Exponent II's Blog, page 9

How Has the Prophet Lived to Be 101? Could It Be…Polygamy?

President Russell M. Nelson turned 101 years old this month, a milestone that very few people reach. According to the Actuarial Life Table on the Social Security Administration’s website, out of every 1,000 Americans born in 1924, only 4.3 of them are still alive. 

How did he manage such a feat? Combined with a healthy lifestyle, good DNA and luck, I have a theory. Almost twenty years ago he married a woman 26 years younger than him with a Ph.D. in gerontology who specializes in the study and care of aging people – and perhaps she’s helped keep him alive.

President Nelson’s first wife Dantzel passed away unexpectedly in February 2005. He married Wendy Watson as his second eternal plural wife in April 2006.

I have no problem with a widow or widower remarrying and finding happiness in another relationship, nor do I mind them finding it quickly. I am however bothered when the story of their meeting and marriage sounds one sided and possibly even spiritually coercive. No matter where I read about their courtship it sounds to me like President Nelson used his position as an apostle to hand select Wendy as his wife, based on characteristics she had that he liked and needed. She did eventually accept his proposal and seems to genuinely enjoy being married to him now, but I can’t imagine a world where a woman as faithful as her didn’t feel enormous pressure to accept the offer of an apostle to be sealed to him.

The age gap between Wendy and her husband is so large that she’s younger than his eldest children and was born less than a year apart from one of his own daughters coincidentally also named Wendy. She’d never married and had built a fulfilling career and single life, including traveling the world with one of her best friends, Sheri Dew.

It was only three months after Dantzel Nelson passed away unexpectedly that Wendy and Sheri were in Italy together and travelled to see the creation of the first stake in Rome – presided over by apostle Russell M. Nelson.

On his long flight to Rome, President Nelson’s secretary had packed several books for him to read – including one authored by Wendy Watson. At the beginning of the stake conference, he read a note with her name on it, and her name leapt off the page at him. (Probably because he’d just barely finished reading her book.) He had a strong spiritual impression to meet her, then took her name to the temple where he again felt impressed to find her.

In a Church News video Wendy describes being totally unsure of “Elder Russell M. Nelson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles” making overtures about getting to know her better and says, “In my own mind, I had wrestled with it and was quite certain there was no possible way that could be right.” She went away by herself and spent two days fasting and praying, stating she was “really serious … actually, desperate” for answers. The heavens finally opened and she knew that it was the Lord’s will for her to enter into this potential relationship with Russell M. Nelson. 

Fast forward to their wedding day – President Hinckley sealed them together, then they did an endowment session with their families. After this, they got in the car and left on their honeymoon. It was the first time they had ever been alone in a vehicle together.

I cannot fathom leaving on a honeymoon with a man 26 years older than me who I’ve literally never even sat alone in a car with before. Was requesting an entire endowment session after their sealing a way for her to postpone her wedding night a few more hours? (The equivalent for me would be leaving for a wedding night with a 70 year old widower, because I am 44. I would also be dragging my feet.)

Wendy says about their marriage being arranged by God: “We think, oh it’s the Lord’s will. That means everything is just going to be easy and wonderful and marvelous, and instead it was tough. We had different expectations. He was still grieving Dantzel without a doubt. Here we are, thrown together – it was a huge change. I say “dramatic”…but it was “traumatic”. Leaving my profession that I loved, that I had devoted my life to…marrying a man 26 years older than I, and moving.”

In an interview with the Deseret News a few days before his sealing to Wendy he spoke only of the loneliness he’d felt since Dantzel’s death and gave no hints whatsoever that he was about to remarry. I understand this could be for privacy, but it would also feel strange if my soon to be husband didn’t even mention my existence mere days before our wedding – instead only talking about his late wife and how sad he was to be missing her. I would feel less like the woman he loved and more like a box he needed to check.

In his April 2018 General Conference talk President Nelson admits using his powers of priesthood revelation to convince Wendy she was to be his next wife. He said, “To strengthen my proposal to Wendy, I said to her, ‘I know about revelation and how to receive it.’”

Others have reported variations of this, such as him saying to Wendy, “There are plenty of things I do not know about you, but I do know revelation.”

While it’s mentioned often that he received revelation that she was to be his wife, there’s no mention of love or Wendy feeling drawn to him the way he was to her. He just received revelation, and (unsurprisingly) as a believing member of the church she followed the direct revelation given to her by an apostle.

Yet isn’t that kind of like Satan’s plan – just being told what to do and doing it? If she had felt excited about the possibility of getting to know him better, why did she need to go fast and pray for two days alone in the mountains, desperate for an answer that matched his? She describes marrying him as a “traumatic” event in her life. I don’t get happy newlywed vibes from her story at all!

I’ve heard other versions of this story before, like when a returned missionary at BYU told a girl he’d received revelation in the temple that she was to be his wife, or when Joseph Smith approached more than one girl to tell her that an angel with a sword had commanded her to marry him.

Both Wendy and Russell claim their meeting and marriage was orchestrated by the Lord. Yet if Wendy views the words of her husband as coming from God, isn’t it more accurate to say their marriage was orchestrated by Russell M. Nelson?

Finally, I can’t help being reminded of another version of this from my high school days, when I overheard a teenage boy joking that he’d be sure to have at least one really hot wife, then another one who was good at cooking, and another who was good at cleaning. Did President Nelson likewise pick one woman to be his true love and the mother of his children, then another woman to be his caretaker in his old age?

(By the way, “Elder Russell M. Nelson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles” is exactly what she called him when they met, and nowadays she almost always calls him “President Russell Marion Nelson”. She refers to him by his full name and priesthood title, even after almost two decades of marriage.)

