miriam beth

 a lot of church is together. we learn in classrooms, we grow in families. we are taught that our families are our greatest group. we are told we will have these families in the gospel together--we are told we will have these families forever. we will be married, we will be parents, we will be brothers and sisters in the gospel, we will be together. 

except when we're not. 

there is a sister in my ward whose husband left the church. and then, a year later, her two sons did, too. and she was heartbroken. she was so, so heartbroken. and she felt so guilty for her heartbreak. she felt like she was being ungrateful with her heartbreak. "i don't want them to feel like I don't love them anymore, but...i think i'm in mourning. i thought we were going to do something else together, and i have to change my idea of family and what that's going to look like. i have to do all this church stuff alone, and that's hard, too. especially because everyone at church is so together..." she said, her eyes full of tears, "and i used to have people to sit with me, but now i just sit there all alone..."

i had a friend who didn't get married until she was older. we went for a hike and she told me how she felt like she had been left behind. "where is my husband?" she asked, her fists clenched at her sides. "where are my children? why am i alone?"

we are meant to do this together. when we give our hearts to jesus, when we exercise our faith and get baptized, we join a family. we are called "the children of christ" and we belong to god--and to each other. we are taught in communities. we gather for celebrations, for weddings and baptisms and graduations. we bring food and we sit together, hold each other's babies, laugh together. we mourn together. we assemble flowers and bring in warm dishes of food. we fold laundry and clean bathrooms and drop things off and pick things up and hold one another in our arms as we cry. 

but sometimes we do not. 

in 2020 we experienced this a little, didn't we? we sat in our homes, watching church through a screen, seeing all the familiar things: the pulpits and the ties, the chairs and the organ. we hear the familiar hymns, so close and so far. this we used to do together. now our circles are tightly drawn. if we do not have the housemates that are also churchmates, we are alone. and that is lonely. 

moroni was alone, too. and this is what he shows us. when he writes of the sacred practices of the nephites he is remembering the togetherness. he mentions the sacrament, the laying on of hands, the communal praying, the together. he misses it, too, doesn't he? 

sometimes things do not turn out as we had expected. sometimes things are different. sometimes they are hard. sometimes we are remembering being together and sometimes we are together. 

i long for the familiar, where i walk into sacrament meeting already exhausted by the sheer effort of just getting there and the sweet older sister who hands out the programs greets me by wrapping me in a big hug. i love the example of a prophet who, raised in the togetherness, now stands alone, and records the beautiful sacred practices of his people. moroni's simple thoughts, his example, continue to comfort us today. applicable now as when he wrote the words.