Bullying At Church

I have a "confession" to make.  I don't talk about it and so unless you went to my old LDS Church in Ogden, you wouldn't know, but for the last year, I've been wearing pants once or twice a month to church.

To some people who aren't familiar with the LDS faith....it's a different choice.  The classic outfit for women in the United States is a dress or skirt. So some members consider pants on a woman to be a controversial choice. On one Sunday in December of 2012, a small number of Mormon women chose to wear pants to promote their cause for what they call "gender equality" in the Church.  That's not why I wore pants.

My original reason stemmed from bullying.  That's right.

 I was being bullied by members of my ward in Ogden.

I was in the middle of my pregnancy with Zach and my body was going through some "changes".  Namely my belly was getting bigger and so were my breasts.  When I graduated high school, I was barely an A cup.  When I got married, I was a B.  By the middle of my pregnancy I was a D.  Why don't you get a "Your Changing Body" discussion when you get pregnant, like you do when you are going through puberty?

I went out and  bought new bras and new clothes because my jeans and a t-shirt lifestyle was not covering my growing body.  By the standards that are set forth by the ACTUAL LDS Church religion, I was still modest.  But as modest as I was....you could tell that I had some pretty big ta-tas.

My mother is "well endowed" and I've heard of people (always women) coming up and telling her that she needs to "do something" about her cleavage.  My mom is particularly thick skinned and handled it with her usually humor,  once telling a woman, "Well, no man has ever complained about it."

After a night at Cub Scout pack meeting (my husband and I were both volunteers in a Webelos group locally), a parent* of a Webelos scout (member of my ward, also) came over to my home and told me that her and "some other ladies" at scouts that night were talking about my breasts and decided that they were "too inappropriate for scouts and church" and were going to talk to the bishop about it, but she decided out of the goodness of her heart, to tell me first so that I could correct it.  She suggested that I wear more baggy t-shirts, like the one I had on (it was one of Aaron's old t-shirts).

She also told me that her son had come home from scouts a couple weeks before and asked his mother, "Have you noticed that Sister Reinert has big boobs?"  Apparently he had also been telling her earlier how hot he thought his teacher at school was (no word on if she had corrected the teacher for such an offense).  My theory is that he noticed because.....they were new.  I doubt he thought that I was "hot" since I was about 7 months pregnant.

I was honestly stunned silent.  I HATE confrontation and standing on my front porch while this woman told me about all of these unknown woman who were talking about me behind my back, I felt totally and completely vulnerable.  I was going through what my outfit had been that night, what my outfits at church had looked like, what my outfits at scouts had been like....I didn't know what I'd done wrong but I felt ashamed.

The definition of bully:  Bullying is the use of force, threat, or coercion to abuse, intimidate, or aggressively impose domination over others.  

Justifications and rationalizations for such behavior sometimes include differences of class, race, religion, gender, sexuality, appearance, behavior, body language, personality, reputation, lineage, strength, size or ability.

Often bullying takes place in the presence of a large group of relatively uninvolved bystanders. In many cases, it is the bully's ability to create the illusion that he or she has the support of the majority present that instills the fear of "speaking out" in protestation of the bullying activities being observed by the group.

She, personally, didn't like my clothes.  Again, by the standards of the actual LDS CHURCH, I was completely fine.  She, and maybe others (this is a MAJOR part of what makes this bullying), personally didn't like my APPEARANCE so they were trying to change it by the use of THREATENING to "tell on me" to the bishop of my ward.  And COERCING to conform to their beliefs of modesty or I wasn't going to be considered appropriate to go to Church or Scouts by this group of ladies.

I wish that this understanding about bullying came to me right away.  Because it didn't.

I went inside my house, AND CRIED.  My husband held me while I cried because I was so ashamed of my body for being "not right".  I cried because I was embarrassed that people had been talking about me behind my back.  I cried because I was scared that maybe more people at the ward felt the same way and that they were talking about me behind my back too and I didn't know. 

And lastly, I cried because I didn't know what to wear to church.  I was scared that most dresses were now too short because of my growing belly.  I had to get down on the floor a lot with the children because I worked with the young children at church.  What if someone saw my underwear and complained to the bishop?  I was scared all the shirts that went with my skirts, that would be long enough, were too low cut and that my boobs would be hanging out.

