Can we have the priesthood without the church?

In my post on Monday, I suggested that the church is what allows us to have the ordinances of salvation. Commenter Michael suggested with a finer point that the priesthood allows those ordinances, not the church organization.

For me the two – the priesthood and the church -- are inextricably linked. Here’s why:

It’s true the priesthood came first, with the restoration of the Aaronic Priesthood in May 1829 (see D&C 13) and the Melchizedek Priesthood following in the same year (confirmed in D&C 27:12).

Section 84 reaffirms that the priesthood is the means by which ordinances are performed and have validity:

And this greater priesthood administereth the gospel and holdeth the key of the mysteries of the kingdom, even the key of the knowledge of God. Therefore, in the ordinances thereof, the power of godliness is manifest. And without the ordinances thereof, and the authority of the priesthood, the power of godliness is not manifest unto men in the flesh; For without this no man can see the face of God, even the Father, and live (D&C 84:19-22).

I understand “this” in the final line of those verses to refer to the power of godliness, which is derived from the authority of the priesthood used in performing the ordinances of the priesthood.

Those verses alone would suggest that Michael may be right: the priesthood is all that is required, not the church itself.

But D&C 20 makes clear that the priesthood is a part of the church:

No person is to be ordained to any office in this church, where there is a regularly organized branch of the same, without the vote of that church (v. 65, emphasis mine).

And so is the ordinance of baptism:

And again, by way of commandment to the church concerning the manner of baptism—All those who humble themselves before God, and desire to be baptized, and come forth with broken hearts and contrite spirits, and witness before the church that they have truly repented of all their sins, and are willing to take upon them the name of Jesus Christ, having a determination to serve him to the end, and truly manifest by their works that they have received of the Spirit of Christ unto the remission of their sins, shall be received by baptism into his church (v. 37, emphasis mine).

And so is the sacrament:

It is expedient that the church meet together often to partake of bread and wine in the remembrance of the Lord Jesus (v. 75, emphasis mine).

The Lord not only revealed these organizational matters, but also the name of the church:

For thus shall my church be called in the last days, even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (D&C 115:4, emphasis mine).

Of course this pattern is not new. We read similarly in the Book of Mormon about the establishment of the church and its ordinances in the time of Alma and the naming of the church as well.

Elder Oaks reaffirmed the relationship between the priesthood and the church in his talk in the October 2010 conference:

During His earthly ministry, Jesus Christ conferred the authority of the priesthood that bears His name and He established a church that also bears His name. In this last dispensation, His priesthood authority was restored and His Church was reestablished through heavenly ministrations to the Prophet Joseph Smith. This restored priesthood and this reestablished Church are at the heart of the priesthood line (“Two Lines of Communication,” emphasis mine).

I accept that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints encompasses the restored priesthood of God, restored and revealed through the prophet Joseph Smith and that that priesthood authority and power are present in the church today. I have personally benefitted from that priesthood power, both in the ordinances of the gospel and the organization of the church and the blessings each has brought into my life.

Pure Religion: Does it require a church?

Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world (James 1:27).

I admit that for most of my adult life, I’d paraphrase the first half of this scripture and leave the second half out. As we discussed it yesterday in Sunday School, however, I realized the problems such an approach causes: One can visit the fatherless and widows and relieve their suffering without a church.

Is that what James really means?

We developed a list of things “religion” is – primarily a system of belief or faith. Our instructor moved on before it occurred to me that religion is also the performance of ordinances.

The key is in the second half of the verse: keeping oneself unspotted from the world. The simple answer is that we should keep the commandments to keep ourselves unspotted. And yet we all sin. We all have need of repentance. And we all have need of the sacrament as part of that process of ritualized cleansing.

Without the church, without the priesthood, there is no sacrament. Nor are there other saving ordinances of the gospel. And without those, we cannot be unspotted from the world. Indeed, having the church and the temple as an occasional place of refuge is a great blessing in the second half of Peter’s description of pure religion. And, if we heed prophetic counsel, it can also be an enabler in the first half.

Helpless Children; Helpless Parents

I have seven children, five of whom are adults. As our kids have worked through the normal stages of development, we've often cited the oldest life-stage we're dealing with and pronounced it as the "hardest time to parent children" – you know: toddlers are the hardest children to parent; no, teenagers are the hardest to parent; no, young adults are hardest to parent.

