Marriage Advice from the LDS General Authorities in General Conference. If you're Mormon, don't get married, or divorced, before reading these excerpts!

To declare the fundamental truths relative to marriage and family is not to overlook or diminish the sacrifices and successes of those for whom the ideal is not a present reality. Some of you are denied the blessing of marriage for reasons including a lack of viable prospects, same-sex attraction, physical or mental impairments, or simply a fear of failure that, for the moment at least, overshadows faith. Or you may have married, but that marriage ended, and you are left to manage alone what two together can barely sustain. Some of you who are married cannot bear children despite overwhelming desires and pleading prayers.

If you are married, are you faithful to your spouse mentally as well as physically? Are you loyal to your marriage covenants by never engaging in conversation with another person that you wouldn’t want your spouse to overhear? Are you kind and supportive of your spouse and children?

I think one of the reasons that we are counseled to get married early in life is to avoid developing inappropriate character traits that are hard to change.

My beloved brethren, may I remind you, if there were a perfect woman, do you really think she would be that interested in you?

And brethren, astonish your wife by doing things that make her happy.

My dear sisters, whatever your calling, whatever your circumstances, we need your impressions, your insights, and your inspiration. We need you to speak up and speak out in ward and stake councils. We need each married sister to speak as “a contributing and full partner”10 as you unite with your husband in governing your family. Married or single, you sisters possess distinctive capabilities and special intuition you have received as gifts from God. We brethren cannot duplicate your unique influence.

Marriages would be happier if nurtured more carefully.

Marriage brings greater possibilities for happiness than does any other human relationship.

Priesthood authority has been restored so that families can be sealed eternally. So brethren, your foremost priesthood duty is to nurture your marriage—to care for, respect, honor, and love your wife. Be a blessing to her and your children.

As grateful partners look for the good in each other and sincerely pay compliments to one another, wives and husbands will strive to become the persons described in those compliments.

Marital unity is sustained when goals are mutually understood.  

Before there was death, there was marriage

an eternal marriage is eternal. Eternal implies continuing growth and improvement. It means that man and wife will honestly try to perfect themselves. It means that the marriage relationship is not to be frivolously discarded at the first sign of disagreement or when times get hard. It signifies that love will grow stronger with time and that it extends beyond the grave. It means that each partner will be blessed with the company of the other partner forever and that problems and differences might as well be resolved because they are not going to go away.

Even a rickety marriage will serve good purpose as long as two people struggle to keep it from falling down around them.

Marriage is yet safe, with all its sweet fulfillment, with all its joy and love. In marriage all of the worthy yearnings of the human soul, all that is physical and emotional and spiritual, can be fulfilled.

When we observe the covenants we make at the altar of sacrifice, we discover hidden reservoirs of strength. I once said in exasperation to my wife, Marie, “The Lord placed Adam and Eve on the earth as full-grown people. Why couldn’t he have done that with this boy of ours, the one with the freckles and the unruly hair?” She replied, “The Lord gave us that child to make Christians out of us.”

And married people should be best friends; no relationship on earth needs friendship as much as marriage.

Friendship in a marriage is so important. It blows away the chaff and takes the kernel, rejoices in the uniqueness of the other, listens patiently, gives generously, forgives freely. Friendship will motivate one to cross the room one day and say, “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean that.” It will not pretend perfection nor demand it. It will not insist that both respond exactly the same in every thought and feeling, but it will bring to the union honesty, integrity. There will be repentance and forgiveness in every marriage—every good marriage—and respect and trust.

Some years ago, I was consulted by a woman who desired a divorce from her husband on grounds which, in my opinion, were justified. After the divorce was concluded, I did not see her again for many years. A chance meeting with her on the street was very surprising. The years of loneliness and discouragement were evident in her once beautiful face.

After passing a few pleasantries, she was quick to say that life had not been rich and rewarding for her and that she was tired of facing the struggle alone. Then came a most startling disclosure, which, with her permission, I share. She said, “Bad as it was, if I had to do it over again, knowing what I do now, I would not have sought the divorce. This is worse.”

