Exponent II's Blog

Posted May 30, 2026 ByGuest Post

Guest Post by Anonymous

He looked like my husband, but he was not acting like my husband normally did. He talked a mile a minute about things that made no sense. The less sleep he got, the more pressured his speech became. His office desk and floor was strewn with hundreds of papers of scribbled ideas for projects that went nowhere. He blew past our established budgets. If I said a word of concern, he shouted that everything was fine and I was the one at fault.
His employer put him on a leave of absence. He grudgingly said he’d go to a doctor like they required to return to work, but claimed that nobody had ever seen anything like what he was going through. However, my many Google searches led me repeatedly to the same condition – mania, the “high” of bipolar disorder.
During this time, I went to the temple to find some peace. As Eve covenanted to hearken to Adam while Adam covenanted to hearken to the Lord, words very clearly came to my mind.

I, a woman, was Adam.

My husband, a man, was Eve.

This seemed to go against everything I’d been taught. Not that I’d been taught that wives should submit to their husbands, but that marriage was equal, with both partners making decisions together. But the Spirit was clear – I could and should take the lead when my husband was unable to be an equal partner. For example, all my life I’d been taught that married couples should have a joint finances. But now, I was afraid that my husband would spend so much that my card would decline when I went to pay for groceries. So, the spirit gave me not just permission, but direction to open my own personal account to use as a backup if that ever happened.

When my husband refused to get in the car when it was time for his doctor’s appointment, I didn’t have to choose between giving up and coercing him (which just led to a fight and a smashed cup on the pavement). Rather, the Spirit guided me to resources such as I Am Not Sick, I Don’t Need Help! by Xavier Amador that taught how to persuade a mentally ill person to seek help by listening, empathizing, finding things to agree on, and partnering with them. Eventually, I was able to use these skills to convince him to check into a hospital, get diagnosed, and medicated.

Yet, seeing my husband as Eve did not mean my husband’s bipolar disorder made him lesser than me, or that his view on things was invalid. His perception of reality was real to him, even when he had hallucinations of cameras and snipers. And even though his actions hurt me deeply, the Spirit filled me with the love that our Heavenly Parents had for him. My husband was still a beloved son of God. This condition was not his fault. So if we were going to save our marriage, I needed to forgive him.

As I pondered this revelation since that time, I realized this interpretation where I took on Adam’s role was not static. I also saw myself in Eve. She made the correct choice to partake of the fruit so that we could all be born. But it came at the cost of introducing pain and death into the world. Likewise, I made the correct choice to reach out to my family and friends for help. They gave me a sympathetic ear for my venting. Those who also had family members who were mentally ill (which I learned applied to more people than I had previously supposed) offered empathy and advice. During my husband’s 11 day hospital stay, they provided meals, childcare, and laundry. I absolutely could not have gone through it alone. And yet, I caused hurt to my husband in doing this. Bipolar still has a stigma, and he wanted to keep news of that private. That is also something we had to work through as we rebuilt our marriage.

So who are we in the story of Adam and Eve? The answer is both. Both is good, no matter what our gender is. This is the beauty of symbolism – that many things can be true at the same time. So, when we turn to symbolic stories in the temple or scriptures to weather the storms of life, we have to make sure our biases and adherence to previous interpretations don’t get in the way of revelation. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have had the confidence to take the actions I needed to, or be able to empathize with my husband to keep our marriage together through the aftermath.

May you also have eyes to see.

Posted May 30, 2026 ByAnn

This is the fifth post in a 12 part series on the Twelve Minor Prophets of the Old Testament. Each month I will highlight a different book of scripture. My goal is to help you become more familiar with these books that have often been overlooked in our Sunday School and Seminary Curriculums.

Big Picture

I’m just going to come out here and say this at the beginning. I don’t think Nahum is inspired scripture. I don’t think that anything in this book can be seen as a prophesy from God. Nor do I think the actions ascribed to God are actually God’s actions. If Joseph Smith can say that the Song of Solomon was not inspired scripture I can say the same thing about the book of Nahum.

The book of Nahum is about the destruction of Ninevah. And on the surface that is great. Ninevah was the capital of Assyria. And Assyria was the enemy of Judah. Assyria had destroyed the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 BC. Assyria had nearly destroyed Judah in 701 BC1. It must have been amazing for the people of Judah to see Ninevah be destroyed. I feel like the book of Nahum was written as a way to celebrate the destruction of Ninevah. I think that over time this celebratory poem was seen as a prophecy of the destruction. And then the “prophecy” was considered scripture.

I just can’t believe that this book was always scripture. I can’t believe that this was a prophecy from a loving God. The almost gleeful way the destruction of an entire city is described does not align with who I feel God to be. And so I don’t believe this book is inspired scripture.

I’m sorry if that may offend some of you. But before you get too upset I want to ask you, “Have you actually read Nahum?” My guess is no. This book is one of the last 6 books of the Old Testament. If you were studying this book in Sunday School or Seminary, my guess is that the teacher skipped it in favor of Micah or Malachi. There aren’t any scripture mastery scriptures in Nahum. There aren’t any prophecies of hope. It’s just three chapters of destruction.

If you do happen to have a testimony of Nahum I’d like to hear about it. Why do you like this book? What about it makes you feel it is inspired scripture? I’m open to other interpretations. Just because I don’t see any value in this book doesn’t mean there isn’t any. Please leave a comment with your feelings about Nahum.

Even though I don’t consider Nahum to be inspired scripture I still want to go over a few things so you can know a few things about this book. Let’s go though some basic questions.

Who – We don’t know anything about Nahum. In verse 1 of chapter 1 it says he was of Elkosh. We also don’t know anything about Elkosh.

Where – We can assume that Nahum was from the southern Kingdom of Judah because the Northern Kingdom of Israel didn’t exist anymore. Israel had been conquered by Assyria in 722 BC.

When – We do know a little bit about when this book was written. Ninevah fell in 612 BC. It was conquered by the Babylonians. The Babylonians would become an enemy of Judah and eventually conquer Judah in 587 BC. But the author of Nahum doesn’t seem to know that Babylon is a threat yet. So we can assume that it was written soon after Ninevah fell.

This is where I would normally imbed a video from the Bible Project describing what the book of Nahum is all about. This time I’m just adding a link to it in the footnotes2. The video is very good at describing the book of Nahum and what is happening in it’s three short chapters, but I feel the video tries a little too hard to make the case that God is behind the destruction of the city.

Looking in Depth

Normally at this point in our discussion we would start looking at individual verses of scripture within the book of Nahum. We aren’t going to do that this time. Instead I want to talk about reasons why I’m so willing to say that this isn’t scripture from God.

There are a lot of directions that I could take this discussion. It just so happens that this month I’ve been reading Better Ways to Read the Bible: Transforming a Weapon of Harm into a Tool of Healing by Zach W Lambert. I found many passages of this book to be relevant as I tried to gather my thoughts about Nahum. I want to share those passages with you.

Zach Lambert is a pastor of a church in Austin, Texas. He says that there are lenses we use to read the Bible. He talks about four lenses that inflict harm and four lenses that promote healing. One of the lenses that inflicts harm is what he calls “The Apocalypse Lens.” The whole chapter talking about the flaws of the Apocalypse Lens is great. I highly recommend this book for this chapter in particular. He spends part of the chapter talking about the concept of Hell. And in that section he says this:

Scripture teaches very clearly that God is love: “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love” (1 John 4:7-8). This passage doesn’t say, “God loves.” It says, “God is love.” Love is God’s primary characteristic; every other characteristic flows through his love. Is God just? Yes, but that justice is loving. Is God faithful? Yes, because God stops at nothing to demonstrate his love. The unbiblical understanding of hell paints a picture of a God who is instead sadistic, vindictive, and malevolent.

Is God sadistic? Does he derive pleasure from inflicting pain on his image-bearing creation? Everything I read in scripture tells me no.

Is God vindictive? Does he destine anyone who chooses to live their life apart from him to be burned alive and eaten by worms for eternity? Every biblical demonstration of God pursuing humanity with his love tells me no.

Is God malevolent? Does he wish evil on humanity? Every story of God graciously forgiving tells me no.3

Zach Lambert has four lenses that he uses to read the Bible. One of those lenses is “The Jesus Lens” In the chapter on that lens he says:

We must interpret all Scripture through the lens of Jesus. This means that if something in Scripture seemingly contradicts the person, work, or teachings of Jesus, we have misunderstood, misinterpreted, or misapplied it. 4

Now, after reading those two quotes I want to show you a few verses from Nahum. Read these and really think about whether or not this sounds like a God who is love. Does this sound like something Jesus would have agreed with?

