Two sets of keys, turned jointly and unitedly in mutual purpose, is what we should be envisioning when we think of our Heavenly Parents and Their work together.

General Conference April 2022 confirmed Heavenly Mother is our doctrine. Further, it was stated that the specifics of the Church’s doctrine on Heavenly Mother could be found in the Gospel Topics Essay. This was exciting!

Dreams are highly valued as a source of revelation in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, but do we have a clear doctrine on dreams?

As a teen convert to the Church, I was taught that we have a Heavenly Mother, but She was being protected by Heavenly Father from the fallen-ness of our world and so we did not pray or speak about Her. The idea, as I understood it, was that if no one thought or spoke about Her, somehow She would be protected. How an immortal, all-powerful goddess could stand in need of protection was never explained to me. Even my teenaged convert self knew that was hooey.

Embodiment is one of the two great doctrines restored by the First Vision. When Joseph Smith entered the Sacred Grove in 1820, he learned two great truths contrary to Trinitarian Christianity. First, he learned that Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father are separate beings. Hence, we do not believe in the Trinity but in the Godhead.

A strange dynamic sometimes animates conversations on the subject when certain members of the Church take part. For example, someone mentions a recent increase in violent crimes in their city. The hypothetical Church member involved in the discussion, upon hearing this, might shake his head and say something like, “Christ is coming back soon.” Others in the conversation usually will mumble some sort of agreement and drop the point.

Apostasy from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has become increasingly common in recent years. I wish to say a few words about how the apostasy of a close family member has impacted my life.

In the temple we are taught that we must enter into a specific order to claim our divine inheritance: the Holy Order of Matrimony. Might this be the holiest Order of God, the one which Priest- and Priestesshood are patterned after? Heaven would then be governed by an order which consists of Priestesshood and Priesthood unified; an order in which complementary physical and spiritual ordinances of birth, awakening, attachment, and oneness are the means by which progression occurs.

Throughout mankind’s existence, and especially during times of crisis, conflict, and confusion such as we see now with COVID and the war in Ukraine, one universal question seems to echo the loudest across time and space: “If there is a loving God, why is there so much suffering?!”

One of the most glorious truths that has been restored in this fullness of times is the knowledge that men and women are meant to be equal partners, uniting with Christ in our complementary differences to fulfill the measure of our creation.