On the value of the lives of the single and childless

This is not a post about the assassination of Charlie Kirk, but it was prompted by the social media responses I’ve seen about the assassination. I think it goes without saying that even people with terrible views don’t deserve to be murdered. The penalty for being a racist, a misogynist, and a homophobe should be criticism, not death.

That said, I’ve seen far too many posts in my news feed that contain comments like “Even if he said things I don’t agree with, he was a husband and a father, and we need to remember that.”

Why do we need to remember that?

I work in the legal profession, and one thing that infuriates me is that if two otherwise identical people suffer the exact same injury, and one of them has children and the other one doesn’t, the one with children receives more money. The system literally values the first person more. Apparently the self-evident truth that we’re all created equal isn’t so self-evident after all.

Bigotry against the single and the childless is one of the last acceptable bigotries in society. The vilest of racists will still fall all over themselves to explain why whatever they’re saying isn’t racist, because we’ve collectively agreed that racism is repugnant. Sir Patriarch will try to hide his sexism under the veil of “oh, but I just respect women so much” – because we know sexism is evil.

I got blocked in a Mormon feminist Facebook group for saying that single and childless people deserve work/life balance just as much as married people and parents. Jokes about cat ladies are told in polite society, and vile and exclusionary rhetoric about single women comes straight from even the Vice President of the United States.

We pay more in taxes. We stay late at work so you can go to your kid’s soccer games, even though we know nobody will return the favor when we need to leave early. And the thanks we get comes in the form of a thousand little digs about how it’s bad to murder someone because he has kids, leaving the subtle implication that people without kids are therefore murderable.

In the church, this rhetoric goes even further. When single people at church point out how terribly the church treats us, we get placated with “Don’t worry; you’ll get a chance for a spouse after you die.” With the implication that our lives are meaningless now, so hurry up and get to the afterlife where existence will have meaning.

I am a person. I am created in the image of God. And my existence has the same value as any other person. Independently, and regardless of my relationship to other people. If I marry and have children someday, I will not attain any more inherent worth than I already have, because the worth of a human soul is infinite.

The Surprising Trend: Why More Young Women than Young Men are Leaving Religion

In the past 25 years, 40 million Americans have left religion, and worldwide, Christians as a percentage of the world’s population is decreasing, while only Muslims and the nones (people with no religious affiliation) are growing. For the first time in a surprising trend, more young women are leaving religion than men.  

According to the American Survey Center, almost two-thirds of young women believe that Churches do not treat women fairly. Another factor is LGBTQ issues, with sixty percent of young people leaving religion saying that “negative treatment of gays and lesbians” is an important reason they are leaving. Younger folks are also becoming more politically liberal and don’t feel comfortable in churches that are anti-abortion, misogynistic, and politically conservative.

Dr. Ryan Burge, associate professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, suggests churches would be wise pay attention. “Right now the ‘check engine’ light is coming on – not every time you start the car, but sometimes,” he says. “And you don’t know whether it will fix itself or get worse.” Dr. Burge has spent years researching the phenomenon of dechurching and has written four books about it.

He says, “People tend to slowly drift away from religion over time.”

“[People who disconnect from religion] just felt like religion, for whatever reason, was not a good fit for them. And so they drift towards people, drift towards places where they fit in, they feel like they belong…

“I think what’s happening largely is [the dechurched] have found ways to replace religion by picking these different communities that tend to be more like them.”

“If you really want to see ground zero for the ditching, I think it’s older Millennials or younger Generation X.”

Dr. Burge says that average churchgoers today are married with children and middle- to upper-class with college degrees. For churches to retain more of their members, he says they will need to listen more carefully to those who have experienced abuse and trauma within the organization. They will also need to understand those who have doubts and concerns about religion that are ignored or unaddressed, and they will need to pay attention to those who feel unwelcome due to sexuality or life choices.

Dr. Burge also says that religious leaders must better address the spiritual needs of the nones by creating inclusive environments that welcome diverse beliefs and backgrounds, fostering a sense of community and belonging, and focusing on shared values and common goals.

Why LDS Members Are Leaving

Last year, Josh Coates and Stephen Cranney conducted a study to understand why some LDS members leave and learned that 18% of former members identify as LGBTQ.  They found that while most current members believe God exists, a minority of those who leave do, although most believe in a higher power but have doubts and unanswered questions. They reported that the top three reasons respondents gave for leaving the church were 1) history related to the historical narrative regarding Joseph Smith; 2) the authenticity of the Book of Mormon; and 3) the church’s stance on race issues.

 Of those who leave, most state they will not return and strongly dislike the church as an institution, although they had a neutral or positive opinion of the people in the church. They are more likely to be divorced, have smaller families, and to not join another religion.

According to the Public Religion Research Institute’s 2022 report about religion in American life, Latter-day Saints ranks first among members of different faiths who had thought about leaving their religion, at 24%.

Data and image courtesy of PRRI’s 2022 Health of Congregations survey.

Dr. Jana Riess spent years carefully researching for a book titled The Next Mormons: How Millennials are Changing the LDS Church. At a conference at Claremont Graduate University,  Riess, said that the church is only retaining 30% of its unmarried millennials in the U.S.

