Why do some little children die? The July ‘Liahona’ addresses this and other questions about those who pass away young

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One of the most hopeful truths of the Restoration is found in Doctrine and Covenants 137:10: “All children who die before they arrive at the years of accountability are saved in the celestial kingdom of heaven.”

While that doctrine is clear, it does still leave room for questions about the specifics of the salvation of young children who die. For example, are little children saved by their innocence alone? At what age can they still be saved? What will they be like at the Resurrection? And then perhaps the most heart-wrenching question of all, why do little children die?

The July issue of the Liahona addresses each of these questions in an article called “The Salvation of Little Children Who Die: What We Do and Don’t Know.” Using scripture and examples from the lives and teachings of modern prophets, the article offers clear and touching explanations on this sensitive topic. 

The Prophet Joseph Smith and his wife Emma lost six of their own children. The Liahona shared that the Prophet once said,

“I have meditated upon the subject, and asked the question, why it is that infants, innocent children, are taken away from us, especially those that seem to be the most intelligent and interesting. The strongest reasons that present themselves to my mind are these: This world is a very wicked world. . . . The Lord takes many away, even in infancy, that they may escape the envy of man, and the sorrows and evils of this present world; they were too pure, too lovely, to live on earth; therefore, if rightly considered, instead of mourning we have reason to rejoice as they are delivered from evil, and we shall soon have them again.”

Find more answers to questions about the salvation of little children in the July Liahona.

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