FAMILY 100-- Equal Partnership

This week I really wanted to focus on what it meant to have an equal partnership between men and women in families. I believe that this concept is misrepresented with the views of the world. There is a large movement in feminism, and it has created ripples throughout the world. There is a fight for women to be “equal”. They want the same roles, pay, duties, respect, and more. They want to feel like they are the same as a man.

This idea is a little bit twisted. Equal does not mean identical. The Family Proclamation outlines the roles of men and women. For men, it states that they must preside, provide, and protect. For women, their main role is to nurture the children and teach them the gospel. Does this mean that the roles don’t cross over? Of course not!!! As equal partners, all duties are shared. We must be willing to help fill any gaps in those roles if necessary, but that doesn’t mean that all of the sudden because both parents decide to work and pursue an intense career, that the duty of rearing the children in the gospel has disappeared.

Many people grow up with the idea that the man is the sole decision maker and the head of the household. This can be a damaging belief:

Elder L. Tom Perry (2004, p. 71) puts it eloquently: “There is not a president or a vice president in a family.” We have copresidents working “together eternally for the good of their family.” In other words, “they are on equal footing. They plan and organize the affairs of the family jointly and unanimously as they move forward. (Hawkins, 2012, p. 42)

I love this perspective. We must jointly make decisions and come together as partners and make our union a true union by not allowing one to be above another. I really liked that quote.

In my reading this week, the following quote really stood out to me, “the restored gospel teaches us that the term “God” means an exalted man and exalted woman united in the everlasting covenant of marriage” (Hawkins, 2012, p. 38). This is really what the gospel is all about. Our goal here on this earth is to become like God. It really aids our perspective to know that God means both an exalted man and woman in the covenant of marriage. Nothing could be more helpful to our understanding.

I hope you have learned something new this week and I hope you will share this information with someone who you feel could benefit from it. I promise as we continue to find balance as equal partners, our marriages and families will receive an added measure of happiness.

References:

Hawkins, A. J., Dollahite, D. C., & Draper, T. (2012). Successful marriages and families: proclamation principles and research perspectives. Provo, UT: BYU Studies and School of Family Life, Brigham Young University.

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