{"id":53744,"date":"2026-06-01T14:00:55","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T20:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=53744"},"modified":"2026-06-01T12:00:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T18:00:09","slug":"freedom-of-reaction-how-did-you-participate-in-church-or-what-did-church-lead-you-to-think-about-yesterday-5-31","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2026\/06\/freedom-of-reaction-how-did-you-participate-in-church-or-what-did-church-lead-you-to-think-about-yesterday-5-31\/","title":{"rendered":"Freedom of Reaction: How Did You Participate in Church (Or What Did Church Lead You to Think About) Yesterday, 5\/31?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Like it or not, the vast majority of those attending Church have no control over what happens there. We don\u2019t control the speakers, or the music, or who teaches the classes, and certainly not what anyone says. This past week I frequently heard fears about the 5th Sunday lesson on the Constitution \u2014 fears that the lesson would be one-sided or lead to partisan arguments or embolden those with \u201cfringe\u201d beliefs to make a scene. I hope none of those fears were realized in your cases. My experience was free from any conflict. The teacher simply covered seven principles behind the constitution without asking for commentary.<\/p>\n

BUT, those principles didn\u2019t include a basic freedom that we often take for granted: the freedom to react in thought in whatever way we want to. Even if we don\u2019t feel free to say what we want to, we can still think without consequences from others. Our mental reactions are our own and are naturally hidden, available only to ourselves.<\/p>\n

However, it\u2019s probably not correct to say that our thoughts are completely without consequences. Our thoughts lead to how we see the world, and eventually to how we act and react with others. Our thoughts change our hearts (see my Come Follow Me post from earlier today) and form the kind of people we are, and in the end I think the Lord judges where we are spiritually by those same hearts.<\/p>\n

So, we can redirect how we think, and by doing so become better people. How we mentally react to what happens in Church is a great place to train our minds and change our hearts. Our thoughts about Church will drive what kind of people we become. We can choose to mentally criticize everything that happens, or we can choose to find generous ways of thinking or focus on the good, true and beautiful in what happens. We have the freedom to think as we will.<\/p>\n

So, what are you thinking in reaction to what happens in Church?<\/p>\n

In these posts I am trying to suggest that each of us can have better experiences at Church if we take responsibility for our experiences, and if we are open to learning from what happens by pondering it \u2014 by thinking about it in many different ways. We can choose to learn and benefit from what happens regardless of whether it fits our perception of what is \u201cgood.\u201d Thinking about our reactions and what we understand allows for revelation and for better understanding.<\/p>\n

In this vein, I like the statement that President Hugh B. Brown made in a 1969 BYU devotional, President Hugh B. Brown declared that the Church is \u201cnot so much concerned with whether your thoughts are orthodox or heterodox as we are that you shall have thoughts.\u201d We should be carefully considering what we hear at Church, regardless of whether what we heard is right or wrong, orthodox or heterodox.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A lot of our thought depends on how we look at it. It is not different from what many artists figure out\u2014they understand that how you see the \u00a0world before you is more important than what you see. You might call it \u2018active listening\u2019 or shifting perspective. It just means that you see differently. And seeing differently reveals a different world.<\/p>\n

In my case, I tend to focus narrowly, thinking about groups of words or sentences, sometimes taking them out of context and thinking about what they say, even if the speaker didn\u2019t intend what I heard. It\u2019s not at all like what we\u2019re taught in school, where the focus is on understanding accurately and completely what the speaker or text says. Its about pulling out useful or inspiring thoughts in spite of what was said.<\/p>\n

So, if you aren\u2019t thinking this way, maybe try it next Sunday, or the next time you are in a class or meeting. If you have already thoughts inspired by what happened at church, what are they? How did you react to what happened in Church yesterday? What did you notice? Did you end up thinking differently? Do you think your reactions were what they should be? Were they looking for what God had to tell you? Did your reactions make things better?<\/p>\n

This is the latest invitation for reactions to local meetings, continuing a series of weekly posts that started with 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

\n
\n

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":"

Like it or not, the vast majority of those attending Church have no control over what happens there. We don\u2019t control the speakers, or the music, or who teaches the classes, and certainly not what anyone says. This past week I frequently heard fears about the 5th Sunday lesson on the Constitution \u2014 fears that the lesson would be one-sided or lead to partisan arguments or embolden those with \u201cfringe\u201d beliefs to make a scene. I hope none of those fears were realized in your cases. My experience was free from any conflict. The teacher simply covered seven principles behind the constitution without asking for commentary. BUT, those principles didn\u2019t include a basic freedom that we often take for granted: the freedom to react in thought in whatever way we want to. Even if we don\u2019t feel free to say what we want to, we can still think without consequences from others. Our mental reactions are our own and are naturally hidden, available only to ourselves. However, it\u2019s probably not correct to say that our thoughts are completely without consequences. Our thoughts lead to how we see the world, and eventually to how we act and react with others. Our […]<\/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-53744","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\/53744","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=53744"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53746,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53744\/revisions\/53746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}