I AM WRITING THIS on the afternoon of Tuesday, May 26th, 2026, which means I’m writing while the Texas Republican Senate runoff election is underway. I am a Texan. Sen. John Cornyn, who has represented Texas for over 23 years, is facing Ken Paxton, the current Tx attorney general and the candidate who is endorsed by Trump. By the time I finish writing this, I will know which of them will face James Talarico in November,but I won’t publish tomorrow, Wednesday, May 27. Coincidentally, over the Memorial Day weekend, in my county of Rockwall Texas, a monument of the ten commandments was erected at the old County Courthouse. I did not attend the unveiling, but have read press and social media reports and seen many photos. There were plenty of small town politicians, leaders of churches, and local, patriotically clad citizens in attendance, including at least one Trump hat. It’s troubling enough to see a government building adorned with a monument to a particular religion, but what was most troubling to me is that, etched at the bottom of the monument is: “Proverbs 29:2 When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice.” The plaza of the old County Courthouse was filled with people who appeared to be rejoicing. Where, though, are the righteous authorities in either my state or my nation?
Continue reading “Corruption Attracts Corruption: What that Says About Religious Paxton Voters”Category: authority
New YW Class Names and the Patriarchal Grip
NO ONE ASKS THE GIRLS. Therein lies the problem.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced earlier this week that it will return to having class names for the female youth groups. The previous names–Beehives for ages 11-13; MIA Maids for 14-15; Laurels for 16-17–had become antiquated (plus teen girls seemed to universally hate them) and so they were retired in 2019. Still, the tradition of having class names was missed. The powers that be at Church HQ have restored the tradition but with the alternate names Builders of Faith (11-13 year olds), Messengers of Hope (14-15 year olds), and Gatherers of Light (16-17 year olds). Colliquial usage will surely shorten the class names to Builders, Messengers, and Gatherers. Sigh. Nothing antiquated here…
And there’s nothing that says, “We didn’t poll the teenager girls for preferences” quite like the names Builders, Messengers, and Gatherers.
Continue reading “New YW Class Names and the Patriarchal Grip”Fallible Men, Empathy, and the Podcasters’ Resignation
UNDER THREAT of excommunication, the high profile wife/husband team behind the Latter-day Struggles podcast, which caters to the mental health needs of LDS Church members, is resigning their membership in order to prevent their being “burned at the stake center.” Valerie Hamaker (a licensed therapist) and her husband Nathan have received an official letter calling them to a proverbial “court of love.” We all know what that means.
I’ve listened to the Latter-day Struggles podcast since its inception. Let’s be clear about who the Hamakers are. They are active members who are raising their children in the LDS Church and who have been wrestling with local leaders for 18 months, hoping to remain on the membership rolls. Therapist Valerie and Nathan, her sidekick, use the podcast to address “beliefs and issues within the LDS faith that are challenging to talk about but vital to discuss for those trying to navigate their relationship in or around the Church.” Unfortunately, however, the couple have lost in the game of leadership roulette. Listen to their episode 313 for the details, but the gist is that their local leaders are uninformed about spiritual development, misunderstand it, and would excommunicate the healer (and her husband) rather than learn from her, which leaves me wondering what they envision the mission of the Savior to have been.
Continue reading “Fallible Men, Empathy, and the Podcasters’ Resignation”Cartoon “Plural Marriage” Destabilizes Family Life for Children
IF YOU NEED MORE EVIDENCE that polygamy culture is alive and well in the contemporary sphere of the LDS, look no further than your gospel library app, specifically at the new picture story published in the Doctrine and Covenants Stories for Children, titled “Plural Marriage: Faith to Obey a Law from the Lord Even When It’s Hard.” (Find it here.***) It provides a carefully curated cartoon version of early Mormon polygamy, stretching from its beginnings with Joseph Smith to its mythologized ending with Wilford Woodruff’s Manifesto, all in just eight panels. To say much is omitted is an understatement. However, its purpose isn’t to teach history but to use well-washed nuggets of fact to tightly define faith as obedience to God through obedience to priesthood authority. That may be the intent, but it seems destined to undermine the mental health (aka the emotional and spiritual well-being) of the children of devout Latter-day Saints, including those in the most secure of homes, by destabilizing their concept of marital boundaries.
Continue reading “Cartoon “Plural Marriage” Destabilizes Family Life for Children”Fairview: An LDS Temple or a Test Case?
IN MY PREVIOUS POST, I made it clear I find the way the LDS Church and its leaders, from the top down, are attempting to ramrod a massive temple into Fairview to be unethical and really quite silly. The threats of litigation made against the Town of Fairview follows a pattern we’ve seen with other temples, but the patterns at play go back much farther than our recent temple building spree. Chances are, you’ve heard the expression “might makes right,” but for LDS, the pattern is more akin to “right makes might.” Many LDS across the nearly 200 years of our story have acted without reasonable forethought, as if the consequences of their actions couldn’t possibly bring disappointment. (Think Independence, Far West, and Nauvoo.) The LDS belief that God is guiding his “one true church” through a modern prophet is so strong that it’s as if members expect God will give them the power to overcome all opposition under any condition. Hence, right makes might. Most recently, many local LDS members followed this pattern by swarming the Fairview Town Council meetings and plaguing the town’s mayor with thousands of emails. The message was clear from our Stake Presidents: the Church (therefore, God) wants the McKinney Temple built as planned on the church-owned lot adjacent to the Fairview meetinghouse. We swarmed and, of course, the town began to resent our arrogance. That’s the pattern. The question is, why is it so dang important to build this temple in this way and in this place? Why are we creating animosity when we could create cordiality?