Nahum chapter 3 verses 5-6 read: I am against you, says the Lord of hosts, and will lift up your skirts over your face; and I will let nations look on your nakedness and kingdoms your shame. I will throw filth at you and treat you with contempt, and make you a spectacle.

I just don’t see a loving God in those verses. And that’s not even the most graphic part of Nahum. A few verses later it gets worse.

So why is this book in our Bible? I think it’s because we like the idea of a God who fights out battles and will defeat our enemies. And yeah, that’s a cool concept. But if you zoom out it gets troublesome. Aren’t those people also God’s children? Just because Ninevah was wicked does it deserve to have every single on of its inhabitants, including many women and children, killed?

Conclusion

One of the commentaries I read in preparation for this study depicts Nahum as the direct sequel to Jonah. This commentary takes the view that Jonah was a historical story. That commentary says “. . . the Ninevites listened to his message, repented, and were spared God’s judgement. This repentance, however, did not last beyond 745 BC, when Ninevah became the leading military power in the Near East.”5

I don’t agree that Jonah was a historical book6 so I don’t consider Nahum a sequel. But I think it is enlightening to look at how God feels about Ninevah in the book of Jonah. The final verse of that book is where God says, “And should I not pity Ninevah, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?”

God has pity for the misguided people of Ninevah in the story of Jonah. I just can’t believe that he would change his mind and directly destroy them a less than two centuries later.

I hope that reading about my pushback against the book of Nahum has been helpful for you. There are many things we can learn as we wrestle with difficult parts of scripture. But one of the best things to learn is that sometimes you can realize that some scriptures do not come from God. That’s what Nahum has taught me the most.

Footnotes We talked about this in depth in the post about Micah. https://exponentii.org/blog/the-twelve-minor-prophets-the-book-of-micah/ ↩︎https://bibleproject.com/videos/nahum/ ↩︎Better Ways to Read the Bible page 73-74
↩︎Better Ways to Read the Bible page 123 ↩︎ESV Student Study Bible introduction to Nahum. ↩︎See my post about Jonah for more about how to interpret that book. https://exponentii.org/blog/the-twelve-minor-prophets-the-book-of-jonah/ ↩︎

Posted May 29, 2026 ByRose

This Sunday the LDS First Presidency has directed that the May fifth Sunday lesson honor the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence as inspired documents that enabled the restoration of the Church. Leaders want the discussion to center on moral agency, defending civil and religious liberty for all, and recognizing historical efforts to protect freedom.

I love my country. My husband and son are veterans, and I am grateful for my pioneer heritage. However, I have a few concerns regarding the upcoming fifth Sunday lesson–in a church that is predominately international.

 1. American exceptionalism–the supposition that church could only have been restored in the United States and that the Lord inspired the US constitution, a document that legalized slavery and disenfranchised the working poor, women, and people of color.

 2. Ethnocentrism– the assumption that the United States is superior to other countries.

 3. Black and white thinking—the notion that the U.S. constitution is better than every other country’s constitution. Some countries have superior health care, freedom of the press, and happiness indexes.

4. Homophobia—the LDS Church uses  “religious liberty” to defend its exclusionary policy regarding its LGBTQ members, including its transgender members, who cannot teach any classes or use an LDS restroom without supervision.

5. Blind spot bias–The lesson ignores the fact that during the last year the United States ranking as a democracy has plummeted.

6. Political partiality—in a church that too often focuses more on the temple and the prophet than on Jesus, this lesson is another way the LDS Church is inflating its own political prejudices while ignoring the teachings of Jesus about wealth and power abuse, respect of those in the margins, including the Samaritans, who were not part of the Jewish culture or nation, and compassion and generosity.

Some scholars argue that some countries’ constitutions rival—or are even superior to—the United States constitution. The German constitution guarantees socioeconomic rights and explicitly protects things like the right to form labor unions, access to public healthcare, and decent housing—aspects that are completely absent from the U.S. text.

The U.S. Constitution is notoriously difficult to amend. Countries like Switzerland feature modern constitutions that are easily adaptable to contemporary challenges, allowing them to remain highly relevant without resulting in political gridlock.  U.S. institutions—such as the Electoral College and the over-representation of small-population states in the Senate—are major design flaws compared to European models that use proportional representation.

Nordic countries—such as Iceland and Denmark—consistently rank at the very top of the Global Rule of Law Index and human rights indexes, as their constitutions provide much stronger and more comprehensive modern legal protections for their citizens

Russell Arben Fox, BCC blogger, suggests that teachers could focus on these statements by LDS leaders attached to the lesson:

Elder Cook: The Declaration of Independence itself is relatively short, but the first five lines in the second paragraph are profoundly significant. They read, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” The next paragraph states that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men. The knowledge of a supreme creator coincides with the religious beliefs of most of us, most of the original colonies, and the founding fathers. It also is consistent with our doctrinal belief that the Declaration and many constitutional principles were divinely inspired.

President Christofferson: Let me interrupt you there in just a second. It’s interesting to think of the Declaration of Independence as kind of a quasi-religious document, really, because it’s tied to religious faith, as you’ve said, not a faith, but religious faith. Our Creator, a Creator who has created us equal, a Creator who has endowed us with unalienable rights. And it’s a birthright, really. It’s a divine birthright that can’t be taken away or abridged. I mean, in the Declaration, we say this comes from the Creator.

President Christofferson: President Oaks did identify five really important, crucial principles that exist in the Constitution….[L]et me say a word first about the first…which was what some call popular sovereignty, meaning that sovereignty, in the end, resides in the people. And that really is a carryover from the Declaration of Independence, isn’t it? Governments derive their power from the consent of the governed. And so with the fact that the people in the end are the sovereign, to me that means that the people have the ultimate responsibility. We have the ultimate responsibility for the success of our own nation and our own government.

Fox suggests that Jefferson’s philosophical introduction to the Declaration of Independence, “wasn’t sectarian, but is rather universal, the idea that we have ‘a Creator who has created us equal, a Creator who has endowed us with unalienable rights,’ serves as a ‘birthright’ to all human beings, everywhere, for all time.”

It would be interesting to see how that discussion could evolve with a homophobic, MAGA-adjacent class. Do they truly believe that people are created equal, including refugees, women and LGBTQ members?

By Common Consent blogger MDH, reviews the fifth-Sunday lesson and the video for presentation with the lesson and shares some fascinating insights:

“Christofferson and Cook completely ignore the fact that Brigham Young took the main body of the Church out of the United States, and thus outside of the government that the ‘divinely inspired’ founding documents established.”





Elder Cook asserts that President Dallin Oaks “way ahead of the rest of the country and society in taking the position to eliminate contention, to try and find agreement—and sometimes on very tough issues that people can’t agree on, at least that you can respect each other.” MDH adds,” In my view, this statement is just factually inaccurate. Yes, Oaks has been one of the recent voices affirming the need to avoid contention and try and find agreement (odd, but not surprising, that there was no mention of former-President Nelson’s work on this same topic). But to assert that Oaks has been ‘way ahead of the rest of the country and society’ just isn’t true.”





The writer concludes,” In the end, I’m left wondering what kind of conversations this video will elicit. One the one hand, I can imagine conversations that just retread all-too-common and uncritical notions of American- and LDS- exceptionalism. But, on the other hand, with a skilled moderator, perhaps this might lead to some really fascinating discussions. I guess we’ll see.”

 I love my country, and my family has paid a high price to serve it. With that said, I also highly regard other countries that value and protect human life and freedoms, treat women and minority groups with respect and dignity, and foster the democratic values of freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and freedom to vote.

What are your thoughts?

Do you think wards and branches outside the United States will enjoy a fifth Sunday lesson celebrating the United States and its founding documents? 

What challenges will teachers have  in potentially avoiding misinformation in the ensuing discussion?

Do you believe that the LDS Church could only have been restored in the United States? Why or why not?

 

Photo courtesy of WikiMedia Commons

Posted May 29, 2026 ByGuest Post

Once I was with a friend a few days after I’d had an overwhelming, emotional experience that I was still processing. We didn’t get a chance to talk much about it, but as she was hugging me goodbye, she said “You look sad about something”. Her words let me go ‘Huh, she’s right. What I’m feeling right now is very intense sadness.’ That realization helped me to move on past the *feelings* and figure out why I was sad. My friend’s act of naming that emotion for me felt spiritual. She saw me, and helped me to understand myself.

