Jacob Hess

Why do so many wonderful Saints pray so hard, and yet remain so sick? In what ways can God still deliver those seeking to follow Him, even as illness expands around us? I believe further light and knowledge is being given for exactly that – and it’s time to celebrate that.    

Brief summary: Jesus was an amazing teacher. But he did more than teach. He healed people. In Jerusalem. And in Bountiful. How about here – and now? Why do so many wonderful Saints pray so hard, and yet remain so sick? For many years, people have been told that depression, anxiety and other mental health conditions were inherently life-long. Rather than seeing their healing gradually expand, many have been taught the best they can hope for is to “cope” and “manage” a chronic condition.  But with exciting research over recent decades, it’s not hard to recognize the emergence of “further light and knowledge” about mental health. What does that mean for us today – especially those among us hurting the most? This presentation will focus on exploring reasons for fresh hope in the possibility of more sustainable healing from mental health conditions, in particular – and consider practical steps that families can take to create sanctuaries of healing in their own home that more effectively counteract the accelerating risk factors for emotional distress swirling all around us.  

One of the most beautiful moments in our Lord’s ministry is where he, sadly enough, made people the angriest. He came home to share a message in Nazareth that could have been one of the most comforting things these people could possibly hear – saying to the people that, essentially, I’m the one who has been “anointed…to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives…to set at liberty them that are bruised. To announce (as another translation says) that the time has come when the Lord will save his people.”

Unfortunately, the idea this was happening nowwas just too much for these people .…so much easier to say, “sure, the Messiah will come one day…but you healing us here and now? That’s crazy talk. Really dangerous.”

Jesus must have known this was coming. But it still had to be a deeply painful moment for him. “This is who I really am! I can free you. I can heal you. You don’t have to keep suffering like this.”

The response: “Wait a minute…isn’t this Joseph’s son?” As Isaiah predicted, he was “despised and rejected of men” and they “esteemed him not.”

How about us today? Do we esteem this same Jesus as the one who can free us from these twin American epidemics of spiraling animosity and devastating health problems all around us? Or is that idea slightly offensive to us as well?

Our dear President Nelson is doing everything he can to prepare us for when the “earth receives her king.” We can be excited at that coming day – when, yes, “yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.”  But in the meanwhile, what about today? For those of us facing difficult mental, emotional and physical problems, does God expect us to simply endure debilitating things year, after year?

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Jacob Z. Hess, Ph.D.

Have we learned enough as parents to trust the Pfizer vaccine as effective and safe for young children over the long-term? In my own review, there are at least three important concerns that still need to be resolved.  

Originally published on Meridian Magazine, November 5, 2021

After the data submitted by Pfizer for its COVID-19 vaccine for children received a thumbs up by the FDA panel last week, the anticipated nudging of parents began.

• Anthony Fauci said, “Even though the chances of (a child) getting sick and seriously ill are small, why do you want to take a chance of that with your child, when you can essentially protect the child by an intervention that is proven to be both highly effective and very safe?”
• Andrew Pavia from University of Utah Health likewise stated potential risks of the child vaccine are “dwarfed by the benefits of getting the vaccine.”
• Dean Blumberg, an associate professor of pediatric infection diseases at UC Davis concluded, “it’s clear the benefits outweigh the risks for this age group.”
• And Pfizer itself declared their vaccine offered children “a high degree of protective efficacy against COVID-19 during a period when the Delta variant of concern predominates in the US.”

Finally, after their own committee approved the shot’s distribution on Tuesday, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky suggested that “Parents should feel comforted not just that their children will be protected but that this vaccine has gone through the necessary and rigorous evaluation that ensures the vaccine is safe and highly effective.”

What more needs to be said? Seems like time to lay aside any further questions, and move on to getting shots in those trembling arms, right? (while anticipating additional data coming soon about children 5 and under).

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Even while hoping this note finds many of you anticipating a restorative and rejuvenating weekend, I know the reality. So many of us – including in our own faith community – are angry. And weary. And fearful. And suspicious.

I felt a prompting this last weekend to interview several neighbors who, like me, have harbored some serious questions about prevailing pandemic policies, and sincere wonderings at why the Church has been so willing to adopt and encourage them. Each of them went through an experience lately of feeling softened by their own communion with God over the matter. I was so touched by the conversations that I decided to write it up in a piece that ran Thursday in Public Square and Meridian Magazines: COVID-19 Vaccination as an Abrahamic Test.

As one woman, Jocelyn, said about her experience: “I felt layers upon layers of hardness on my heart peel off. I could just feel it come off my heart. I didn’t even know that hardness had been there.”

I’ve felt the same just in witnessing their experiences. I can’t deny that peace these brothers and sisters have felt from God in doing something that felt terrifying. They speak of arriving at the vaccination clinic, for instance, fully conscious of the possibility that their life could be harmed – but wanting more than any other consideration to trust the peace they had felt from God.

