In Feb. 1972, for the General Women’s Meeting, Harold B. Lee, then President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, spoke about Motherhood. This is a portion of his talk.

“To be what God intended you to be as a woman depends on the way you think, believe, live, dress, and conduct yourselves as true examples of Latter-day Saint womanhood, examples of that for which you were created and made.

“Many of you have read the righteous defense of woman’s place in the world as expressed by a woman, Jill Jackson Miller of Beverly Hills. She writes under the heading “Open Letter to Man.”

‘I am a woman.

I am your wife, your sweetheart, your mother, your daughter, your sister—your friend.

I need your help!

I was created to give the world Gentleness, Understanding, Serenity, Beauty, and Love.

I am finding it increasingly difficult to fulfill my purpose.

Many people in advertising, motion pictures, television, and radio have ignored my inward qualities and have repeatedly used me only as a symbol of sex.

This humiliates me; it destroys my dignity; it prevents me from being what you want me to be—an example of Beauty, Inspiration, and Love: love for my children, love for my husband, love of my God and country.

I need your help to restore me to my true position—and to allow me to fulfill the Purpose for which I was Created.

Oh, man, I know that you will find the way.’ 

“That, I think, is the plea of every true woman’s heart in this day. It seems abundantly clear that to follow the extreme fashions of this day is to give credence to the efforts of some who would topple mankind from the pedestal on which we are placed in the divine plan of the Creator. The woman who is too scantily dressed, or immodestly dressed, ofttimes is the portrayal of one who is thus trying to draw the attention of the opposite sex when her natural adornments do not, in her opinion, suffice.

“I sat this morning with some of my brethren who are among our most prominent leaders. One of the brethren said he had recently had requests from two sisters, at different times, asking if he would give them a special blessing so that they could have children. On inquiry he found that in their earlier married life they had refused to have children, and now, when they desire children, for some reason they can’t have them.

“Another one of my brethren spoke up and said, “That reminds me of our own experience. We married quite young and we had our children, five of them, before my wife was 28. Then something happened and we were not able to have any more children.” He continued: “If we had delayed having our family until after I had my education, which would have been about that time, we probably would have had no children of our own.

“When I consider those who enter into holy wedlock in the Lord’s own way and receive the divine commandments to multiply and replenish the earth, then through their own designs fail to observe the commandment, I wonder if, later on when they are ready to have the children, the Lord might not think: “Maybe this is the time for you to do a little soul-searching in order for you to come back to the realities for which you have been placed upon the earth.

“Today, strangely enough, half the world is trying to prevent life and the other half is trying to prolong life. Have you ever thought of that? Where do we brothers and sisters stand in this picture? It is when we tamper with nature that we are in trouble, for there are things a woman does that are natural in the divine order of things. To be a wife is one of your greatest responsibilities—true companion, a helpmeet to your husband.

“Someone spoke a profound truth when he said, “No man can live piously, or die righteously without a wife.” Even God himself said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an helpmeet for him.” (Gen. 2:18) The apostle Paul’s statement had broader meaning than some have interpreted it, when he declared: “Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.” (1 Cor. 11:11) He was teaching the great truth that only in holy wedlock for time and eternity, in the new and everlasting covenant, can the man and woman attain to the highest privilege in the celestial world, but he may likewise have been stressing the great need of a husband and a wife for each other in this world.

“In defining the relationship of a wife to her husband, the late President George Albert Smith put it this way: ‘In showing this relationship, by a symbolic representation, God didn’t say that woman was to be taken from a bone in the man’s head that she should rule over him, nor from a bone in his foot that she should be trampled under his feet, but from a bone in his side to symbolize that she was to stand by his side, to be his companion, his equal, and his helpmeet in all their lives together.’

“But now there are the “unclaimed jewels” who have not as yet had an acceptable offer of marriage or if married have not been able to have children, and they wonder about the doctrines that I have just now spoken about. To these President Young made a promise for which the plan of salvation provides the fulfillment. He said, “Many of the sisters grieve because they are not blessed with offspring. You will see the time when you will have millions of children around you. If you are faithful to your covenants, you will be mothers of nations.” (Discourses, p. 310.)

“Over the years I have been asking mothers of large families—successful families—what did you do to make your family successful? And I recall the cardinal thing that one such mother answered in reply to my question: “I was always at the crossroads of my home when my children were growing up.” And another said, “We took great pains with our first child; then the others took that as a pattern thereafter.” From my experience, I wouldn’t stop at the first child. I think I would advise you to go further than that. But there is much to be said for following that counsel.

“I now want to say something to you sisters that is a somewhat delicate subject. Even if circumstances require mothers of families to work because of the insufficiency of their husbands’ salaries, or because they have been left alone in widowhood, they should not neglect the cares and duties in the home, particularly in the education of the children. Today I feel that women are becoming victims of the speed of modern living. It is in building their motherly intuition and that marvelous closeness with their children that they are enabled to tune in upon the wavelengths of their children and to pick up the first signs of difficulty, of danger and distress, which if caught in time would save them from disaster.

“Within the past year a prominent speaker at a local service club dinner was quoted as saying this: “The nation has taken the wrong approach to many problems. We deal with the delinquent after he is a delinquent; the drug addict after he is an addict; the criminal after he is a criminal. We forget that we should work with our youngsters before these problems arise. There is no substitute for the family. This is where the children are brought up, where their habits are created; where they receive strength to face the world.

“Wives must work to see that their husbands do not neglect the family. It takes planning. I picked up something–a statement from an unlooked-for source, Princess Grace of Monaco, in a magazine called Family Circle. She could have been a Relief Society president writing; this is what she said: “I am like anyone else trying to keep a home together. I must fight, I mean fight, for the time to be with my children. My husband and I spend every spare moment we have with our children in an effort to share our lives with them. And where there are no spare moments, I struggle to make them.

“The most powerful weapon we have against the evils in the world today, regardless of what they are, is an unshakable testimony of the Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Teach your little children while they are at your knee and they will grow up to be stalwart. They may stray away, but your love and your faith will bring them back. Remember, paraphrasing what President McKay said, “No success will compensate for failure in the home.” Remember also that no home is a failure as long as that home doesn’t give up. If a sixteen-or seventeen-year-old is incorrigible, don’t give up. Keep the pipeline of faith and love filled and win him back. We are the Lord’s children, and he doesn’t give up.

“That the Lord may help us so to do for the salvation and blessing of all our Father’s children, I pray humbly in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Maintain Your Place As A Woman, Pres. Harold B. Lee, Feb. 1972

Painting, “A Moment In Time”, by Katie M. Berggren, who says, “My purpose is to paint and capture the special moment between mother and child”. Find her work at http://kmberggren.com