Church Posts Controversial Family Message To Women

On the same day the CDC announced a record low in the US fertility rate, the official Church account puts out a social media message supporting women working and guys . . . not? The comments on the post go viral. A BYU-I message also advocates for married mothers working.

 Raw Transcript

All right, welcome to Quick Show today.
My name is Greg Matson and I am your host. Today is April 10th, 2026. We're talking about a controversial post that
the church put up in regards to family and family structure and and gender roles, etc. This is uh kind of
interesting that this is being put out in the environment that we are in right now where culture seems to be tugging us
along with it. Maybe a little reluctantly, but we are moving toward culture without question. I don't see how you
can question that at all. This episode is brought to you by Go and Do Travel and the Wavemakers podcaster cruise coming up November 14th through 21st.
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Okay, so a post came out from the church uh on their official social media account. This went out through all the
socials. And I'm going to go here to X to take a look at the post that is found here. We can take a look here at what
this says. I'm just going to go over a little bit. It's talking about a couple.
Uh the guy is talking he's talking about how he hasn't really found what he wants to do in his life yet, but his wife wants to be a doctor and how great this
is. Um he says that he he went to college, thought he had a pretty clear path. It didn't end up being that way.
He talks about his wife who says that she always he says that she always knew what she wanted to be a doctor and how wonderful this was and stepping her
stepping into her dream together was an easy choice for him. I wanted to support her the way she was has always supported
me but supported you in what I mean I and honestly watching her work and sacrifice and love people like she does
has strengthened my faith more than anything else. So, we're giving support and advocacy here in this message to the
wife working and perhaps the guy not working or not choosing a career path yet at this point. Um, look, I
understand that there are scenarios where this is almost a must. I've seen this and and and they've made it work.
It's not like everything fits every family, but this is a messaging for advocacy. There's no question you can
3 minuteslook at this with and you can't look at this and not say that this is an advocacy in the way that this is done.
This isn't a matter of talking about how they are accepted and included and that families can be made up of different ways and that that's not really what
this is. This is a a this is a support for careerism for women. That that's how
I see this. and and it's it's very concerning to me that that this is being put out on an official social when when
it's the exact opposite of what is put in to the family proclamation. And again, look, I understand that sometimes
people have I know people that have this type of a scenario and they work through it, but but in an environment
where men are getting hammered, where they are floundering more, where you have a essentially a 50%
surplus of women going through college today, right? It's about 6040 right now and going through master's degrees and
Ph degrees. it gets even worse to to to hold this up as some type of an ideal which is what they're doing is is
very concerning to me. Why would you go along with what is happening in the culture? One of the entire reasons that
we are struggling as a culture is because of gender roles and because of decreasing families and a record low fertility rate for the United States.
The same day that the CDC and other government entities came out saying that we had a record low fertility rate, the
church puts this out on the same day yesterday, April 9th.
Consider that what what in the world I mean what when we look at the last couple of paragraphs on the family proclamation
about prophets have have fortold the calamities and destruction if we don't
pay attention to family and to building families up and having kids and focusing that on as the ideal.
Those things are because of holding up ideals in our culture that go against having families and having more kids that those this doesn't compute.
This is cognitive dissonance in this messaging. And considering the messaging, we would consider that this is a message that is given to women.
Right? That that's what I would say. I even though this is a guy speaking, I I don't think this is messaging to men,
right? because we're not talking about the man achieving something here or or being may maybe it's an acceptance. I I I don't know. But it seems to me like this is messaging to women.
Go fulfill your dreams. Go get a career.
Children can wait. And maybe you have fewer children, but you're going to reach your dreams. Again, I'm not going
to individually go after this couple. I I don't know all of their circumstances.
There are exceptions to the rule, but you have to hang on to an ideal or we get the last two paragraphs of the
family proclamation. Let me go on with this a little bit further in in what it says here. My path hasn't been as clear.
This guy says, I've tried different directions, learned a lot, prayed a lot.
Okay, I get it. Maybe he's not quite ready in a place where he's he's moving forward. All right, but she's going to be a doctor, so she's going to have a
career. supporting her doesn't shrink my purpose, it expands it. Okay, go look at the roles in the family proclamation. I do you believe that?
Okay, he says our callings from God can look different and that's beautiful. Why?
Explain that to me. You can't just stay say something like that.
But again, I'm not going to individually say anything about these these individuals and their choice and where they're going to go. Maybe this is going to be what results in the best option
for them and for some families that is the way. But this is coming out on an official church social media channel account.
And we have to hold on to the ideal and where men are already receiving the messaging of of basically void messaging. There's
no messaging for men right now. There's there's very little messaging for men in the church. There's very little messaging for men in our society. And
that's where this void you end up coming up with these toxic individuals like a Andrew Tate and and a Nick Fuentes and
others because men are like searching for something. There's no tie to their identity and their purpose because
everything they see in society through education, through the media, etc. is about belittling them and raising up women.
And it's not just hurting men. It hurts women. Women are more unhappy, more depressed, more anxious than they've
ever been since we've ever monitored these things in the United States.
