& these are my tomatoes planted 24 varieties this year been collecting seeds, trading for almost a decade here I feel like a patriarch fingers splayed, laying hands blessing the rows like a wife, these plants respond well to attention, a gentle sweep of the …
Category: Issue 181
Emily Dow Partridge
Keep walking. Keep walking, don’t think about it. Don’t think about this morning, being deep in the washing when Mrs. Durfee stopped by, telling me to meet him tonight at the Kimballs’. Couldn’t change my dress, people would wonder, so here I am stinking of sweat and lye walking as fast as I can, walking …
Sylvia Porter Sessions Lyon
Men must retire to the woods to receive visions of God. Women give birth & see His face, feel Him push through. The details of all nine births live in me, cross-stitched to my lungs & I can recall each one as if they had happened this dawn. But my dear Josephine, my fourth birth, …
Mysterious Ways, Continued
In this column, I share Jennifer and John’s continuing adventures in the LDS Borderlands (names and details have been changed). The first part of their story was told in a previous column, “Mysterious Ways,” published in early 2014.1Here’s a quick recap of that first column: According to Jennifer, her husband, John, a high school principal, …
Escaping the Faith Crisis Cycle
Polygamy is one of the main aspects of Mormon history and theology that sends previously true-believing Mormons spinning into a faith crisis. If you spend any time on the Bloggernacle, you’ll see it happening over and over again. As I’ve watched people go through this kind of crisis, I’ve noticed that it partakes in Elisabeth …
Principles for Polyamory
By Natasha Helfer Question: My husband and I have been transitioning away from Mormonism for the past five years. It has been incredibly painful, but also liberating—allowing us to figure out how we want to live and interact with the world. We both regret that, like many Mormons, we didn’t get to explore our sexuality …
Progressive Polygamy
By Brady Williams When Brady Williams is not spending time with his especially large family hiking, playing croquet, or watching movies, he’s out and about trying to make a difference in this world—from relieving modern-day slavery in Guinea Bissau to teaching construction trades in Haiti. Or, right-click here to download the audio file: …
Cultural, Demographic, and Judicial Trends Leading Toward the Popular Acceptance and Eventual Legalization of Polygamy: A Libertarian Polemic
By George R. Compton George R. Compton Ph.D. (economics, UCLA, 1976) writes on various controversial subjects ranging from U.S. Middle Eastern policy to immigration and education reforms. A frequent presenter at the Salt Lake Sunstone Symposium, he has served in a variety of Church callings and carries a current temple recommend. Legalized polygamy is …
Legalizing Polygamy: Cultural Bias, Moral Obligation, and Social Tolerance
By Robyn Williams Robyn Williams graduated spring 2017 with a B.S. in English creative writing and plans to continue writing and advocating for positive social change. Robyn enjoys traveling, hiking, and playing with her large, wonderful family, including her husband, four sisterwives, and their 25 children, of which she is the biological mother to five. …
Poly-wood! Mormon Polygamy in the Movies
By Randy Astle Randy Astle is a writer and filmmaker in New York City. He has written numerous articles, and is nearly finished with a book on Mormon film. A TRIP TO SALT LAKE CITY Released during the Smoot Senate hearing, A Trip to Salt Lake City (1905) was both the first Mormon fiction …