Minutes and Discourse, 9 June 1842
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Source Note
Female Relief Society of Nauvoo, Minutes, and JS, Discourse, , Hancock Co., IL, 9 June 1842. Featured version copied [ca. 9 June 1842] in Relief Society Minute Book, pp. [61]–[68], handwriting of ; CHL. For more complete source information, see the source note for Nauvoo Relief Society Minute Book.
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Historical Introduction
On 9 June 1842, JS delivered a discourse on mercy to the . He opened the society’s eleventh meeting, held in the near the , with prayer and then addressed the assembled women. He began his discourse by reiterating counsel he had given them in March 1842, shortly after the Relief Society was organized. In that discourse, as well as in this 9 June sermon, he expressed concern that some who had been admitted may not have been worthy of membership. He continued his 9 June discourse by counseling the women to be charitable, humble, and merciful. JS briefly interrupted his discourse to give the Relief Society time to receive new members; he then continued his address. He emphasized that the purpose of the Relief Society was not only to relieve the poor, but also to reform the repentant and save souls. He concluded by offering to provide the society with a city lot and an unfinished house they could use to begin building homes for the poor.As secretary of the Relief Society, recorded an account of JS’s discourse in her minutes for the 9 June 1842 meeting. Although the original loose minutes she took are no longer extant, Snow copied the minutes, including her account of JS’s discourse, into the Relief Society Minute Book, probably shortly after this meeting.
Footnotes
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1
Discourse, 31 Mar. 1842; see also Relief Society Minute Book, 31 Mar. 1842, in Derr et al., First Fifty Years of Relief Society, 42–46.
Derr, Jill Mulvay, Carol Cornwall Madsen, Kate Holbrook, and Matthew J. Grow, eds. The First Fifty Years of Relief Society: Key Documents in Latter-day Saint Women’s History. Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2016.
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1
, June 9th.
J. Smith opened the meeting by pray’r and proceeded to address the congregation on the design of the Institution— said it is no matter how fast the Society increases if all are virtuous— that we must be as particular with regard to the character of members, as when the Society first started— that sometimes persons wish to put themselves into a Society of this kind, when they do not intend to pursue the ways of purity and righteousness, as if the Society would be a shelter to them in their iniquity.
Prest. S. said that henceforth no person shall be admitted but by presenting regular petition signed by two or three members in good standing in the Society— whoever comes in must be of good report.
Harriet Luce and Mary Luce were receiv’d into the Society by recommend.
Objections previously made against Mahala Overton were remov’d— after which Prest Smith continued his address— said he was going to preach mercy Supposing that Jesus Christ and angels should object to us on frivolous things, what would become of us? We must be merciful and overlook small things.
Respecting the reception of Sis. Overton, Prest. Smith It grieves me that there is no fuller fellowship— if one member suffer all feel it— by union of feeling we obtain pow’r with God. Christ said he came to call sinners to repentance and save them. Christ was condemn’d by the righteous jews because he took sinners into his society— he took them upon the principle that they [p. [61]]
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