He loves cities, and when he lived in New Orleans in the early 90s, he made friends in bars and in an informal group of gay professionals who gathered once a month. "All they asked me about was my relationship to Jesus Christ.". I love John and I support him, but I have never made any claim against truth claims of the church. Look at Steve Benson, I suspect that there was no way they were going to ex him so he exed himself. Peggy Fletcher Stack. Quinns parents were divorced when he was 4, and he was raised largely by his mothers parents, who frequently fought. At least, that's how Hall sees it. Quinns mother, on the other hand, was a sixth-generation Mormon: She had an ancestor who converted when the Mormons were still in Nauvoo, Ill., and who is mentioned in Joseph Smiths journals. Quinn was convinced, in any case, that his fate in any disciplinary council was predetermined, that Boyd K. Packer wanted him out of the church and Hanks was going to make it happen. . Which has also, it seems, made Michael Quinns singular focus on the unspoken parts of the Mormon past less relevant to younger historians, who operate with more freedom and less pressureand who draw far more interest than their predecessors from the wider world, which has suddenly become fascinated by Mormonism. He developed a fervent testimony not only that God exists but that God spoke to Joseph Smith face to face and that the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants are, like the Old and New Testaments, divinely inspired. Some things that are true are not very useful. Its not clear whether Packer read Quinns work before interviewing him, but if he did, it probably would have struck him as less than useful. The same month that his essay about post-Manifesto polygamy was published, in April 1985, Quinn and his wife separated. They didn't say anything. I could listen to the spirit there. She currently serves on the . Using the familiar Christian metaphor of a lost sheep who listens for the one voice that can guide it back home, Oaks said Mormons should beware of alternate voices whose avowed or secret object is to deceive and devour the flock. Among the voices Oaks warned about were the ones heard in magazines, journals, and newspapers and at lectures, symposia, and conferences. At the same General Conference, another apostle said that a true stalwart of the church would not lend his or her good name to periodicals, programs, or forums that feature offenders who do sow discord among brethren. , When the Sunstone Symposium next convened, in the summer of 92, Lavina Fielding Anderson presented a paper on this growing conflict between leaders and intellectuals. was pressured to resign from Brigham Young University and subsequently excommunicated from the faith in 1993 as part of the famed "September Six . ", 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. But he had a caring bishop that first year and decided on his own to serve a mission. This massive housecleaning may be one of the church's largest since the 1850s, when thousands were excommunicated for everything from poor hygiene . Gileadi was not part of the Sunstone and Dialogue circles that the others moved in; he had been writing and teaching popular workshops about biblical and Book of Mormon prophecies, which appear to have been deemed false doctrine by LDS leaders. Packer approved Quinns hiring, but he may have come to regret it five years later. There would be quite a number of people in the Mormon community who would look unfavorably on that. Later that year, Quinn was recommended for a one-year appointment at Arizona State. The [women's] Relief Society president found a way to involve me as a "permanent substitute" for Relief Society pianist. 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. 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. Quinns religious status wouldofficially, at leastbe decided by his own stake president, not by the higher-ups in Salt Lake City. (They draw numbers to pick sides.) He revised the story occasionally over the next decade, submitting it unsuccessfully to the Paris Review and the Atlantic. After organizing a massive campaign to pass Proposition 8 and make gay marriage illegal in California, for instance, the church suffered a massive backlash and has since appeared more tolerant toward gay rights activism. Today my story was picked up by the Salt Lake Tribune in Peggy Fletcher Stack's thoughtful article about excommunication. The prophet at the time was Ezra Taft Benson, who, at age 94, was mostly incapacitated. [4], She won the 2004 Cornell Award for 'Excellence in Religion ReportingMid-sized Newspapers' from the Religion Newswriters Association in 2004, an award she also received in 2012, 2017, and 2018. He visited these homes with his missionary companion and asked the boys if they still wanted to be Mormons. When interviewing Quinn in 76, Packer said, I have a hard time with historians, because they idolize the truth. As Quinn writes, the Manifesto inherited ambiguity, was created in ambiguity, and produced ambiguity.. By the time Quinn arrived, the program had been disavowed, and many of these baptisms needed to be undone. All rights reserved. It was really important to Paul and me that Christian grow up in a religious community, and the church was the one we chose. [9] She started the "Faith" column after a discussion with Tribune editor Jay Shelledy. She was struck by how frail he appeared, and found herself feeling nothing but compassion and love for a man who had once seemed like an enemy. SALT LAKE CITY (RNS) After years of tension between Mormons and gay rights activists -- with political action and theological pronouncements on one . July 26, 2012 12:03 pm . He was troubled by the openness with which materials were being made available