I suppose I should have foreshadowed my own shadow. I should have seen what I did not want to see. That said, I must say, I see what I see for fear my shadow over-take me, for fear I become mere shadow of my former Mormon self. Formerly and formally, I tell it like it is, that is to say, “it” being what I see I say, what I say I mean, what I mean to say, I think is really me. I like to think I think so, so I say what I think.
I have a six-year old named Sofia, who, for reasons beyond my comprehension, insisted that we all call her “Cat Poop” for about six months last year. This feels relevant to the conversation at hand.
When I sold The Bishop’s Wife, a contemporary murder mystery set in Utah, to a national press in 2012, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what my “bio” would be. I…
I have worked at The Salt Lake Tribune for nearly twenty-eight years, after being hired November 4, 1991 as a full-time religion writer. So my only beat for twenty-seven years has been religion, and, as…
After arriving home during a long rainy drive from St. George on Conference Sunday last October, a headline from the Salt Lake Tribune on my social media feed immediately became a source of anxiety. Topping…
It’s been almost six months since we were asked to ditch the term “Mormon.” I’ve been reflecting on it lately, I think because I’m anticipating some sort of follow-up at General Conference and I am…
It is no easy thing to command a language to change. Language just sort of happens, and those who make the rules eventually have to get on board or become irrelevant. Only pedants and fools…
Dialogue 52.3 (Fall 2019): 1–18
Shields argues that if you deny or dismiss Sidney Ridgon’s contributions to the early church, then the scripture canon during this time would need to be reinterpreted.
I’m still haunted by a woman who died in our intensive care unit a decade ago. She was eighteen weeks pregnant and had a kidney infection serious enough that her lungs failed. She quickly ended up on maximal life support, barely surviving from day to day.