Getting Past the Labels: How the Truth Makes Women Free

by Wendy C. Top

This book began as the author's search for answers to the 'priesthood question': Are women of equal worth with men even though they don't hold the priesthood? Yet as she sought her role in our father's kingdom, she discovered that the greater insecurities were not necessarily in women's relationships with men but in their relationships with each other. She 'We have got to get past the labels 'married,' 'single,' 'mother,' 'childless' and even the fact that we don't hold the priesthood and see ourselves first and foremost as daughters of God, each with her own equally important mission and unique powers and abilities.' When we really understand the truth about what God wants for us as individual women in the latter days, that truth will make us free from insecurities, free from untruthful comparisons and unrealistic expectations, free to love each other as we contribute, each in her own way, to the Lord's work.

Genres: Religion, Lds

147 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 2000

Reviews

[Amanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful! Word after word inspiring me to do better and be better. I think every page has a highlight. Definitely one to read again, or at least refresh what I have learned!

[Sasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I never would have chosen this book for myself--my mother gave it to me. But I began skimming it while sitting bored in a car one day and WOW! I have never felt repressed or underappreciated as an LDS woman; to the contrary I've felt being an LDS woman ennobling and empowering--so first impressions of this book's premise just didn't seem to apply to me. There is so much more than meets the eye, however, and there is much that Wendy Top sheds a lot of insightful light on in regards to being an LDS woman.

[Arren Q · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed the philosophy and the narrator's frankness...
The doctrine rang true and When I went to utilize it in personal scripture study I was happy to find that the passages I liked and wanted to remember were from prophets and apostles for the most part. I had been nervous about copying passages into my journals that was not from a truly trusted source. Some woman's opinion would not be truly trusted. The words of the prophet is.

[Liz · Rating 1 out of 5]

When I first read this book, I liked what it had to say. But a few years later, I threw it across the room. I can no longer accept the excuses Top makes for why women are in a subserviant role in the Mormon church. They are designed to keep women submissive rather than empower them.

[Elise · Rating 4 out of 5]

A friend gave this to me years ago and it took me a long time to pick it up off the shelf. Very interesting book.