Defending the Faith: We develop character in the stream of life

A former Augustinian monk, the great Reformer Martin Luther, eventually married a former nun, Kathryn von Bora. Together, they had six children and raised four orphans, and numerous accounts indicate that the adjustment wasn't always smooth, that the children weren't always easy or orderly. Accordingly, Luther, having known both, concluded that "marriage is a far better school for character than any monastery."

Confronting multiple and often conflicting tasks, constantly distracted, and learning (sometimes painfully, after resistance) to subordinate our preferences to the needs of others, we grow in ways that simpler, easier lives could never afford us.

Daniel C. Peterson is a professor of Islamic studies and Arabic at Brigham Young University, where he also serves as editor in chief of the Middle Eastern Texts Initiative. He is the founder of MormonScholarsTestify.org, the general editor of "Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture" online at www.mormoninterpreter.com and he blogs daily at www.patheos.com/blogs/danpeterson.