Pray, pray hard.

I was checking my facebook this morning and found this on my friends blog. We have to stay strong and bind together more than ever before. I'm pretty sure that Satan is freaking out over this and is using his minions to try to over come the righteous. We MUST know what side of the fence we are on, especially when we have to face these kinds of things. Pray for the people who are filled with rage and hate against us for standing up for what we believe to be true. (Our fast sunday is this sunday, so join with us or next week and fast and pray hard for the Lord's will to be done!)

Dear Friends and Family - 

I had a very disturbing experience yesterday that I would like to share
with those of you that live outside of California (or outside of the San
Francisco Bay Area).

This weekend we have stake conference. Our stake conference always
begins with a stake temple session on Friday or Thursday night. Early
Friday morning I received a call from the second counselor in our bishopric
to let me know there would be numerous protesters outside the temple,
and to remind everyone to stay calm and drive carefully. The beautiful
Oakland Temple is located right across the bay from San Francisco, very
close to the city of Berkeley.

Apparently the opposition to proposition 8, the amendment that seeks to
make marriage in CA between a man and a woman again, has realized the
deep involvement of the church and begun to protest right outside the
temple and harass temple patrons.

... As we approached the off ramp, I realized there would be trouble. 
There was a backup onto the freeway from cars stalled on the off ramp. 
As we moved forward inches at a time, we realized this was due to a large
group of loud protesters who were standing on both sides of the street,
yelling, screaming and waving signs. When we got to the top of the offramp,
ready to make our turn, one protester jumped out right in front of our car. 
It took my husband all his self control to carefully maneuver around him to
the left and proceed to the temple.

I tried not to listen to all they were shouting at us, but I was shaking as I got
to the temple front door. Several of the sisters, especially the ones driving
on their own, were crying (which made me snap out of it and go into Relief
Society President mode to comfort them). Later, as I was sitting in the perfect
quiet of the chapel, I couldn't help but think of Lehi's dream, and the people
who mocked the Saints from the big and spacious building but 'we heeded
them not.' 

It was a truly surreal experience, I'd never thought that I would have to go
through an angry crowd to get to the temple. As we left late at night, the
protesters had dispersed, temple security (who all looked very large and
Tongan) stood by the gates. I never saw a single police man.

Please pray for those of us in California fighting for prop 8--it's getting kind
of scary out here!