Guardians of Virtue

Today I taught a lesson in our Sunday Relief Society meeting about the Law of Chastity. I think it went well, and hope the direction I took with it was helpful to the women in our ward.
I heard a few horror stories from relatives that had participated in the same lesson a few weeks ago. About discussions that went off track to debate birth control, same-sex marriage, and public school education. I wasn't sure exactly how I wanted the lesson to go, but I knew what I didn't want it to turn into. So I spent the week looking for a way to present the lesson material to my target audience- mostly women in their 50s and 60s with a few young mother's thrown in- in a way that was relevant to their situation that would invite participation and discussion but not debate and would not make anyone uncomfortable.
I decided to approach it as a discussion of our role as women as teachers of children and protectors of the people we love, as "guardians of virtue" in all its forms. We talked about Chastity and its definition, then why breaking it was such a serious sin. My logical explanation was that the Lord values life. The most serious sin is murder, the taking of a life. The second most serious sin is breaking the law of chastity, abusing the powers of creating life. I pointed out the counsel we are given to teach our children, the resources the church has given us to do it like "A Parent's Guide" and "For the Strength of Youth" and even the Friend magazine here and here. And repeated a talk we had in sacrament meeting last week that reminded us that whatever we didn't teach our children, the public schools and media would happily take over for us.
We talked about giving our children the right information now, before they got the wrong information later. About giving them the tools they needed to make good choices and explain their choices to others. And about being good examples in our own choices of dress, media consumption, and in standing up for what is right in public places, such as speaking out against inappropriate media or school programs.
We talked about many ways Satan tempts people to break the law of chastity, such as promoting immodest dress, lowering the standards of media content, promoting homosexuality, and spreading pornography. I told the Chocolate cake story* and we played "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes"** and talked about putting filters on our computers and using the parental controls on the tv remote and keeping both in busy spots around the house, not in bedrooms or basements or office corners. We shared ideas about the importance of dressing modestly at every age, of keeping our temple covenants after we get there, and living so the Holy Ghost can help us make good choices.
I shared my testimony of the importance of the Law of Chastity, of the sacred responsibility we have to teach our families and children about virtue and chastity, and the help we can have from the Holy Ghost in knowing what to say and when to say it, and the importance of keeping a constant watch against Satan's efforts to infiltrate our homes with inappropriate media.
I wish I had more time to talk about the miracle of forgiveness, that there is always a way out, and the church's addiction recovery program to help deal with pornography problems, and found a way to keep the old ladies in the back row from tuning out and falling asleep, but I was out of time and discussion questions. And I still wonder if I should have made brownies, or maybe some chocolate cake? Oh well.
All in all, I learned a lot, which I guess was the point, right? I have a good FHE lesson in the works to help my kids fight the coming onslaught of public school next week and a stronger testimony of one more gospel principle. I will call that a success!

*When I was in YW um, several years ago, we were taught an object lesson by a guess teacher. I don't know who she was, but I still remember what she said. I will summarize. I am sure there is a longer illustrated version somewhere in a "Best of Mormon Something" anthology. Here is the short version I shared today.
Once upon there was a happy little town. They were given two rules, which if they kept carefully they were guaranteed to always be safe and happy. The two rules were: 1. Never eat chocolate cake and 2. Never wear the color red.
One day there gathered a team of mean people who decided that they wanted to make everyone miserable like they were, so they set about trying to make the people break the rules. They first tried to open a chocolate cake stand but were quickly shut down and run out of town because the people knew better than to let chocolate cake into their town.
So the team leader opened a bakery. The people protested at first, but since there was nothing in the laws prohibiting bakeries, and the bakery promised to sell just cookies, they let them stay. First he sold cookies, then chocolate chip cookies. People were worried at first, but eventually learned to like cookies and figured the law was against, cake, not cookies. Next the baker made muffins, then cupcakes. Just white cupcakes, so nothing really wrong to alarm the towns people.  Then he added chocolate frosting, and started making white cakes with chocolate frosting, and even chocolate chips. But since the rule was against chocolate cake, no one could do anything to stop him. Finally the baker introduced a chocolate and vanilla swirl cake, which wasn't really technically against the rules, and wasn't it almost the same as plain white cake anyway? He added less and less vanilla swirl to each cake until eventually the people of the town were happily consuming chocolate cake and had forgotten all about the first rule of happiness. When they started to feel sad or guilty about the rules, they just ate more chocolate cake and soon felt better.
The baker soon was able to close his shop because the people were making their own cakes at home now. He soon returned however, and opened a dress shop. He put up a billboard in the center of town featuring a smiling model eating chocolate cake and wearing a beautiful dress, in a lovely shade of pink.

**I read a talk from a YW leader who took her girls shopping for modest clothes. If they could sing "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes"  complete with lifting their arms, bending over, leaning forward, etc. without revealing anything, the clothes were modest enough. An easy gage to teach our girls to use when they pick out their own clothes.