{"id":52449,"date":"2026-01-12T14:00:31","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T21:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=52449"},"modified":"2026-01-11T18:23:53","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T01:23:53","slug":"your-reactions-to-church-yesterday-1-11","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2026\/01\/your-reactions-to-church-yesterday-1-11\/","title":{"rendered":"Your Reactions to Church Yesterday, 1\/11"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recently I explored the writings of a Mormon literary thinker little-known among Church members today, Wayne Booth. In The Company We Keep<\/em>, Booth proposes that human beings not only learn by induction and deduction, but by what he calls \u201ccoduction\u201d \u2014 the discovery of knowledge in conversation with others. This is a cornerstone of how we are supposed to learn at Church, in our Sunday School, Priesthood and Relief Society classes. It is also a key element to how we are supposed to learn in counsels. It requires that each person in a class, or in a counsels, both listen carefully to what others are saying, and contribute actively to the discussion. Without both of these, coduction, or group learning, can\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n

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If we are to learn at Church, we need to be engaged. It doesn\u2019t help if we complain about how others act. Instead, we need to listen carefully to what they say, and to what that implies, and contribute to improving the experience for everyone. And we can start by looking at how we react to what is said or communicated at church.<\/p>\n

How did you react to Church yesterday? What did you notice? Did you end up thinking differently? Do you think your reactions were what they should be? Were they ethical? Did your reactions make things better?<\/p>\n

This is the latest invitation for reactions to local meetings, continuing the spirit of my post<\/a> on September 25th about how we receive what happens in Church meetings\u2014sermons, lessons and anything else\u2014and enter a conversation with them, magnifying what was said or adding what we think. In these posts I\u2019m asking us all to think about how we listen and receive what happens at Church. If we only listen for mistakes, or things that bother us, what does that say about us? Is it most important to criticize others? Or to try to change ourselves?<\/p>\n

The point here is that no matter how poorly prepared the speaker or teacher is, or no matter how what happens triggers us, or is objectively or doctrinally wrong, we can still find elements in what is said and what happens that inspires and edifies us. Even if church meetings aren\u2019t conducted in a way that reaches us, we can take responsibility and find a way to feel the spirit.<\/p>\n

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So please, write down reactions and thoughts to what happened in Church. You might keep your own \u2018spiritual journal\u2019, or, if you like, you can post your reactions below. I\u2019m adding my own reactions and thoughts as a comment to this post \u2014 instead of as a part of this post, because my reactions aren\u2019t any better than anyone else\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Let me emphasize that this is NOT a place to criticize what is wrong with church or your fellow congregants. The point is to post what you learned because of what happened at Church or how that led you to think. It\u2019s about the good things we can get out of Church, not the negative things that disturbed or upset us. It doesn\u2019t have to be orthodox, traditional or even on topic.<\/p>\n

If you like, make your response in the format, \u201cThey said or did this, and I said or thought that.\u201d Even the things you dislike the most can be turned into lessons for what the gospel teaches we should do.<\/p>\n

My hope is that these reactions serve as an example of a better way to treat what happens at Church instead of the perennial complaints about speaker or teacher preparation or ability, or complaints that the Church should do things differently.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recently I explored the writings of a Mormon literary thinker little-known among Church members today, Wayne Booth. In The Company We Keep, Booth proposes that human beings not only learn by induction and deduction, but by what he calls \u201ccoduction\u201d \u2014 the discovery of knowledge in conversation with others. This is a cornerstone of how we are supposed to learn at Church, in our Sunday School, Priesthood and Relief Society classes. It is also a key element to how we are supposed to learn in counsels. It requires that each person in a class, or in a counsels, both listen carefully to what others are saying, and contribute actively to the discussion. Without both of these, coduction, or group learning, can\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":111,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latter-day-saint-thought"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/111"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52449"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52452,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52449\/revisions\/52452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}