WE BELIEVE IN BEING CHASTE Summary

183rd Annual General Conference of

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

Saturday afternoon, 6 April 2013

Key Doctrines and Principles:

Elder Bednar carefully and thoroughly explains doctrines, definitions, and standards related to Heavenly Father’s central plan—“the overarching context . . . of happiness for His children” that provides for and enables all to progress to become more like our Heavenly Father “to help [us] become happy, and to bring [us] safely home to Him with resurrected, exalted bodies . . . to be together in the light and filled with hope

Elder Bednar then pronounces the intent of the adversary. “Lucifer labors to make the sons and daughters of God confused and unhappy and to hinder their eternal progression. The overarching intent of the father of lies is that all of us would become ‘miserable like unto himself’ (2 Nephi 2:27). Lucifer wants us ultimately to be alone in the dark and without hope. Satan relentlessly works to distort the most important elements of the Father’s plan. . . . Lucifer seeks to frustrate our progression by tempting us to use our bodies improperly. . . The very tool he does not have is thus the primary target of his attempts to lure us to spiritual destruction.”

Favorite Quotes:

“As we pursue the pathway of virtue, ‘the Holy Ghost shall be [our] constant companion’ (D&C 121:46). Thus, living the law of chastity invites some of the greatest blessings men and women can receive in mortality . . ..”

“Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord” (1 Corinthians 11:11). The man and the woman are intended to learn from, strengthen, bless, and complete each other.”

“Marriage between a man and a woman is the authorized channel through which premortal spirits enter mortality. Complete sexual abstinence before marriage and total fidelity within marriage protect the sanctity of this sacred channel.”

“Elder Dallin H. Oaks explained: ‘The power to create mortal life is the most exalted power God has given his children. . . . Outside the bonds of marriage, all uses of the procreative power are to one degree or another a sinful degrading and perversion of the most divine attribute of men and women’ (“The Great Plan of Happiness,”Ensign, Nov. 1993, 74). . . . Such relations . . are in mortality one of the ultimate expressions of our divine nature and potential.”

“We are agents blessed with moral agency and are defined by our divine heritage as children of God—and not by sexual behaviors, contemporary attitudes, or secular philosophies.”

“The ‘man [or woman] of Christ’[sic] (Helaman 3:29) is spiritual and bridles all passions (see Alma 38:12), is temperate and restrained, and is benevolent and selfless.”

So what: 

“Our physical bodies make possible a breadth, a depth, and an intensity of experience that simply could not be obtained in our premortal existence.”

“Thus, our relationships with other people, our capacity to recognize and act in accordance with truth, and our ability to obey the principles and ordinances of the gospel of Jesus Christ are amplified through our physical bodies . . . we experience tenderness, love, kindness, happiness, sorrow, disappointment, pain, and even the challenges of physical limitations in ways that prepare us for eternity.”

“ Simply stated, there are lessons we must learn and experiences we must have, as the scriptures describe, “according to the flesh” (1 Nephi 19:6;Alma 7:12–13).”

“As we look beyond mortality and into eternity, it is easy to discern that the counterfeit companionship advocated by the adversary is temporary and empty. . . . Love increases through righteous restraint and decreases through impulsive indulgence.” (Emphasis mine.)

“Obedience to the law of chastity will increase our happiness in mortality and make possible our progress in eternity.”