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In preserving religious freedom, Latter-day Saints in the counseling profession are at a “title of Liberty” moment, the Church’s general legal counsel declared June 15 in a speech during the third day of the LDS Family Services System-wide Seminar in Salt Lake City.
Elder Lance B. Wickman, emeritus General Authority Seventy, made the comment in allusion to the Book of Mormon incident in Alma 46, when Moroni, the chief commander of the Nephite armies, raised a banner to inspire the people to defend their religion, freedom, peace, and families.
Speaking to an audience from several nations gathered at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, Elder Wickman spoke of how religious freedom is being encroached upon in the field of mental health consultation.
“These threats are emerging threats,” he noted. “They have not yet fully occupied the field, but they are real and they require men and women of faith to confront them squarely and to confront them now.”
He began by identifying some essential truths.
“Religious freedom is a basic principle of the gospel and a fundamental human right, a right essential to mortality’s central purpose of exercising our divinely granted moral agency to choose to accept Jesus Christ as our Savior and live His gospel,” he said.
“Religious liberty is the protected space in which that agency is nurtured and thrives,” he said, adding that for Latter-day Saints it allows the flourishing of faith that is central to their lives.
“That alone justifies the protection of religious liberty as a fundamental human right,” he remarked.
To read the full article on the Church News, click here.