sex education, parents should seek to ensure that the instructions given to their children are consistent with sound moral and ethical values.
First Presidency, Church Handbook of Instructions, section 21.4.11
First Presidency
[When a child is born to a single mother,] if LDS Family Services is not available in the area, leaders should encourage the placement of the child for adoption with a temple‑worthy couple through a local licensed agency. LDS Family Services may be of assistance in identifying reputable, licensed adoption agencies. Licensed agencies are designed to protect the interest of the child, screen adoptive couples before placement, and provide needed supervision and counseling.
First Presidency, Church Handbook of Instructions, section 21.4.12
First Presidency
We feel that men must be considerate of their wives who bear the greater responsibility not only of bearing children, but of caring for them through childhood. To this end the mother's health and strength should be conserved and the husband's consideration for his wife is his first duty, and self control a dominant factor in all their relationships.
First Presidency, First Presidency (David O. McKay, Hugh B. Brown, N. Eldon Tanner ), The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter‑day Saints, Office of the First Presidency, April 14, 1969
First Presidency
When a man and woman conceive a child outside of marriage, every effort should be made to encourage them to marry. When the probability of a successful marriage is unlikely due to age or other circumstances, the unmarried parents should be counseled to work with LDS Family Services to place the child for adoption, providing an opportunity for the baby to be sealed to temple‑worthy parents.
First Presidency, Church Handbook of Instructions, section 21.4.12
Marion G. Romney
Morality in general and chastity particularly are outmoded. Man—so our children are told—is an animal, the product of biological evolution; his generative powers are not sacred and God‑given for the purpose of bringing God's spirit children into mortality, and therefore to be exercised within the limits divinely prescribed, as the gospel teaches, but they are playthings to be exploited and prostituted for the gratification of sensual and lustful desires. Courage, honesty, loyalty, patriotism, law and order—these and other elements of the divine nature are no longer revered as virtues.
Marion G. Romney, Home Teaching and Family Home Evening (Marion G. Romney, 1969 Annual General Conference, Improvement Era)
Orson F. Whitney
During certain periods ‑‑ those of gestation and lactation ‑‑ the wife and mother should be comparatively free to give her strength to her offspring; and if this involves some self‑denial on the part of the husband and father, so much the better for all concerned.
Orson F. Whitney, Apostle Orson F. Whitney, Relief Society Magazine, v. 3, no. 7, July 1916
Neal A. Maxwell
We know so little about the reasons for the division of duties between womanhood and manhood as well as between motherhood and priesthood. These were divinely determined in another time and another place. We are accustomed to focusing on the men of God because theirs is the priesthood and leadership line. But paralleling that authority line is a stream of righteous influence reflecting the remarkable women of God who have existed in all ages and dispensations, including our own.
Neal A. Maxwell, "Women of God," Women, 1979, p. 94
Peggy Fletcher Stack
Fourteen percent of LDS teens say they have smoked a cigarette in the last month.
Peggy Fletcher Stack, Salt Lake Tribune, August 9, 1991
Robert Gottlieb
When non‑Mormon Indians are asked about the program [LDS placement program for Native Americans], their response is invariably bitter and hostile as they explain that many Indians view the program as a form of kidnapping that takes away the Indian community's most prized people, its youth.
Robert Gottlieb, Bob Gottlieb and Peter Wiley, "The Kids Go Out Navaho, Came Back Donny and Marie," Los Angeles Magazine, December 1979, p. 140
Tim B. Heaton
Seven percent of Mormon women give birth before marriage.
Tim B. Heaton, Salt Lake Tribune, August 9, 1991
Tim B. Heaton
The median age of first birth [for Mormons] was 22, much younger than most other religious groups.
Tim B. Heaton, Salt Lake Tribune, August 9, 1991
Tim B. Heaton
These trends coupled with some reluctance to discuss sexual issues openly could lead to an increasing discrepancy between official codes of conduct and actual behavior.
Tim B. Heaton, Salt Lake Tribune, August 9, 1991
Mark A. Taylor
According to that state's Department of Vital Statistics, it ranks 13th nationally in child abuse, but comparing Utah statistics with those compiled by the National Association for the Protection of Children, the incidence of reported child abuse is six times higher in Utah. The incidence of sexual abuse — including rape, incest and intercourse — is 33% more than the national average, and the child‑murder rate is five times higher.
Mark A. Taylor, Affirmation: Sin & Death in Mormon Country: A Latter‑day Tragedy
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