Continue reading “Fairview: An LDS Temple or a Test Case?”Dear Sister Larson, This is Why I Stand with the LDS Women who Spoke Out on Instagram
DEAR SISTER LARSON, I want to respond to your recent, public post that pertains to the aftermath of last week’s Relief Society Worldwide Devotional, as well as those who agree with its content. I consider myself an LDS feminist, something I haven’t come to easily or without decades of study and reflection, both of Church doctrine and history. I’m disheartened because I think your words alienate LDS women from one another. There’s been too much of that lately, from both views. Because of the many hats you wear (therapist, chaplain, RS leader), your words bear a unique sway that, I think, deserves to be answered. It’s unfortunate that this answer is coming from a place of my own perceived self-defense, but you were neither generous nor kind to those of us who think differently than you do. As you can see, I will be at least as direct in my tone as you were. What I’ll do is repeat each paragraph you wrote and then respond.
(Note to readers: you can click here to read it straight through.)
Sister Larson, you write:
“So I don’t normally weigh in on stuff like this because honestly I feel like it shifts our focus away from assisting in bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of man(kind). But I feel like I have an interesting perspective because of all of the hats I wear.”
Continue reading “Dear Sister Larson, This is Why I Stand with the LDS Women who Spoke Out on Instagram”LDS Men, Power, and Gender Equality: A Continuing Discussion
IN MY PREVIOUS POST, I make the controversial assertion that LDS men who recognize LDS women don’t have fair, much less equal, footing in the Church should resist edicts of up-level priesthood leaders when those edicts diminish the visibility and influence of women. The essay was a reaction to Bay Area leaders removing Relief Society (RS) presidents from the stand during Sunday meetings after being instructed to by an area authority. In general, LDS will acquiesce to higher authorities, even if they object on ethical grounds, to keep their callings. Giving in on this, they reason, will let them positively influence on that later. I don’t fault anyone for wanting to continue serving as best they can in a flawed system. However, as long as our forward-thinking, local priesthood leaders continue in this pattern, the status quo lives on. LDS men and women share responsibility to even the playing field within the Church. In the future, I’ll address a woman’s responsibility, but today, men still have my attention.
Continue reading “LDS Men, Power, and Gender Equality: A Continuing Discussion”LDS Men, No More Passes for Your Wrong-headed Obedience
TODAY I DIRECT MY THOUGHTS primarily towards the men who hold the LDS priesthood because two recent events have garnered my attention, in part for the way each involves decisions made by LDS men. The first is the child sex abuse civil lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which was just dismissed by an Arizona judge, and the second is the sudden ending of a San Francisco Bay Area tradition that had Relief Society (RS) presidents sitting beside bishoprics during Sacrament meetings. The decisions I’d like to focus on are not those made by the men considered to have high authority in the Church (or their attorneys), but the decisions of the local leaders to obey them, even in situations where they know obeying them is not only wrong but could bring harm to others.
Continue reading “LDS Men, No More Passes for Your Wrong-headed Obedience”Allyship is a Love Unworthy of Rebuke
LAST SUNDAY, I CAUGHT another glimpse of what it might be like to sit as an LGBTQIA congregant in a chapel surrounded by people you love, while they are comforted by a sermon that depicts your greatest hope as evil. If you’re LDS, you’ve likely had a high councilor deliver a classic sermon like the one mine did last Sunday, one that used thinly veiled language to praise those who resist “the pressures of the world” which “call good, evil and evil, good” by “fully sustaining the prophet.” While this language may be used to encourage avoidance of various sins, in this instance, it was also clearly coded as a rebuke against those of us who don’t accept and promote current LDS doctrine and policy about LGBTQIA people as eternal truth, whether we be LGBTQIA ourselves or an outspoken ally. The assumption is that if we disagree with the fallible human who serves us in the priesthood office of prophet, we disagree with God. Today, I’m not going to run a convoy of reason through the gaping holes in that logic. Rather, I want to speak specifically as an ally who was subjected to a type of public rebuke.
Continue reading “Allyship is a Love Unworthy of Rebuke”LDS Sr. Leadership, the SEC, and my Sustaining Vote
PUBLIC CHATTER HAS largely abated regarding the February 21 SEC order and its incumbent fines of $1 million against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and $4 million against church-owned Ensign Peak Advisors. You can read the specifics in the order by clicking the colored link above (its surprisingly easy to understand), but the tldr; version is that, between 1998 and May, 2018, the First Presidencies and Presiding Bishoprics (identified as “senior leadership” in the order) created 13 shell (or unfunded) companies into which they pretended to transfer portions of the Church’s billions in order to hide it from the public, and then they knowingly falsified documents (F13 forms) to cover it up. This is a civil* crime. The realization that our senior leadership spent two decades willfully committing crime ought to shock members to their core. It does me.
SEC orders are negotiated documents, which means the Church agreed with the accusations as stated in the Feb. 21 order. They did it. For 20 years, the First Presidencies and Presiding Bishoprics willingfully broke the law. The fact is, the following men, each of whom served in either a First Presidency or Presiding Bishopric sometime between 1998 and 2018, made hypocrites of themselves as they illegally hid the Church’s wealth from the SEC, the general public, and, most importantly, from its membership. They are:
Continue reading “LDS Sr. Leadership, the SEC, and my Sustaining Vote”