We build our marriages with endless friendship, confidence, integrity, and by administering and sustaining each other in our difficulties.

I do not mean to overemphasize differences, but they are real, and make things interesting. Our differences are the little pinches of salt which can make the marriage seem sweeter.

I learned in serving almost twenty years as bishop and stake president that an excellent insurance against divorce is the payment of tithing. Payment of tithing seems to facilitate keeping the spiritual battery charged in order to make it through the times when the spiritual generator has been idle or not working.  

In the enriching of marriage the big things are the little things.

There is really only one way to ensure good family communication, and that is the Lord’s way. He advocates the council method.

How can a family go wrong if each major decision is carefully measured by gospel teachings?  

To pay tithes and offerings while ignoring the balance of Heavenly Father’s advice concerning sound judgment in family finances will probably cause the windows of heaven to stick a little bit. The promised blessings will not likely be forthcoming as expected.

Every prophet in this dispensation has taught in clear, unmistakable terms that the Saints should stay out of debt (we heard it again this morning from President Kimball), that we should not participate in “something-for-nothing” schemes, which has been stressed today. He advises us to be frugal, to save, and to earn our money the old-fashioned way, by the sweat of our face.

Few things are as destructive in a marriage as the statement, “Sweetheart, I just signed up today for a $200 course at the local health spa.” A well-planned health course may be just the thing, but not as a surprise addition to an already strained budget. This could have been and should have been a prime topic for pillow talk beforehand. As Elder Neal A. Maxwell told us so well recently, “If your companion is going to participate in a crash landing, then she should also help file the flight plan.  

Now, brothers and sisters, every divorce in the Church affects the work of the kingdom adversely.

And don’t you agree that perhaps the most important questions that will need to be answered by a divorced person in the hereafter will be these:

1. “Did you do everything possible to save your marriage?”
2. “Were gospel truths applied to the fullest?”
3. “Did you seek out, listen to, and abide by priesthood counsel?”

HEADLINES & VERSE. Thursday. August 10. 2017

A PRESIDENTIAL PROMISE IS AS FIRM AS A FLORIDA SINKHOLE  

Resist the hypnotic appeal

When Presidents promise a deal.

Their words have the weight

Of thin paper plate --

And wriggle around like an eel.

HEAVY RAINS PROVE NEW ORLEANS IS JUST A LAKE WAITING TO HAPPEN

When hit by a cloudburst of rain,

New Orleans goes right down the drain.

With pumps that don’t suck,

They’re plumb out of luck.

A nice place to live -- for a crane.

UBIQUITOUS DONUT FRANCHISE TO MAKE SPECIAL DONUT FOR UPCOMING SOLAR ECLIPSE. THIS ISN'T REALLY NEWS, BUT WE'RE HOPING THEY'LL READ THIS AND SEND US A COUPLE DOZEN FREE SAMPLES.

The world can watch eclipses till astronomers all scream;

Me, I’ll settle down to watch, and eat, a Krispy Kreme.

Other donuts, with their sprinkles and their foofaraw,

Cannot match the flavor or my salivating awe.

And if the world should end when next we have a big eclipse,

I’ll be a smiling corpse with Krispy Kreme upon my lips.

HEADLINES & VERSE. Wednesday. August 9. 2017

TRUMP PREPARES FOR NUCLEAR WAR WITH NORTH KOREA, WITH HIS PASTOR'S BLESSING

A pastor in Texas has said

That Kim Jong Un ought to be dead.

He further insists

That Trump use his fists

To start the atomic bloodshed.

AFTER YEARS OF INTENSIVE RESEARCH, SCIENTIST NOW SAY THE SUN IS HOT AND THE MOON IS COLD

I know that the sun is quite hot.

And that the moon at night’s not.

Much more than this, I

Know little -- so why

Go tie myself into a knot?

AS TRUMP GROWS STRONGER, THE DOLLAR GROWS WEAKER

When trading in dollars today

You don’t hear the usurers say

“The greenback is safe.”

Instead, it’s a waif --

And to Trumponomics is prey.