In Genesis, Adam named all the things in the garden of Eden before realizing that a partner for him was missing. Sometimes naming something allows you to see its true nature. Other times naming things allows you to see that something is missing. Being able to put language to an experience allows you to have a clearer picture of reality.

I’ve been reading a bunch of academic writing recently. (This is your warning that long, intimidating words are coming up. I promise I’ll explain them!) One article* I read gave me some powerful language that I wish I’d had earlier. I learned the term epistemic injustice, which can be broken in to two varieties: testimonial injustice and hermeneutical injustice. Wikipedia’s article on epistemic injustice has a great overview on the history of these terms, but here’s my brief explanation:

Epistemic is a fancy word for ‘the way you get new knowledge’, so epistemic injustice means that there is something unfair about the way knowledge is transmitted (or not transmitted, as the case may be).

Testimonial injustice deals with a person not being believed because of their position in society (their class, race, gender, etc.) This obviously harms the person who isn’t believed. However, it also harms the listener, because they are failing to understand other ways of seeing the world.

Hermeneutical means the way you interpret something. Hermeneutical injustice happens when the person doesn’t have the language to interpret or explain their experience. This is the perfect term to describe why it took so long for me to come out to myself as queer.

As a student at BYU in the early 2000s, I knew what being gay was. I had heard the term lesbian once or twice. There was a time when I wondered (again) if I was gay, but concluded it couldn’t be true because I was definitely attracted to men. I didn’t know the word ‘bisexual’. The acronym LGBT wasn’t familiar to me until after I was married. It wasn’t until several years later that I realized that word could apply to me. When I came out to my husband, he had to work through having a new perception of me. It was a bit of a struggle. On the other hand, I felt like I had finally comprehended a piece of myself that had always been there. For a while, my husband was frustrated that I didn’t tell him about this before we got married, but…I couldn’t have. I didn’t have the language to describe my experiences. I value honesty. I would have told him. I wish we could have had conversations about it earlier. I wish we had gone into marriage with a clearer sense of what we were choosing. I wish I had better understood the portions of my sexuality that I was sacrificing when I chose to marry.

One of the most painful hurts is that language about bisexuality already existed, I was just “protected” from it because of church culture. There was very much a sense that if you don’t talk about the idea of same sex attraction, then people won’t experience it because they don’t know about it. That’s not true. It’s a betrayal of trust to purposefully withhold language that a person may need in order to comprehend their experience of the world. Being shielded from knowledge that already exists is a form of hermeneutical injustice.

Bisexual erasure is a form of testimonial injustice. It contributes to bisexual people having higher rates of mental health struggles than other LGBTQ identities. Lesbian, gay, and heterosexual people have a history of dismissing bisexual experience, which can make it difficult for bisexual people to feel fully accepted in either straight or queer communities. Testimonial injustice also effects the prejudiced listener–a concept I hadn’t considered before. Their harm may be more of a spiritual consequence rather than a physical consequence. Part of learning to be like Jesus is learning to listen to and understand those who are different than yourself. That is something one can actively practice doing to avoid inflicting testimonial injustice.

June is Pride Month. Prevent injustice and give yourself and your loved ones the gift of LGBTQ+ language. Read through a glossary of gender, sexuality, and identity terms (like this one) and talk about them in a conversation. Discuss a book featuring LGBTQ+ characters with your child or your book group. Follow accounts that educate about queer life. Make safe spaces for authentic storytelling. Learn about the experience of queer Mormons. Cry when you read Kerry Pray’s I Spoke to You with Silence and have your heart filled when you follow it with The Book of Queer Mormon Joy. Witness Nathan Kitchen’s leadership as president of Affirmation during the Policy of Exclusion in The Boughs of Love. Learn about Laurie Lee Hall’s experience as a transgender woman working for the church by reading Dictates of Conscience. Open your mind to those who experience the world differently than you, and I’m willing to bet your heart will be opened too.

*Kirk Lougheed, “Epistemic Injustice and Religious Experience” in The Lost Sheep in Philosophy of Religion: New Perspectives on Disability, Gender, Race, and Animals, ed. B. Hereth and K. Timpe (Routledge, 2019), 79.

Image from pexels

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Posted May 28, 2026 ByNatasha Rogers

June 9, 6 p.m. MT / 8 p.m. EST – on Zoom

Join our editor in chief, Millie Tullis, for a generative writing workshop. This workshop will be a welcoming space to practice writing, reflect, and gather with other Mormon feminists. Writers of all levels are warmly encouraged to attend.

This event is free.

Register and sign up for future notifications: exponentii.org/workshops

Photo by Florian Klauer on Unsplash

Posted May 28, 2026 ByRose
Introduction

Dehumanization of LDS women by the Church fosters abuse, disempowers women to fully use their talents and voices in and out of the church, and dangerously damages women, who too often experience marginalization and even excommunication for speaking out for the ethical treatment of women and others. It creates a system where too often rapists are protected and church resources are used to silence victims.

Dehumanization of women  denies their full humanity. It can be subversive and subtle in practices that restrict their roles, ignore their experiences, or rationalize male dominance. This issue is rooted in historical interpretations of scripture and tradition that have marginalized women’s voices and leadership, the objectification and dehumanization of women through language, church patriarchal practices, rigid gender roles, objectifying modesty standards, and the exclusivity of male leadership in all decision-making bodies 

Polygamy and Dehumanization of LDS Women

In the beginning years of the LDS church, young women and girls were often coerced into polygamous marriages with older men. Leaving their homes and countries to join the Church, women were sometimes given to high-ranking LDS leaders in polygamous marriages, being told that their eternal salvation depended on in. 

Heber C. Kimball gave his 14-year old daughter, Helen, to Joseph as a wife and young Helen described her “happy dreams [as] all o’er,” having a “sicken’d heart,” and “dayly” pining for her freedom.

Heber C. Kimball took at least 43 wives himself and is reported to have said, “I think no more of taking another wife than I do of buying a cow.”

In current LDS scripture in Doctrine and Covenants 132, we read that Emma Smith was told she would be destroyed if she did not accept her husband’s polygamous wives. Linda Hamilton wrote that D&C 132, “women are reduced to objects that should be desired, possessed, and taken. No agency is granted to women in this revelation, except to refuse her husband and be destroyed.”

In the LDS church, polygamy is now practiced  through temple sealings and not in a mortal context,  yet its theological practice continues to it reduce the identity of women to the property of their husbands.

Objectification, Sexual Abuse, and  Dehumanization of LDS Women in the Purity Culture

In the LDS strict purity culture, women are too often objectified as non-human objects and implicitly or explicitly blamed for being sexually abused. The the top LDS leader said in a 2005 General Conference talk, “Young women, please understand that if you dress immodestly, you are magnifying this problem by becoming pornography to some of the men who see you.”

He recently remarked that his statement is “pure inspiration.”

Oaks’ statement implies that a woman’s clothing choices can dehumanize her and that women are responsible for men’s sexual choices, a dangerous concept used to blame victims of sexual assault and to protect perpetrators. As a Rape Crisis Center educator, I repeatedly heard rapists justify their behavior, saying the female’s apparel or actions motivated the rape. After teaching the young men about the suffering of rape victims and their powerlessness to stop the rape, young men realized that they alone were responsible for the abuse. The LDS Church needs to better understand and implement this concept.

In the dehumanizing LDS purity culture, leaders have told females that “it is better to die in defending one’s virtue than to live having lost it without a struggle.” In LDS scripture, we read that rape survivors had lost their “chastity and virtue,” and LDS girls too often are told that anyone who has experienced sexual abuse is worthless, like a licked cupcake, chewed gum, or a crushed rose. 

Research shows that too often LDS women who report abuse to their church leaders are blamed or punished for their abuse. Suzie Greco reports that in a study from the journal Affilia: “Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse: The Case of Mormon Women,” of 71 survivors of childhood sexual abuse who spoke to their bishops, 5 were excommunicated or disfellowshipped. I know women who have suffering this dehumanizing experience, and research corroborates what I have observed over the years.

Because women are dehumanized and devalued in the LDS Church,  they are too often blamed, silenced, or punished when they report abuse, which further traumatizes abuse victims who deserve the best of pastoral care.

LDS Theology and the Dehumanization of Women

In LDS temple marriage ceremonies, men are told that they “preside over” their wives, which leaves too many men feeling that they can control, subjugate, and rule over their spouses. (Preside means to old a position of authority over, from the Latin verb praesidere, literally meaning to sit in front of or to superintend.)

