The Real Meaning of Christmas

Remember how I said I was a cry baby? Well..yeah:

 

May you all take a moment during this busy season to remember exactly why we are celebrating.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Do animals have spirits?

A friend basically asked me this question. I wanted to share my reply:

We DO believe that animals have spirits (as well as plants and any "living" object -so basically everything if you want to get technical and include atoms)
Now with having a spirit comes all the same laws and commandments of God that we have - including their agency.
We often don't think about this - because we just expect them to do what they are supposed to do - plants grow and produce fruit every year at certain times of the year, certain bugs help keep plants healthy, etc.
But plants, animals, and other living things CHOOSE to follow God's laws and commandments. They are just so "pure" and righteous that they follow God perfectly.
There is the parable where god "rebukes" the tree for disobeying him and not producing fruit. While this is a parable, it is also something that could quite literally happen. A tree CAN refuse to produce fruit - but it simply won't because it obeys God.
So I hope that helps answer your question somewhat. I wasn't exaclty sure about what you meant by "Pure Spirit of God" but yes - animals, and every living thing, have spirits.

 

Anyone else have thoughts to add? I would love to hear

Thoughts

Earlier today – well only about an hour ago – I was depressed beyond imagination again. But this time it was really odd and almost scary – I was so depressed, but I was sitting there thinking “This isn’t so bad. I don’t have to be happy. I’m not super happy, but I’m also not crying and in a horrible mood – just more blah. I could live an entire life ‘blah’ like this”

Yes, honestly, I really was thinking that. And I have no idea why. Soon as I caught myself thinking like that – I decided I needed to go take a nice hot bath and listen to some conference talks to get me out of this horrible situation.

I listened to this talk by Elder Scott. It was just what I needed – I had some new insights, but mostly just refreshing reminders of my potential.