Then I had an epiphany.

I didn't care.

I didn't care what these women thought.  It didn't matter.  I went to church for Jesus Christ.  Isn't it a scripture mastery that I had learned in high school.  

1 Samuel 16:7 for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.

Heavenly Father didn't care what I wore to church.  Heavenly Father was already happy with me for being willing to serve in Cub Scouts (when so many other women in the ward wouldn't) to the best of my abilities.  Heavenly Father was already pleased with my efforts to be the best primary teacher and primary presidency 2nd counselor that I could be.  For years, I had thrown myself wholeheartedly into doing the jobs that I'd been asked to do.  My willingness to further Christ's love was all that was important to Heavenly Father.  It didn't matter what I wore.

I had a nice pair of dress pants in my closet.  I had lovely maternity blouses. 

I woke up that Sunday with determination to look my very Sunday best.  I ironed my blouse.  I did my hair.  I put on my make-up and I pulled on my pants.  It had been a long time since I had put that much work into my appearance.  I was my honest-to-goodness, Sunday best.  The best I had been in years.

It also had the added bonus of being able to move around all day with children without being worried about flashing anybody.  I could sit comfortably with my pregnant body and not worry about what people were thinking about my modesty.  I wasn't sitting irreverently.  My belly just made it hard to keep my legs closed.  I felt great.  I felt comfortable.

The ACTUAL Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has this to say about the "pants at church" situation, "attending church is about worship and learning to be followers of Jesus Christ. Generally Church members are encouraged to wear their best clothing as a sign of respect for the Savior, but we don't counsel people beyond that."

I learned a valuable lesson in this last year.  

People will ALWAYS judge you.  No matter how hard you try to improve and better yourself.  People will judge you.  I found that to be such a RELIEF!  I don't need to be worried about "Are people judging me?" because YES!  The answer is always YES!  Not just people at church.  People in the grocery store.  People at the park.  People at the mall.  People at work.  And if I can never be perfect in their eyes, THERE IS NO POINT TRYING TO PLEASE THEM.  I don't have to try to please them, EVER.  I only have to please God....and He only requires that I try.  He gives me full points for showing work...not perfection.

My mom says, "The Gospel is True and People are Jerks."  The part that matters most is that the Gospel is True.  

I'm a child of a Heavenly Father who loves me and wants me to return to live with Him someday.  He wants me to live a full and happy life.  He wants me to have struggles and trials and to grow and thrive because of the hard times.  He places people in our lives for a reason.  They teach us lessons.  I believe that the Book of Mormon is a true account of Jesus coming to the America's.  I believe that Joseph Smith translated it and that we still have living prophets on the earth today.

My message is two fold.

1) Don't be that person.  Don't be that person who judges others by your own standards and tries to force them to conform. Don't be that person who makes another person believe that they "aren't good enough".   When the Savior corrected someone, He did it with love.  Not threats.  No coercion.  

In a situation like this in the bible, He wrote his correction (the same one He would have given this woman) in the sand, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her."

Don't be a bully.

2)While sometimes the culture of a religion can produce people who bully and hurt others, the actual Gospel of Jesus Christ is one of love and inclusion.  If we focus on that part, we can get through all of the hurtful people in our world.  For every mean person that I've encountered in my faith, I've found 5 wonderful people who fill the world with love.  I don't focus on how hurtful human beings can be.  I focus on the good that people can bring.  I want people to read this and recognize bullying that they see and help stop it.  I want people to see how they can maybe change a small part of their sphere.  Recognize the good in others and emphasize it.  

I want people to see that we are all in different places on our path and instead of seeing themselves as "further along", seeing everyone, themselves included, as a "work in progress".  You don't know how "further along" you are, because you don't know where the other person started or how long their race is or how they will be measured.  Everyone is doing the best they can with what they have.

Don't be a bully.

*To this day, I've only told 3 people who this woman was, though many of my close friends in that ward know the story.

**Again, this story is just of one ward in Utah.  It isn't a commentary on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  The opinions and views expressed in this post are through the biased eyes of one member of that Church.  It isn't Church policy or accepted Church culture to bully others.

***Depending on how this opinion piece is received, I might write about my year of wearing pants and how the ward generally reacted.  Because you better believe, it made waves.