President Ezra Taft Benson told husbands, “Your place is to give direction to all family life.”

President Gordon B. Hinckley said, “Husbands, love and treasure your wives. They are your most precious possessions.”

President Thomas S. Monson said, “Sustain your husband…Your husband, as the priesthood bearer, is the head of the home. You, the helpmeet, are not the head.”

Melissa Tyler, in a excellent Exponent II blog post, includes this quote by Brigham Young: “One thing is very true and we believe it, and that is that a woman is the glory of the man. What is the glory of the woman? It is her virginity, until she gives it into the hands of the man that will be her lord and master to all eternity.” 8 Oct 1861 General Conference.

She also quotes Brigham Young as saying, “Speaking of a woman who complained that her husband was a dirty man and expected him to participate in basic household chores, he preached: “I said to myself, I expect I shall be married when I am old enough, and if I get such an animal as you are, I will put hooks in her nose to lead her in a way you have not thought of.” — (sermon delivered in the Bowery, 6 Apr 1857, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 4, page 312.)

In LDS temple liturgy, Mother in Heaven plays no role in the creation process, which is orchestrated by three males. Women’s husbands symbolically take their spouses through the veil to the celestial kingdom. Women (and men) covenant to give all their time, talents, and material means to the patriarchal LDS Church, not to the Lord.

Words matter. Theology matters.

In predominately LDS Utah, domestic violence and rape statistics are much higher than the national average, and Dr. Susan Madsen, an LDS scholar, writes, “The research tells us that intimate partner violence — a form of domestic violence — tends to be more pronounced when societies have more ‘patriarchal elements’ that are found in many religious practices.”

If a man perceives his wife as a possession, it is easier for him to justify acts of abuse.

The LDS Church has repeatedly silenced and removed women who speak out for justice and accountability, who document issues of ecclesiastical abuse, or who report having been abused themselves.  It is  unacceptable that those who report or experience abuse in the LDS Church can be punished more than those who perpetrate the abuse.

Dr. Jana Reiss, LDS scholar, wrote about a former bishop who was charged with a sexual offense and released on the following Sunday from the high council by his church leaders, who said he is a “great person.” During that same week, Lavina Fielding Anderson, excommunicated for documenting abuse incidents in the church, was denied rebaptism after decades of faithful church attendance.

Dr. Reiss said, “This is why the system is stacked against women. It’s not just that women are not permitted to make decisions that affect anyone but other women and perhaps children in the church (and even then, such decisions must always be approved by male priesthood leaders). It’s also that women simply do not have the access to decision-makers that men do. When (former bishop) Stephen Murdock comes before a disciplinary council on charges of sexual misconduct, which I fully expect will happen, it will be the exact stake high council he served on, with the same men deciding his fate. Men who know him well.

“The second sad reality is related. All Latter-day Saints, both men and women, are counseled to obey their leaders. To do so is considered a blessing. We are instructed that the Lord himself called our bishops, stake presidents and general authorities to the positions they hold, and it is not our place to question them. Such a system is at great risk for abuse.”

LDS Patriarchal Practices and the Dehumanization of Women

When I was trained as a stake Relief Society president by the LDS General Relief Society President, she taught us to never contradict or correct a priesthood leader. As I recognized first-hand as a stake and then ward Relief Society president that woman are not allowed to contradict or report an abusive bishop, I observed how dangerous and dehumanizing this teaching was for women. Although the Church teaches that it has the gold standard for abuse, it routinely allows it to happen and does little to protect its members—both children and adults– from it.

Looking back on my years of service as an LDS female leader, I see that in some ways I was a robotic non-human in the eyes of the Church, expected to perform my duties without full use of my abilities to discern, lead, intuit, and receive direct revelation for myself. In every situation, I was managed and controlled by a man—and in some instances, these men were abusive, manipulative, and cruel.

Over the years, I have observed severe issues of ecclesiastical abuse that are and were allowed and even accepted by LDS leaders. Women who are abused and dehumanized in the Church have no systemic way to defend themselves and are too often shunned or expelled if they try to do so.

Whether it is through benevolent patriarchy or cruel edict, LDS leaders attempt to control every aspect of women’s lives, whether it is how they dress, speak, marry, bear children, eat, or think. Recently,  the top LDS leader told young women that the missionary age has been reduced so that they can marry at a younger age. They are also told  “that being a mother is their highest priority, their ultimate joy.” Part of this encouragement is to ensure that elderly folks do not “face a future of too few children maturing into adults to support the number of retiring adults.”

When LDS leaders urge women to marry young and have lots of children, they ignore the fact that some will never marry or be able to bear children, while others will find child-rearing less than their “ultimate joy.” Some suggest that the LDS culture views women as baby-makers more than human beings. I have witnessed many single sisters dehumanized in the church culture that prizes married members with children—especially men.

Although LDS women once had their own organization, magazine, curricula, and opportunities give healing or comforting blessings, all aspects of their religious autonomy have been appropriated by men.  Today LDS women are tasked with much church work but are managed in every aspect by men.

LDS Views of Heaven and the Dehumanization of Women

The highest level of the celestial kingdom, LDS heaven,  is reserved for obedient LDS women who are married to faithful LDS men. We read: “[Women] were elected by God to be wives and mothers in Zion. Exaltation in the celestial kingdom is predicated on faithfulness to that calling.”

Recently, President Oaks was recorded as saying that we have a heavenly mother or mothers, but for reasons the Lord has not revealed, we do not know much about our heavenly mother.

In response to Oak’s statement, Linda Hamilton, Exponent II blogger, writes, “This seemingly small admission matters a lot. The pinnacle of Mormon doctrine is the belief that we can all become like God. That God is an exalted man and our eternal destiny is to become like him. So if God is a polygamist, then to be truly like him we’re all going to need to become polygamists. That thing we pretend was long ago in the past haunts our future—its our eternal destiny.”

She adds, “I should also note that Oaks and Nelson, the prophet, are polygamists. They are both married to two women, their first wife and current living wife. They also both openly talk about being sealed to both women and view this is a polygamous relationship. Polygamy is very much real and alive to them.”

I sat by my dying mother’s bedside and witnessed a courageous, faithful woman who was terrified of dying because she was a second wife  who did not want to enter a polygamous relationship in the afterlife. No woman should have to suffer that kind of grief.

Members laughed when President Oaks delivered a 2019 general conference address in which he said he had received a letter from an women who wondered if, as a second wife, she would “have her own house in the next life, or would she have to live with her husband and his first wife?”

For second wives, this is not funny.

Reducing women to possessions creates a system where too many LDS men devalue their wives, assuming they will receive more women in heaven and where too many women are expected to robotically marry young, have many children, and obey church leaders without question. The Proclamation to the Family reinforces strict gender roles that deny the humanity of women, whose husbands are again told that they “rule over” them.

Critical Changes Needed to Stop the Dehumanization of LDS Women

If the LDS Church truly believed are all are children of God, created in the image of deity, it needs to value all voices,  give women an equal seat at every table, and stop silencing and punishing woman for being sexually assaulted.  To stop the dehumanization of women, the LDS church needs to train its clergy to value and respect women, have a hotline where women can report abuse, and include an equal number of women in all decision-making. 

Giving women equal rights in the LDS Church is a human rights issue, meaning that women should have freedom from violence, discrimination, and subjugation. LDS  Former Utah Supreme Court Chief Justice Christine Durham, an active LDS member and a longtime equal right amendment (ERA) supporter, says, “Until we [women] have our own provision in the Constitution, we will not be truly equal under the federal Constitution.”

In 1976, LDS church leaders mobilized women to actively oppose the equal rights amendment, using church meetings, literature, and organizational networks to influence state legislatures. In 2019, LDS spokesman, Doug Anderson, said, “The church’s position on [the Equal Rights Amendment] has been consistent for more than 40 years.”

Not only do women deserve constitutional rights in every government, but they deserve fundamental human rights in their religions as well. Jesus valued and included women in his ministry. His first convert was a Samaritan woman. His first appearance after his resurrection was to a woman. His first miracle was in behalf of a woman. Women in the Bible served as prophets, apostles, and pastors, and after Jesus’ death, they had significant roles of authority in congregations.

Marg Mowczko wrote, “The church’s mission can only be enhanced and made more effective when gifted men and women minister together using their complementary skills and abilities. Men and women should be united in the cause of the gospel and in building up the body of Christ.”

Further information:






https://www.equalrightsamendment.org/



“Has the Church encouraged members to oppose ratification of the ERA?

