Just today, someone posted a clip of President Dallin H. Oaks speaking in what appears to be a recent sacrament meeting. In the clip, Oaks bears his testimony:

“We know that we are children of heavenly parents. So we know that we have a Heavenly Mother—or mothers.”

Unsurprisingly, the line is getting attention—especially for its potential polygamous implications. But beyond that, it got me thinking about the deeper theological implications of the doctrine itself.

If there really is a Heavenly Mother—or Heavenly Mothers—it would be profoundly disrespectful to ignore her and withhold from her the worship she is due.

In the Bible, worship refers to the reverent honor and homage paid to God. The word comes from the Old English weorthscipe, meaning “worthiness” or “respect.” Worship involves both the inner posture of the heart and the outward expressions of reverence, love, and adoration. As Christians, we worship God not just as our Creator, but also as our loving Father. That relationship heightens both the intimacy and awe in our praise.

But if we have a Heavenly Mother—someone equally responsible for our spiritual origin—shouldn’t she also be the object of reverent love, prayer, and praise? Shouldn’t we speak of her, sing to her, and adore her with the same devotion?

And yet, in Latter-day Saint worship, she is never prayed to, never sung about, and almost never mentioned. That’s not reverence—it’s erasure.

The common LDS explanation is that she is “too sacred” or mysterious to be spoken of, prayed to, or worshipped. But imagine saying that about God the Father. Scripture doesn’t portray God as someone to be hidden or protected from our lips. Rather, it is His glory to make Himself known. He reveals Himself so that we might worship Him. If Heavenly Mother is divine—co-eternal and co-equal with the Father—then silence isn’t reverence. It’s dishonor.

And this silence also exposes three deeper problems:

First, the doctrine of a Heavenly Mother isn’t found anywhere in the Bible or even the Book of Mormon. On the contrary, biblical references to female deities—such as Asherah—are uniformly condemned as idolatrous (see Jeremiah 7:18; 44:17–19). Heavenly Mother isn’t revealed in the Doctrine and Covenants or the Pearl of Great Price either. Her existence is not revealed, but deduced—from the LDS belief that exalted men become gods and therefore must have eternal wives. It’s theology by extrapolation, not revelation.

Second, openly discussing Heavenly Mother invariably raises difficult questions: the “ghost of eternal polygamy,” the nature of divine gender roles, and the uneasy silence around divine femininity. These are theological landmines, and Church leaders seem eager to avoid them.

Third, and most fundamentally, the doctrine highlights the fact that Mormonism is not monotheistic. Traditional Christianity worships one eternal God in three persons: Father, Son, and Spirit. But the existence of a divine Heavenly Mother—or Mothers, as Oaks openly allows—pushes LDS theology squarely into polytheistic territory.

And this is precisely why she remains unspoken. If Latter-day Saints were to regularly pray to her, sing to her, and include her in worship, it would be impossible to maintain the appearance of Christian continuity. Investigators would immediately recognize that this is not biblical Christianity, but a fundamentally different theological system.

So her omission is not just odd. It’s strategic. And that silence, that absence, speaks volumes.

By contrast, the God of the Bible is not hidden or speculative, but gloriously self-revealing. From the opening pages of Genesis to the final chapter of Revelation, God speaks. He calls, covenants, redeems, and dwells with His people. Even more significantly, He comes in the flesh in the person of the Son. Christ is “the image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15), and “in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily” (Colossians 2:9). Jesus Himself declares, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). It is precisely because the God of Scripture has made Himself known—most fully in the incarnation—that we can worship Him freely and joyfully.