Dave: We remind our listeners about a new way to support Mormon Land. [15], Stack wrote a children's book about religion with artist Kathleen B. Petersen, entitled A World of Faith, published in 1998.[4][16]. It was held by the stake high council, and so my bishop and ward members took the position that that was their doing. Last month, for instance, the Daily Beast reported that a blogger named David Twede was facing excommunication because of critical pieces he had written about Mitt Romney. And it was not popular with those of the brethren that Quinn had already angered with his talk on Mormon history four years before. I wouldn't give it up, but promised him I wouldn't use it. That has been a blessing truly fulfilled. She has participated as much as she was able playing the piano and singing in the choir and watched as seven lay bishops have come and gone. It was his death and funeral that prompted the couples current bishop to bring up the possibility of her rejoining the church. Since then, only one Avraham Gileadi, an Old Testament scholar who has spent his life researching and writing about the biblical oracle Isaiah's prophecies about our time has been rebaptized into the faith. I see her articles on here all the time and the Tribune has never really been a friend to the TSCC. He then expressed his gratitude to the church for providing, throughout his life, a vehicle for service. A view of the Salt Lake Temple outside Olympic Medals Plaza in Salt Lake City, Utah. Groundbreaking Emma Smith biographer, a 'giant' in Mormon scholarship, dies at 82. Half of these men speak for the accused, and half for the church. Kelly was excommunicated from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in June. Those 15 men oversee the multiple Quorums of the Seventy, who in turn direct the stake presidents and bishops who minister to congregations on a part-time, voluntary basis. Hanks officially came back into the fold in 2012. The men at his door were the local stake president and his two counselors, the men responsible for overseeing all the congregations in the area. A beaming Bishop Madrigal said I should expect very soon to get a telephone call scheduling an interview with a general authority, she wrote. I moved into recognizing the value and power of a lay priesthood in the body of Christ and Christian community. That was my decision. Crucially, much of that project is onlinemore than anything, the Internet has revolutionized the field. He slept on her futon and had no Internet access or health insurance. Her sincere belief in Jesus and determination to follow him no matter the adversity faced within or without the church should be commended, and this good and faithful servant should be rewarded, he wrote. The nature of religion reporting in Utah is changing. In 1981, he gave an address to church educators called The Mantle Is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect, which was organized around four cautions. The second of them is this: There is a temptation for the writer or teacher of church history to want to tell everything, whether it is worthy or faith-promoting or not. Bradley and Hanks are friends who trod a lot of common ground, Robertson said. Kate Kelly, founder of the Ordain Women movement, was excommunicated in 2014 for her views on gender inequality in the Mormon Church . Lavina Fielding Anderson, who was excommunicated in 1993 as part of the so-called September Six, has had her request for rebaptism into the LDS Church rejected by the faith's governing First Presidency after being approved by her local lay leaders. Paul's mother was great. On March 23, 2018, Andersons husband, Paul, died of heart failure. No way. (KUTV) Peggy Fletcher Stack is the religion writer for the The Salt Lake Tribune.It's the best beat on the paper, she said.Stack fell into the job when she was hired in 1991.I have no degree in . I couldn't help but wonder if I, too, would be excommunicated if my concerns were made public. He himself did not even stay in town. While Packers precise involvement remains a matter of dispute, what little is known hints at his interference. The former LDS stake president, who oversaw a group of congregations in Tooele for eight years and worked as an architect on her faith's most sacred spaces, faced, in her mind, an . Quinn was convinced, in any case, that his fate in any disciplinary council was predetermined, that Boyd K. Packer wanted him out of the church and Hanks was going to make it happen. I prayed every article I wrote into print, he said, continually asking God what he should do. Bad marriages had women running to and away from . But 90 percent of the ward has changed since my court. He has occasionally attended other churches. By Peggy Fletcher Stack June 23, 2015 Many Mormon feminists experienced Kate Kelly's excommunication as a harsh slap felt around the world. Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company. [5] She then received a fellowship to work in the Church History Division of the LDS Church (then run by Leonard J. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted. Truth is, she has never stopped attending her Mormon ward. Many people do reside in the borderlands between Mormon and not. In September, Hanks wrote Quinn another letter, saying that he had listened, twice, to a recording of Quinns paper about the Baseball Baptism Program, delivered at the Sunstone Symposium that summer. Stack has been the lead religion writer for The Salt Lake Tribune since 1991. He acknowledged to me that, of course, it is possible to find outlets for service outside of Mormonism. Or a great one, if possible: Since childhood, Quinn had been told by his grandmother that someday he would be an apostle of the church. We had stake [regional] conference in September. Knowing her personally (not closely, but we're acquainted) I get the feeling that she is much more culturally LDS than actually LDS. "Given who I was, there was no place to go but out," Hanks said in 2003, on the 10th anniversary of the excommunications. Hanks worked for the Church Educational System, where Packer had long been an administrator, and Quinn heard that Loren C. Dunn, a friend of Packers and fellow general authority, had spoken to Hanks personally. I go over the temple ceremony and the covenants in my mind and remake them before the Lord often. Excommunication is a complicated and multi-layered process for sexual minorities in the church who choose to marry in a way that the church considers a "same sex" marriage. (Rick Bowmer/AP) This article is more than 8 years old. How is she still a practicing member after all this exposure to the truth? In a detailed confession, Hofmann said that he had secretly stopped believing in Mormonism as a teenager and had hatched a plan to embarrass the church by creating fake documents that exposed uncomfortable facts about early Mormon history. Wilkinson was reprimanded, though, and in 1970 he was replaced by Dallin H. Oaks, a law professor at the University of Chicago who had clerked for Chief Justice Earl Warren at the U.S. Supreme Court. Every morning he worked there was Christmas morning, Quinn says. During the hiring process, a college dean offered to protect him, Quinn says, from those peoplethe LDS leadersup in Salt Lake., Before he could be hired, though, he had to visit LDS headquarters at 47 East South Temple in downtown Salt Lake and sit for an interview with one of those peoplespecifically, a general authority, one of the 100 or so men who run the church. I was not surprised or angry about the outcome, Anderson said Wednesday, and she has no plans to try to open that door again. The other five people who were by then being referred to as the September Six had already faced their courts. The bishops next comment was, Whats wrong with those people up in Salt Lake? He was thrilled to have Quinn in his ward. In 1989, Dallin H. Oaks, the onetime law professor and BYU president who was now an apostle, had given a talk called Alternate Voices at the churchs semiannual General Conference. Peggy Fletcher Stack is an American journalist, editor, and author. Hi, Peggy. These dangers, Packer said, were the relatively new feminist and gay-lesbian movements, and the ever-present challenge from the so-called scholars or intellectuals.. Look at Steve Benson, I suspect that there was no way they were going to ex him so he exed himself. Even in the novels, he noticed, the gay characters came to terrible ends. The church reports a worldwide membership of 16 million. In the early 90s, when he was living in New Orleans, Quinn, nearing his 50th birthday, tried his hand at fiction, going back to the literature he once studied as an undergraduate. BYU and Utah State both wanted to hire him. They had the responsibility to preserve the doctrinal purity of the church, they said, adding that, because Mormon leaders are constrained by confidentiality rules, the media have relied on information supplied by those disciplined or by their sympathizers. Similar councils occurred more sporadically over the next few years. He was excommunicated by the LDS Church in 2013 for refusing to cease publication of his 2011 book, Passing the Heavenly Gift which challenges many points of LDS orthodoxy. Lavina Fielding Anderson, one of the famed September Six writers and scholars disciplined by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1993, got a big no last week to her request for rebaptism from the men who matter most: the faiths governing First Presidency. At the time, he was grieving the death of his son, who had gone missing and was found weeks later hanging from a tree by an extension cord. As the historian Ross Peterson said at the time, Comparing Sunstone and Dialogue folks to people who were shooting Mormons in 1839 Missouri is unfair. Peterson, after speaking about Mormon temple rites in the press, had been shown his own file during a conversation with local church leaders. The September Six were six members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) who were excommunicated or disfellowshipped by the church in September 1993, allegedly for publishing scholarly work against or criticizing church doctrine or leadership. [9] She started the "Faith" column after a discussion with Tribune editor Jay Shelledy. "Nobody asked me to disavow my book or stop writing," Hanks told The Salt Lake Tribune that year. [5], In 1975, following discussions with Scott Kenney and others, she helped found Sunstone, an independent magazine of Mormon studies. sltrib.com 1996-2023 The Salt Lake Tribune. Anderson was excommunicated for an article she wrote in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought that described episodes of what she called ecclesiastical abuse of Latter-day Saint intellectuals. Anderson was photographed at her Salt Lake City home with the work of her late husband, Paul L. Anderson, on Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2019. The latter, a smaller school, offered less money, but BYU had its own drawbacks: It was and is a conservative place, politically as well as religiously. Gileadi, a Hebrew scholar who got into trouble for unorthodox writings about the biblical Isaiah, was rebaptized within several years. A candlelight vigil was held outside the Salt Lake City meetinghouse where it took place. [5][7][8] From 1978 to 1986, she was the third editor of Sunstone. The Strengthening Church Members Committee almost certainly passed along notes about Quinn to his new stake president, Paul Hanks, in early 1993. He stinks.. She talks very vaguely when it comes to personal, specific spiritual beliefs and whether they align with