“Yes. The First Presidency has spoken out against the amendment and urged members to exercise their civic rights and duties and to “join actively with other citizens who share our concerns and who are engaged in working to reject this measure.”

“Passage of the ERA would carry with it the risk of extending constitutional protection to immoral same-sex—lesbian and homosexual—marriages.”—the official LDS Church magazine, the Ensign, March, 1980.

For a brief review of the LDS Church and the Equal Right Amendment, read Linda Hamilton’s post here: https://exponentii.org/blog/the-era-prop-8-voting-and-obedience/

3. To better understand how woman are dehumanized and marginalized in the LDS Church, please read “Dear Mormon Man.”

4. Scriptures supporting women’s rights: 

‘Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.'” (Acts 10:34-35).

“The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:31).

“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatian 3: 28).

” But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant.” (Matthew 20:25-28).

“[God] inviteth all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth all that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female…” (2 Nephi 26: 33).

“So God created humans in his image,in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” (Genesis 1: 27).

5. Much could  be written about the LDS church’s dangerous dehumanization of LGBTQ people. Church leaders have–among other things, called them “diabolical, blasphemy, pervert, unnatural, abnormal, an affliction, immoral, impure,  under the control of Lucifer, transgressor, evil, sinful, ugly, predator, sin of the ages, deceitful, abominable, detestable, crime against nature, degenerate, addict, unmanly, diseased,  promiscuous, enslaved, contaminate, carnal, aggressive, brutal, abusive, violent, and filthy.”

6. Pages could be written about the LDS church’s dehumanization of BIPOC, who have been called, among other things, “heathen, seed of Cain, fallen, fence-sitters, despised among all people, cursed, dark and loathsome, children of Canaan.” Some of they statements are still found in LDS scripture. (see 1, 2 Nephi, Jacob, Moses 7, Brigham Young’s talks, Mormon Doctrine by Bruce R. McConkie, and other talks by LDS prophets.)

Thanks to Micheile Henderson at Unsplash for final image and to Flavia Jacquier at Pexels for blog post for the featured image

Posted May 27, 2026 ByJosie Grover

Deconstructing parts or all of faith is a rigorous exercise. It is challenging and uncomfortable but when persevered can be rewarded with wonder and enlightenment. It gives us a greater appreciation for our innate wisdom and goodness. It offers the freedom of will we find when we can live in congruence with our own value system instead of one handed to us. I have felt my deconstruction from the condition of patriarchal religion has manifested in this way.

For most of my 45 years as a woman in the LDS church, my faith up to a point had not allowed me to even acknowledge any amount of unease I felt over the persitent presiding of men over women. Or the lack of empowerment I felt in my spritiual eptitude. Doubting the priesthood felt unrighteous to me, and I wanted to feel righteous at all costs. With those great costs, I chose to stuff down inner conflicts rather than deal with them.

And this was the way until the misaligment became too loud and present to ignore. When harm to myself and other women, and unaccoutabiltiy for certain priesthood holders became apparent as a pattern. This was the time I started to ask the hard questions of myself.  Questions independant of those I would expect to get the right answers to in the bounds of the church.  

Could a church system where only men hold authority be not divinely appointed?

Have I been held back from my own spiritual growth by practices that have relying too much on men?

Do I hold men on a spiritual platform when I am myself an equal?

Was polygamy a false doctrine?

With these thought exercises, I could move from organizational seeker of truth to an independant one.  And it broke me into feeling fully free in my spiritual intellect for the first time in forever. 

For two years of my life I lived on the island of Oahu and loved to free dive in the deeper waters off the shore. There is something incredible about descending to where you have to be uncomfortable to experience beauty. It leaves no room for mental distraction. Going deep makes your body stronger.  Your lungs learn to hold longer to air. Your legs become about to move through resistance. Spiritually and psychologically, at this point, I was diving, exercising new muscles, meditating in the new ideas, and finding the beauty that not everyone ventures to find. 

Since shaking patriarchy as a part of my religious view, I have been able to make healthier decisions for myself in multiple areas of life. I have become more assertive in my needs. And more forgiving of my short comings. It has given me a greater sense of love for human connection and the desire to understand all people. It has moved me into learning more about history and culture.

I share this or those on the precipice of change. Those afraid of what might be waiting in the deep and unknown should they dare to venture. I hope those in a place of readiness will take the dive beyond the conditions given by systems like patriachy.  Where people are held in places that make them worth more to the group and less fulfilled at individuals. 

“It’s okay to tear it all down.  It’s okay to be scared.  The beauty in it is you get to choose.  You are no longer at a point in your life where others get to choose for you.  So go ahead.  Do what you know in your should you need to do.  What you are building in the process is so good, it’s going to take your breath away.”

Melissa Neeb – Faith in the Mess

Posted May 26, 2026 ByKate Baxter

I’m sitting in a sub-par Mexican restaurant, wondering when I became a lady who lunches, something very different from a lunch lady, but still involving dishes and steam. My non-LDS childhood friend Chelle is in town. An amateur social scientist, everything authentically LDS is anthropological catnip to her, so she tags along with me to an RS meeting of empty nesters. I prep Chelle that nominally it’s about ministering and Christ, but it’s really more about group therapy and Diet Cokes.

She’s all in.

Susan walks in a little late. She sits down in the empty chair next to me and says, “Sundress? Cute. Very, um, bright. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you wear something like that.”

“Thanks,” I say. “I’m entering my Dress Era.”

“Oh. That’s…nice,” Susan says in the voice very polite people use when they have no idea what you’re talking about.

Chelle tries not to snort into her soda. As much as I’d like to think I’m too young for this group, my empty nest doesn’t lie.

“It’s the new slip garments,” Diane says. “They make wearing dresses so easy now. Don’t you agree, Kate?”

I try not to squirm in my seat. “Yes,” I say. “They do.” Technically, this t-shirt dress is very g-friendly, but I’m only wearing bike shorts and a bra underneath.

Old high school habits die hard, even in middle-age.

Luellen leans close. “I haven’t tried the slips yet. I can’t figure out what to wear underneath. It feels like we traded one thing for another.”

I take a breath to say cotton grannie panties, but Mary Beth beats me to it. “Oh!” she says. “We had a whole conversation about this in the temple dressing room last week. Everybody agreed—nothing. Garment slips are complete underwear.”

Without missing a beat Diane says, “That’s what I do, too. So much more comfortable.”

My jaw hits the table.

Chelle’s eyes light up. “Just so we’re clear, you guys are free bal—” She feels me flinch and pivots. “I mean—going commando in the temple?”

“Yes, dear,” Diane says as if to a very slow child. “We’re all in long dresses with too many layers. Nobody’s going to see anything.” She sips her water and sighs. “It’s very freeing.”

“Not just in the temple,” says Mary Beth. “A lot of the women said they wear them that way around the house, even to church.”

The sisters who lunch nod very matter-of-factly as my brain melts. I’ll never look at a woman of a certain age in a dress the same way again.

Temple?!

Church?!

Maybe I’m the one who’s too old for all this.

“Did you hear the Morris boy got called to Guatemala?” Luellen asks as the conversation turns.

Chelle catches my eye. “Your older Mormon friends are so metal.” She giggles in delight.

“Yeah,” I say. “Who knew?”

Posted May 25, 2026 ByCandice Wendt

During my last Christmas break, I experienced a strong sense of well-being. I slept as much as I needed, played games with my family, and had time for creativity. Things weren’t optimal in some ways; some of my family members had influenza; the weather was bad and we didn’t go outside much. But I felt like myself in a way that I often don’t and had energy to reflect, pray and journal at the end of the day. Being present and open came readily and I felt gratitude and contentment about life.

As I went back to my office job, I had the same intentions, but in the thick of my daily grind, it was a lot harder to enjoy the same kind of experience of life.

Often in Mormon feminist spaces, we are very pro work and careers, and this is absolutely necessary due to Mormonism’s disempowering legacy of rigid gender norms that have discouraged women from pursuing professional training and full-time paid work. If women have jobs, CVs and salaries, they have more choices and power than otherwise. And employment can meet certain needs beyond survival, such as for a “second place” in our lives to develop our skills, connect, and contribute.

What we don’t discuss as much is how capitalist work systems have aspects that are morally bankrupt and dehumanizing and how they can harm us and the people around us.