to certain individuals other than those authorized, according to Lucile C. Tates admiring 1995 biography, Boyd K. Packer: Watchman on the Tower. He himself did not even stay in town. The general authority assigned to interview Quinn in the spring of 1976 was Boyd K. Packer. Kate Kelly, founder of the Ordain Women movement, was excommunicated in 2014 for her views on gender inequality in the Mormon Church . The stake president, who oversees a number of congregations, remained optimistic, she said, zeroing in on the words, at this time., But the writer replied, Theres hope, and then theres experience., Besides, she said, it was a form letter.. But the cause didn't really matter because it was pretty clear that Elder [Boyd K.] Packer [of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles] was trying to send a message by targeting certain people, such as historians and feminists. Log in or sign up for Facebook to connect with friends, family and people you know. Woodwards piece, headlined Apostles vs. Historians, called Quinns talk a stirring defense of intellectual integrity that had put Benson and Packer on the defensive. It was illustrated with a large photograph of Quinn up top, and a considerably smaller one of Packer. [10][11][12][13] The American Academy of Religion awarded her a first place Journalism Award in 2014 for her reporting on LDS missionaries who return home early from their volunteer missions. But some simply baptized the boysa few without explaining what the baptisms were for. Within the past few years, Bradley had a change of heart and was rebaptized. When he came to understand this aspect of himself, and learned a name for it, he did what was already typical of him at that age: He went to the library. Mormon higher-ups hold keys to excommunication process against two activists. For her part, Anderson always has felt a great sense of peace that I made a moral decision, an ethical decision, a decision of integrity and conscience, she wrote. The demographics of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints include statistical data relating to the church's population and particular groups within it.. Excommunication has played a significant role throughout the churchs history. Paul usually sits on the outside of the pew, so when the sacrament comes, he shakes his head toward me so we don't have any socially embarrassing moments. That's a good question. Anderson was photographed at her Salt Lake City home on Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2019. In both forms of LDS courts, the accused is typically allowed to bring in character witnesses. disciplined Anderson and five other Mormon intellectuals, church disciplinary actions threatening Mormon feminist Kate Kelly and blogger John Dehlin. [5] She met Mike Stack when he volunteered as a photographer for Sunstone in 1984, and they married in October 1985. "Given who I was, there was no place to go but out," Hanks said in 2003, on the 10th anniversary of the excommunications. Snuffer was excommunicated. "All they asked me about was my relationship to Jesus Christ. or. All rights reserved. I have been doing that for 18 years. Peggy Fletcher Stack, David Noyce 3/23/2022. Two of the so-called "September Six" have found their way back into the LDS fold while Anderson though never rebaptized in some ways has never left. By then, Quinn had more or less moved on. When I make comments in Sunday school and Relief Society, they are accepted as anyone else's. Devout Mormons consider these callings divinely inspired. Until 23 years ago, one could not formally leave the church without being excommunicated. He referred to the pathos that I felt in your private letters to mea plea to not be discarded from something that you love. I want to help resolve that pathos, he added, and a sadness that seems to pervade your private writing to me.. Nor does it read like one. sltrib.com 1996-2023 The Salt Lake Tribune. The timing of his career, which once appeared serendipitous, now seems almost cruel. Whitesides says that Connie Chungs people asked her to take a hidden camera into her court. "We pray that a spirit of clemency will guide the words and actions of everyone especially those who bear the heavy responsibility of ecclesiastical discipline of church members and that the words of President [Dieter F.] Uchtdorf [second counselor in faith's governing First Presidency] will hold sway: "Regardless of your circumstances, your personal history, or the strength of your testimony, there is room for you in this church. Quinn went to Californiahe had another fellowship at the Huntington Librarystaying this time with his mother. Hi, Peggy. In October, the Salt Lake Tribune reported that a threatening phone call had been made to the home of a local man named Michael D. Quinn. 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. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted. Gileadi, Toscano, Anderson, and Hanks were all excommunicated. She's been covering religion for the paper since 1991 taking on a variety of topics, but mostly the LDS Church. There are important aspects of Mormon life, such as temple ceremonies, that are open only to the truly faithful. We were sitting in the front room of a house owned by a gay couple he knows in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Salt Lake City. Many of the shifts in the church administration's position toward intellectuals recently has had to do with history and intellectual openness, while the issues driving Lavinas excommunication are still very much alive and unresolved today., It is possible, Bowman posits, there was fear that allowing for her rebaptism would send a signal on those issues that the First Presidency did not wish to send.. 