Our Readers Write

Home Evening Ideas

Editor:

Our family has come to love family home evenings very much. We try to make each Monday evening special in some way. I can’t tell you how much we appreciate the ideas presented in “Today’s Family” that help make family fun really special. We have tried each idea and have found them to be quite successful with our four young children. During the family home evening lesson in Relief Society we were given an opportunity to share ideas with each other. Several of the sisters referred to the ideas in the Ensign and expressed a wish that more ideas be given.

Since that lesson in Relief Society, many families have started having family home evening and many have improved their family nights by using the ideas shared that day. Many of us can hardly wait to receive each issue of the Ensign to see what interesting suggestions can be used to add sparkle to our family fun and home evenings.

Please don’t let an issue go by without an idea (or two or three) that can be used for family home evenings.

Mrs. Kenneth Wilcox
Littleton, Colorado

May we encourage our readers to share their home evening ideas with us. We will try to pass some of them on to others in the Ensign family.

Magazine Vacuum

Editor:

After reviewing the first four issues of the Ensign, we feel compelled to say that it does not indeed replace those publications it was supposed to. We find it sorely lacking in fundamental gospel columns such as “Research and Review,” “Spiritual Living,” and “Social Relations.” The advertisements are highly missed, as they were the only current source of information on new Latter-day Saint literature, products, etc. We fail to see the need for dropping them and creating such a vacuum. The new publication is well done, but again we can only say it does not replace the material deleted.

James H. and Ellen M. Gregory
San Diego, California

Pioneer Perspective

Editor:

There is much to revere and cherish in the history of our Mormon pioneer forefathers, and I am very proud of their achievements. However, as a convert to the Church and the only member in my family, I sometimes regret the overemphasis placed by some members upon having a pioneer ancestry. I am not suggesting that we, as members of the Church, discourage pride in our heritage. However, we must be aware that occasionally converts to the Church without strong Church backgrounds may sense rejection from those members with well-established Church ancestries. Much of the growth and development of the Lord’s kingdom here upon the earth depends upon the efforts of the missionaries to bring new people into the Church each year. Let us do everything we can to welcome these new people and make them feel totally accepted into the fellowship of the Church.

Judith T. Michelson
Arlington, Virginia

Grateful Subscribers

Editor:

A check given in gratitude. Our Ensign—and we feel that it is ours—has purpose and fulfillment for us. Each month we are inspired to change our lives. I guess that’s what it’s all about.

S/Sgt B. W. Shackelford and Family
San Angelo, Texas

Editor:

Please add twenty years to my present subscription.

Royal R. Meservy
Whittier, California

King Follett Sermon

Editor:

“The King Follett Sermon” given by Joseph Smith, which appeared in the April and May issues of the Ensign, has greatly increased my testimony of our eternal Father’s plan. Thank you for printing these true words of wisdom.

Mrs. Adrian De Moree
Preston, Idaho

Response to Parents

Editor:

Parents, are you listening? I much appreciated what you had to tell us in our February New Era [page 16]. These are truly the things you have been trying to help us understand. My interest was sparked by our letters to you in the February Ensign [page 54]. I am not proud of the way some of these letters were expressed, although I cannot deny that these are things some of us do tell you. Then two of you wrote the Editor in April [Ensign].

Parents, you have had a slight headstart on us—only two or three decades but, still, the difference is noticeable. That is why you should rightfully be better than us. That is why your letters showed a concern for us, the youth. True, our letters showed a concern for ourselves. That’s why we are still youth.

But, if you look past our selfish requests, you’ll notice that most of us do show our love and appreciation for you (even in those Ensign letters). It will be hard for us to talk with you as long as we remain imperfect, just as when someone’s life is not in order, it is hard for him to talk with our Heavenly Father.

Parents, please don’t give up. We need you. Help us.

Please keep talking to us, and try to understand when we talk to you. And then be bigger and better than we are—look past our unrefined ways of communicating, to see our real message. We appreciate you; we love you.

Lawrence A. Jackson
Dunkirk, France

Navy Note

Editor:

In behalf of the LDS group aboard the aircraft carrier USS Franklin D. Roosevelt, deployed here in the Mediterranean Sea, I wish to tell you how much we enjoy both the New Era and the Ensign. Both magazines are truly wonderful. We get a couple of copies of each and pass them around as much as possible. Good reading materials are hard to come by aboard ship. Keep up the outstanding work; we appreciate it.

Charles D. Walton
LDS Group Leader
U.S. Navy

Population Explosion

Editor:

Thank you for the article “Realities of the Population Explosion” [May, p. 18]. Dr. Low offers hope that the required technology will be developed to meet the very real problems created by an increasing population density.

I disagree, however, with one point. Dr. Low implies that legislation to end income tax deductions for all children after the second would constitute an infringement on the basic human right of a couple to decide how many children they wish to have. He fails to recognize that this deduction is actually a subsidy. Whenever an item being subsidized, whether it be children, railroads, or SSTs, is considered to be either available in sufficient natural supply or is no longer desired, that subsidy may be removed. The termination of the subsidy does not interfere with the right but only the expense of producing the item.

While children are a national resource, they also create expenses which someone must pay. If we consider it a commandment to bring many spirits into the world, we should also consider it a commandment to pay for the care of each of these spirits. Many LDS communities, for example, complain about relatively high taxes required by their schools, while they fail to recognize that they are sending more children per family into those schools. LDS parents should be willing to accept the added tax burden that might be required to support their larger families, rather than to demand a subsidy, in the form of a tax deduction, for each child.

Raymond M. Kuehne
Bloomington, Indiana

Editor:

As a young mother, I really did appreciate “Realities of the Population Explosion” by Philip F. Low. There are many people who want to put pressure on us these days to curtail our families (I have five children), and it is very gratifying to have documentation to present to those naive folk who have allowed themselves to be swallowed up in the wave of hysteria over population controls. We know that we are right because the Lord says so, but some people do not regard him as a valid source, as you may have noted.

Johan H. Jensen
Gridley, California