Finding Joy in the Savior’s Plan

In September 1975, just after the United Nations declared a decade for women, a reporter was interviewing me about Latter-day Saint women. “Can you hold the priesthood?” she asked. “Do you feel Mormon women need to be liberated?” I felt confused, awkward, and unsure of my answers. After she left I pondered the questions she raised, determined to find answers for myself.

Today I wish that reporter would return. I would like to tell her that I know the gospel is true and that joy comes from following a plan where women and men have unique paths. Married or single, rich or poor, in the marketplace or at home, a woman finds joy by following the Lord’s commandments and bringing refinement and beauty into the world. Knowing this is so, why should we heedlessly pursue the philosophies of men?

President Kimball said, “Let us get our instruments tightly strung and our melodies sweetly sung. Let us not die with our music still in us. Let us rather use this precious mortal probation to move confidently and gloriously upward toward the eternal life which God our Father gives to those who keep his commandments.” (A Woman’s Choices, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1984, p. 97.)

No matter what our situation in life, we are a conduit for beauty. We must learn to sing our own song while life lasts, not to let others control the music of our lives or cover it up with a cacophony of noise.

We need not search for a woman’s place; we need only search for the Savior. He will show us the vision of our potential and help us find the joy that comes from being virtuous women.—Wilma Gardner, Salt Lake City, Utah

Photography by John Snyder