The modern Mormon church has become a fairly top-down organization, but most responsibility for attending to its members still resides in local lay leaders. In the late 60s, he was called to preside over the churchs missionary efforts in New England, and moved with his family to Cambridge, Mass. The [women's] Relief Society president found a way to involve me as a "permanent substitute" for Relief Society pianist. A candlelight vigil was held outside the Salt Lake City meetinghouse where it took place. She was told to pass along this message: Im tired of hearing him criticize the church. Ive had more than one therapist Ive talked to about this issue say, Dont you see that you were purposely setting yourself up for this fall? he told me. Religion Two decades after she was "exed," Utah writer still attends her LDS ward. Some, perhaps, simply regretted the bad press. The stake president said I was "exed" for apostasy but I didn't really fit the handbook definition. Photo by George Frey/Bloomberg via Getty Images. We had been home about 20 minutes when two high counselors came to our house and delivered a letter, inviting me to a disciplinary hearing two weeks from that day. Quinn argued against excommunication, he told me, but he did not have the final say. That higher-ranking leader, James Paramore, had further instructed West to say that the decision was Wests own, and had not come from above. All rights reserved. She was the editor of Hastings Center Report from 1986 until 1991, when she was hired to start the "Faith" column in the Salt Lake Tribune.
An Excommunication, And The Future Of The Church Of Jesus Christ - WBUR Then I went away to my cabin for the summer and he called all the temples in Utah, saying he was canceling my recommend. The bearded dad, a father of 11 who was excommunicated from the LDS Church in 2015 for apostasy, suggests they sing hymns . Many people do reside in the borderlands between Mormon and not. The Salt Lake Tribune, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) public charity and contributions are tax By declining to talk with any priesthood leaders, he wrote, you are cutting yourself off from the blessings of the Temple and the blessings of the priesthood. He insinuated that the churchs problems with Quinn were not all theological. Daryl Peveto/Luceo Images for Slate. By then, Quinn had more or less moved on. In the quarter-century since her ouster, Anderson consistently has attended weekly services at her Latter-day Saint congregation, the Whittier Ward. June 17, 2014 8:59 pm . She won the Cornell Award for Excellence in Religion ReportingMid-sized Newspapers from the Religious News Association in 2004, 2012, 2017, 2018, and 2022. "It will be a chance for a larger audience to hear this story," she said, and to hear how people can wrestle with their faith and then live it out.
PDF Peggy fletcher stack excommunicated - World Tile I felt they were not going to drive me away. It is always harder on the loved one who has to stand by and see someone they love being hurt. 2012. The prophet at the time was Ezra Taft Benson, who, at age 94, was mostly incapacitated. Stack has been the lead religion writer for The Salt Lake Tribune since 1991. But it also betrayed tensions within the church that may never entirely go away. He then announced that I was not a member in good standing and could not use my temple recommend. Truth is, she has never stopped attending her Mormon ward. If her reentry had been approved, Anderson would have been the third of the six the other five are Avraham Gileadi, Lynne Kanavel Whitesides, D. Michael Quinn, Paul Toscano and Maxine Hanks to be welcomed back into full fellowship with the Utah-based faith. At least, that's how Hall sees it. The latter, a smaller school, offered less money, but BYU had its own drawbacks: It was and is a conservative place, politically as well as religiously. After reading Peggy Fletcher Stack's article (linked in April's post), I realized that many of us share Lavina's ongoing concerns, including the exclusion of women from institutional authority and the side-stepping of the Heavenly Mother doctrine. Today my story was picked up by the Salt Lake Tribune in Peggy Fletcher Stack's thoughtful article about excommunication. Woodruff himself said in his journal that he was acting for the temporal salvation of the church, and the 1890 Manifestoas his official statement is knownwas not immediately taken to be a divine revelation. But 90 percent of the ward has changed since my court. I had my answers.". By then an assistant district attorney, Lambert later helped prosecute the case against Hofmann. He had, after all, believed for many years that he would someday be a leader of the church, knowing that if this were true he would have to forever suppress an essential part of himself. Hed been told it was an unusually accepting congregation. On Tuesday morning, James J. Hamula was released from his position in the First Quorum of the Seventy of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints after disciplinary Michael Quinns final disciplinary council was held on Sept. 26, 1993, in the Salt Lake Stake Center, the headquarters for the oldest stake in Utah, founded by Brigham Young in 1847. He froze. He said it was apostasy because I believed that general authorities had done something wrong. Sunstone The spiritual journey of Maxine Hanks, one of the "September Six,'" comes full circle. We had stake [regional] conference in September. I hate him. Log In. This has been intentional. "But when I got to the point of priestly ordination, I pulled back. Vern Anderson, the AP reporter, wrote an 800-word story about the essay in January, just before Hanks showed up at Quinns apartment. His wife Margaret, an English professor and feminist who attracted attention from church leaders before her husband did, was excommunicated in 2000. or. The fact that we keep going to church is a blessing. Hymns were sung. Hed read the essay about women and the priesthood, and he asked Quinn to speak on the subject at an upcoming fireside, an informal evening meeting often held at Mormon meetinghouses. It is also worth noting that the church president in 1993 was an ailing Ezra Taft Benson. Caffeinated Version: I have been doing that for 18 years. Peggy Fletcher Stack has been reporting on faith and religion since 1991. I feel like I am going by proxy for others who feel too damaged, too hurt and afraid to go. Packers notion that those writing church history should share only those things that are faith-promoting is not just intellectually offensive nowit has become quaint, the relic of a time when information was not so freely available. What's it like going to church for two decades as an excommunicated member? At Sunstone, Hanks described her path back to Mormonism as a heros journey, la Joseph Campbell. Especially considering that in a lot of cases she's the one doing the exposing My guess is she's a let's-reform-this-baby-from-within progressive. For the faithful, the simplest narrative regarding LDS polygamy is that God wanted Mormons to practice it between 1843when He revealed the doctrine of plural marriage to Joseph Smithand 1890, when He informed one of Smiths successors, Wilford Woodruff, of a change in course.