She reveals that the top ten reasons LDS members leave include:

“I could no longer reconcile my personal values and priorities with those of the Church” (38%)
“I stopped believing there was one true church” (36.5%)
“I did not trust the Church leadership to tell the truth surrounding controversial or historical issues” (31%)
“I felt judged or misunderstood” (30%)
“I drifted away from Mormonism” (26%)
“I engaged in behaviors that the Church views as sinful” (23%)
“The Church’s positions on LGBT issues” (23%)
“The Church’s emphasis on conformity and obedience” (21%)
“Lack of historical evidence for the Book of Mormon and/or Book of Abraham” (21%)
“The role of women in the Church” (18%)

Unlike Dr. Burge’s findings, Dr. Riess found that those with college degrees tended to leave the LDS Church more frequently and found that the retention rate for those born after 1981 is 46%. After her extensive research, Dr. Riess discovered that the main reason people are leaving the LDS Church is their inability to reconcile their values and priorities with those of the Church. This issue has become a genuine struggle for many when they see top Church leaders make unethical decisions regarding finances, share misinformation regarding historical subjects, and overlook vulnerable people, decisions that contradict core values of integrity, honesty, and compassion.

Others are troubled when they see little, if any, of LDS tithing donations used to help starving children throughout the world, and yet billions of dollars hoarded in accounts that purchase US stocks and global real estate. Many struggle with the marginalization of female and LGBT members. Although they do not expect leaders to be perfect, they want them to be ethical and equitable and to apologize for past mistakes.

With the LDS Church’s preoccupation with temple attendance and worthiness, heterosexual marriage, and childbearing, many folks, including those who are single, do not fit the strict parameters of LDS leaders’ expectations and feel unwelcome. Some are concerned that the focus is on following the prophet instead of Jesus. 

The Challenges Religions Face to Retain Members

All religions, including the LDS Church, must balance their core doctrines while adapting to an information where people can quickly research information that was once locked in vaults and kept secret among top leadership. Church leaders need to untangle patriarchal hierarchies that disempower women and marginalize LGBTQ members, and they should be transparent and accountable in all of their financial and corporate decision-making.

Although dechurching may not stop, leaders can slow it down by carefully evaluating whether or not they value those in the margins, including LGBTQIA members, women, and single and childless folks, the sick and the destitute. They must determine if their practices promote greed, dishonesty, and fear or generosity, integrity, and compassion. They must decide if their  theology reflects Jesus’ admonition to “love one another as I have loved you” or if it increases their power and prejudice.

Jesus did not sideline women, who had significant roles in his ministry and the early Church leadership. Churches today must evaluate which identity markers are worth keeping and which ones no longer serve them. Leaders need to listen to, learn from, and love those in the pews and find ways to create a true community based on equality and respect for all instead of catering only to cisgendered men. When obedience to Church leaders trumps love of self, God, and neighbor, some members will vote with their feet and walk out the doors, never to return. May church leaders choose wisely.

 

Thanks to  Mert Coşkun for the photo on Pexels

 

 

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Guest Post: Walking Out Of The Shadow: Part 2 of The Shadow Side of Faithful Womanhood

Guest Post by Josie Grover

On a prior blog post, I wrote of a dream that helped me process loss of personal authority I was relinquishing to be a fully faithful woman in the LDS church.  As a summary, my dream had a powerful woman pursuing me at the orders of a man in military attire.  The woman had emerged from a cave, walking from the shadow into the light. The cave is the aspect of the dream that I would like to focus on as a follow up,  specifically the difference between being in a cave and enjoying light coming in through the opening, verses stepping out fully into the light of day. 

I recently learned the Allegory of the Cave by Plato. In this philosophic story, prisoners are chained in a cave with their backs to a wall, only able to face toward the end of the cave.  From the other side of the wall behind them burns a fire from which other individuals are projecting shadow imaging onto the cave surface the prisoners are seeing. One day a prisoner is suddenly freed from his chains and wanders out of the cave into full sunlight. There he sees for first time, real and tangible objects that create shadows on the ground and understands that shadows are only projections of reality. What he was shown in the cave was not at all reality but a controlled version of it. As he makes his way back into the cave to tell the other prisoners, he is met with disbelief and mockery.

This allegory is meant to demonstrate what it is like for someone to be a recipient of group mind control where they are given doses of truth without full context. Many times the people being programmed don’t believe the information being shared by people outside of the controlled system.

As we sit together in the sheltered cave of the LDS church, we do enjoy the light of the divine feminine to an extent. It enters in as God’s love for womanhood.  We feel the glow when we are taught that Eve was not the original sinner other Christian denominations frame her to be, but the wise and sacrificing mother of humanity that knew before Adam what must occur. We have paintings in our buildings of the resurrected Christ appearing first to Mary Magdalene. We have the unique opportunity in this faith to at least acknowledge a presence of a Heavenly Mother. These are the controlled version of story.  It comes with heavy instructions. They ask us not to pray to Heavenly Mother. Information about her attributes are limited. It is almost in mockery of the divine feminine that it is paired with the idea that godly womanhood does not include leadership, or a very filtered down version of limited leadership. We are left with shadow projections. The shape of reality with out the full manifestations of it.

I have received new and empowering insight on divine womanhood since leaving the cave. For example, author Beth Allison Barr in The Making of Biblical Womanhood provides scriptural evidence that patriarchy is human sin. Barr explains that as Adam and Eve are being escorted from the garden, God is expounding on the trials and tribulations of this life. It is in this context that He tells Eve “thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” It was not in commandment that this was stated, but a foreboding of the specific earthy trials of womanhood. Patriarchy was not an order that existed when Adam and Eve lived in the presence of God, but it is something that will be persistent in the fallen world. 

From Mary Magdalene I have have learned that women have much to contribute to the spiritual stewardship of mankind. Christ appointed Mary as an apostle to apostles, a role that she stepped into upon the death of Christ as she comforted those followers who were in deep mourning. It was also Mary that ushered in the news of Christ’s return in full glory to His twelve.  In the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, a text that was living in hiding for hundreds of years, we learn of more wholistic ways of helping our spirit find God while in earthly form. She knew much and Christ trusted her. 

