Mormon Studies Commons^™

On The Day My Missionary Son Departs, Darlene Young

BYU Studies

. . . seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me —Genesis 22:12

This poem was a finalist in the 2024 BYU Studies Poetry Contest.

Ward Choir, John Alba Cutler

BYU Studies

We brought no gold to make an offering, no goat, no lamb, no blood on the lintel— only voices.

Same Purpose, New Approach: A Case Study Of The North Dakota Bismarck Mission Using Social Media During Covid-19, Scott L. Howell

Faculty Publications

This is the story of how one mission in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Church) adapted its approach, but not its purpose, to invite all to come unto Jesus Christ during the first 16 months of the COVID-19 pandemic (March 2020 to July 2021). The North Dakota Bismarck Mission (NDBM hereafter) covers all or parts of the states of North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Montana, and Nebraska, and, like the other 404 missions¹ throughout the world, traditional approaches to missionary work were significantly disrupted by the effects of COVID-19. No longer were missionaries able to find and …

Constructing A Religious Paradox: The Nauvoo Temple, 1841-1846, Justin R. Bates

Montview Journal of Research & Scholarship

While still in poverty and fleeing heavy persecution in 1841, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints committed themselves to an unexpected architectural endeavor. They decided to construct a temple to their God in their newly christened frontier city of Nauvoo, Illinois. What motivated these poor, homeless, persecuted Christians to start construction on such an ambitious project? Though they were being driven from the state, were about to lose the Temple, and had just lost their alleged prophet, they still chose to finish it. Despite significant financial and social challenges, the Latter-day Saints chose to build the …

Los Artículos De Fe: De La Iglesia De Jesucristo De Los Santos De Los Últimos Días, Joseph Smith, Vanja Y. Watkins, Marvin K. Gardner, María Marta Molina De Monterroso, John C. Leavitt

Books

No abstract provided.

Mormon-Ish: Negotiating Religious Ambivalence Online, Kristen Tobey

2022 Faculty Bibliography

Reporting on responses from a survey of disaffected Mormons who utilize internet resources to manage feelings of distance from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, this article explores the production of religious ambivalence online, arguing that ambivalence is not a default position for those too passive or afraid to leave, nor is it a failure of decisiveness or commitment. Rather, it is a produced religious mode that depends on robust socialization mechanisms to result in a strong sense of personal and collective identity. The online context enables, and indeed requires, an operationalization of religious ambivalence as both a …

The Sticks Of Judah And Joseph: Reflections On Defending The Kingdom, Joseph M. Spencer

Faculty Publications

I wish to pursue two tasks simultaneously in this essay. First, in line with its title, I will address a very old matter of interpretation. I aim to explain as definitively as possible how to make sense of the relationship between Ezekiel 37:15–19, with its talk of the sticks of Judah and Joseph, and the claims of the Restoration, which include somehow connecting the stick of Joseph to the Book of Mormon. Second, in line with the subtitle of this essay, I wish to draw a crucial lesson from the history of how Latter-day Saints have dealt with this issue …

Salt, Smurthwaite, And Smith: The Origins Of The Modern Legal Identity Of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints, Nathan B. Oman

Faculty Publications

In 2019 there existed a legal entity known as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This fact will likely strike most readers as unexceptional. More interesting, however, prior to 2019 there had been no such legal entity as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for over 150 years, the last of that name likely having been disincorporated in 1862. Even more strangely, although there were millions of people around the globe who identified themselves as Latter-day Saints, in 2019 the only member of the legal entity known as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints …

Civil Disobedience In Latter-Day Saint Thought, Nathan B. Oman

Faculty Publications

The twelfth article of faith declares, “We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law” (A of F 1:12). On its face, this statement seems to be an unqualified acceptance of legal authority, one that would suggest that Latter-day Saints ought to shun civil disobedience. However, a closer look at Restoration scripture, teachings, and experience reveals a more complicated picture. To be sure, law-abidingness has long been central to the Saints’ identity, particularly in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and like the New Testament, Restoration scripture generally accepts the need to …

Early Latter-Day Saint Missionary Training At The Church Academies, 1883-1925, Rebecca A. Wiederhold

Faculty Publications

View presentation recording here: https://youtu.be/tohMNqlwKhA?t=1366

As the American and European educational landscape progressed toward the end of the 19th century, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began to recognize that proselyting missionaries who “were taken from the plow, the anvil, the shoemaker’s shop and carpenter’s bench” would need general education in order to “keep pace ... with the rest of the world.” To address this emerging need, a training program was developed at Brigham Young Academy in Provo, Utah, to prepare Church members for missionary service through general education and courses on church doctrine. Many of the other …

