Letters to the Editor
March 21, 2018David Timmins, A Neglected Chronicler
Kirk D. Hagen, Science/Religion Complement
Susanne Müller-Schröter, Praise from Afar
Michael Fillerup, Celestial Sex?
DiaBLOGue
About the Artist: Jacob Fossum
March 20, 2018Jacob Fossum has little sense of belonging to a specific place, having lived in a number of states while growing up. He currently lives in Sacramento. He derives from a long line of Mormon pioneer…
Writing: An Act of Responsibility
March 20, 2018You’re a writer who loves these big, tough songs that pierce your heart and make you feel alive all over again. You believe in literature with a soul—the book that makes you think, that makes you feel as though you’ve been somewhere and experienced something, that you’re a different person for having read it. Writing just to entertain isn’t your goal. Writing to impress others with your cleverness or hoped-for-brilliance doesn’t matter as much as it once did. Your desire is something like Chekhov’s who spoke about writers describing situations so truthfully that readers could no longer avoid them. Or in your own words, to wrangle with the tough places in yourself and your subject. That’s what matters to you.
Should Mormon Women Speak Out? Thoughts on Our Place in the World
March 20, 2018I am happy to pay tribute to Gene England, a vivid and significant twentieth-century intellectual of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Gene influenced many Mormons with his rigorous ethics, his lived religion, his human interactions, and his ability to record his life and get it all down. He certainly influenced me.
What I Would Be If I Weren’t A Mormon
March 20, 2018When I first asked myself the question in the title, I was wondering specifically what religion I would participate in if I weren’t Mormon. I soon tangled myself up in questions about what it means…
Joseph Smith: Lost and Found
March 20, 2018I met Joseph out of all Mormon context. I met him between Emerson and the Beatles, between the American Revolution and the sixties, between the conservative New England tilt of my education and the ecstatic,…
A Novel with a Lot of Way-Out-There Ideas | D. Michael Martindale, Brother Brigham
March 20, 2018Joseph Smith received golden plates, magical translating devices, and countless visits from heavenly messengers, but a host of cognitive and cultural biases combine to render them almost commonplace in our collective Mormon memory. These supernatural events…
Balancing Faith and Honesty | Segullah: Writings by Latter-day Saint Women
March 20, 2018I have long bemoaned what I felt was an empty niche in LDS publishing—that is, a publication that is absolutely committed to upholding the doctrines and leadership of the Church but is also equally committed to exploring all aspects of living a life of faith, including its difficulties, without any sugar-coating. I wanted something that avoided both shallowness and cynicism. I’m excited about the possibilities of a new LDS women’s literary journal, Segullah, which I believe is filling that niche. With its casual, intimate tone, Segullah appeals to women of all levels of education, but its articles and poetry are thoughtful and well written without sentimentality and pat answers.
A Must-Read on Gender Politics | Martha Sonntag Bradley, Pedestals & Podiums: Utah Women, Religious Authority, & Equal Rights
March 20, 2018Martha Sonntag Bradley’s Pedestals & Podiums: Utah Women, Religious Authority & Equal Rights needs a new subtitle. This is the story of LDS women (in and out of Utah), religious authority, and the Equal Rights…
Building “as Great a Temple as Ever Solomon Did” | Matthew McBride, A House for the Most High: The Story of the Original Nauvoo Temple
March 20, 2018It is a pleasure to review this excellent book which will be a standard work on the Nauvoo Temple among the Mountain Saints for many years to come. McBride, the manager of online development at Deseret Book Company and an avid researcher, has written an easy-to-read and well-documented history of the Mormon temple at Nauvoo.