From books on the Mother God that is hidden in the text of the Old Testament, we learn that Her main gift to Her children is wisdom.  Often she is symbolized by a tree. In a moment of clarity, I understood that the tree of knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden was Heavenly Mother abounding with the fruit of wisdom which Eve, who as Her daughter, gravitated towards.

Walking out of orthodoxy, the full light of feminine Divinity has given me a confidence in myself that I struggled to find under an all male authority.  I feel more open in my relationship with God and Jesus. I enjoy moments of praying to my Mother and feeling her gentle guidance as whispers of affirming wisdom.  I was neglecting these opportunities for insight and connection while in full obedience to the teachings of the church. While LDS women do have power from on high, I hope that a distinctly feminine power will be able to grow there to the point that men’s portrayal of Her is no longer the dominating narrative. It is one hope of many.

Josie is a wife and mother living in Southern Utah. She works as an ultrasound technologist and spends much of her free time learning about LDS church history and feminism in Christianity. While she is not a full believing member of the church she attends her local ward with her family and loves the community found there. She just started an Instagram account where she expounds on her passions concerning social justice issues. You can find her at @josieunpacksitall.

Guest Post: Faith and Uncertainty: My Journey as A Gender Care Provider

Guest Post by Anonymous.

My first class in graduate school was psychopathology where we studied the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, the “bible” of mental health diagnoses. I assumed I would learn about the clean, research-validated boxes in which people fit, gaining a roadmap for categorizing symptoms. Instead, I learned a lesson that has been pivotal for both my professional and spiritual life. 

My professor told us that to be good psychologists, we must develop a “strong tolerance for ambiguity.” I have since learned to appreciate deeply that human behavior and mental health are multidimensional and often do not fit nicely in boxes or diagnostic categories. I still find myself wanting certainty when it is not always possible. Sitting with ambiguity requires vulnerability and humility, a willingness to acknowledge that despite my years of training, research, and expertise, I do not fully understand the complexities of lived human experience. 

I feel this deeply as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My gospel knowledge has matured over time, too, and I have moved from checklist, memorized, black and white views on what is “right” and “wrong” to living in the gray areas. As I have faced spaces where the Gospel doesn’t have an answer, or where culture seems to conflict with doctrine, I have had to learn to tolerate ambiguity. Facing these instances is what has truly shaped my testimony and conviction in what I believe.  

These lessons have guided me through my work with transgender/gender diverse folx. I am part of teams who support accessing gender-affirming medical care, socially transitioning, and identifying mental health supports. The work I do is incredibly complex navigating individual mental health, medical/legal systems, social/political contexts, and medical decision making. Particularly in the current time, I am constantly facing ethical and moral situations that have been deemed “controversial.”  

Many would argue that there are clear, black-and-white, right and wrong approaches to gender care. Again, though, human behavior is often in the gray in-between. How do I know if someone’s gender identity will shift over time? Is my patient truly able to consent to irreversible care decisions? Do they have the support needed to transition? Are we moving through the process slowly enough to ensure understanding and support but fast enough to prevent unneeded distress? Balancing mental health with providing thoughtful, careful care is incredibly challenging and complex. 

As a disciple of Christ, I am further confronted with cognitive dissonance and internal conflict over the ways that my work clashes with church policies and teachings. There is so much unknown and ambiguity. I do not understand the eternal role of gender. I do not know if and how sex and gender are determined and how they relate to our bodies/spirits/souls. I also question to what degree our current church policies reflect eternal truths and revelation or patriarchy, cultural bias, and politically driven decisions.  

On a more personal level, I’ve grappled with thoughts about the eternal nature of my work. How will this impact my church membership and involvement? If I tell others at church details about the work I do, will I be limited in my responsibilities? I’ve already been censored when invited to give talks about mental health at church; told what I can or cannot say and even not to talk about LGBTQ+ topics at all. Will I qualify for a temple recommend (does my work count as “supporting or promoting teachings, practices, or doctrine contrary to those of the church”)? Will others understand the divine guidance I’ve felt in this work, and ways I see it magnifying my spiritual gifts, or will they see me as misguided and sinful for facilitating gender transition? How will this be viewed as part of my ultimate judgment? Am I playing God by helping people change their bodies, or am I honoring agency and showing charity?  

To be clear, I am still a privileged cisgender woman. Though I facilitate transitioning, my distress and these questions I grapple with are likely only small portion of what many transgender/gender diverse folx experience.    

People in my life have questioned my integrity for both doing gender affirming work in the first place, and equally, for staying in a religion with explicitly exclusionary policies. Initially, I admit that I felt so overwhelmed by this conflict that I essentially ignored it. I created a massive divide between my work self and my religious self. I rarely shared about my religion in professional spaces, and I rarely talked about my work with the LGBTQ+ population at church.  

Of course, this was impossible to sustain because I constantly felt inauthentic and afraid. I ultimately had to go deep into myself to confront my fears and solidify my own values and beliefs. It’s still hard, of course, and I am mindful about what I share. But I have found more peace and conviction as I have been more deliberately authentic in all spaces. The reality is that this work has brought me closer to Christ in ways no other work has or likely ever will. Through confronting ambiguity and uncertainty, I have learned to rely on faith and charity.  

I resonate deeply with the movie Conclave, especially the way in which it explores the idea of uncertainty and faith. One quote from the movie powerfully declares that: “Certainty is the great enemy of unity. Certainty is the deadly enemy of tolerance.” I could not agree more; this is what my journey has taught me on a deep level. When we become so enamored by certainty, rather than faith, charity, and hope, we ignore things that contradict our certainty. This leads to prejudice toward things that do not fit in our black and white boxes. We become insular and homogenous, casting out those who do not fit our rigid definitions. We strive to eliminate uncertainty by ignoring it or willing it away, but of course this is not possible or successful. 

