Volume 18, No. 3

Fall 1985

The Fall 1985 Issue delves into the complex relationship between LDS women and the concept of priesthood, examining scriptural, historical, and personal dimensions. Melodie Moench Charles discusses scriptural precedents for priesthood, while Linda King Newell explores the historical ties between Mormon women and priesthood authority. Meg Wheatley-Pesci proposes an expanded definition of priesthood and reflects on its current and future implications. Richard S. Van Wagoner provides insight into Mormon polyandry during the Nauvoo period, and Kahlile Mehr analyzes women's responses to plural marriage, highlighting the challenges faced by women in polygamous relationships. Jessie L. Embry and Martha S. Bradley explore the dynamics between mothers and daughters within polygamous families and share their perspectives on the experiences of these women. And much more!

Articles/Essays

LDS Women and Priesthood: Scriptural Precedents for Priesthood

Melodie Moench Charles

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 15–20
I have heard many LDS women approach the issue of women and the priesthood by protesting that they do not want to hold the priesthood because they have no interest in passing the sacrament or performing some other ecclesiastical duty. I will venture a guess that many men who have the priesthood do not particularly want to hold it either, and that some of them also have no interest in passing the sacrament. But the reluctance of some men would hardly be a good reason to prevent all men from holding the priesthood.

LDS Women and Priesthood: The Historical Relationship of Mormon Women and Priesthood

Linda King Newell

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 21–32
While an examination of that history leaves unanswered the question of women’s ordination to the priesthood, the historical overview of LDS women’s relationship to priesthood suggests a more expansive view than many members now hold.

LDS Women and Priesthood: An Expanded Definition of Priesthood: Some Present and Future Consequences

Margaret Wheatley

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 35–42
In seeking to predict what might occur in the Church if priesthood were extended to women, it is helpful to focus attention on some of these organizational dynamics.

Government-Sponsored Prayer in the Classroom

Robert Riggs

During its 1984 session the United States Senate fell eleven votes short of the two-thirds majority required to endorse a constitutional amendment allowing government-sponsored prayers in public schools (S. J. Res. 1983). This was the…

Mormon Polyandry in Nauvoo

Richard Van Wagoner

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 67–83
Van Wagoner defines polyandry as having two or more husbands at the same time. He identifies women who ended up marrying members of the Twelve or Joseph Smith while they were were already married to their own husband

Women’s Response to Plural Marriage

Kahlile Mehr

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 84–98
Mehr shares stories of polygamy in late 19th century and early 20th century. He especially focused on LDS women’s opinions of polygamy when they entered into polygamous relationsips.

Mothers and Daughters in Polygamy

Jessie L. Embry and Martha Sonntag Bradley

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 99–107
An analysis of what the individual wives’ roles are in the 19th century among plural marriages. Embry and Bradley make the argument that the daughters in a polygamous relationship pay attention to how their own mom is doing, which determines whether or not when they are older they enter into a polygamous relationship.

Exiles for the Principle: LDS Polygamy in Canada

Jessie L. Embry

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 108–116
Embry describes the role that polygamy played in the forming of Cardston Canada, both Pre-Manifesto and Post Manifesto.

The Black Door

Patricia Hart

Hyrum Black had three wives. All of the people up and down Tudor Avenue knew that. In fact, I suppose all of the people in Salt Lake City knew that there were polygamists among us,…

The Only Divinely Authorized Plan for Financial Success in This Life or the Next

Neal Chandler

Thelm, the man is standing in his own way. If only he would get the vision of this thing. . . . See the potential, the tremendous opportunities. If he’d just drop those skeptical blinders…

Letters to the Editor

Soul-Making, or Is There Life Before Death?

U. Carlisle Hunsaker

This not existing is despicable.” Such was the outcry of a man who i came to the painful realization that he was so immersed in and ab sorbed by a field of forces and influences…

Reflections on the Restoration

Lowell Bennion

The world’s living religions began with the lives and teachings of charismatic leaders such as Moses, Buddha, Confucius, Jesus, and Muham mad. Each won a following by the force of his character, the witness of…

One Year

Margaret R. Munk

The scene was written
In advance,
Rehearsed as often
As the days of waiting
Would allow.

Lightning Barbs

Marden J. Clark

I’d ridden this way a hundred times,
Up Monday Town along the fence
Dividing wheat from perennial sage
Herding cattle to summer grazing

In Silence She Speaks | Susan Evans McCloud, Not in Vain

Carolynne Cecil Berrett

Dr. Ellis Reynolds Shipp closed her un published autobiography with the words, “Great minds are they who suffered not in vain. . . . I do not feel my spirit great, but oh, I have…

Faithful History | Milton V. Backman, Jr., The Heavens Resound: A History of the Latter-day Saints in Ohio, 1830-1839

William D. Russell

Milton Backman, a professor of Church history and doctrine at Brigham Young University, has written a history of Mormon ism in Ohio in the 1830s. He appears to have consulted virtually all of the primary…

Fast and Loose Freemasonry | Mervin B. Hogan, Mormonism and Freemasonry: The Illinois Episode, and Mervin B. Hogan, The Involvement of Freemasonry with Mormonism on the American Midwestern Frontier

Kent Walgren

Mervin B. Hogan, a prolific expositor on the subject of Mormonism and Freemasonry, is apparently gaining some reputation among Mormons and Freemasons alike for “impeccable” and “peerless” scholar ship. (See Jerry Marsengill, Introduction, The Official…

Volume 18, No. 3

Contents

Articles/Essays

LDS Women and Priesthood: Scriptural Precedents for Priesthood

LDS Women and Priesthood: The Historical Relationship of Mormon Women and Priesthood

LDS Women and Priesthood: An Expanded Definition of Priesthood: Some Present and Future Consequences

Government-Sponsored Prayer in the Classroom

Mormon Polyandry in Nauvoo

Women’s Response to Plural Marriage

Mothers and Daughters in Polygamy

Exiles for the Principle: LDS Polygamy in Canada

Fiction

The Black Door

The Only Divinely Authorized Plan for Financial Success in This Life or the Next

Letters to the Editor

Letters to the Editor

Personal Voices

Soul-Making, or Is There Life Before Death?

Reflections on the Restoration

Poetry

One Year

Lightning Barbs

Reviews

In Silence She Speaks | Susan Evans McCloud, Not in Vain

Faithful History | Milton V. Backman, Jr., The Heavens Resound: A History of the Latter-day Saints in Ohio, 1830-1839

Fast and Loose Freemasonry | Mervin B. Hogan, Mormonism and Freemasonry: The Illinois Episode, and Mervin B. Hogan, The Involvement of Freemasonry with Mormonism on the American Midwestern Frontier