In fact, they're all hard. Because the stakes are so high. I am certain, looking back, that my parents also had sleepless nights wondering about the choices I was making. Not that I was doing awful things, but just wondering if it would all turn out all right. Whatever hang ups my parents may have had (and I'm sure they had some, but I'm happy not to enumerate them), I do know that my parents genuinely wanted what was best for me, and that generally meant something better than what they had as kids.

And they delivered. My father worked hard to provide a comfortable life for us. We weren't rich (as Mom regularly reminded us – "We can't afford that!"), but I always had shoes that fit (even if my pants didn't, since that pre-school year trip to JC Penney had to last all year), plenty to eat (though there were a lot of casseroles – shepherd's pie was my least favorite followed closely by tuna noodle casserole), and a family that loved me.

My mother was a big believer in letting us fight our own battles. I remember coming home from the Junior High bus one day, after a near fist fight with a kid who had been picking on me. I had not been hit (our mutual friends separated us and saved me from injury, if not embarrassment). Mom pointed out that in that case she hadn't meant I should literally fight my battle, but she still didn't tell me what I'd done was wrong. And she didn't rush to call another parent to smooth things out for me. I don't think it would ever have occurred to her to do such a thing.

So you'd think I'd be able to sit and watch my kids make their own mistakes and patiently wait for things to resolve themselves. As if. I have to sit on my hands, bite my tongue, bide my time, and hope I don't explode with more "help" than they need.

The divine model is more like my mom. Heavenly Father allows us to flounder. He gives us a chance to learn truth and to practice it (and practice and practice) until we get it right. And he allows us not to get it right. I remember in a Fortran class years ago our professor suggested the computer was infinitely patient: as many times as we typed a line of code wrong, the computer would calmly respond: "Data entry error" (or whatever the error code was). Our Father in Heaven is also patient. The Lord reminds us that He is anxious to gather us as a hen gathers her chicks, and that his arms are outstretched still, but we must walk to Him. And He waits. And I hope I can learn to do the same.

The Church in Shanghai

I had the opportunity to spend eight of the last ten weeks in China on business (two trips, four weeks each). While there I attended the Shanghai Pudong Branch in the Shanghai China International District. And my last Sunday I was able to attend a district conference of the Shanghai China International District, as well.

The Chinese government allows for religious freedom, but places some restrictions on the church there. Like other denominations, expatriate branches of the church are open only to holders of foreign (non-Peoples Republic of China) passports, or the spouses of holders of such passports. Church members are not to disseminate church literature to Chinese nationals, nor are they to proselyte in any way. In the branch I attended, an announcement in the bulletin and also from the stand at the beginning of sacrament meeting made this policy clear.

Non-LDS friends in China also indicated that their experience is the same at their churches. (They attend different denominations in different languages: English, German, Spanish and Mandarin (Taiwanese).)

I'm impressed (but not surprised) that the church is so cautious. Until sometime last year, the church was recognized by the national government, but not by the local Shanghai government, so they could not rent a public space for meetings. With the official recognition in Shanghai, the church can now rent a beautiful conference center for Sunday services of the two Shanghai branches. There were two other branches represented at the district conference: Nanjing and Suzhou. I didn't count noses, but I'd estimate we had over 500 people there for the Sunday session of conference.

One of the things I noticed early on in my visits to the Pudong Branch was the absence of full time missionaries. When we lived in Taiwan, we met in a stake center next to the temple, and shared our building with five wards, and there were full time missionaries in the building throughout the day on Sunday. Not having missionaries in regular church meetings was strange to me. (The last time I attended a ward without missionaries was in Provo while I was at BYU.)

Of course, lessons and topics are common, though the population of these branches is more diverse than my suburban ward in Southeast Michigan. In the branch I attended, over the course of my visit I heard speakers from the US, Japan, Korea, Australia, the Philippines and Italy. Many (including Americans) have been in China for years. A young man of Korean birth spoke in district conference. He said his family had been in China for ten years which meant he's probably attended all his schooling in China. And others were from close to home. I sat next to someone from my home stake in Michigan during conference.

It's a rich blessing for the saints to be able to meet wherever they find themselves. I know I was glad to have the Pudong Branch to call my own for the weeks I was in Shanghai.

UPDATE:  Because this particular post generates a lot of traffic, I'm adding a link to my more recent post on the Church's website on the Church in China.  You can read the post here.