Our gospel teach that faith requires work. How many members of our church are acting on faith to truly question and seek to understand gender diversity? The “work” involved in this means we must sit with and learn from those who are gender diverse, also sitting with the ambiguity and questions this may bring up. Following Christ’s example, we must be in relationship. I have felt deeply that if Christ were here now, he would do exactly what he did when he was on the earth before: prioritize ministering to those most rejected by society. I can think of no group more rejected and targeted now than transgender/gender diverse people, but are we really ministering to them as Christ would? Is our energy dedicated to serving them, or bearing down on rigid doctrines? 

Sadly, I see that the all-too-common current response to transgender/gender diverse people is to reject, ignore, require conformity, or blame. This only leads to increased misunderstanding, prejudice and rejection. We seem to be leaning into a space where we cannot allow gray—by declaring that sex and gender are binary. Or, acknowledging that others may feel differently but should not act differently, something that may be biologically impossible.  

I watch as my patients live in intense fear to be their authentic selves, and as many of my fellow gender care providers receive death threats. I’ve had to face whether doing this work will threaten the safety of myself and my family, having anxiety attacks about being arrested or attacked and taken from my young children. I watch as supposed Christians are so focused on preserving the family and gender roles that they lose sight of the fact that we are talking about actual people and families. Our churches are now spaces where everyone cannot be their authentic selves, and instead of offering welcoming protection and support in a time when it is needed most, our churches become places of increased risk and isolation that contribute to deep distress. Have we so fully lost touch, and “looked beyond the mark,” that we have forgotten that true faith and charity require showing love in these exact kinds of circumstances? 

I frankly feel that too many, especially in our church, are so dependent on rigid views, and so afraid of the uncertainty that comes with considering sex and gender, that they are numb to intellectual, emotional, and spiritual reason. We have forgotten to exercise faith in the face of ambiguity, choosing to ground ourselves in exclusionary views rather than expansive charity and respect that Christ taught. I yearn for the day that our churches are places of safety and compassion, where all people can turn for solace, rather than avoid due to fear.  

I have had distinct moments where it is as if a conduit is open and I feel intense love for the patient/families I am working with. This is overall rare but is powerful and striking when it happens because the love I feel is palpable and overwhelming, at times bringing me to tears. I believe in those moments I’m getting a small glimpse of this person’s potential, goodness, and humanity. I have had these experiences with the transgender youth and families I’ve worked with. Though there is much ambiguity, I do not feel ambiguity in these moments. In fact, I feel even greater certainty that we need to convey this love, and that not doing so would be a greater sin. 

I wish I could share the deeply powerful stories I have heard from the patients I work with; their pain, experiences of rejection and victimization, and their joy and resilience. Yet I also recognize that hearing these stories from me, however powerfully I could tell them, would not change perspectives. What causes change is hearing these stories from transgender/gender diverse people themselves; being in relationship so the experiences and emotions  are personal and real, not just words on a page.  

Please fellowship transgender/gender diverse people and families. Listen to their stories. Say their names and pronouns and create safe spaces for them to live authentically. Learn about what it means to be intersex and talk to intersex people. Consider the implications of a spectrum of gender and sex and what this might mean doctrinally. Take these questions to our Heavenly Parents and seek specific guidance about how to minister to this group. Doing so will save lives and make us all more Christlike.  

The author is a feminist, mother, runner, and psychologist who is trying to balance it all. She works with LGBTQ+ youth and families in research and clinical settings, primarily focused on gender-related supports and needs. She values deep connection, meaningful conversations, and being in nature.

Book Review – Turning Pink: An American and Australian Memoir by Sherrie Gavin

Sisterhood is very important here at the Exponent. Those of us on the blog team love to celebrate each other’s accomplishments. When long time blogger, Sherrie Gavin, announced that her memoir was ready for publication we rejoiced along with her. 

Sherrie’s Exponent sisters cheered her on during the events of the book as well. Sherrie’s book is the story of how she and her husband adopted their two daughters. The situation was complicated and along the way she was supported from afar by the sisterhood of Exponent bloggers. 

On the dedication page Sherrie thanks her Exponent sisters by name. It is fitting that the Exponent Blog should review her book, Turning Pink: An American and Australian Memoir.

I joined the blog team years after the events of the book took place. I knew Sherrie from online blog contributor events. She organizes an annual Christmas gift exchange. The first year I drew her name for a gift. I scoured her blog posts for hints of what kind of gift she would like and in the process learned a lot about her.

I was excited to read Sherrie’s book so I could learn the full story of how this adoption occurred. The book did not disappoint. I was so engrossed in the story I stayed up late reading it. 

This story begins after Sherrie and her husband Bruce had been married for 10 years. Sherrie knew she would not be able to have children. It affected how she felt in a church where motherhood was glorified and was a way women bonded. Sherrie and Bruce had considered adopting, but they lived in Australia where private adoption is not allowed and the government processes only a handful of cases each year. 

She had nearly given up on the idea of ever being a mother. Then, miraculously, she was told of two American girls living in Australia who might be available for adoption. She meets the girls and brings them home with her on a trial basis. And so begins the process of becoming their mother. 

The girls, Cheyenne and Reesey, are three and two years old. They are sweet, but also suffering from trauma from abuse. Sherrie describes how much she loves them. However, she is new to parenting and so she has to learn many things quickly. Some of the best parts of the book are her describing how she learned to connect with the girls and help them heal.