Lay Latitude: Latter-Day Saint Women's Agency In Northwest Arkansas, Andrew Tompkins

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The question of women’s agency in gender-traditional religions has been the subject of much scholarly attention over the past four decades, but little research has been done focusing specifically on Latter-day Saint women and their identities and roles within the structure and practice of the Church. In popular media representations, Latter-Day Saint women are often depicted as submissive or surviving, either powerless pawns or resistant warriors. However, many Latter-day Saint women find fulfillment and empowerment within and because of, rather than outside or in spite of, the institutional Church. In this thesis, I explore women’s agency in Northwest Arkansas’ Greendale …

Early Missionary Training At Brigham Young Academy And Byu, Rebecca A. Wiederhold

Faculty Publications

Early missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were expected to prepare themselves for missionary work by gaining their own scriptural understanding and knowledge of gospel doctrine. As the Church grew, schools were founded in the latter half of the 19^th century. Some of the pre-cursors to the Missionary Training Center (MTC) as we know it today were administered by Brigham Young Academy and later Brigham Young University. This exhibit details missionary training efforts here from the 1880s through the 1920s, when the Salt Lake Mission Home was established.

The Use Of Gethsemane By Church Leaders, 1859–2018, John Hilton Iii, Joshua P. Barringer

Faculty Publications

Many commentators have noted that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (herein referred to as “the Church”) has a distinctive focus on Gethsemane.1 For example, Douglas J. Davies has written that the “LDS interpretation of Christ’s garden experience involves a most interesting relocation of the act of atonement within Christian theological accounts that have, traditionally, seen the cross as the prime site of assuming human sin”2 and that “Mormonism relocates the centre of gravity of Christ’s passion in Gethsemane rather than upon the cross and Calvary.”3

The Book Of Mormon In American Missions At The Turn Of The Twentieth Century, John C. Thomas

Religious Educator: Perspectives on the Restored Gospel

Historians describe the opening decades of the twentieth century as a challenging time of transition for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The Manifesto on plural marriage in 1890 and the successful bid for Utah’s statehood in 1896 pointed toward rapprochement with American culture. But in an era of potential assimilation, tensions lingered as Mormons labored to “translate the things America demanded of them into the language and imperatives of their own faith.” Thomas G. Alexander observed that ongoing controversy in the era prompted Church leaders to search for “a new paradigm that would save essential characteristics of …

The Law...Could Not Be Kept Here: Consecration In Nauvoo, 1840-1842, Mitchell K. Schaefer

Student Works

Since the earliest days of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints there has been an ongoing discussion on the law of consecration and stewardship, the Church's earliest attempt to establish what Joseph Smith's revelations called Zion, a society unified in heart and mind and void of both poverty and materialism. Within a decade of Joseph Smith's death Orson Pratt, and other Church leaders, taught said doctrine as though Joseph had revoked or rescinded the law sometime in the 1830s and that it was no longer necessary for the Saints to practice the principles contained therein. This ideology has …

Descriptions Of Old Laie, 1871-1921, Riley Moffat

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

Along with the few photographs of La’ie during the early plantation era from about 1865 to 1920, several people made verbal sketches of La’ie. La’ie and Hawai’i always have been considered exotic, and before photographs were common in newspapers, magazines and books, a verbal description was a highly developed means of sharing with readers what a place was like. It was meant to help a reader visualize a place the way we now use photographic images. We’ve all heard that a picture is worth a thousand words; here follows some examples of people using words in the place of a …

The Branch At Nanakuli, Ross Moody

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

Brother Low reports, "A jack hammer was necessary to dig footing the entire length of the building except the spot where the baptismal font was designed in the plans. Considerable time and effort was spent trying to get me to relocate the building in another location rather than the one chosen by the authorities, but I refused to change the plan. Consequently, the excavating for the font was carried on by two sisters and was accomplished with ease."

The Lds Church In Waianae From A Bishop, A Stake President, And A Patriach's Point Of View, Reuben Paet

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

June 30, 1935--Oahu Stake Organized Nanakuli Branch became a branch in the newly organized stake with Joseph K. Kauhi as Branch President.

Walter Spalding And The Building Of The Laie Temple, Riley Moffat, Max Moody, Lloyd Walsh

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

Ross Moody alerted me to an interview his father, Max Moody, temple president from 1978 to 1982, recorded with Walter Spalding of the Spalding Construction Company after a dinner party at the home of Max Moody in Kahala with Hawai‘i temple president Lloyd Walch on the evening of May 28, 1973.