Even if we have never suffered from financial insecurity, how many of us have been impacted by immediate family members wrestling with shame, burnout, anxiety or depression caused by the high-pressure, unstable, or taxing nature of their work lives? (I raise my hand here). Even when conditions are desirable, capitalist work is not truly supportive to mental, physical, or spiritual health or family life. And to whatever degree it touts wellness, its motivation is to meet its own selfish objectives.

A system in which just about everybody has to sell their time and compete to meet basic needs like shelter and healthcare is harmful on many levels, and the validation we get from the system usually turns out to be less substantive and satisfying than we hoped. It’s not that everything in capitalist systems are bad, or that work in itself is bad. Labor is necessary in life and an important way we interact, meet needs, and create meaning. The problem is systems in which many humans are treated as expendable and the majority of people work out of fear of eviction and impoverishment rather than better reasons.

In the 1800s, it became abundantly clear to many working class people that capitalist work that places profits, speed, and turnout as top priorities led to wide-spread injuries, health problems, maiming and other disabilities. Karl Marx was one of the first to talk about how capitalist work is also psychologically harmful as he witnessed people working out of fear of starvation and death. Such workers could not enjoy personal meaning or investment in their tasks at hand–they were alienated from their work.

According to Micha Frazer-Carrol’s essay “Why Work is Sickening” (from Mad World), the lower you are on the job status ladder and the more profitable the company, the more likely you will be to suffer from both mental and physical health problems caused by work. Amazon, Walmart and Apple, she writes, have some of the highest employee turnover rates (replacing more than half their workers each year), workplace injuries, and suicidality rates. Low tier workers have repetitive, straining tasks, little autonomy, and are subject to strict, rushed deadlines that keep them feeling dysregulated and unsafe throughout the day.

When you realize that not being chained to a full-time job (however alienating or intolerable the job may be) means having a much lower quality lifestyle, losing health care or a vehicle, or becoming homeless, it doesn’t feel like capitalist work really is the rewarding, self-actualizing thing it sells itself as. It becomes more like servitude. There is a meme that says, “I asked my best friend ‘how was work today?’” The BF replies: “There’s something magical about a place you can’t leave for 8 hours a day 5 days a week for fear of being homeless.”

This is deeply funny, relatable and sad all at once. It points to the absurdity of a system in which one’s capacity to maintain stable employment or one job after another determines who is housed and who is not. Frazer-Carrol writes that due to the pervasive threat of unemployment, “the mental burden of work is not limited to a person’s shift, and does not end when we clock out. It continues on and on, stretching forward in the imagination into sleepless night, what-ifs and other forms of anxiety. For many of us, it can feel as if the only way we can possibly ward off these nightmarish outcomes is by working harder, faster, accepting worse terms and conditions, and accepting alienation” (Mad World 80).

It’s not only paying rent and putting food on the table that is at stake, its also the personal worth, dignity, and deservedness assigned to us by society. Most of us start out with seeming 0 credit and must hustle to earn assurance that we deserve anything life giving or good– even just necessities to stay alive–from meritocratic systems. This breeds shame, unproductive comparisons and mental illness. Just ask university students; they can tell you the main message North American and other Anglo-American cultures give them is that their personal worth and worthiness is determined by their academic achievements, career success, and their capacities to earn money. They’ll also attest that this is spiritually vapid and hurting young peoples’ motivation, sense of purpose, and mental and physical health.

Even a situation that seems “ideal” such as a cushy, stable, coveted desk job can come to feel like captivity, fuel depression and anxiety, and not actually be good for one’s intellect, body, or soul. Filling a role where someone higher than you on a merit ladder tells you what to do and how to do it year after year is not empowering and does not lead to emotional and spiritual alignment. Most positions don’t offer us the level of autonomy or meaning that we need, and burden us with pressures to people please, practice perfectionism, and fawn on others.

This post gathers a patchwork of recent insights, all of which critique capitalist systems and their assumptions.

The Early Modern Shift to “Wage Work” Meant Lost Freedoms and Safety Nets for Women

It’s easy to assume that things have always been this way or have to be this way, that is, that everyone must earn enough money if they want to be safe and survive, but that’s not true. I learned on BBC’s podcast Witch, episode 4 how during medieval times in Europe, peasant women enjoyed a certain kind of freedom and autonomy that they eventually lost. Village life included access to “common lands,” where they gleaned grain, foraged for wild food, kept livestock, grew herbs and vegetables, collected firewood and other materials, and generally had space and shared natural resources to do what they needed. They didn’t have bosses. They didn’t have designated work hours; they decided what they did and when they did it. Their livelihood was a grace and they were very connected to the natural world.

If someone became widowed or didn’t have someone else supporting their needs, no problem–the common land had their back. They wouldn’t starve and were surrounded by a community of women for support and collaboration.

This changed across Europe during periods of “enclosure,” when the wealthy claimed the common lands to be used for more efficient and standardized forms of agriculture and peasants came to be denied access. There were riots, but the trend didn’t stop as it stretched across the continent. 

At this point, women were forced into the world of “wage work.” No longer would they directly benefit from the bulk of their own work, choose their work activities, or work at their own pace. And because wage work was a male dominated domain, they were at a disadvantage as employees. Enclosure made women more vulnerable to poverty, starvation, and social alienation. Many older and disabled women were not considered employable, became beggars because they no longer had any means to obtain food, and in some cases were condemned for witchcraft and executed.

When Western civilization placed money at the center and made wage work necessary to survive, this was in some ways a real hit to women’s autonomy. It’s not that we should go back to medieval village life, it’s a problem that in the modern era there continues to be only two real options for women to survive and have stable resources: 1). be a suitable, consistent and industrious wage worker or 2). be born into or marry into wealth.

As the West embraced capitalism, Christian leaders and congregants enmeshed their growing capitalist values with the gospel. Work came to be treated as a pillar of morality and a way to prove that you’re a good person who abstains from sloth, sin, desire, and over-dependence. 

Capitalism Makes Homelessness Inevitable

In capitalist society, it is often touted that as long as people work hard, they will be safe and provided for. Yet in practice, those who are lowest in the economic hierarchy are treated as expendable and sub-human. Homelessness is inevitable for some because what is valued isn’t actually human rights or including everyone, but money and where it is moving in the market. Construction of low income housing (which is less lucrative) is not prioritized and subject to frequent disruptions and stalemates, such as economic recessions, market fluctuations, war, and ambitious projects that are prioritized more. Available housing simply does not keep up with need. City plans regularly end up treating the poor, unemployed, and homeless as part of the detritus that must be “cleaned up” when they demolish and renovate rundown areas. And orphaned and abandoned teens and young adults, who have no network to lean on help them launch their lives, are often forced into homelessness.

Recently I learned about my city’s long, dark history of failing to respect human rights to be sheltered throughout the 20th century at Écomuseé du Fier Monde. From 1880-1930, Montreal was a hub for manufacture and naval shipping populated by thousands of factory laborers. Machinery was large and dangerous; jobs were grueling, repetitive, high-risk, and poorly remunerated. Housing shortages caused hundreds of factory workers to live on the streets, not an easy thing to survive in a place that is regularly -22F in winter. The city’s program to provide meals and temporary shelter was intentionally designed to inflict shame and desperation. A pioneering union organizer, Albert Saint-Martin, accused the city of seeking out and contributing to the deaths of thousands of lower-class men. 

Homeless and unemployed men eat in a soup kitchen run by Catholic nuns. Nuns were at the forefront of feeding and housing the homeless in Montreal starting in the 1850s. Notice some of the men shield their faces from being photographed. I wish we discussed more in feminist spaces about the shared burdens of shame and worthlessness that both men and women can experience on the job market and when facing financial instability. The psychological and physical burdens on men can be immense due to traditional gender roles. (from the exhibit Place Émilie-Gamelin : 200 ans de cohabitation sociale )

Homeless men sleep in a shelter in Montreal in 1933. Most homeless people were left on the streets as there were never enough beds for all (from the exhibit Place Émilie-Gamelin : 200 ans de cohabitation sociale)

Homelessness only increased throughout the century and was exacerbated by numerous economic recessions in Montreal. As low income housing decayed over time, and large projects needed space, such as a campus for Radio Canada, university buildings, sky scrapers, and hotels, the city again and again demolished apartments in its oldest neighborhoods, evicting waves of thousands of tenants who had nowhere else to go. There were not nearly enough available low-cost housing options or beds in homeless shelters. The problem continues today as several thousands homeless individuals struggle to survive on Montreal’s streets. 

In the museum was a bizarre poster made by a Catholic campaign during the post-WWII era. It asserts that financial security is a matter of personal diligence, which makes the difference between owning one’s own home or renting an apartment and risking eviction. It fails to acknowledge that the moral failings that led to homelessness are societal rather than personal. 

