Volume 23, No. 4

Winter 1990

The Winter 1990 Issue examines diverse theological, social, and personal issues within and around the Mormon Church. Blake T. Ostler explores the concept of grace in Christian theology, while Velia Neil Evans advocates for the rights of Mormon women to engage in wage work. Eugene England reflects on masculinity in the context of the Melchizedek priesthood, and Lavina Fielding Anderson critiques structural inequities in religious practice. Michael W. Homer delves into Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s involvement with spiritualism and its connection to emerging religious movements. Marge Whitman shares insights on coping with cancer, emphasizing the need for support amidst fear and suffering. In the "Personal Voices" section, Todd Marley offers a Christmas reflection, and David L. Wright’s fictional piece, "Of Pleasures and Palaces," explores themes of fulfillment and human experience.

Articles/Essays

The Concept of Grace in Christian Thought

Blake T. Ostler

Mormon Women and the Right to Wage Work

Vella Neil Evans

Dialogue 23.4 (Winter 1990): 47–82
In this essay, I will analyze recent Church discourse against a pattern of constricting employment options for women and will discuss the implications of that pattern.

On Being Male and Melchizedek

Eugene England

The Grammar of Inequity

Lavina Fielding Anderson

Dialogue 23.4 (Winter 1990): 83–96
This essay explores some of the strengths of deliberately choosing
to relate to our world with gender-inclusive language in three areas

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: Spiritualism and “New Religions”

Michael W. Homer

Cancer: Fear, Suffering, and the Need for Support

Marge Whitman

Of Pleasures and Palaces

David L. Wrights

(1961) I sat waiting in the downstairs living room in the “House of Happiness” where only a correct, efficient, middle-aged nurse interrupted a grueling aura of lost wills, defeated pluck. The inmates, whose residence in…

“That Is the Handwriting of Abraham”

Milan D. Smith Jr.

In his stimulating article “Knowing Brother Joseph Again: The Book of Abraham and Joseph Smith as Translator” (Dialogue, Winter 1989), Karl Sandberg seeks to explain the Prophet Joseph Smith’s translation of the Book of Abraham almost exclusively in terms of seership (where one does not necessarily actually view the material...

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