There are so many obstacles in the way of this adoption going through. Sherrie doesn’t even have the girls’ birth certificates. She has to navigate the challenging world of visas and residency on top of figuring out if it’s even possible to adopt these girls in Australia. These parts of the book had elements of a legal thriller. There were so many times I paused reading and thought, “Okay, I’m pretty certain these girls are Sherrie’s daughters, but HOW on earth did they actually adopt them?” 

The girls’ legal guardians vacillate between being supportive of Sherrie and her husband to tormenting them with threats of taking away the girls. I was surprised at how vindictive and manipulative they could be toward a couple who just wanted what was best for the girls. Michelle, one of the legal guardians, ranks among one of the worst literary villains I’ve ever encountered. I was thrilled whenever Sherrie could get an upper hand and angry when Michelle emotionally abused Sherrie.

Sherrie describes the ups and downs of motherhood. She talks about the sweet and awe inspiring moments filled with love for the girls. She also doesn’t shy away from sharing the toll all the changes took on her physical and mental health. She is honest about the impact that suddenly becoming responsible for two young girls had on her marriage to Bruce. I appreciated these raw and emotionally honest parts of the book. 

All through the book Sherrie shares how God and miracles help make becoming parents possible. I was touched by these parts. As someone who has been re-examining my relationship with the divine I found it very helpful to hear Sherrie describe the ways that God helped the process along. The story of this book is of a large miracle wrapped up in many small miracles. 

I recommend this book to anyone who would like to witness a miracle. Many times it seemed like the adoption would be impossible. And yet the miracle occurred.

The book is published by Common Consent Press and is available now. You can order it a physical copy from Amazon or Barnes and Noble. It is also available on Kindle.

The Problem with Comparing Bathsheba to a Sheep

Every night, I read to my eight-year-old from a storybook Bible. (It’s called The Peace Table and I highly recommend it if you want inclusive, justice-oriented scripture interpretations, plus artwork depicting Bible characters as POC.) Recently, we read the story of David and Bathsheba, found in 2 Samuel:11-12.

David, king of Israel, of Goliath-slaying fame, sees Bathsheba bathing on a roof, apparently cleansing herself after her menstruation, and decides he must have her. But, there’s one problem—she’s already married to Uriah. David sleeps with her anyway, and Bathsheba gets pregnant. So, David sends Uriah to the battlefront so that he’ll die (after Uriah refuses to abandon his duty to go home and sleep with his wife so he could think he got her pregnant instead). Once Uriah is killed in battle, David marries Bathsheba himself.

Growing up in the LDS church, I heard this story dozens of times, and usually as a cautionary tale about how even the most “righteous” can fall to temptation, particularly sexual temptation in the case of this story. As I read it to my son, we got to the part where the prophet Nathan teaches David about his sin through a parable—and this struck me differently this time around. As Nathan told the parable of the man with many sheep who stole another man’s only sheep for himself, I realized he was literally comparing a woman to livestock. In this instance, the man with many sheep was David, who already had many wives, and stole Uriah’s only wife, Bathsheba, for himself.

The prophet Nathan counseling King David on his sins. lds.org

Obviously, what David did to Uriah was wrong—but what never quite crystallized for me before was how much he wronged Bathsheba as well. Because in this story, she is no more than a sheep—a creature that can be stolen against her will, who belongs to men and whose ownership can be shifted about as they please. I do remember even as a child wondering what Bathsheba thought about becoming David’s wife, but this is never mentioned in the Bible. Her opinions and feelings are treated as insignificant to the tale. Even when the child David fathered dies, this is treated as a result of David’s sin—but Bathsheba, who presumably was only the victim of this situation, also had to suffer the loss of her child.

I feel like this all comes down to, once again, polygamy. Polygamy turns women into objects men can possess and collect as displays of their wealth and power. David’s actions are only portrayed as wrong because he stole something that belonged to another man, not because he took advantage of a powerless human being. This allowed Joseph Smith to, thousands of years later, look at this story and decide David’s multiple wives must have been approved of by God, rather than merely being an unfortunate product of David’s time period.

Photo by Sam Carter on Unsplash

I don’t want to get into what Joseph’s motivations for taking on polygamous wives actually were—in the end, we can only speculate. But, certainly in D&C 132: 38-39, David is cited as a justification for polygamy: “David’s wives and concubines were given unto him of me (God).” David’s son, Solomon, is also mentioned, and in the Bible his sin is portrayed not in having multiple wives but in marrying woman from outside of his faith.

So, maybe this actually comes down to taking the Bible too literally. As I’ve learned from Dan McClellan’s social media, and Rachel Held Evans’s books, A Year of Biblical Womanhood and Inspired, if we truly followed every last thing in the Bible, we wouldn’t be able to mix our fabrics or eat shrimp. The Bible also can be and has been used to justify basically anything—from slavery to misogyny to war and genocide. In the end, Joseph Smith seems to have been a bit selective when it came to restoring all things, and yet insisted polygamy had to be one of those things.

But perhaps we shouldn’t try to exemplify a story where women are treated as equivalent to sheep.

This is Benevolent Sexism and I Hate It

Before I say anything else, this blog post is going up on President Nelson’s 101st birthday and I know from personal experience there are many, many women who love this man very much – not just from afar, but women in his family. Any man who lives to be 101 and has so many people who love him has accomplished something great. That said, I stand by everything I write below.

I’m doing research on Wendy Watson Nelson for an upcoming blog post, and came across an interview with Wendy by her friend Sheri Dew. In it, Wendy declares emphatically that President Russell Nelson respects and honors women SO MUCH. I was curious what she would say to back this claim up. 

To me, respecting and honoring women would mean including them in church leadership that is reserved only for men. 

