Later he was told that despite his request that no one speak for him, a friend had attended and done just that, playing recordings of Quinns presentations at past Sunstone Symposia and reading excerpts from his writings. My searching was complete. The Strengthening Church Members Committee almost certainly passed along notes about Quinn to his new stake president, Paul Hanks, in early 1993. After 18 months, he moved to New Orleans, where it was less expensive to live. But 90 percent of the ward has changed since my court. In the field of Mormon history the changes are particularly pronounced. (Peggy Fletcher Stack writes for The Salt Lake Tribune.) After the church court, when I walked into the chapel, it took about three times longer to get to my seat because so many people hugged me. She was also the only one whose disciplinary council was overseen by her bishop, rather than her stake president. [Husband] Paul, Christian [their son] and I sang in the choir that day. But it was a forgery. ", Kelly goes on KUER's Radio West "A lot of people are asking me why I came forward [with the news of my disciplinary hearing]. In 1997, the acclaimed historian Richard Bushman, who spent much of his career writing on non-LDS topics, began studying his religion again in earnest, and convened an annual seminar that helped attract young scholars who might have pursued other interests. In both forms of LDS courts, the accused is typically allowed to bring in character witnesses. He never wrote another work of fiction. KRE/AMB END STACK 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. No telephone call came., On Aug. 27, McLean delivered the First Presidency denial. Neither Paul nor I nor Christian had to field a single negative comment the next week, when we went to church in our ward. While serving it in England, he was tasked with cleaning up the results of the Baseball Baptism Program, in which missionaries used sports to attract young converts. I didn't have to look at the councilmen and wonder what they said about me. Hanks was excommunicated in 1993, one of the "September Six," Mormon writers and scholars who were disciplined by their local LDS officials in the same month. I moved into recognizing the value and power of a lay priesthood in the body of Christ and Christian community. According the her Wikipedia page: She is a great-granddaughter of Heber J. 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. 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. 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. It took several hoursa vigil was held outside for the first few, with candles and hymns and hot chocolate. The churchs critics find the timing convenient: By 1890, the U.S. government had threatened to seize LDS property if polygamy wasnt renounced. This is maybe where John and I are very different. That bright line is one of the reasons Mormons still sometimes seem separate from the mainstream of American life even after a century of assimilation. Even in the novels, he noticed, the gay characters came to terrible ends. Hed been told it was an unusually accepting congregation. [5][8] During her time with the magazine, she helped turn around its finances, saving it from closing. But some simply baptized the boysa few without explaining what the baptisms were for. Photo by George Frey/Bloomberg via Getty Images. On Sept. 30 he called Hanks to ask what the court had decided. Peggy Fletcher Stack has been reporting on faith and religion since 1991. But the third bomb, which badly injured but did not kill Hofmann, hinted at a tie to the salamander letter, a disputed historical document that Christensen had purchased from Hofmann a year before and which had inspired Quinns latest research project, a book eventually titled Early Mormonism and the Magic Worldview. (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 . The four-day symposium, which begins Wednesday evening, also will include dozens of sessions about Mormonism and politics, about how members grapple with contemporary issues such as gay rights and feminism, building online LDS communities, Mormon Latino views of the church's immigration stance and how the Utah-based faith has developed its "brand" in the past several decades. 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. All rights reserved. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. I see her articles on here all the time and the Tribune has never really been a friend to the TSCC. Or a great one, if possible: Since childhood, Quinn had been told by his grandmother that someday he would be an apostle of the church. That higher-ranking leader, James Paramore, had further instructed West to say that the decision was Wests own, and had not come from above. If he doesnt, I have his phone number and I know where he lives. This was hard on Paul [who works at Brigham Young University]. Mormonism was as much an identity issue for them as it is for me. One of the central questions in the aftermath of Septembers events was just how involved Packer himself had been in them. I could listen to the spirit there. I did the very best I knew how to do, the thing that I felt was the right thing to do., Donate to the newsroom now. Today, its Nelson, with a new counselor, Oaks, instead of Dieter F. Uchtdorf. These men are often referred to by Mormon faithful as the Brethren. Unlike local lay leaders, who hold secular day jobs and perform their ecclesiastical duties on a voluntary basis, they are full-time employees who oversee the global operations of the church. 