General Conference April 2021

I'll use this week's spiritual thought to report on last week's General Conference -- again landing on Easter weekend. This is the third conference in a row held remotely, I'm starting to get used to it. They certainly get through the meeting a little faster with less time spent going up and down from the podium.

For those of you unfamiliar with our Conferences, here's a link to all events of last weekend. If you see something you like -- check it out -- watch a video or read a transcript ...

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2021/04?lang=eng

But I certainly miss the Tabernacle Choir and other visiting choirs -- and I was somewhat hoping we might hear some older not-heard-in-a-while arrangements. The ones used were still good -- I've just heard them a lot. We did get a couple of mixtures of different local groups singing from around the world -- that was fun. There was even a young Korean children's choir singing in the language I used to know (originally broadcast in 2014). So cute!

The April 2020 Conference was almost entirely on the uprising pandemic. October 2020 was almost entirely on rising political strife and our leaders' alarming concern.

And we come to April 2021, which still had some pandemic and political strife talks, but we got a lot more talks on Jesus himself -- appropriate for Easter, and also got to hear from a lot more international voices -- some really good stories as they discussed handling different situations in their own countries.

I did feel vindicated from a lot of the talks -- in particular, Elder Oaks' talk on the Constitution and political neutrality. He condemned (as I had done myself several times), the practice of judging fellow members of the Church solely on the way they vote. However, after some further introspection -- these talks would be meaningless if I didn't come out of it with my own "homework" -- something I need to work on.

So the biggest thing I got out of this conference: The same talks that seemed to vindicate me were also bringing to my attention that I am, myself, a part of the problem. In the case of the pandemic, I had become very judgmental and slightly antagonistic. Though I always try my best to speak "nice" words, there was still an underpinning of arrogance and self-righteousness. I may have been "right," but I was pushing away opponents instead of helping them to see the light. And the biggest part of it: I was judging them to be idiots, when I should be remembering that we are all rational and intelligent human beings.

Do not judge -- that's what I need to work on. I guess I haven't been that bad -- I don't know of many friends that I lost -- one had to go because the toxicity was unbelievably high -- but I'm still friends with many opponents who had said, "If you voted for <blah> unfriend me now." I guess because they still see the niceness in me even when I'm being a jerk. Either way, I need to improve. I'm still going to be loud, but I can certainly be nicer and remove all judgment.

What did you get out of Conference?