Poster made by a Catholic campaign during the post-WWII era in Quebec. It says “Tomorrow you will create a home. Your choices today will lead you to either prudence (by picture of purchased home) or carelessness (rented row home). 

Mass Incarceration: Profitable and By Design

American society often buys into the same kind of thinking as this Catholic campaign did: safety and success are a matter of personal virtue, merit, and effort rather than communal responsibility. In reality, our economic and social systems are not actually set up to support everybody, and it is those born into the most vulnerable and deprived conditions who get excluded from receiving what they need to obtain stable employment that is enough to live on and being treated with dignity.

Another area where this happens is mass incarceration. We may assume that those in prison are treated justly, and that incarceration is the right thing to do to keep society safe from people who refuse to cooperate with it. But it’s a lot more complex than this. My husband wrote something on Christmas Day 2025 that I can’t stop thinking about: “Mass incarceration and detention are features, not bugs, of late-stage neoliberal capitalism. They manage populations excluded from stable employment by deindustrialization, austerity, racialized labor markets, and global inequality—by removing them from public life and disciplining them through confinement.” In other words, prisons are largely a way to further disempower and control people who are already being denied access to revenue and social status. He also pointed out that prisons are also a sizable industry and revenue stream in and of themselves, which creates incentives for perpetuating these systems as a way to deal with underprivileged and racialized individuals.

There is a popular urban myth that those who plan prisons project the number of cells needed partly by the reading stats coming out of US elementary schools. If kids don’t learn to read by third grade, the narrative goes, they are nearly destined to end up behind bars. While this isn’t literally true, the myth speaks to real horrors created by systems that don’t adequately support youth who are disadvantaged and use incarceration to manage them as they grow up. In essence, we might as well be building future prison cells for underprivileged and racialized eight-year-olds. The resources, funds, and privilege required to attain stable employment simply won’t be there for many of them; those on the top aren’t sharing or create programs and initiative that sufficiently help their plight. This is a reality that is sickening and that should move us to action. The cost of our society’s love of money and preference for free markets is treating the poor abominably.

Work: an Idol and Demon at Church 

Does the LDS Church recognize or speak out against economic systemic brokenness and cruelty in our society regarding the cutthroat job market, unemployment, homelessness, incarceration, etc.? Does it offer adequate relief from the dehumanizing elements of the economic world we have to deal with? 

Not nearly enough. While many of its teachings and scriptures do resist and preach against such evils, the Church is too often a place where the typical earn-your-worth-through-work thinking does active harm.

Volunteer labor is treated as a way to signal faithfulness and worthiness. Fulfilling callings is often not treated as an act of generosity, something appreciated, or a real choice, but rather like a debt we’re paying. Beyond callings there is always more work to do: family history work, temple work, missionary work, cleaning buildings and temples, ministering, paying tithing, and teaching. Church life teaches us to hustle for acceptability and can exacerbate workaholism and neglect of family members. The Church has tried to increase rest for members by cutting community programming; to me this honestly seems to mostly just be a symptom of it buying into late-stage capitalist dissolution of community life. The stripping down of community has left us socially depleted and less connected and motivated to engage, and pushed out if we don’t treat LDS priesthood ordinances as unique and essential. Our energy to serve fizzles out as we no longer have friends or much of anything to look forward to at Church. The Church seems increasingly invested in escaping into the afterlife and not offering little but worthiness/loyalty tickets into heaven.

As Mormons, Gender role distinctions complicate our relationships with work and create pain points. Men face pressures to become single-income earners, a cultural ideal that is unrealistic for the majority of people and devoid of any actual spiritual value. While those men with impressive careers are more likely to receive leadership callings and climb priesthood ladders, most of them are excluded from such privilege. Women are left out of this interplay; we and what we have to offer work-wise is presumed to be inferior both Church and career-wise, which is infuriating. Most women have to figure out full-time work situations while receiving no appreciation at Church for doing so. We are also encouraged on occasions like Mother’s Day to be workaholics in our domestic spheres who are endlessly patient and never tiring–machines that unfailingly produce domestic relief and goodness for others and have no needs ourselves. We are reduced to efficient cogs in the Church’s capitalist-type production line of producing new generations of faithful members.

One of the reasons Mormon women are traditionally discouraged from becoming high earners or professionals is because the Church is enmeshed in capitalist worldviews, and it’s another way to assign minimal power to women in its system. Husbands end up wanting or needing to play too big of a role in steering decisions about the wife’s work situation– whether she should/can go back to school, needs to start a business at home, or when it’s time when she must get a full time job. As a Millennial woman who was discouraged from seeking professional work that could detract from motherhood when I was younger, who was placated in the 90s with assurances like, “if you choose to work part-time someday, it will help you buy a home,” (completely inadequate in today’s economy) and who now finds myself competing with peers who prepared for careers, I feel let down and betrayed by what I was taught in my Mormon circles and at church about women’s labor and careers. While I can appreciate there is meaning in treating family relationships and parenthood as important, the expectations set concerning my work choices were maladaptive in a rapidly changing capitalist economy.

At church we regularly justify and preach meritocracy, which provides moral rationales for inequality on the basis of some people working hard or being more gifted or moral. Luck and unjust privilege typically aren’t acknowledged. Members and local leaders emphasize scriptures such as Jacob 2:17–19, which can be distorted into justifications for accumulating wealth and feeling good about it. We ignore the Book of Mormon’s condemnation of the evils of income inequality. Historically, Americans Mormons haven’t typically criticized corruption in our economic systems; we drank the koolaid and accepted free market capitalism as a righteous path long ago. 

The Church (not the scriptures) teaches that we must rely on ourselves; we are to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. This resonates even more during the era of Trump, who is stripping away social safety nets, DEI programs, and expanding mass incarceration and ICE detainments and deportations–all things a large portion of Latter-day Saints somehow seem to be pleased with.

Assumptions both in and out of church about money and the moral value of work and wealth are at odds with the teachings of Christ. The New Testament is not capitalist. Industriousness and earning social and spiritual safety through labor and/or monetary wealth is contrary to what Jesus teaches. Yet Christianity has already conflated oversimplified free-market thinking with its conceptions of holiness and deservedness for several hundred years, contributing to Christians’ and Mormons’ harmful beliefs about work, money and their moral significance today.

It is as if we pretend that everyone already has what they deserve–as if the world is already sorted into a social hierarchy that is just in God’s eyes. Our meritocratic frameworks ignore how our systems exploit the poor, how hard the poor work, and how unjust the world’s conditions are. A system in which people compete for money, status and luxury at the cost of lower-class people is ultimately shallow, values-poor, and hedonistic rather than spiritual. Meritocracy does not teach the value of compassion or spiritual wisdom, the responsibility to provide for those with disabilities, chronic illnesses, or less access to necessities, or acknowledge there could be other, more ethical ways to structure society than capitalism.

Not the Only Way to Live

In The Employees, a novella by Danish author Olga Ravn, workers on a large space ship are devoted to their jobs and know little else, but exposure to natural objects and artifacts collected from a foreign planet upsets their peace. The employees became unsettled and dissatisfied with their sterile, work-saturated, underdeveloped lives; they long to become truly, fully human and grounded in a more nature-based experience. Some try to cope by spending hours with the natural objects, many become deeply unsettled and mentally ill. I feel a bit like these workers when I’m exposed to other ways of living; I long for life to be freed from the obligation to sell our time and in many cases to spend more time with devices and machines than with people.

In Meritocracy Mingled with Scripture, Justin Pack discusses how hunter gatherer groups’ experience is one of great abundance and freedom. People collaborate and support each other, practicing gifting rather than using monetary systems. There is no debt. No exorbitant thanks, shame, or exacting records of give and take. Instead, the focus is on the collective benefits and plenitude made possible by communal living and sharing resources, as well as compassionately recognizing the humanity of others, and showing respect and welcome. They don’t have that sinking feeling we often do of never doing or being enough. They have enough food. Their needs and wants are met. They have more time than we do for play, rest, and spirituality. This kind of life helps them be in touch with their humanity, nature, and other people. It’s not that they have more stuff than modernized capitalist societies or more conveniences, but that their way of interacting and getting what they needed seems to have been a spiritually richer and more peaceful approach.