doctrine, but she doesn't hesitate to call the church out on its shit at all. Quinn was an ordinance worker, meaning he went to the temple regularly and helped others perform those rites. The stake president shook our hands and was cordial. She said hello, but he did not recognize her. Within the past few years, Bradley had a change of heart and was rebaptized. Paul usually sits on the outside of the pew, so when the sacrament comes, he shakes his head toward me so we don't have any socially embarrassing moments. However, we believe that Latter-day Saints who are committed to the mission of their Church and the well-being of their fellow members will strive to be sensitive to those matters that are more appropriate for private conferring and correction than for public debate. There are times, they added, when public discussion of sacred or personal matters is inappropriate., The Statement on Symposia was another tear in the already fraying relationship between church leaders and scholars. That came out in early 1993. News. (Quinn attempted to reach this friend through a third party before my piece was finished, but declined to give me his name before speaking to him.) I love the gospel. Hed better start keeping it to himself. She has sat quietly in the same pew as the emblems of the sacrament, or communion, have passed by her more than 1,200 times without being able to partake. By Peggy Fletcher Stack. What's it like going to church for two decades as an excommunicated member? When they did, Quinn, an only child, would go to his room, put on a classical record, and turn the volume up. She was struck by how frail he appeared, and found herself feeling nothing but compassion and love for a man who had once seemed like an enemy. All contents 2023 The Slate Group LLC. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. In many respects, Andersons affirmations mirror those of other members. He got up in front of the congregation and declared his belief in the Mormon gospel, in Joseph Smiths status as a prophet of God, and in the Book of Mormon as divine scripture. Many religions have strictures that establish who is in and who is out, but the Mormon church draws a brighter line than most. Quinn went to Californiahe had another fellowship at the Huntington Librarystaying this time with his mother. Daryl Peveto/Luceo Images for Slate. So she met with local and high Mormon leaders and, after several months, they set a baptismal date. That's a good question. He turned 65 two years later, making him eligible for Social Security and Medicare. These are very sensitive and highly confidential and this is why I have not mentioned them before in writing. Hanks alluded to these matters in subsequent letters, but never explicitly said that he had Quinns sexuality in mind. We had been home about 20 minutes when two high counselors came to our house and delivered a letter, inviting me to a disciplinary hearing two weeks from that day. Robert Kirby does this also, but much more indirectly. This puzzled me because I had a lot to say, but the message was absolutely clear. Following the wave of media attention that greeted the September excommunications, the First Presidency defended what had taken place. The churchs critics find the timing convenient: By 1890, the U.S. government had threatened to seize LDS property if polygamy wasnt renounced. Men only become gay in prison, or sometimes in the Navy. She did, however, tell her leaders her concerns about church exclusion policies: barring worthy LGBTQ couples who are legally married from full participation; blocking worthy and righteous women from the male-only priesthood; and keeping Mother in Heaven from her place in our understanding.. She studied "traditional, sacramental Christianity and priesthood," Hanks said this week. Ordain Women's Kate Kelly loses last appeal; husband to resign from Mormon church . Soon after, he happened to attend, with some friends, a meeting of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a splinter sect that believes Joseph Smiths son, not Brigham Young, was Smiths rightful successor as prophet. When I make comments in Sunday school and Relief Society, they are accepted as anyone else's. ", Kelly goes on KUER's Radio West "A lot of people are asking me why I came forward [with the news of my disciplinary hearing]. It did not happen overnight, but many LDS leaders seemed to regret the furor and the hurt that surrounded those excommunications. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. When something like [my excommunication] blows up, the first casualty is trust and that never comes back. Gileadi was not part of the Sunstone and Dialogue circles that the others moved in; he had been writing and teaching popular workshops about biblical and Book of Mormon prophecies, which appear to have been deemed false doctrine by LDS leaders. Denver Snuffer . The accused is called in, another prayer is offered, and the court proceeds. There were stretches of time when he was the only deacon, and he and I would exchange glances as he passed the sacrament to our row. The president in 2012, when Hanks was readmitted, was Thomas S. Monson. SALT LAKE CITY (AP) Laurie Lee Hall was excommunicated from the Mormon church for being a woman. Grant, an LDS Church president, a granddaughter of United States Senator from Utah, Wallace F. Bennett, and a granddaughter of American physicist Harvey Fletcher. At least, that's how Hall sees it. Packers involvement mattered because the Twelve Apostles are considered by devout Mormons to be prophets, seers, and revelators. If they directed the councils, then the excommunications were, essentially, a message from the churchs highest spiritual authorities about what Mormons were allowed to do andpublicly, at leastto say.
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