YES ON PROP 8: Yes to God's Love Story

Once Upon A Time... - Sarah F. Langford

It is 12:26 in the morning. As any normal college student, I am still up in the early hours of the morning trying to stay on top of midterms, study guides, essays, and homework. Yet tonight, for once I am caught up on homework but still find myself with the need to write. Perhaps I might call it soulwork. This time, I am not writing for a teacher or a test. Not notecards to study or even homework. Rather tonight my soulwork is to share with all of my dear friends back home in California a most sincere and righteous desire of my heart. That is, the beauty of traditional marriage.

As busy as college life may be, over the past few weeks I have found a few hours here and there to volunteer for the InternationalVoiceForYouth program. With a combined effort amongst different faiths, inspired leaders, and service organizations, I have been part of a most historical effort to preserve the beauty of traditional marriage between a man and woman. In a matter of hours, a most sacred and honored union designed by God himself could possibly fall victim to the ways of the world. Do I try to persuade your thoughts or list statistics to get your vote? Do I share the inevitable side effects that could harm generation after generation in the near future? Or do I just try to convince you to say Yes to Proposition 8? Sure I could do all of that. Instead, I would like to share a love story with you.

You see from the beginning of time, love stories have surrounded each one of us. In my lifetime alone, I grew up with the fairytale love stories of the prince and princess, of Ariel and Eric, Aladdin and Jasmine. As I grew older, I learned to love the stories of Mr. and Mrs. Claus, and Lucy and Ricky Ricardo. Once understanding the love that goes beyond the happily ever after, there is a constant reassurance in the love of my family. I have seen siblings unite in marriage and be sealed for time and all eternity to their spouses. I see the commitment to sacred promises and covenants by the love of my parents. And I see the true love story come alive, as I look at photo albums full of pictures of the traditions and blessings created by the love of my grandparents and their 60 years together.

As I have grown up a bit and enjoyed my studies in school, I have found that love stories, traditional love stories, a love between a man and a woman have linked the past to our future throughout the Ages. In biblical times, The Old and New Testament both state cherished love stories between men and women. It was not good for Adam to be alone, therefore God creating the crowning glory of the woman to be by man's side. In classical Greek and Roman mythology, the Gods united amongst themselves in love and adoration. In Hinduism and the stories of the Eastern land of India, their stories and dances were filled with the art of love. Native American Indians focused on family and stuck together as tribes. And on and on and on. These historical aspects of love only serve as testaments of the true value and sacred design of the heavenly love story.

Yet with all of this there is still a love that exceeds our entire capacity to understand. Our wise and Omnipotent Author created a sacred, divinely crafted union that is designed to forever unite man and woman througout the eternities. Although the trends of the world may argue otherwise, we must look inside our own souls and listen to the heart beat God gave us. We all have the agency to act for ourselves, and we all can love whomever we care for. However, the message of Propositioin 8 is not prohibiting anyone from loving anyone else. Proposition 8 is only trying to preserve a heavenly love story, written by the Lord himself. The beauty of the love story is found in the tradition. Not just any tradition, but a heavenly tradition. A tradition tha must remain sacred, unbroken, unaltered, or tampered with. A tradition that we might easily not have the capacity to understand. And a tradition that we should not take lightly.

There are some things in life that matter more than we will ever in this life fully understand. This is precisely one of those things. It just simply matters. We can not allow the Lord's love story to be rewritten, nor could I allow my thoughts on this sacred blessing to remain unwritten.

So as I write you about this love story form the Lord, all I can do is write as if every fiber in my body was pouring out upon these pages, and share with you the love inside my heart. I may not be married yet, nor have children to raise up in this world. But someday I will and I pray to God that they can partake of the Lord's love story and the design of the sacred family unit in the same ways that I have been able to experience it. What I do have is my family, the traditions that we hold dear, and the love story that we continue to write. As important as my family traditions are to me, so are the traditions of my Father in Heaven. And this is one tradition he does not want us to lose, to forget about, or to erase. I know He wants us to enjoy the blessings of traditional marriage between a man and a woman. I know what my heart beat is telling me and the love that my Heavenly Father has written specifically for my soul. So as you go to the polls tomorrow and read the written words "Proposition 8", my sincerest prayer is that you look to your past to read the love stories that surround you, and look to your future to the love stories that remain unwritten.

It is my prayer that we all can awknowledge God's design, God's good wisdom, his blessings and his love. This is my soulwork for you and the righteous desire I hold dear to my heart. Yes for Prop 8. Yes to God's love story.