Here’s a snippet of the interview (start at the 20 minute mark to hear this section):

Sheri Dew: “What do you see personally about his regard for women?”

Wendy: “Well this is a man, President Nelson. It is deep in his soul, in his cells. I’m sure if we cut him it would come out: I HONOR WOMANHOOD…”

From me (Abby): Okay, that’s nice. But what does honoring womanhood actually mean to Russell M. Nelson?

Wendy explains by saying, “I’ll just give you a personal example, and that is… this one little illustration in my own life which happens every single day. He will never go through a doorway first. If I’m with him, he’ll stand to the side. He always has me walk through the doorway first. If we’re in the kitchen, we walk down the hall to go to the office. We walk down the hall together, then he stands to the side for me to go in through the door first. 

That to me says it all: his honoring of woman.”

Last year at his 100th birthday party, President Oaks and President Eyring praised his respect for women in a similar fashion. 

Elder Oaks gushed, “…when people enter the room, he almost always stands for them. But he always stands if there are women in the room.” Elder Eyring added: “Always!”

These are the examples given (by the people closest to him) of how Russell M. Nelson honors women. 

 

Look! Elder Oaks is treating Elder Eyring like a lady. 

I want to be very clear: it is now 2025, not 1925. I genuinely don’t care if a very old man stands up when I walk in the room or not. I don’t care if he pauses to let me enter a room first. I don’t care if he holds the door for me, or tells me I’m sweet or pretty, or gives me a candy from his pocket. I don’t care about these things. They don’t make me feel respected by men!

Rather, I feel like men in power say and do these things in an attempt to placate me, then expect me to sit obediently at their feet like a child and follow their commandments without question. When this happens, I feel angry and invalidated – like they view me as a beloved pet. I want the type of respect that truly values my insights and experience in the world as a female, and the type of love and admiration that encourages them to follow and learn from me in return.

Respect for women is so much deeper (and harder) than simply standing up or walking through a doorway second. I’m exhausted as a woman waiting for top church leaders to learn this incredibly basic definition of what respect and human dignity actually means.

The Price Women–and Many Men–Pay in the Patriarchal LDS Church

Patriarchy lies at the very foundation of the LDS Church. Men oversee every aspect of its structure—finances, policies, doctrine, and even the women’s organization, where females are ultimately managed by men. Women–and many men–pay a significant price in the patriarchal church system.

In practice, every woman’s decision can be overridden by a male leader. While some women may find comfort in patriarchal faith traditions, a new trend is emerging: young women are leaving the Church at higher rates than young men. That shift is telling.

Add polygamy into the equation, still authorized in LDS temples for posthumous marriages, and the reach of patriarchy becomes even more stark. In temple ceremonies today, men covenant to “preside” over their wives—a word that traces back to the 17th century French présider, meaning “to be set over others, to direct and control.” This is not symbolic language. It codifies male authority into LDS couples’ most sacred commitments.

Only six women are mentioned in the Book of Mormon, Sariah, Mary, Eve, Sarah, Isabel, a harlot, and Abish, a servant or slave. In the Bible, women are viewed as the property of men. A mere 1.2 percent of Biblical verses are spoken by women, and of them are nameless. 

Research consistently shows that patriarchal religions reinforce harmful patterns: women are valued more as wives than as individuals, victims of sexual abuse are often blamed, heterosexuality is treated as the only valid orientation, divorced women are devalued, and gender inequalities are institutionalized—leading to economic vulnerability and sexual exploitation.

UCLA religion professor Scott Bartchy , defines patriarchy  not only as men ruling over women, but as “the rule of a few men over everyone else, male and female.”

He adds, “Patriarchy subordinates not just women and children, but also most men, leaving only a small group with real power.”

The consequences are devastating. Dr. Susan Madsen’s research links LDS patriarchy to widespread accounts of domestic violence, with bishops too often “ignoring or minimizing” women’s reports of abuse. Dr. Madsen states, “Power disparity is at the root of violence. Research continues to show that when men have significantly more power than women–in homes, groups, communities, and societies–there tends to be more issues with abuse. At its foundation, power is about relationships.”

Gender based violence is endemic in all patriarchal cultures.

The Church’s own hotline has been repeatedly used—not to protect victims—but to shield the institution’s reputation.

Last year, a New Zealand journalist released a six-part investigative podcast exposing how the LDS Church built systems that protect its wealth and reputation while shielding sexual predators. The evidence is damning.

I have personally witnessed close friends endure deep psychological and physical suffering at the hands of bishops, husbands, and ward leaders. Many were silenced when they sought help and punished when they spoke out. These abuses are not isolated—they are endemic.

The lawsuits reflect this reality. This year 91 current and former California residents filed suit against the LDS Church for childhood sexual abuse, alleging decades of assaults by local leaders while the institution did nothing. Since 2002, two investigators have received over 4,000 reports from LDS abuse survivors or their families. They found more than 400 LDS leaders convicted of sex crimes or of failing to report them. For every person convicted, there are likely hundreds who have never faced justice.

The reality is that LDS policies favor a narrow demographic: heterosexual, married, temple-attending, Caucasian men. Until that changes, the Church cannot claim to be equitable, trustworthy, or just.

Importantly, patriarchy harms men as well. They are pressured to suppress emotions, take on crushing callings, and provide for families under impossible expectations. In patriarchal systems, both men and women suffer shame when they fail to meet unattainable standards of purity, performance, and perfection.