Who cannot be touched by such faith?

At the end of the essay, I brought attention to the experience of others who have exercised their own faith and felt different guidance in their own individual situation. Then I asked: “Do you have faith to take the vaccine, even if your bias is against it, if the Spirit gives you peace to proceed? And do you have faith to not take the vaccine if you feel so guided by the same Spirit, even if you are going to get some push-back from those around you?”

These have been good questions for me to ask. And I’m grateful for the greater peace that has come as I’ve allowed my heart to soften and trust a little more.

Perhaps this whole struggle can even soften us on other issues that we’re clenching our hearts against each other about. For instance, Mandi, a staunch conservative said, “This whole experience has given me a lot of compassion for people who have struggled with LGBT+ stuff.”

As I said at the end of the essay, I repeat here:

As a final note, if you find yourself fixated on this issue and grappling in your heart with frustration towards brothers and sisters, or even the prophets themselves, please take a moment to remember the full range of things Latter-day prophets have been sharing with the world  (here’s one summary we put together, Prophets on Pandemic). It’s a beautiful message—and I’m confident, the most hopeful message anywhere in the world. Don’t let that gloominess or hardness ruin this upcoming conference weekend! Heaven (literally) knows we all need some uplift and rejuvenation!  So, please don’t let yourself go into the weekend looking for more reasons to be frustrated. God wants more for you, and all of us. 

Happy conference, everyone. If God has something to place on your heart and mind this weekend – including peace, comfort, love or knowledge – my prayer is that NOTHING will stand in the way of that happening.

Hurrah for Israel!

Imagine for a moment what it would have been like in early 2020 if the same virus hit us, with the same objective threats present – but one thing had been different:  Everyone’s views about what was going on, and what we should do in response, were allowed to be shared. The overriding message was: “Let’s hear all the best ideas of what steps to take – and the nature of the challenge we’re up against.” 

• Rather than doctors like Scott Atlas and Anthony Fauci being ‘at war,’ they were in the same room, putting their heads together from the beginning. 
• Rather than only allowing experts with some opinions to inform the public of their views – and punishing or sanctioning those in the minority, a wide variety of expert positions were heard. 
• Rather than videos sharing minority positions being squelched, they were allowed to the full scrutiny of broad public consumption – with confidence in the capacity of our collective wisdom and deliberation together to ultimately sort through what was true. 
• Rather than labeling anything outside the standard answers as “misinformation” and “disinformation,” we allowed competing arguments to emerge – with confidence in the best information rising to the top and being discerned in our collective wisdom.
• And rather than assuming that the right path was clear and obvious, we also practiced humility – recognizing that with such a global crisis, we needed to stay open to new ideas and recognize that  none of us could see the whole picture on our own. 
• In short, rather than managing an awkwardly controlled and narrow public health conversation, we embarked on a project of seeking the truth together – appreciating that everyone’s perspectives could inform a fuller picture and a wise response as a whole.

How would that one shift have changed our ensuing response to the pandemic? Where would we be now if we had pursued that kind of open conversation? Would we see the same levels of resistance, hesitance, and hostility (to each other, to public health dictates) that we do right now?

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First, we misunderstand each other profoundly. Next, we stop caring when real harm befalls the people disagreeing with our view of the universe.

In America today, have you noticed there’s only One Right Way to think about a lot of things? Climate, race, sexuality – and now health. For years, dissenters to the One Right Way have been met with harsh rhetoric reflecting a growing severity of judgment against the other side – which continues to be all too effective in intimidating and silencing dissent:

Deniers. Racists. Bigots. Haters. 

And yes, those crazy “anti-vaxxers”….who are irrationally fearful, impervious to reasoning, hostile to science, pathologically self-absorbed and clearly possessing no respectable philosophy of their own when it comes to infectious disease management. Yes, these looney-toon folks are simultaneously “anti-science” and enthralled by “pseudoscience” and “quackery,” right?

Amidst the flurry of name-calling, proponents of the dominant narratives across each of these issues are sitting in almost unquestioned power – a place from which you would think they would speak with a greater degree of confidence and comfort. Instead, it seems as if many of them cannot stand when someone voices a minority position. They seethe and rage whenever someone dares proffer another view, in a way not dissimilar to the backlash following Elder Jeffrey Holland’s eloquent and tender talk expressing unorthodox views on sexuality.  

More and more, we see expressions of condemnation against heretics to the various orthodoxies SO intense that good people don’t think twice about agreeing to severe restrictions on the basic freedoms of those who disagree (cue the accelerated rush towards mandates punctuated by President Biden’s recent speech). In recent weeks, I’ve been struck to see two articles in respected national media outlets entitled, “We’re done with the vaccine refusers” and “Make the unvaccinated pay out for their deadly decisions.”

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