I just finished my last semester of my undergrad degree. (Yay me!) One of the courses I took for my General Liberal Education Requirements was a class in women and gender studies called “Religion, Sexuality, and Feminism”. It was a fascinating class and I learned so much about other religions.
For our final paper, we had to discuss a religion from a feminist perspective. I had done research on Wicca for a class presentation, so I thought it would be kind of cool to do a paper on Mormonism, specifically on Heavenly Mother.
You can read it here.
I learned a lot and I am amazed at how out of touch we as a church are with Heavenly Mother. I wish we knew more about here.
It was a good experience. I was hoping to combine Mormonism and Feminism for my master’s thesis, but it’s not going to work out at my local university. This is probably the closest I will get.
Interesting and well written, and doubtless deserving of a good grade, though I do wonder if the generalizations about LDS culture and silence might have been affected had the bibliography included notice of writings by Alyson Von Feldt (her Occasional Paper on Wisdom Teaching i the Book of Mormon, or her insightful review of Dever’s Did God Have a Wife? in the FARMS Review). Or Daniel Peterson’s path breaking “Nephi and His Asherah.” Or Kevin Barney’s FAIR paper on “Do We Have a Mother in Heaven? or his Dialogue article on “How to Worship Our Mother in Heaven without Getting Excommunicated. Or Elaine Cannon’s essay on Mother in Heaven in The Encyclopedia of Mormonism. Or the 2011, BYU Studies article by David L. Paulsen and Martin Pulido entitled, “A Mother There: Historical Teachings and Sacred Silence.” Or things by Eugene Seaich such as “A Great Mystery” and even yours truly in some of my essays. The recent Meridian essay by Warren Aston, Debunking Myths About Mother in Heaven came too late, of course. There are many of us who have written on the topic and who have not come close to be silenced on the topic.
I’ve currently re-reading Margaret Barker recent The Mother of the Lord, vol1 , which is packed with valuable insights on the topic.
Best
Kevin Christenen
Bethel Park, PA
Thanks for the kind words, Kevin.
I am doubtful the generalizations of culture would have been different if I had read those articles, but I am certainly open to learning which of the cultural aspects I mentioned do not apply generally.
I am glad there are so many who have not been silenced on the topic, and now I have a lot more reading material :) So thank you for that, too.