In a recent broadcast, one of the top female leaders of the Mormon church made the following statement, “There is no other religious organization in the world that I know of, that has so broadly given power and authority to women.” (J. Anette Dennis, 1st Counselor in the LDS Church Relief Society General Presidency). Please join Amy McPhie Allebest (Breaking Down Patriarchy), Chelsea Homer (Lost & Found Club) and musical artist Mindy Gledhill as they discuss their reactions to this statement, and their experiences as women in the LDS/Mormon church.
Breaking Down Patriarchy – YouTube
Lost and Found Club | Community-Led In-Person Events
3 Responses
The church is always very vague about exactly what we have all this power and authority to do. Let’s take a look at things women are shown doing in the fluffy video they showed at the beginning of that RS meeting. According to that video, women have priesthood authority to do the following things:
– Smile.
– Walk around, specifically walk around temple grounds.
– Hug other women.
– (but never hug men, or even interact with them at all. In fact, there is no visual of women interacting with adult men in the whole video, except one woman holding hands with her husband while they walk around the temple grounds, and one woman taking the sacrament off a tray passed to her by a man. There is no footage of a woman leading or teaching any adult man or even talking with one…)
– Care for children, babies, and old women in hospital beds.
– Teach primary and other classes where adult men are not students.
– Read scriptures and pray
– Cook with other women
– Sew with other women
– do difficult unpaid labor and carry the mental load
A small video is worth 1000 words.
Also, if ever any of us were hopefully told that we’d be Co-God with your husband, check out this clear message from Joseph F. Smith:
“God is a man. His wife is queen, but is not and never can be, God! … No woman can attain to the Godhead … It is the same in regard to the Priesthood. A woman does not “hold a portion of the Holy Priesthood thro’ her husband (or father).” … Because a man is an Elder, a High Priest, or an Apostle, it does not follow that his wife is an Elder, High P-r or an Apostle, or that she “holds a portion” of the Melchisadec Priesthood.” — Letter from Joseph F. Smith to Susa Gates, dated 29 Jan 1888. Susa Young Gates papers, circa 1870-1933; MS 7692; scan of original letter available on the Church History Library website.
You said this so perfectly. Well done, and I couldn’t agree more!!!
Thank you for speaking truth into reality! You have touched me very deeply. As a ward clerk 20 years ago, I sat in a “court of love” regarding a single sister who had been accused of having sexual relations with a married brother in the ward. I watched the bishop and his councilors shame that lady by asking inappropriate probing questions that left her weeping with her shoulders heaving up and down as she sobbed in shame. I felt ashamed to be part of that abusive system. That very night I told the bishop I could no longer serve. That benevolent patriarchy truly is sexism in all the ways you ladies described. “If the prophet speaks to God, does God have nothing to say to women?” “I don’t know if I will ever stop crying over Mormonism.” “Silence of the patriarchy in the face of the cries of their people.” Oh my! A wise person stated that her greatest teacher was suffering. Your suffering, coupled with your critical thinking skills that lend towards right thinking drive true emotion and true care. The patriarchy drives dull care with the quiet changes, obfuscation of doctrinal and historical realities and a purity culture that indeed damages not only the capacity of the individual to experience a true self-loving space to live within, but brings a destructive dialectic within marriages that erode the potential for the bliss we all deserve. I am a man. I would not wish the priesthood on any woman. I have no use for it myself. It is not real and can only wield power in the secular arena. Yes, the LDS church creates community. And yet, how are the fruits of that “community” manifest in your lives as you find the emotional foundation it laid for you is pain, shame and guilty sorrow. In your own words, the wall of words from that community have been “crazy making.” I am still learning to divest myself from the taint of patriarchy. Guess what? I have grown my hair long to make a statement of solidarity to the women in my life with this foundational topic you three so gloriously broached. I love each one of you for your vibrant voices pushed forth from caring, loving hearts. How wonderful is that?