EPA CHIEF SCOTT PRUITT TOO SHY TO MEET WITH ANYONE DURING VISIT TO NORTH DAKOTA -- HE STAYS IN HIS ROOM AND WATCHES BRADY BUNCH RERUNS

The EPA chief is so shy

That from public gaze he does fly.

He only will join

With those who have coin,

Or those who burn coal on the sly.

Photo Essay: Going Somewhere

Most people are going somewhere, or think they are going somewhere -- but an existential wool gatherer like me believes most people don't really know where they're going most of the time. So here is a collection of people purposely striding along at the Provo Rec Center today, whom I have randomly assigned to destinations that they seem to merit.

These two are waiting for vindication

This new woman is looking for a chiffon tutu 

This crowd is headed to the Linoleum Museum

The willowy young woman in the white t-shirt is looking for lox in all the wrong places

This man and woman are headed to Bert Lahr's Moose Country

This lady is on a jaunt to the Pimento Fair

He is hurrying to the Irish Potato Famine

This crowd is off to watch a whiffen poof

These two men are frenemies, but don't know it yet

HEADLINES & VERSE. Tuesday. August 8. 2017

LAB MICE MAY HOLD THE KEY TO WEIGHT LOSS FOR WOMEN

There once was a woman whose weight

Gave her a lumbering gait.

She said “Woe is me,

Lab mice ought to be

Probed for my cure by the crate!”

PERU HAS LOST MOST OF ITS GLACIERS, YET VILLAGERS REFUSE TO ACCEPT GLOBAL WARMING AS THE CAUSE

There once was a mob in Peru

Who thought global warming was fou.

With sticks and with stones

They smashed gauging cones --

And swam away without ado.

JOB FAIRS RARELY LEAD TO FULL-TIME EMPLOYMENT

My circumstances need a change; they’ve sunk a bit too low.

So I’ll attend a job fair to increase my weak cash flow.

With resumes and bizness suit I trod the many aisles

Of booths and give them my best pitch -- with many sincere smiles.

Responses are lukewarm at best; although their signs declare

They are seeking workers, they don’t seem to really care.

When the fair is over all my resumes are gone,

And all I’ve got is bus fare and a KFC coupon.

Tomorrow I will try again a job to find and hold

Before the pork and beans run out and I have grown too old.

HEADLINES & VERSE. Monday. August 7. 2017

FRENCH PRESIDENT MACRON WANTS HIS WIFE TO WORK FOR HIM. 

A husband who works with his wife

Is bound to find plenty of strife.

At first they are thrilled,

Then tension will build --

It ends with a scream and a knife.

AT THE BEST RESTAURANTS, DISHWASHERS OFTEN BECOME PARTNERS

At the heart of ev’ry hash house is the man who does the dishes;

His work is long and hard and wet; the cutlery is vicious.

Yet he does not complain as steam envelopes his physique.

This is not a job for lollygaggers or the weak.

It pays ten bucks an hour, and with leftovers so thick

It makes the strongest trencherman just a wee bit sick.

Who are these men of cast iron, who tussle with such grease?

Is their loyalty complete, or does it ever cease?

No chef can do without them, so the smart ones recognize

They’d better cut ‘em in when they are going to franchise.

Oh, I have washed some dishes in my time when I was young --

But all I ever got was just the lashing of a tongue.

So I became a poet -- and my hands are lily white,

and can’t afford to eat where a dishwasher is in sight.

NORTH KOREA THREATENS ATOMIC RETALIATION FOR U.N. SANCTIONS

The U.N. has sanctions galore

For countries when they make them sore.

A slap on the wrist

Makes no one desist

From starting a nuclear war.

Three of the Strangest Disability Payment Stories You'll Ever Hear!

On January 5, 1919, Mr. James Mulney was walking on his way to work, enjoying the fine thaw that had set in earlier in the day in the city of Boston, Massachusetts. He worked as a day supervisor at the Delaney Candy Factory, and was just crossing Kearny Square on Commercial Street when all sweet, sticky hell broke loose.  A storage tank just off of Kearny Square containing over 25-thousand gallons of molasses collapsed, sending a wave ten feet high of molasses surging down Commercial Street, where the unfortunate Mr. Mulney was walking.  He was swept up in the tide of molasses, which carried him, half-suffocated, into the Back Bay of Boston Bay, where he was rescued by naval cadets from the training ship USS Nantucket.