Careerism isn't the answer to help fulfill your dreams. I'm sorry, it's not. Not for women.
And and some people are going to make that choice. Fine. Everybody should have a choice. I want them to have a choice.
Both of my daughters work full-time.
But to put this up as an official acceptance and support and advocacy because that's what this is
makes zero sense to me the same day the record low fertility rate comes out for the United States in 2025 for 2025.
Now he finishes off here and says there's not one right way to build a family or future for us. This is ours
and it's sacred. Okay. Again, why?
If you're going to say that, that's fine. But just explain explain why it is sacred. Now, you understand that that's what they're putting on the account.
This is sacred.
Whether or not this guy says this, the church account is putting that quote in to send a message to you.
We are slowly but surely moving ourselves through the collapse of the West.
Now, another recent post that came out on on I've got it on Facebook here from BYU Idaho does the same thing. It's
about a woman and she's got a career and she had a decision to make. She started off working so that she could support her her her husband in school.
Great. that that's a great thing to be able to do. Then she had a kid and she kept working, helped supporting her husband and then she had a second kid
and she didn't have to work anymore. She says this, but she chose to work anyway because that she was going to be able to
find herself and and and and enrich her life through a career.
This is the messaging of the church again in an environment. This isn't like
a an an anomaly in our society. This is the message of our society. Let me show you this real quick.
I always pictured myself being a working mom, but then once I had children,
making the decision to be a working mom was one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to make.
After I graduated from college at BYU Idaho, I got to work. And then we had our first daughter and I had to work to
support our family. After having our second daughter, at that point in mine and my husband's career, I actually didn't have to work. And I was at a
point where I had to make a decision if I wanted to keep working right when my career was taking off or be a
11 minutesstay-at-home mom. Now, choosing to work for me wasn't really a choice between family and work. It wasn't that black
and white for me. I could see things that I wanted to do and accomplish and my strengths were like itching to be at
center stage of those opportunities. And some of those strengths do fire on all cylinders in my household. And then there's some that need a different
environment to thrive and to grow. And and that's why I choose to work. I always think about our purpose of this
life is to return and live with God again. But our strengths and our talents and our passions are what give us
purpose in our life. I like to think of them as little god-given glimmers of him
that are with us that he gave to us. We are not meant to bury our talents. We are meant to have joy in becoming like him.
Okay, this is obviously I'm sorry this is not just a story of of one woman. This is an advocacy piece for working,
right? It it is my strengths and everything else, my joy. This is what matters the highest. It's not the kids.
And I'm not saying she doesn't care for her kids. That's not what I mean, right?
But but but obviously she's saying this out. This is what they're quoting. You have to think about how the message is put together and why they want to do this. Who wants to put this out? It's
not just a story about these two. It's who is creating this and why do they want it created? And why do they want to set this message up? Why is this
important to a few individuals or to an institution to put this out? What is their thought process?
What's behind it? It's messaging. And and the message is go work.
You can fulfill yourself and become more like Heavenly Father if you work as a mother. That's the
13 minutesmessage. pretty clear. So as the the US hits its f low low point in the fertility rate and and yes Utah is a
little higher than the average but it is d going the exact same direction. We can see these things. We saw this incredible record fantastic news for the church of
these these record uh baptisms of over 380,000. I think it was 384,000 convert baptisms in 2025. It's the
largest ever and it's a huge jump from where we were before in the low 300s and I think it was 2000
can't remember two I'm not sure when that was but this is this is a new record about we're about
close to I think a 25% jump over uh what we had in 2024. So it's it's fantastic news but take a look at something here.
Regardless of the fact that our proitizing is going to uh very conservative family
oriented countries and regions where they have a lot of kids. Shocker. That's where the the gospel is being accepted
in the world. Shocker as we go the exact opposite direction here in the west. But you see here the growth here. You can see the growth on the left graph.
Uh total number of members going all the way up. We're almost at 18 million. We're very, very close. 17.8 currently.
You have convert baptisms here that was up at I think it was 384ish.
But look at the children of record. Go back to 2010. You're hit right at about 120. And then you start to taper off overall.
COVID was obviously a major drop. That makes sense. Comes back up. But you can see why where this is dropping where we're only at about 75% of where we were
even in 2010. How can that be in a growing church?
Well, well, there's two things that are happening, right? Number one, you have people fall away from the church. You have to look at that. There's a higher degree of people that have fallen away from the church. And number two,
you have to look at smaller family sizes.
The whole world's fertility rate, by the way, is dropping. Even in Africa,
Philippines, Latin America, etc. It's dropping also, just not as fast or as far as the West and the United States has fallen.
But that's what our future looks like right there. That's what the future is is that children of record right there.
That's th those that are are generational members of the church. They are, you know, what are we building these individuals up? Well, sure, but
the number is shrinking. The amount of children of children children of record is shrinking as the church con converts
grow. And thank goodness we are getting those members again shocker in places like Africa and the Philippines and
Latin America especially where where there is are families that still have a lot of kids.
that that's can you imagine what that children of record would be if we didn't have those areas and we didn't have an explosion of of baptisms and conversions in in those areas.