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. Fulton has called Quinn a nothing person.. Experts authenticated the letter, and Christensen, a devout Mormon, bought it from Hofmann, with plans to donate it to the church. Quinn argued against excommunication, he told me, but he did not have the final say. The former LDS stake president, who oversaw a group of congregations in Tooele for eight years and worked as an architect on her faith's most sacred spaces, faced, in her mind, an . When interviewing Quinn in 76, Packer said, I have a hard time with historians, because they idolize the truth. Quinns status in the church remained unchanged. 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. It was, Quinn told me, an awful, awful year., When he had recovered enough to write, Quinn finished the sequel to The Mormon Hierarchy and revised Early Mormonism and the Magic Worldview. 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. By then an assistant district attorney, Lambert later helped prosecute the case against Hofmann. The biggest thing that got me was the excommunication of bill reel segment of the Mormon stories podcast. In 2004, after a series of fellowships and visiting appointments, he was the only finalist for a tenured position at the University of Utah. Peggy Fletcher Stack is an American journalist, editor, and author. This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2012, and information in the article may be outdated. 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. The Mormon church holds two different kinds of disciplinary councils: a more elaborate process that is often reserved for those who hold the Melchizedek priesthoodgenerally speaking, all devout adult menand a simpler process mostly used for those who dontmeaning women and men who have not advanced far in the church. As Quinn writes, the Manifesto inherited ambiguity, was created in ambiguity, and produced ambiguity.. I always felt that I had Gods sanction and encouragement, so I went ahead following that path. Even early on, a fellow Mormon historian started telling Quinn he must have a death wish regarding his membership in the church. According the her Wikipedia page: She is a great-granddaughter of Heber J. But by the fall of 92 he had to return to Salt Lake City to finish research on the book, and he had grown tired of hiding from church authorities. Press J to jump to the feed. 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. My own name remains on the rolls of the church, and I plan to leave it there, though I stopped believing in the Mormon gospel 15 years ago. He subsequently has . McMurrin Differed in Gentler Times. Paul Toscano, a combative lawyer, showed up for his, at the Cottonwood Stake Center in the southern part of Salt Lake City. On March 23, 2018, Andersons husband, Paul, died of heart failure. In her paper, she mentioned an internal espionage system that creates and maintains secret files on members of the church. A BYU literature professor named Eugene England rose to speak as soon as Anderson finished. At first, his timing appeared serendipitous: In 1972, while he was completing a masters in history at the University of Utah, an academic named Leonard Arrington was appointed church historian. How have the members of your ward treated you? P The Sunstone Symposium runs July 25-28 at the University of Utah's Olpin Student Union. He has continued to publish articles about Mormon history and to participate in the Sunstone Symposium. Anderson was photographed at her Salt Lake City home with the work of her late husband, Paul L. Anderson, on Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2019. Quinns polygamy essay, meanwhile, produced more trouble for him with LDS leaders. It was held by the stake high council, and so my bishop and ward members took the position that that was their doing. was pressured to resign from Brigham Young University and subsequently excommunicated from the faith in 1993 as part of the famed "September Six . A beaming Bishop Madrigal said I should expect very soon to get a telephone call scheduling an interview with a general authority, she wrote. In 1981, Quinn was asked by the colleges chapter of Phi Alpha Theta, a national honor society for history students, to respond to The Mantle Is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect. He did not pull his punches. We embedded him as thoroughly in the church as we ourselves had been. They divorced soon after. If Peggy wanted to do some groundbreaking . From an early age, he felt within himself the presence of God, this burning of the spirit, as he says. It had since become the premier event for the so-called scholars and intellectuals of Mormonism to gather and exchange ideas. (They draw numbers to pick sides.) Just go to . She said hello, but he did not recognize her. It was not the last time he helped to excommunicate people, though. 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. All rights reserved. On Oct. 16, 1985, Quinn was having a late lunch at a BYU food court when he heard a news report that Mark Hofmann had been blown up by a pipe bomb in Salt Lake City. So she met with local and high Mormon leaders and, after several months, they set a baptismal date. 