After a few days of recuperating at home, Mr. Mulney attempted to go back to work, but the minute he walked into the candy factory he fainted.  When brought to by his concerned co-workers he immediately began screaming that he could not stand the smell of molasses (which was the common candy sweetener back in those days, not corn syrup).  He had to be restrained from jumping through a plate glass window to escape from the factory, and was escorted back home by several policemen, where he stayed for the next 25 years, a recluse who refused to have a single piece of toffee or taffy in his house.  He lived on a disability pension granted him by the state of Massachusetts.

Mary Livingston was a logging camp cook up in rural Vermont back in the 1870â??s.  She was known as an affectionate, good-humored woman who could cook up a storm for the hungry loggers that were sawing down the last of the old growth forests in Vermont.  During the winter of 1876 she and four hefty loggers were trapped by a blizzard in a small line shack as they were making their way back from a barn dance.  The blizzard raged for three days, and it was four more days before a rescue party could dig them out of the shack, which did not have any food.  They found a scene of horror; Mary, hollow-eyed and laughing maniacally, presided over the half-eaten corpses of the four lumberjacks.  She claimed a bear had broken in to the shack, killed the lumberjacks, and taken bites out of each of them, while Mary cowered in the corner, covered by a blanket.  There were no bear tracks or scat, and it appeared as if the door and windows had not been broken by any forced entry.  A coronerâ??s inquest delivered a verdict of â??death by mischanceâ? and left it at that.  Mary went back to work as a cook, but she was no longer the jolly flirt of former days; instead, she muttered over the pots and pans, and started serving stews that had unidentifiable gobs of meat in them.  She claimed they were raccoon and squirrel, but the loggers began to think it might be something, or SOMEONE, else.  Several loggers disappeared mysteriously from the camps where she was working.  Finally the loggers took up a collection, which they presented to Mary, calling it a â??disability paymentâ?? for her terrible ordeal in the cabin during the blizzard â?? with the stipulation that she discontinue her cooking and retire someplace far away from the forests of Vermont.  She took the money and left, never to be heard of again.  The loggers hired another cook and thankfully went back to their regular diet of flapjacks and fatback.

Joshuah Norton was a canny English businessman who decided to take advantage of the Gold Rush fever of 1849 by taking a stock of dry goods around Cape Horn by ship and setting up shop in San Francisco.  But when he arrived in San Francisco Bay his ship caught fire and burned to the water line; all his earthly goods were gone, and the maritime insurance company refused to pay off.  So Norton arrived on the beach with the singed clothes on his back and nothing more, a pauper.  For several years he attempted to recoup his losses by working for other mercantile establishments, but his run of bad luck was amazing.  He lost job after job, until he began losing his mind.  One day, in 1859, he promenaded through the notorious Barbary Coast section of town dressed in a dilapidated military uniform, complete with gold epaulets and a Napoleonic hat.  He handed out hand-printed business cards to one and all, that read:  NORTON THE FIRST, EMPEROR OF SAN FRANCISCO, PROTECTOR OF MEXICO.  Instead of locking him up, the citizens of San Francisco decided to humor him, and for the next 20 years he was respectfully addressed as â??your majesty, Emperor Nortonâ?.  He was allowed to dine for free at the finest restaurants and occasionally sat in on a minor trial at the courthouse, dispensing imperial justice to pickpockets and drunks.  Towards the end of his life he asked for, and received, a disability payment for, in his own cockeyed words â??Years of unwearyingly serving my people of the Norton Empireâ?.  He died in 1880, and was given a huge funeral, attended by more than 30-thousand people.  The Mayor of San Francisco and the city council solemnly proclaimed that the â??Empire of Norton the Firstâ? had now officially ceased.

All this was done with a straight face.