Emily Hill would go through more challenges than her 20-year-old self setting sail to join the Saints ever thought she would. But those experiences helped her write prose that would inspire millions.

This excerpt is from Be Your Best Self by President Thomas S. Monson, which was published in 1979. This excerpt originally ran on LDS Living in July 2017.

Hannah’s story represents the feelings of many couples in our own day who suffer similar concerns.

These questions will help you learn as much as possible.

The following is an excerpt from Voices of Hope: Latter-day Saint Perspectives on Same-Gender Attraction, taken from the chapter “Perspectives for Parents.” Click here to learn more.

Part of the information sent to prospective missionaries is a list of needed clothing, supplies, and incidentals. The Missionary Department is appropriately concerned that missionaries arrive in the field properly equipped for the service they are expected to render. I remember receiving my list in 1965 and I have been with my eight missionary children as they received theirs. My children have generally requested a new suitcase, although we have convinced most of them that such an expenditure is not necessary. We have a nice selection available. Then the shopping begins, as they scour the city for the things they will require for the time of their service in Santiago or New York or Las Palmas or San Salvador or Salvador or Carlsbad or Añasco or White River. My bank account has ached with the abuse it has taken. My Mastercard has been swiped so many times it nearly set my pants on fire.

Mormons have a complicated political history in Idaho. Though members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were among the first permanent white settlers in the territory, they couldn’t vote, hold office or serve on juries.

My Sunday column — written before the Paul Ryan pick, but still relevant in its aftermath — argues that Mitt Romney’s understandable reluctance to talk about his Mormon faith has cut him off from what would otherwise be a very natural part of his campaign narrative, both in personal and philosophical terms. My argument runs counter to some of the arguments in Adam Gopnik’s tour d’horizon of Mormonism in a recent issue of the New Yorker, and particularly this passage:

Jake Pulsipher's first day as a working missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began at 6:30 a.m. with prayer and exercise, followed by breakfast and study. Then he put on a black suit, white shirt, and red tie, along with his official name tag, and headed out to knock on doors and tell people about Jesus. In doing so, he became the latest of 20,000 Mormon missionaries in the United States.

Maybe the economy is a political black hole, sucking every other issue into an impossibly dense void. Maybe Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are just private, cautious men by nature.