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 churchs critics find the timing convenient: By 1890, the U.S. government had threatened to seize LDS property if polygamy wasnt renounced. . Fulton has called Quinn a nothing person.. [4] During her time there, she has met and interviewed the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, and Gordon B. Hinckley, among others. Believers in Denver Snuffer's Remnant movement gather in a Sandy, Utah, home for a fellowship meeting on Aug. 13, 2017, to sing songs and partake of the sacrament. In the field of Mormon history the changes are particularly pronounced. In Mormon history circles, this period is often called the Camelot years., After those 18 months, Quinn left for Yale to do a Ph.D. and finished it in just three years. He normalized what many call "sinful" behavior, by admitting to looking at nudie mags, drinking, smoking, and intimated other transgressions, yet still going on a mission. Down in Provo, Avraham Gileadi met more quietly with his local leaders. ", "Guilt, pain, help and hope when Mormon missionaries come home early", "For a string of vivid reports revealing the perverse, punitive and cruel treatment given to sexual assault victims at Brigham Young University, one of Utah's most powerful institutions. 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 . ", This page was last edited on 30 November 2022, at 04:21. This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2012, and information in the article may be outdated. Once the kids were interested, the missionaries were supposed to contact their parents, with the aim of converting whole families. Lavina Fielding Anderson decided not to appear at her court, either, which took place at another Salt Lake meetinghouse a few days afterward. Sunstone The spiritual journey of Maxine Hanks, one of the "September Six,'" comes full circle. Lavina Fielding Anderson may have been excommunicated from the LDS Church for apostasy more than 20 years ago, but don't think for a minute that this Utah writer is now an outsider to her faith. SALT LAKE CITY (AP) Laurie Lee Hall was excommunicated from the Mormon church for being a woman. Following his excommunication, he finished The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power and turned his attention to another scholarly book with deep personal meaning. 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. In the quarter-century since her ouster, Anderson consistently has attended weekly services at her Latter-day Saint congregation, the Whittier Ward. Report a missed paper by emailingsubscribe@sltrib.comor calling801-237-2900, For e-edition questions or comments, contact customer support801-237-2900or emailsubscribe@sltrib.com. Peggy Fletcher. My parents never blamed me, but they were heartbroken. While preparing for the retired Brigham Young University artists memorial service, Bishop Mahonri Madrigal read Pauls written testimony, or statements of faith, that the ward had compiled in 2000. Salt Lake City Laurie Lee Hall was excommunicated from the LDS Church for being a woman. The nature of religion reporting in Utah is changing. The symposium's "Pillars of My Faith" session will showcase a similar path, said Mary Ellen Robertson, Sunstone's interim executive director. 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. Local TV reporters were filming the session, and the AP reporter Vern Anderson was sitting at the far side of the room about halfway back. 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. One of the articles came from an anthology called Women and Authority: Re-Emerging Mormon Feminism, edited by Maxine Hanks, a distant relative of Pauland his uncle Marionand, soon, one of the September Six herself. Stack has been the lead religion writer for The Salt Lake Tribune since 1991. It is always harder on the loved one who has to stand by and see someone they love being hurt. In May, my stake president called me in about it. Lavina Fielding Anderson, who was excommunicated in 1993 as part of the so-called September Six, has had her request for . The day before, a similar bomb had killed Steve Christensen, a friend and Mormon history enthusiast who had arranged for Quinn to speak at lunch and dinner engagements, paying him with generous gift cards to his fathers clothing store. She was upset that he was not attending church, and so he drove 45 minutes to a singles ward, a Mormon congregation specifically for unmarried adults, near UCLA. It was a long time coming: Quinn had known he was gay since he was 12 years old. (KUTV) Peggy Fletcher Stack is the religion writer for the The Salt Lake Tribune.It's the best beat on the paper, she said.Stack fell into the job when she was hired in 1991.I have no degree in . Unresolved: Release in which this issue/RFE will be addressed. Taking the sacrament because it's an exclusion I feel every single week. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted. The Mormon intellectual community far and wide is mourning the loss of Linda King Newell. The church's definition of "membership" includes all persons who were ever baptized, or whose parents were members while the person was under the age of eight (called "members . . Half of these men speak for the accused, and half for the church. He decided that only 16 of the changes were significant. West refused to do this, according to Quinn. Anderson was excommunicated for an article she wrote in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought that described episodes of what she called ecclesiastical abuse of Latter-day Saint intellectuals. I imagine she walks a careful, thin line to avoid being exed. This puzzled me because I had a lot to say, but the message was absolutely clear. This new knowledge sent Quinn to the Journal of Discourses, a 26-volume collection of Mormon sermons. I admire her. The