Many indigenous communities practice gifting and grace in ways that defy capitalist thinking and practices. Last fall, my spouse attended a large gathering of aboriginal peoples in Auckland, New Zealand. As they welcomed other communities in an opening parade, Māori representatives performed welcome rituals that involved dance, singing, and gift giving, three activities that are of great importance to them. As I watched videos from the event of Māori people offering gifts, showing welcome, and spontaneously standing up to sing at the conference to show appreciation when someone shared something meaningful, I was deeply touched, even teared up. I was filled with a sense that the Māori people are more in touch with how to be human in healthy, expressive, and generous ways that I have simply not experienced myself. I see immense moral beauty in following their traditions of freely giving away handmade items to those who need them, to show welcome, and to strengthen relationships. 

Our Eurocentric approach to work and civilization is not what humans naturally do or the best way to live. What we have isn’t truly inclusive, fair, human, or designed to support the well-being or security of people collectively. The way we are measured and rewarded according to our assets, statuses, and accolades as workers/ employees is dehumanizing and anxiety-provoking. I wish society was more set up for cooperation and harnessing collective synergy instead of competition and (over)consumption, and that we had more freedom as to how we spent our time. Frazer Carroll writes, “How else could labor be organized to ensure that the work did not dictate who lives and who dies? Through a shift towards communal labor, living and wealth distribution, we could lay the foundation to finally disentangle illness from work. We might labor because we wanted to, because we loved one another or because not everyone can. We could create conditions that were self-directed, and conducive to life, joy, safety and connection, rather than suffering and destruction” (Mad World 89).

So What?

What is the value of examining these topics? Is there any point to becoming more aware of these things and more discontent with them?

Learning to critique these things can help us foster more compassion toward our own and others’ struggles to work full time and achieve wellness and satisfaction in the process. And help us detach from beliefs that we must hustle to feel acceptable and worthy.

Examining these problems helps me recognize that I shouldn’t force myself to expend energy that I don’t have to please and accommodate the workplace or the Church. I don’t need to go the extra mile at every turn, or try to force my career into hyperdrive for my life to be fulfilling or to prove that I’m a good person. I don’t need to constantly labor in the Church to feel accepted by God. I know now that the cultures and systems I deal with are deeply flawed and measure my performance in unsatisfying ways. I can set boundaries with them and affirm for myself that I am enough and worthy just as I am. Being average is normal and perfectly fine. My nervous system wasn’t built for constant competition and moving success targets.

Examining these issues also helps me have realistic expectations for my work life: I don’t expect my paid work to be completely satisfying to me, and I don’t believe that my work situations, successes and failures (& Church callings/ status) accurately reflect my talents, intelligence, potential, or what I deserve. Few or none of us, women and men, have the experience of really having the roles and experiences we deserve. We’re all children of God with immense potential, and most of us find our work alienating or anguish-evoking in one way or another. All of us have to deal with injustices that are largely a matter of luck and privilege. Our situations do not actually reveal the truth about who we are, how we measure up, or make us better or worse than others. And the desire to find satisfaction through claiming to be better or more deserving than others proves hollow and destructive.

It can also help us see that not all work is good (or equally good) for people, and that work in and of itself is not a moralizing, worth-granting or magically blessing-producing force. Yes, work is necessary part of life, and can help us learn and grow, but it is not meant to be the idol and demon it has become in our money-centered society or Mormon culture.

Recognizing meritocracy and capitalism as flawed and immoral systems can help us have more compassion for those who are poor, unemployed, and homeless. As I walk around my city each day, I see both the very wealthy and the unsheltered, inadequately clothed, and malnourished. As I recognize systemic and cultural issues and the history of homelessness, I better understand that the homeless and poor do not deserve the deprivation of basic comforts that they suffer from, and that most people spending time in prison deserve something more supportive and caring from society. It fills me with greater love and compassion to recognize distorted and oversimplified assumptions and how systems work against human flourishing in our society.

So much of what I’m exposed to (museum exhibits, books, plays, media in general) spotlights the lives and accomplishments of highly successful, exceptional individuals. While much of this is understandable, it is also exhausting and biased toward the wealthy being who we should pay attention to. I can start feeling like we and our lives don’t matter unless we acquire fame, fortune or outstanding success. Looking at the ugly underbellies of poverty, homelessness, and incarceration is liberating to me. It begs important questions: do we care about the stories, suffering, and lives of ordinary and low-class people? Do we really value dignity and human rights? There is something very spiritual about learning and caring about underprivileged and ordinary lives. Give me a museum exhibit about the history of homelessness like the one I shared photos from above, and I’ll call it spiritual food and revelatory truth. For me, when such histories become a focus in public spaces, it is an antidote to shame and apathy. 

When feminists celebrate work life and career empowerment and what it offers them without criticizing capitalist system’s moral failings and harms, we may come across as less informed and less inclusive than we actually want to be. When we focus primarily on white, North American, middle and upper class sentiments and solutions, our dialogue is limited in scope and audience, as well as moral and spiritual vision. On the blog, we struggle to attract and retain writers of color and international writers partly because of the limited moral weight and resonance of privileged, white North American relationships with the capitalist world.

At times it has been tempting for me to leave spirituality behind and to pursue meaning primarily in the accomplishment-oriented parts of life. My work certainly is a crucial way that I provide for my family, and has potential to be meaningful and personally fulfilling (if I’m lucky and perhaps esp. if I’m privileged). But when I look at the moral problems with capitalism and meritocracy, its clear that external validation in the working world shouldn’t replace the meaning, hope, peace, and transcendence that faith and spirituality can provide. The systems aren’t just marginally flawed or unfair; they are deeply broken. As much as I’m deeply disappointing in the current institutional Church, I value having a faith-based framework for re-examining society. I want to retain my hope that it is possible for our world to receive restorative justice and healing with divine help. Distrusting, criticizing, and resisting capitalist systems helps keep moral meaning and hope bright in my life.

The feature image is courtesy Exponent II’s non-profit Canva resources.

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Posted May 23, 2026 Bymimi

Four years ago I was determined to read the whole Old Testament cover to cover. I was “good” at reading my scriptures and it seemed silly I’d never read the full Old Testament. But my resolve to read it only lasted till mid-Genesis when I read the end of the “Lot’s wife” story. Obviously I’d grown up hearing about Lot’s wife doubting while fleeing her home, turning backward, and then being turned to salt. That story alone is fairly heartbreaking when you stop to think about it: A woman is forced to leave the home she loves because it’s being destroyed and when she merely looks back she’s no longer allowed to live. But I’d been hearing that story since I was a kid, so I guess I’d become a little desensitized to the heartbreak of it.

But it was in the next few verses that I really struggled to continue. Lot’s daughters were living in a cave with their dad when they realized that they had no one to impregnate them. So, they took the noble road by essentially get their dad drunk and raping him in order to get pregnant. I realize I’m 100% judging this story with all the 2026 morals that I have and I should probably be more accepting of their nobility given the time frame. But still, with my (admitted) 2026 ethnocentrism, I couldn’t get through that story without wanting to throw up.

I kept reading the scriptures daily because I’m “supposed to” read the scriptures. That’s how we hear God, right? That’s what I’ve been taught my whole life. So, I’d read – trying to skim over the parts that didn’t resonate with me and focus on just the parts that do. At that time (before I was a regular blogger on this site), I even wrote a guest post about this exact lesson that includes Lot’s daughters – focusing on the parts that resonated (see here). 

But the story of Lot’s daughters seemed to open up a wound inside me that made it difficult to read any scripture without first focusing on all the ways it doesn’t apply to me. The story of Nephi now reads like a cocky man trying to mansplain the world to his unnamed wife and daughters. The story of Ammon reads like a guy willing to do anything (including make a bucket of people’s arms) to get in the good graces of his boss. The story of Abraham almost killing his son reads like a dad trying to cover up his mental health diagnoses with a fantastical story about an angel. The wound opened by the story of Lot’s daughters has only grown deeper.

Intellectually, I know that I am judging all these stories unfairly – using my 2026 moral code. But at some point, I also have to admit to myself that I’m a woman living in 2026 and stories written about men by men thousands of years ago just aren’t that interesting to me. 

Is it possible that reading the scriptures is not the best way for God to talk to me?

Is it possible I could find God elsewhere?

Is it possible that maybe I’m not “supposed to” read the scriptures every day at this point in my life?

Or is this what I’m “supposed to” do, still? Even if it doesn’t resonate. Even if it makes me want to throw up. Even if I feel invisible as I see in the pages God talking to men but rarely mentioning a woman. 

Do you engage in daily scripture reading? If so, what keeps you there?

Have you found other ways to hear God’s word?