Come Listen to a Prophet's Voice: Part 4- A Plea of Urgency

A PLEA TO FATHERS AND HUSBANDS

Our husbands have as much responsibility in supporting us in our efforts to live righteous lives as we have in supporting them in all they do.
“Verily I say unto you, that every man who is obliged to provide for his own family, let him provide, and he shall in nowise lose his crown.” (D&C 75:28)
“Women have claim on their husbands for their maintenance, until their husbands are taken” (D&C 83:2).
Referring to these scriptures, Ezra Taft Benson petitions husbands to give serious thought to their role in the family. “ This is the divine right of a wife and mother. While she cares for and nourishes her children at home, her husband earns the living for the family, which makes the nourishing possible. In a home where there is an able bodied husband, he is expected to be the breadwinner. Sometimes we hear of husbands who, because of economic conditions, have lost their jobs and expect the wives to go out of the home and work, even though the husband is capable of providing for his family. In these cases, we urge the husband to do all in his power to allow his wife to remain in the home caring for the children while he continues to provide for his family the best he can, even though the job he is able to secure may not be ideal and family budgeting may have to be tighter.
Also, the need for education or material things does not justify the postponing of children in
order to keep the wife working as the breadwinner in the family. I remember the counsel of our beloved prophet Spencer W. Kimball to married students. He said, “I have told tens of thousands of young folks that when they marry they should not wait for children until they finished their schooling and financial desires....I know of no scripture where an authorization is given to young wives to withhold their families and go to work to put their husbands through school. There are thousands of husbands who have worked their own way through school and have reared families at the same time.”38
“Sometimes the mother works outside of the home at the encouragement, or even the
insistence, of her husband. It is he who wants the items or conveniences that the extra income
can buy. Not only will the family suffer in such instances, brethren, but your own spiritual
growth and progression will be hampered. I say to all of you, the Lord has charged men with the responsibility to provide for their families in such a way that the wife is allowed to fulfill her role as mother in the home.”39
Spencer W. Kimball asserts, “The Lord said women have claim upon their husbands for their maintenance until their husbands be taken. Women are to take care of the family – the Lord has so stated – to be an assistant to the husband, to work with him, but not to earn the living, except in unusual circumstances. Men ought to be men indeed and earn the living under normal circumstances.”40
The responsibility of keeping mother in the home is a joint effort between family members.
Elder Richard G. Scott advocates, “As a husband, don’t encourage your wife to go to work to
help in your divinely appointed responsibility of providing resources for the family, if you can
possibly avoid it. As the prophets have counseled, to the extent possible with the help of the Lord, as parents, work together to keep mother in the home.”41
Affirming all that has been stated by all the prophets from the beginning of time, Gordon B. Hinckley, president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, announced in a
proclamation to the world, “By divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their
families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children. In these sacred
responsibilities, fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners.
Disability, death, or other circumstances may necessitate individual adaptation.”42
I wonder how many women notice that men are responsible only to “provide the necessities of life...,” and not, all the luxuries that his wife wants? We have been so affluent as a society that we have forgotten the difference between needs and wants. Hopefully we will pause for a moment and truly examine what are needs are and what we can sacrifice in order to be home with our children.

A PLEA TO WIVES AND MOTHERS

Speaking of the break down of society, Spencer W. Kimball asks, “Can it be arrested? Can we turn the tide and bring back decency and order out of chaos?
The answer is yes- a positive, stentorian yes. But the solution is not easy.... The Lord has given us a plan, within our capacity to follow, but ignored by the masses because it requires that sacrifice and dedication that men are reluctant to give.”43
And what is that sacrifice and dedication of which President Kimball was speaking? He gives us the answer in this urgent, heart felt plea to the women of the Church.
“I beg of you, you who could and should be bearing and rearing a family: Wives, come home from the typewriter, the laundry, the nursing, come home from the factory, the café. No career approaches in importance that of wife, homemaker, mother – cooking meals, washing dishes, making beds for one’s precious husband and children. Come home, wives, to you husbands. Make home a heaven for them. Come home, wives, to your children, born and unborn. Wrap the motherly cloak about you and, unembarrassed, help in a major role to create the bodies for the immortal souls who anxiously await.
“When you have fully complemented your husband in home life and borne the children,
growing up full of faith, integrity, responsibility, and goodness, then you have achieved your
accomplishment supreme, without peer, and you will be the envy [of all] through time and
eternity.”44
And finally, Gordon B. Hinckley pleads, “If anyone can change the dismal situation into which we are sliding, it is you. Rise up, O Women of Zion, rise to the great challenge which faces you.”45
Women, we are at the very root of the problem and the solution! If society is to change, it
will be because of righteous women. If children are to be able to stand valiant against ever
increasing wickedness, it will be because of righteous mothers in the home.
Please, Come Home!

(Bibliography and references upon request.)