So that's something that's happening.
But hey, if we put our career first as mothers, we can go out there and we can shrink the child of record number even
further. Right? That's the messaging that we're getting. It's bizarre.
And and I have to say this obviously many times here so it doesn't sound like I'm being misogynistic or reducing options for women. I'm not. I think
every woman should have her choice of what she wants to do. I'm glad this woman at from the BYU Idaho message has the option to do what she wants to do.
What I don't like is that the messaging,
the direction, the script, everything that they are doing is a message for advocacy
for this in a world that is pulling us in that direction and we should be going the opposite direction.
Now, you can take a look here at the Wall Street Journal and take a look at the graph here on the left. You see the US fertility
rate uh coming in here from the 1940 up to 2025,
right? Where we are now at there there's two different ways to look at the rate where I think we're at 1.57 per woman.
Uh as far as the total amount of births that that a woman will have in the US,
we are at 53.1 per 1,000 women. Uh ages it's ages 15 to 44 is where we're at.
Now, one positive of this that changes the fertility rate is we have a reduction in teen pregnancies. So,
that's a positive for sure. But the what we're getting is a drastic drastic drop
in children being born from women in their 20s especially,
right? Because everyone is putting off marriage or not getting married or putting off having kids. Why? for
careers because we have created an economy now in the US and in the west where we rely on two incomes,
right? So, so, so we've structured it this way and and and obviously from our messaging from the
church, we are accepting it. We're running with it. We don't care about the last two paragraphs of the family
proclamation. Now take a look here at the different ages. US birth rates by age group. As you look here at this second graph in the Wall Street Journal,
look at the numbers here that you get for those that are ages 25 to 29.
Excuse me, 20 to 24. Look at the drop off. That is the largest drop off ages 20 to 24. That makes sense in a in a low fertility environment.
Again, pushing off marriage, pushing off having children, 20 to 24. And some of you out there saying, "Oh, that's so great. Let them let the women develop.
Let men develop. They can get married later after they're established. They can get have kids later on when they know what they're doing." That's all BS.
It's all BS. All of the social studies,
all of the papers written on these things show the exact opposite.
Marriages are stronger overall when they are married. When you you get married earlier, you have more kids when you start having kids earlier.
um people are happier and families stay together more when when you have marriages that start early and you have kids early on.
All everything points in that direction.
But the church's messaging here is the opposite. BYU Idaho's messaging BYU Idaho, the most conservative all of all
of the education institutions certainly for the church is the one that put that message out. Okay? And again, it's not
about the woman. It's not about the woman. It's about the institution and those that wanted to frame this message.
That's what it is. That's where the messaging comes from. It's not the woman on on X. It's not the guy. It's those that wanted to put this messaging out,
which is the messaging is the exact opposite of what President Oaks was talking about in conference last weekend. The exact opposite. Okay. So,
again, let's look at a couple of these numbers here. By age,
you have 20 to 24 dropping down considerably. Ages 25 to 29, not as much, but it's one of the next largest
drops. Another large drop, almost as large as the first was teens, 15 to 19.
That's great, right? That's a positive in this. But everywhere, I mean, every single age gra age group here except for
35 to 39 is dropping considerably. So women that still want to have children that are putting it off, they're in the
35 to 39 range. That's the only one that has is moving up out of all of these and and it is tapering off also here
that you see to the end over the last 5 years. So that's where we're going.
21 minutesThat's where our society is going in the west. That's where the country is going in the west. as uh
as marriage is put off, as marriages don't happen, as digital dating is destroying relationships between men and
women and and in preventing them from even happening.
And and and then we get messaging that that tells us that this is great, right?
Hold off on kids, hold off on on marriage, focus on your career. Um men
don't need jobs. women should go out and get the jobs. And again, it's just it's a spiral. This is a kind of spiral messaging. As you'll see in the church
right now, we hardly get any messaging toward men. There is no body in the church. Zero. There's no organization in
the church from the top, right, that focuses on adult men. Not one.
And so there's no messaging from them.
There's no one in saying, "Hey, we have to get this messaging to these men." No,
there's nothing. Those that are responsible are all in priesthood positions where they are responsible for the entire church.
And and if you go to the website, if you go to the messaging that you're getting on these social accounts, the messaging is almost always to the women. And so as
you get this, you get men that flounder more. And then you have a spiral effect here, a reaction that says, "Hey, well,
we've got a lot more women that are working now." Well, because we don't have a lot of men that are doing as well in our society and in our church.
So, we better reflect what's happening in the church. And so, we're going to show these women that are working because there's so many more women
working and how they chose that career over staying home with their kids,
right? And let's let's show how that is inclusive. We are very inclusive here.
Um and and the there is no ideal anymore. There's no ideal for family. We don't want to hold that up. We want to
show that everything works in different areas here. And I understand you have to create a bridge between the environment and between the culture and doctrine and
the church. But you never let go of the ideal. You cannot let go of the ideal.
Once you let go of that ideal, it's done. It's over. You will lose it.
and and and messages for advocating against the ideal is bizarre. It is strange.
Thanks for listening.