A Bishop's Experience In The Nanakuli Branch And The Waianae Ward, Joseph Allen

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

I arrived in Hawaii in 1957 to teach at Waianae High School. Soon after, I was introduced to the members of the Nanakuli Branch. At this time, Sam Alama was the Branch President with Ash Tun Soon as a counselor, James Chong and Bill Keiki were clerks.

A Visual Tour Of Oahu’S Chapels Of Yesteryear, Riley Moffat

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

Andrew Jenson was Assistant Historian of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for many years. He was born in 1850 in Damgren, Denmark. The family joined the Church in 1854 and emigrated to Utah in 1866, settling in Pleasant Grove. After a mission back to Denmark Andrew become interested in publishing material about the history of the Church. He began his Church service in 1888 by throughout the Eastern U.S. collecting material on Church history.

History Of The Laie 1st Ward, Lorene Pukahi, Harold Pukahi

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

Directories of Laie LDS wards.

History Of The Laie 2nd Ward, Jay Wrathal

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

Portraits of Bishops of the Laie 2nd Ward

Closing The Church College Of New Zealand: A Case Study In International Church Education Policy, Scott C. Esplin

Mormon Pacific Historical Society

“It is the policy and practice of the Church,” observed the Church News, “to discontinue operation of such [Church] schools when local school systems are able to provide quality education.” Thus the difficult decision was announced on June 29, 2006, to close the Church College of New Zealand by November 2009. The pronouncement and even the very words chosen to convey it place the decision in the historical context of Latter-day Saint education. This policy regarding Church school closures was established over nine decades ago, and the practice has been consistently applied worldwide since. Church education in the Pacific, …

Mormon Media History Timeline: 1827-2007, Sherry Baker

Faculty Publications

This timeline is a work in progress. It is posted currently as a PDF file in order to make it available in a timely manner to scholars who are working on Mormon media history, or any other scholarship for which it might be helpful and informative. It is anticipated that the timeline eventually will be reworked into media formats that will make it more accessible, and that will allow it to be updated, enhanced, and corrected over time. If you wish to comment upon this Mormon Media History Timeline, contact Sherry Baker at [email protected].

Memoirs Of The Relief Society In Japan, 1951-1991, Yanagida Toshiko

BYU Studies

My poems are my tears,

as my eyes are moistened at once

in joy and in sorrow.

—Yanagida Toshiko

“The Scriptures Is A Fulfilling”: Sally Parker's Weave, Janiece L. Johnson

BYU Studies

Sally Bradford Parker is not a name most LDS Church members recognize, but her faith, exemplified through the letter featured below, weaves an important fabric distinctive to early Latter-day Saint women. The limited number of known early Mormon women's voices, especially prior to the organization of the Relief Society in 1842, makes this document particularly valuable. As Sally shares her experience, she augments and supports the testimony of Hyrum Smith as a Book of Mormon witness and particularly the witness of another woman—the Prophet's mother, Lucy Mack Smith. When Sally arrived in Kirtland she was in awe of the many …

A Study Of The For The Strength Of Youth Pamphlet, Jared A. Jepson

Theses and Dissertations

This study is an examination of changes in the various editions of the For the Strength of Youth pamphlet, an outline of standards and expectations for the youth of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Over the course of the past forty years, eight editions of the pamphlet have been printed. The first edition was published in 1965 and the most recent publication was in 2001.

The study revealed that significant changes have been made in the various editions. The initial six pamphlets, which were published from 1965-1972, focused on social behavior of the youth such as dress …

Early Mormon And Shaker Visions Of Sanctified Community, J. Spencer Fluhman

BYU Studies

Polly Knight's health was failing as she and her family trudged toward western Missouri. Having accepted Joseph Smith Jr. as God's prophet on earth, the Knights left heir Colesville, New York, farm and joined with other Mormon converts at Kirtland, Ohio, in 1831. Finding a brief respite there, they again set out, this time for the city of "Zion" that Joseph Smith said they would help build in Jackson County, Missouri. Worried that Polly was too ill to complete the trek, her family considered stopping in hopes she might recover. But "she would not consent to stop traveling," recalled her …

The Lost Commandment: The Sacred Rites Of Hospitality, Peter J. Sorensen

BYU Studies

Also when a stranger came into their cities and brought goods which he had purchased with a view to dispose of there, the people of these cities would assemble, men, women and children, young and old, and go to the man and take his goods by force, giving a little to each man until there was an end to all the goods of the owner which he had brought into the land. (Sepher Ha-Yashar 18:16)