A missionary who doesn't want to preach false doctrine When he went into his office, the bishop, a man named Tom Andersen, said hed read this article in the L.A. Times, Quinn told me. June 19, 2014 ; 1 of 9; A member of that sect told Quinn about a since renounced bit of theology once preached by Brigham Young, referred to as the Adam-God doctrine. Youngs notion, roughly speaking, was that God and Adam are one and the same. Packer, the second-most senior among the 12, was the substitute president of the Quorum of the Twelve whenever Hunter was sidelined for medical reasons. My guess is she has to be to keep the doors open so people willing to talk to her. When something like [my excommunication] blows up, the first casualty is trust and that never comes back. They can't ex someone with that king of lineage. SALT LAKE CITY (AP) Laurie Lee Hall was excommunicated from the Mormon church for being a woman. My strong hunch is that she is a cultural Mormon who no longer believes, pays tithing or observes the WoW, and that she's loosey-goosey with her attendance. Quinn told friends that he did not want anyone to lobby on his behalf. Grant, a President of the LDS Church and is the granddaughter of United States Senator from Utah Wallace F. Bennett. "Nobody asked me to disavow my book or stop writing," Hanks told The Salt Lake Tribune that year. Going to the temple, but I feel that it's more important to have the temple in me than for me to be in the temple. Instead, he simply took away Quinns temple recommend. Temples, distinct from regular meetinghouses, are reserved for sacred rituals, and require a recommend, a small card indicating ones worthiness, to enter.
Peggy Fletcher Stack: How I report on Utah's changing faith landscape Kate Kelly, founder of the Ordain Women movement, was excommunicated in 2014 for her views on gender inequality in the Mormon Church . Vern Anderson wrote an AP story about the book, and several Utah papers carried reviews. Later that evening, having dinner alone, he felt a new sense of relief about what had happened so far and what he believed was about to happen. He was 32; he and his wife, Jan, were expecting their fourth child. ", Hanks' rebaptism suggests a difference in LDS leadership from then to now, said Dan Wotherspoon, Sunstone's editor from 2001 to 2008. She has sat quietly in the same pew as the emblems of the sacrament, or communion, have passed by her more than 1,200 times without being able to partake. He hopes that eventually hell manage to sell the condo and will get enough money for it that he could move back to New Orleans and live there for the last couple decades, God willing, of his life. The church has control of my membership; I decide whether I'm Mormon or not. It was run by William O. Nelson, he said, once an assistant to Ezra Taft Benson who now reported to Boyd K. Packer. Whats more, all Mormons are supposed to have a calling in the church, which makes for a wonderfully participatory religion but also discourages casual membership. Peggy Fletcher-Stack: Hi Dave. While the simpler approach is handled by a bishop and his two counselors, the more elaborate version is run by a stake president, and it involves not only his two counselors but the stakes high council, a group of 12 men. Like Quinn, hed first become interested in Mormon history when he learned that polygamy had gone on for years after its public abandonmenthe knew about this because his mothers parents were among the secret polygamists. Still, he sought out the scriptures first edition himself, and did his own comparison. In the field of Mormon history the changes are particularly pronounced. I see her articles on here all the time and the Tribune has never really been a friend to the TSCC. The suit was settled out of court and a process for voluntary withdrawal was established in 1989.). Stack has been the lead religion writer for The Salt Lake Tribune since 1991. Not long before Hofmann sold that forged document, he approached Quinn in the church archives, and asked about the succession crisis and the article. By Peggy Fletcher Stack The Salt Lake Tribune.
