Richard J. Cummings

RICHARD CUMMINGS is a professor of languages and director of the Honors Program at the University of Utah. A version of this essay was first given during the Pillars of My Faith session at the Sunstone Theological Symposium 25 August 1984.

Quintessential Mormonism: Literal-Mindedness as a Way of Life

Articles/Essays – Volume 15, No. 4

No single feature of Mormonism strikes many perceptive non-Mormon observers with greater force than Mormon literal-mindedness. For instance, in his monumental and largely sympathetic monograph The Mormons published in 1957, Thomas F. O’Dea wrote that…

Frustration and Fulfillment | Mary Lythgoe Bradford, ed., Mormon Women Speak

Articles/Essays – Volume 16, No. 4

I was intrigued by the cover design of this collection of twenty-four essays by Mormon women. It reminded me of a circular stained glass window with a gently smiling woman’s face in the center sur…

The Stone and the Star: Fantacism, Doubt, and the Problem of Integrity

Articles/Essays – Volume 17, No. 1

In 1831, a revelation given through Joseph Smith echoing the book of [Daniel, characterized the gospel set forth by the restored Church as a veritable monolith: “The keys of the kingdom of God are committed…

Out of the Crucible: The Testimony of a Liberal

Articles/Essays – Volume 19, No. 2

As I look back over the years at my own perspective on the Mormon experience, I find that the most compelling doctrines of Mormonism can all be subsumed under the heading of “eternalism,” that felicitous…

A Mormon “Pilgrim’s Progress” | Levi S. Peterson, The Backslider

Articles/Essays – Volume 21, No. 1

Levi Peterson’s first novel is an event eagerly awaited by all those who have come to appreciate such masterful, prize winning short stories as his “The Confessions of Saint Augustine” and “The Road to Damascus,”…