noisy nonsense on-screen felt to Quinn like a rough equivalent of what the church was doing to him. There was no process for voluntary withdrawal from the Mormon Church in the 1960s, so each of these kids had to be excommunicatedtechnically, for apostasy. After Paul Toscano was excommunicated, Steve Benson, grandson of the then Mormon prophet, met privately with the apostles Dallin H. Oaks and Neal A. Maxwell, and asked them aboutamong many other thingsthe rumor that Packer had something to do with it. Bradley and Hanks are friends who trod a lot of common ground, Robertson said. If he doesnt, I have his phone number and I know where he lives. The fact that we keep going to church is a blessing. He recounted what his former stake president, Hugh West, had done when he received what Quinn saw as similar orders from above. What do you think about these potential actions against Kate Kelly and John Dehlin? If there is unfinished business, its the First Presidencys, not mine.. Hired in 1991 to cover Utah's various faiths, particularly Mormonism, Peggy has talked forgiveness with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, nearly fainted waiting for the Dalai Lama, fasted with Muslims during Ramadan and has reported on 50 consecutive semiannual LDS General Conferences. When his mother died in 2007, she left him the condo. I attended the Sunstone Symposium this past summer, held on the University of Utah campus, and many people I spoke to there said that as Packers influence has waned, a more tolerant approach to dissent is taking hold. 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. 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. Robert Kirby does this also, but much more indirectly. The other five people who were by then being referred to as the September Six had already faced their courts. 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. They were eventually published, without Quinns permission, by two prominent anti-Mormon activists, Jerald and Sandra Tanner. I heard she's not Mormon at all. One of Ordain Womens founders, Kate Kelly, was excommunicated in June 2014. After 18 months, he moved to New Orleans, where it was less expensive to live. Few people had attended the talk itself, but an independent BYU newspaper ran a story about it, and copies of Quinns remarks, titled On Being a Mormon Historian, began to circulate. I wrote an article for "Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought" that summarized 133 cases of LDS ecclesiastical abuse, and my pleas to do better to care for the Mormon faithful. Why didn't you go to the hearing to defend yourself? In California, Quinn had picked up his mail at a P.O. Hofmann eventually became, in the words of one expert, the most skilled forger this country has ever seen. For LDS leaders nervous about church history, he was a nightmare personified: a lying, murderous man hell-bent on embarrassing the religion while glorifying and enriching himself. And he was the most strident of the group when it came to denouncing internal critics of Mormon leaders and teachings. She said she was really angry at the church, not at me. At its worst, such talk is sometimes called speaking evil of the Lords anointed.. Peggy Fletcher Stack has been reporting on faith and religion since 1991. When they left, they said, "Have a nice day," to which I replied, "You have just assured that I will not.". It went back to his college years. Paul Toscanos sister-in-law was excommunicated for her writings about the Heavenly Mother, a controversial aspect of Mormon theology. At Sunstone, Hanks described her path back to Mormonism as a heros journey, la Joseph Campbell. We had stake [regional] conference in September. 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. The entry for perversion said See homosexuality, and he read all the available books in that categorynot a lot in a small public library in 1956, though fairly heady stuff for a 12-year-old: Kinseys Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, some Freud, some Havelock Ellis. If the blessing really happened, then Brigham Young, who led the early Mormons to Utah, might have been wrong to seize control of the church after Smiths murder. This made some church leaders uneasy. Log In. Most people don't know I've been excommunicated. Quinn told friends that he did not want anyone to lobby on his behalf. Then he made copies of his letter and Hanks letter and dropped them off at the offices of Vern Anderson and Peggy Fletcher Stack, a former Sunstone editor who had become a religion reporter for the Salt Lake Tribune. He froze. During Quinns college years, BYUs president, Ernest Wilkinson, organized a student spy ring intended to catch out professors with communist leanings. Oaks said Packer had met with Toscanos stake president, and acknowledged that this was a mistake. Vacillating Wildly From Dispiriting to Exhilarating, the worldwide effort to bring salvation to all of Gods children, Some things that are true are not very useful, LDS Authority and New Plural Marriages, 18901904, this growing conflict between leaders and intellectuals, Mormon Women Have Had the Priesthood Since 1843, Quinns paper about the Baseball Baptism Program, the responsibility to preserve the doctrinal purity of the church, critical pieces he had written about Mitt Romney, Hanks described her path back to Mormonism, the administration caved to pressure from Ira Fulton. West did not formally revoke the recommend, he just put it in his drawer. While LDS leaders can be defensive about media attention, sustained criticism from the outside world seems to have an effect. The same group of local church leaders who participated in Gileadi's excommunication were present at the baptism service.
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