Clothing has been the subject of scriptural injunctions and aperennial topic of Church leaders’ concern. Subtle changes inboth dress standards and rationales for modest dress in the latterhalf of the twentieth century reflect the LDS…
Dialogue 14.3 (Fall 1981): 11–45
Mauss situates the 1978 revelation on the priesthood in modern American historical context. Everything changed for the Church during the Civil Rights Movement when people both inside and outside the Church were harshly critcizing the priesthood ban. When the world was changing, it looked like the Church was still adherring to the past.
Dialogue 51.4 (Winter 2018): 49–76
What of the Latter Day Saint movement that claimed to prophetically discern the times and seasons of these latter days and also boldly proclaimed that they were the restoration church?
Religious images have long been used in Latter-day Saint worship and instruction. Paintings, illustrations, and graphic works served a devotional function among the early Church members. Not only did the Latter-day Saints in Nauvoo use…
Dialogue 14.3 (Fall 1981): 89–100
Joseph Smith’s 1838 account of the First Vision has taken priority in structuring Mormon identity, despite the existence of different versions. This article explores why that version is so meaningful to Latter-day Saints, reflecting on the symbolic strucutre of the account.
Dialogue 40.1 (Spring 2007): 83–136
Watson explains how the secret marriage of Louis J. Barlow to a 15-year-old girl caused a major rift among fundamentalists. Today’s fundamentalist members are still experiencing the effects of that marriage.
Dialogue 28.4 (Winter 1995): 31–55
In many respects the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints of the 1960s mirrored the general tumult, if not the details, of the larger American society.
Dialogue 50.2 (Summer 2017): 1–52
“What do We know of God’s Will for his LGBT Children?: An Examination of the LDS church’s position on homosexuality” divides it up into a “doctrinal, moral, and empirical perspective.” Cook’s goal is to understand, to encourage empathy, and to encourage people to see current teachings on homosexuality as incomplete. In this way, it has a lot in common with earlier pastoral approaches. The analysis here is strong, and this division is a version of other theological traditions of reasoning from scripture, tradition, reason, and experience. This essay asks some great questions and raises some pretty serious critiques about the problems with contemporary LDS teachings and practices. “The longer this change takes,” he writes, “the more we will lose gay people, their family members, their friends, and other sympathetic Church members, particularly younger people who do not see same-sex marriage as a threat to society or a sin against God.”
Dialogue 43.1 (Spring 2010): 1–36
And in fact, what might it mean that God “used” evolution tocreate life’s diversity? Was this a choice for God among other al-ternatives? Do Wildman’s pessimistic conclusions hold for Mor-monism? Does evolution imply a noninterventionist Deity? Arethere more optimistic views possible, some of which may actuallysuggest that evolution enhances and expands our view of God?
Dialogue 46.3 (Fall 2013): 106–141
Wilfred Decoo writes in 2013 ““As Our Two Faiths Have Worked Together”— Catholicism and Mormonism on Human Life Ethics and Same-Sex Marriage.” He expains, “I analyze a number of factors that could ease the way for the Mormon Church to withdraw its opposition to same-sex marriage, at least as it concerns civil society, while the Catholic Church is unlikely to budge.”