Including the authority of women’s voices and experiences—almost always more than half the membership of their communities—does not threaten the integrity or the stability of religions. It strengthens, broadens, and deepens them and contributes to their resilience and to their realization that they are continually unfolding. Mary Farrell Bednarowski
Event: Salt Lake Symposium 2009
SL09162 Is Heavenly Mother a Member of the Godhead? [Partial]
Feminist theologians have responded to the feminist challenge to an exclusively male God by exploring the feminine attributes of God, pointing out feminine metaphors describing God, and seeking to develop a more inclusive language to speak about God. The Mormon doctrine of divine embodiment requires that Mormon theologians go further. Our teaching that God the …
SL09231 Panel: Why We Stay
This perennially well-received session features the stories of those who have chosen to remain active, dedicated Latter-day Saints even in the face of many difficult challenges to traditional faith. How have these members wrestled with their faith and yet emerged more determined than ever to be a part of the Latter-day Saint community? J. Frederick …
SL09274 Panel: A Murder of Editors
Playwright and film director David Mamet writes that “art flourishes in times of struggle.” A panel of editors from various Mormon magazines and journals will discuss the role struggle has played in the writings they have recently published. They will also discuss the struggle of their publications to meet and prosper from the challenges of …
SL09332 Panel: Remembering the Longfellow Chapel
Participants will reflect on the meaning of the Cambridge Chapel situated on Longfellow Park just outside Boston. For generations of Latter-day Saints, this meetinghouse represented the center of their faith, spirituality, and community. Panelists will consider the meaning of sacred space, the role of undergraduate and graduate education in Mormon identity, the nature of Latter-day …
SL09372 Panel: What’s Up With the Principle? Serving the Polygamous Community
In recent years, women have been “leading the charge” in educating and serving the polygamous community. However, both men and women, and even teenagers, from inside the polygamous culture have spoken out publicly in order to dispel stereotypes and to educate Fundamentalist Mormon families. Several from outside the polygamous culture have made a special effort …
SL09101 Devotional: The Sanctity of Doubt [Partial]
Toscano will read a selection from his book The Sacrament of Doubt which explores the relationship of faith and doubt as necessary elements of genuine spirituality. Paul Toscano
SL09163 Study Aids for Bible Lovers
This session will expand on the 7th Article of Faith: “We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly.” To understand the Bible requires considerable study, not only because of translation issues but because books of the Bible were written by people who lived as many as …
SL09232 Power to the Purple: The Poetry of Mary Bradford and Friends [Partial]
Since adolescence, I have squirreled away poems in drawers, files, journals, sometimes even publishing some. Susan Elizabeth Howe and Robert Rees read and criticized my entire oeuvre and helped me choose those poems worthy of inclusion in a published collection. Then I took the poems to Anam Cara, Sue Booth Forbes paradisiacal writers and artists …
SL09275 Panel: Bridging Stereotypes Through Blogging
Picture a Mormon woman. Many specific traits come to mind, some profound, some superficial. Even if many of the stereotypical traits fit, they don’t fit everyone, and sometimes they fit in unexpected ways. Blogging helps to break down stereotypes because superficial barriers like age, race, economic class, and geographic location are stripped away, and people …