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. He also criticized Ezra Taft Benson, then a senior apostle, who had made comments similar to Packers. All contents 2023 The Slate Group LLC. Though the letter from the current First Presidency made up of church President Russell M. Nelson and counselors Dallin H. Oaks and Henry B. Eyring offered no explanation for the rejection, Bowman speculates that there may be at least two possible answers history and dissent. (Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Lavina Fielding Anderson, who was excommunicated in 1993 as part of the so-called September Six, has had her request for rebaptism into the LDS Church rejected by the faith's governing First Presidency after being approved by her local lay leaders. I feel like I am going by proxy for others who feel too damaged, too hurt and afraid to go. 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. Peggy Fletcher Stack / Salt Lake Tribune: High-ranking Mormon official, who twice spoke in General Conference, is excommunicated Check out Mini-memeorandum for simple mobiles or memeorandum Mobile for modern smartphones. . The Mormon church, he said, drew him out of his largely monastic life and compelled him to help the men and women he saw every Sunday. . 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. McLean invited her, she said, to describe her faith in a letter, which includes her conviction that God cherishes everyone. Stack is an advisor on religion to the Public Broadcasting Service,[2] and has written two books. It's a way for me to participate and contribute, almost like having a calling. Maybe she wants to be, though. 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. There is a peace that comes with that kind of clarity. 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. The Salt Lake Tribune, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) public charity and contributions are tax Two decades ago, Maxine Hanks could not have imagined where her spiritual journey would take her, but she knew this much: She would not likely be walking into the waters of Mormon baptism. Like Robert Kirby, it would be a shit storm to ex her. Nowadays, anyone can Google Mormon polygamy and learn more than theyd ever need to know about that practice, about its abandonment, the subsequent fallout, and so on. He went to stay instead with an old college friend, Richard Lambert. 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. Once the kids were interested, the missionaries were supposed to contact their parents, with the aim of converting whole families. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. He asked Quinn to come see him in his office after work one day, Quinn says. Quinn read Hanks letter that night and wrote a detailed response. He said it was apostasy because I believed that general authorities had done something wrong. Peggy Fletcher. Look at Steve Benson, I suspect that there was no way they were going to ex him so he exed himself. That was established definitively in 1986 after Hofmann confessed to the murders of Christensen and Sheets as part of a plea to avoid the death penalty. By Peggy Fletcher Stack After an exhausting six-hour disciplinary hearing Sunday, Mormon leaders temporarily suspended Grant H. Palmer's membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A church spokesman told him that it did exist, and the First Presidency issued a formal statement about it the following week. Quinn got hate mail. 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. This friend, Quinn says, told him that the men on the council disagreed about whether Quinn was an apostate, and that President Hanks finally declared that Boyd K. Packer was pressing him to take action, and they needed to do something. I didn't have any doubts. Grant, a President of the LDS Church and is the granddaughter of United States Senator from Utah Wallace F. Bennett. At the time, he was grieving the death of his son, who had gone missing and was found weeks later hanging from a tree by an extension cord. I felt they were not going to drive me away. Nor does it read like one. West did not formally revoke the recommend, he just put it in his drawer. Robert Kirby does this also, but much more indirectly. And he was the most strident of the group when it came to denouncing internal critics of Mormon leaders and teachings. He decided he would suppress that part of himself and be a good Mormon. June 17, 2014 8:59 pm . Peggy Fletcher Stack is an American journalist, editor, and author. The church has control of my membership; I decide whether I'm Mormon or not. Packer approved Quinns hiring, but he may have come to regret it five years later. After high school, Christian went to Stanford, and we thought, "This may be where we hear bad news." I asked Quinn this past summer if he thought the provocations he penned as a historian might have been fueled on some level by his own inner conflict with Mormon teachingsif perhaps, unconsciously, he wanted to force a showdown with church authorities. How is she still a practicing member after all this exposure to the truth? SALT LAKE CITY (AP) Laurie Lee Hall was excommunicated from the Mormon church for being a woman.
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