No gospel precept resonated with greater importance
in the heart of President Joseph Fielding Smith
than that of the sanctity of the home and family.
His messages to the members of the Church
were replete with counsel to parents and children.
A priority in his ministry was to strengthen
an already revealed institution, that of family home evening.
President Smith emphasized that Monday evening
should be set aside as a sacred time in which families,
uninterrupted by the affairs of the Church or the world,
could gather together to be instructed
in gospel principles.
Under his direction, no Church meetings
were to be scheduled or held on Monday evening.
In general conference of April 1970, he reminded the Saints--
We plead with fathers and mothers
to teach personal purity by precept and example
and to counsel with their children in all such things.
We ask parents to set an example of righteousness
in their own lives and to gather their children around them
and teach them the gospel in their family home evenings
and at other times.
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