Wallace B. Smith, great-grandson of Joseph the martyr, was president of the RLDS Church from 1978 until 1996. During Smith’s eighteen-year tenure, the RLDS Church trans-formed from a sect to a denomination. This shift can be seen in five innovations that occurred through his leadership. Best known is the ordination of women, which began 17 …
Event: Salt Lake Symposium 2004
A RETURN TO LOGIC: BLAKE T. OSTLER AMONG MORMON THEOLOGIANS
For the past several years, I’ve noticed a trend among theologians and philosophers of religion away from the first-person and autobiography-driven work that is part and parcel of the postmodern shift and toward a more conscious placing of their arguments once again in a logical framework. I think this is an important step if philosophers …
MORMON INTELLECTUALISM: COMMUNITY OR MOVEMENT?
The way something is classified carries significant consequences for how it’s perceived. Such is the case with the rise of Mormon intellectualism and the desire among some to have it be seen as a “community” rather than a “movement.” In this presentation, I argue that debates over such things are now pointless: those who would/do …
THE ‘PHENOMENON OF THE CLOSET DOUBTER’ REVISITED
Mormons have historically been expected to gain a “testimony” of the unique religious tenets of the Church. This expectation has been so prevalent that those not able to testify to having such “knowledge” typically feel marginalized, unworthy, and suspect in the eyes of believers. One peculiar response to this expectation has been the (unwitting) creation …
THE PIVOTAL BATTLE OF OUR AGE: WAR METAPHORS, SAME-SEX MARRIAGE, AND THE LDS RHETORIC OF DOOM
A few days after Canada legalized same-sex marriages, BYU professor Brett Lattimer called this “a bigger [issue] than the Civil War,” and Richard Wilkins, another BYU professor, asserted that “the pivotal battle of our age has began.” When and how did LDS leaders begin to use war metaphors to describe Satan’s purported assaults on the …
LDS WOMEN, A REFLECTION ON RIGHTS AND POWER INSPIRED BY JOHN SHELBY SPONG’S BORN OF A WOMAN
Do LDS women suffer from a dehumanizing syndrome similar to that exemplified in Mary, the mother of Jesus? According to Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong, “Mary is a male-created figure who embodies the kind of woman dominant males think is ideal, docile, obedient, powerless.” This presentation will draw parallels between the Mary described by Spong …
AMERICAN TRINITY
“Instead of waiting for Him to return, I am going in search of the Nephite God, the Savior of the world. Jesus.” This is Zed speaking, short for “Zedekiah,” one of three Nephite apostles who Christ promised could minister to the earth’s inhabitants continuously until the second coming. In this monologue, we learn that after …
WHY WE STAY
As part of its mission to host respectful discussions of all perspectives and topics related to Mormonism, Sunstone occasionally invites participants who have left Mormonism to speak and share their stories. This session features the stories of those who have chosen the opposite tack, highlighting the struggles of those who have chosen to remain active, …
REAL GODDESSES HAVE CURVES (AND IDENTITIES)
This panel invites Mormon women to talk about how they find meaning and inspiration in images of divine female power drawn from other religions and traditions. What do we learn about ourselves as women and as agents of the divine by studying the stories or representations of goddesses such as Shakti, Kali, Rhiannon, Venus, Athena, …
A PRETTY MORMON CHILDHOOD
Fourteen years ago, in An American Childhood, Annie Dillard channeled her adolescence selves to vividly capture growing up in Pittsburgh in the 1950s. Ten years later, David Sedaris dissected his eclectic North Carolina childhood in his highly irreverent Me Talk Pretty One Day. Schizophrenically inspired by both authors, this essay is a series of humorous …