It's been a long day. I'm still actively attending and serving in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints even while I wrestle with doubts and questions. I need to stay anchored to something while I figure things out. But as a member of my ward's bishopric, that means my Sundays are usually quite busy.
Since starting down this path of exploring my LDS faith as well as learning more about the Catholic faith, one of my guiding mission statements has been: “I want to know God's will for me and have the faith and courage to do it.” But this morning I had the thought that maybe I need to add an additional mission statement: “I want to know which church can best help me to become more like Jesus Christ.”
I've been diving deep into historical and theological study but neglecting my spiritual life. I've been reading from the scriptures every day, but spiritual practices like prayer and meditation have kind of taken a back seat. I'm going to try to change that.
I went to the temple today. I'm trying to go at least once a week during lent. In the LDS faith, the temple is a separate experience from Sunday meetings at your local church building. It was peaceful and reverent, but I didn't get any answers or have any profound experiences.
When I wasn't working from my home office or shoveling snow (we had our biggest snow storm of the season today – it's been a mild, dry winter and the snow was desperately needed) I was trying to think about the importance and solemnity of the day and reflect on Jesus Christ more than usual.
I observed Lent for the first time last year. I am not Catholic, but it was an overwhelmingly positive experience for me and I have been looking forward to doing it again this year.
I went to a couple thrift stores last week looking for any book by Terryl Givens or Tad R. Callister. I didn't find what I was looking for, but came home with a stack of books, anyway. Among them was a book called “Radical Integrity: The Story of Dietrich Bonhoeffer” by Michael Van Dyke. It was relatively short (205 pages) and I read it in two days. And I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.
In his book Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis explains the Christian perspective on the relationship of human individuals to one another, and two errors we are tempted to fall into.
I never did fall back asleep last night. My soul was in too much turmoil. So I decided to watch a movie to distract me. I think there was a little divine intervention at work because the movie I picked was exactly what I needed.
A friend reached out with a dilemma. He lives far away from the meeting place of his religious community. They use Zoom to broadcast their meetings for those who can't attend in-person. For many reasons, he avoids using proprietary software (software that is not free as in freedom), but he was seriously thinking about installing Zoom in this case. I can empathize with his dilemma. All of us have to make choices like this every day.