As a former bishop’s wife, I saw firsthand the toll it takes. Bishops, often working full-time jobs and raising families, are burdened with duties no person can reasonably bear. Their wives and children suffer as well, as they navigate life with an absentee father who is expected to choose obedience to the Church over his family. Our ward was large, with 850 members, my husband’s job was time-consuming, and the needs of the ward members were great. The combination was incredibly stressful for my husband and our family, whom the Church taught to sacrifice all for the kingdom of God. 

After my husband served as bishop, he was placed in high stake callings, which meant we didn’t see him in church on most Sundays because stake meetings conflicted with our ward schedule. His demanding church responsibilities kept him from his family even more, and he missed the opportunity to nurture his children and spend time with them that they needed and deserved.  

Because the church has an unpaid local clergy, many men are taken from their homes and expected to perform superhuman service with little training and even less support from the church. Perhaps paid, well-trained clergy should be considered. Although most bishops are kind and caring, some are abusive and need greater scrutiny, oversight, and training that the church currently provides.

A healthy church requires all its parts—head, hands, eyes, and feet, yet the LDS Church currently functions with a head but little else since so many subgroups are suppressed from functioning. Masculine traits like assertiveness and competitiveness dominate, while feminine traits like empathy, cooperation, and compassion are neglected. The result? Billions of LDS tithing dollars are invested while proportionally, a minute percentage of its income goes to humanitarian aid worldwide. 

True health, whether in a person or an institution, comes from integrating both masculine and feminine traits. Jesus himself embodied this balance. He celebrated the marginalized, lifted women, embraced the poor, and healed the broken. Any church claiming His name is duty-bound to follow His example.

The Church must confront these questions: If all are children of God, how can any subgroup be marginalized? Would a loving God design a system where some are silenced, suppressed, and sidelined while others wield unchecked power? Can a true church be built on practices that exploit the vulnerable while privileging the powerful? If Jesus loves everyone, would He knowingly marginalize and abuse some while empowering and protecting others?

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints can do much more to follow the One whose name it bears.

The LDS Church has a choice: cling to a system of patriarchy that protects power and wealth at the expense of its people or transform into a community that reflects Christ’s love, goodness, and integrity. May it choose wisely.

 

What are your thoughts?

 

How are woman and men are negatively impacted in high-demand patriarchal religions?

If the LDS Church believes are all are children of God, how can this be demonstrated in its theology, policies, and practices?

 

 

 

Photo: Pexels, Lisa Summers

When you are the cautionary tale

On a recent Sunday morning, a friend and I went for a walk. It’s a not-infrequent Sunday morning activity for us, although it’s been a while since we went out because our schedules have not been aligned. Before I left the church and she stopped attending, we would work around church time, but now we usually go during church, as her family is out of the house.

After this walk, which was typical in every way, I got a text from her. Someone had reported back from sacrament meeting: A woman who used to be in our ward saw us walking during church (she must have been running late?) and felt the need to include us in her testimony. Per my friend, this woman commended everyone who had gone to church that day for their valiance after seeing “two sisters in the ward” out walking. 

In her defense, when I resigned I asked the bishop to keep discussion to a minimum. It appears he has done an excellent job of it. Not in her defense, it is literally not her business who is in church or not except for her.

But this bugged me. I was struck by the public shaming aspect, the assumptions of lack of valiance or faith, the sense of superiority. When I was Mormon, it was comments like that, usually made off-handedly and without a thought as to how they would land with outsiders–because I was an outsider for years before leaving, even though I wore the clothes and said the words of an insider–that reminded me that I didn’t belong, that I was different, that this wasn’t a safe space for me. 

What’s more, it was so unnecessary. Can’t people simply be valiant? Must they be compared to someone else to feel good about being in church on Sunday morning? Surely the reason they were all there that morning was to connect with divinity, to learn or even just to fulfill a covenant, not to feel superior to the neighborhood apostate who walked away? They got their blessings for attending regardless of who wasn’t there. 

And what if I hadn’t left? What if I was really struggling with church–as I did for years, as I know many others do every week–and just needed a break that week? A mental health day. A walk in the forest with the sun on my face and a talk with a good friend. Is that so wrong? (Cue Sister Toth as a missionary almost 20 years ago: “Yes. Communing with God in nature doesn’t count.” I hope all the people to whom I taught that figured out the teaching was wrong long before I did. Commune with God wherever and however you feel God.) What if this public judgment was relayed to me when I was sensitive, struggling, wondering if I can be myself in church or if the ramifications would be too much? The message would be loud and clear: No. This isn’t a hospital for the sick. Show up with your best, every time. There are no other options.

In her excellent book “Caste,”* author Isabel Wilkerson compares society to a cast in a play, where people are assigned roles at birth–lead, supporting, backstage, usher. “As an actor, you are to move the way you are directed to move, speak the way your character is expected to speak. You are not yourself. You are not to be yourself. Stick to the script and to the part you are cast to play, and you will be rewarded. Veer from the script, and you will face the consequences. Veer from the script, and other cast members will step in to remind you where you went off-script. Do it often enough or at a critical moment and you may be fired, demoted, cast out, your character conveniently killed off in the plot” (p. 63).

In church, other members will make you face the consequences of veering off script. I have yet to experience a time when divinity forced such a consequence on me. Everyone’s time might be better spent focusing on their own lines, their own roles and their own relationships with divinity. Be yourself. If there is no place for your true self, better to know that now. And please, don’t be the member who shames, publicly or privately, those who fall short of what you think they should be doing. Church is supposed to be a hospital for the sick. Don’t stand at the door and turn the sick away.

*I highly recommend this book, which looks at the United States as a caste system like India’s, with black people at the bottom of the system. It is eye-opening, particularly as this time discontent and division in the country.

Photo by Audri Van Gores on Unsplash (This is what our forest looks like when it is not summer.)