After 20 years, this excommunicated Mormon still attends her LDS ward The Bible and the Book of Mormon, which depict flawed, human prophets, are, Quinn said, an absolute refutation of the kind of history Packer advocated. I could listen to the spirit there.
Peggy Fletcher Stack - Wikipedia She said she was really angry at the church, not at me. by Peggy Fletcher Stack. The Strengthening Church Members Committee almost certainly passed along notes about Quinn to his new stake president, Paul Hanks, in early 1993. He was excommunicated by the LDS Church in 2013 for refusing to cease publication of his 2011 book, Passing the Heavenly Gift which challenges many points of LDS orthodoxy. He visited these homes with his missionary companion and asked the boys if they still wanted to be Mormons. If you've picked up a copy of the Salt Lake Tribune in the last 26 years, you know Peggy Fletcher Stack's name. The high council also heard from Andersons son, Christian, who offered his personal assessment. Last month, for instance, the Daily Beast reported that a blogger named David Twede was facing excommunication because of critical pieces he had written about Mitt Romney. Since I'm there every Sunday, I don't fit their model of an excommunicated member. Boyd Packer, left, and Dallin Oaks, right, Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, wait for the start of the first session of the 181st Semiannual General Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, U.S., on Saturday, Oct. 1, 2011. The symposium's "Pillars of My Faith" session will showcase a similar path, said Mary Ellen Robertson, Sunstone's interim executive director. It was held by the stake high council, and so my bishop and ward members took the position that that was their doing. He insisted that the September councils were local affairs, but church employees who reported to him had, it turned out, been keeping tabs on the six who were disciplined, and rumors swirled that Packer himself personally insisted that the courts take place. The men at his door were the local stake president and his two counselors, the men responsible for overseeing all the congregations in the area. He turned 65 two years later, making him eligible for Social Security and Medicare. He was excommunicated in 1911. ", Kelly writes in London's Guardian newspaper "For me it is because of my faith and not in spite of it that I have a desire to stand up for myself and my sisters.
1511: Mormon Stories Transparency Q&A for Peggy Fletcher Stack and Tony Peggy Fletcher Stack, The Salt Lake Tribune, 24 Nov. 2022 To that end, the power that Ms. Cheney and Mr. Kinzinger bring is their personal stories of defiance and excommunication. Look at Steve Benson, I suspect that there was no way they were going to ex him so he exed himself. (Benson died in 94, Hunter in 95.) The charge stems from Palmer's 2002 book, An Insider's View of Mormon Origins, which challenges the traditional explanations of the faith's founding . In 1981, he gave an address to church educators called The Mantle Is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect, which was organized around four cautions. The second of them is this: There is a temptation for the writer or teacher of church history to want to tell everything, whether it is worthy or faith-promoting or not. While LDS leaders can be defensive about media attention, sustained criticism from the outside world seems to have an effect. In September, Hanks wrote Quinn another letter, saying that he had listened, twice, to a recording of Quinns paper about the Baseball Baptism Program, delivered at the Sunstone Symposium that summer. One theory on that first day of panic was that the bombings were connected with the business, an investment company called CFS. Mormons devote one sacrament meeting each month to personal testimonies, and Quinn was sure this would be his last opportunity to offer his in church. Mormons from around the world have gathered to listen to church leaders during the two-day conference. See Photos. Peggy Fletcher Stack, David Noyce 3/23/2022. With his background in education, he became interested in how the church taught its own past, and decided he did not like what was going on at the church historians office. The most senior apostle, Howard W. Hunter, also suffered from serious health problems. Maybe she wants to be, though. Did the Utah Legislature do enough to save the Great Salt Lake? I accuse that committee, England declared, of undermining our Church.. He took a fellowship at the Huntington Library, near his hometown of Pasadena, Calif., and began indexing his enormous collection of notes on old Mormon documents, in preparation for his next book. "All they asked me about was my relationship to Jesus Christ.". In hindsight, the purge of September 1993 looks like the last big push for a kind of control that LDS leaders will probably never have again. A page of the so-called Salamander Letter, forged by Mark Hofmann. That last comment became the caption for a Newsweek photo three months later, when the magazines religion reporter, Kenneth L. Woodward, wrote a 1,000-word story about Quinns talk and the controversy it prompted. . He found me outside and was kind and helpful. Then she was accused of apostasy for editing an anthology, Women and Authority: Re-Emerging Mormon Feminism, which included a discussion of the all-male LDS priesthood and women's relationship to it. She has been visited by all her ward and stake leaders since 1993, she said, but this was the first time anyone had ever proposed it. He himself did not even stay in town. . Dear Reader: When I began this series of essays on leadership, I never anticipated the final installment would chronicle recent events that have triggered the biggest spiritual struggle of my life.