A couple of weeks ago, a young couple, new to our ward, spoke in our sacrament meeting.

The wife spoke openly of her struggle with relatively newly-diagnosed bipolar disorder, and of her husband’s patient kindness and caring for her.

I was deeply impressed, not only by what she said about her husband, but with her.  I appreciated her candor.  I admired her courage.

I believe that members of the Church are coming to a better understanding of, and to more compassion for, mental and emotional illness and those who suffer from it.  Elder Holland’s wonderful remarks during the Saturday afternoon session of October 2013 General Conference were a landmark, as were, earlier, Elder Alexander Morrison’s 2003 book Valley of Sorrow: A Layman’s Guide to Understanding Mental Illness and his 2005 Ensign article on “Myths about Mental Illness.”

I understand the strong social pressures within and without the Church to act as if we’re perfect, as if we have everything together, and the strong personal urge to avoid too much openness, too much vulnerability.

But I also believe that, carried too far, this pretense does us considerable harm.  First of all, it can become, essentially, a lie.  None of us is really perfect, none of us really has his or her act fully together, and few of us even come close.  All of us have insecurities, areas of guilt and feelings of inadequacy.  And it’s awfully hard to keep up such a faade.  And not, it seems to me, very worthwhile.

As I write, I’m thinking about two friends who are going through a terribly difficult time, something of which most of us who knew them had no inkling until just the past few days.  A mutual friend wrote to me today, expressing concern and a desire to help, but also saying that he has typically tended to assume that everything is going swimmingly well for others, just not for him.  For that reason, therefore, this recent turn of events in the lives of people we both care about was especially shocking.  How can we help?  Could we have helped earlier?

I agree.  And I’ve noticed the same thing.  I sometimes wonder why I’m facing challenges, or why things aren’t going the way I would like for my children. Why is everybody else doing so well?  Why do their paths in life seem so effortless and so effortlessly successful?  Why not us?  But, of course, this is all illusion.  Everybody has challenges.  As the passage in Susan Evans McCloud’s wonderful LDS hymn reminds us, “In the quiet heart is hidden sorrow that the eye can’t see.”

I always think, in this context, of the Simon and Garfunkel song “Richard Cory”:

They say that Richard Cory owns one half of this whole town,
With political connections to spread his wealth around.
Born into society, a banker’s only child,
He had everything a man could want: power, grace, and style.

But I work in his factory
And I curse the life I’m living
And I curse my poverty
And I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be
Richard Cory.

The papers print his picture almost everywhere he goes:
Richard Cory at the opera, Richard Cory at a show.

But I work in his factory
And I curse the life I’m living
And I curse my poverty
And I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be
Richard Cory.

He freely gave to charity, he had the common touch,
And they were grateful for his patronage and thanked him very much,
So my mind was filled with wonder when the evening headlines read:
“Richard Cory went home last night and put a bullet through his head.

But I work in his factory
And I curse the life I’m living
And I curse my poverty
And I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be,
Oh, I wish that I could be
Richard Cory.

And I think of the earlier poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson (d. 1935), which inspired the song:

Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.

And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
Good-morning,’ and he glittered when he walked.

And he was rich – yes, richer than a king –
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.

So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.

And I recall this passage, from Mosiah 18:8-10, about the Book of Mormon prophet Alma:

And it came to pass that he said unto them: Behold, here are the waters of Mormon (for thus were they called) and now, as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people, and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light;

Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and to stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death, that ye may be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection, that ye may have eternal life-

Now I say unto you, if this be the desire of your hearts, what have you against being baptized in the name of the Lord, as a witness before him that ye have entered into a covenant with him, that ye will serve him and keep his commandments, that he may pour out his Spirit more abundantly upon you?

I understand the need for privacy, and am not calling for the Church to be transformed into one great boundary-less sensitivity-training session and group hug.

 But I do think that too much pretense harms us and prevents the Church from fully carrying out its divinely-appointed mission.  Furthermore, acting as if we have to merit admission into heaven rather than to seek entrance via the grace of Christ is plain, unambiguous, heresy.

Years ago, Hillary Clinton published a book entitled It Takes a Village.  The title allegedly came from an African proverb:  “It takes a village to raise a child.” She came under a great deal of fire from my fellow members of the vast right-wing conspiracy, and I understand why:  Most of us aren’t fans of Ms. Clinton, and most of us read her title as really saying “It takes an intrusive and vastly-extended state to raise a child.”  But I was very uncomfortable with much of the rhetoric, because, despite my libertarian leanings on political and economic issues, I’m also, at heart, a communitarian.  And I think it really does take a “village” to raise a child – and to sustain and nourish the rest of us, too, even after we’ve left childhood long behind.