It was held by the stake high council, and so my bishop and ward members took the position that that was their doing. I had a spiritual prompting that summer staying at my cabin that I wasn't to go. A year later, David J. McLean, president of the Salt Lake Liberty Stake, reconvened a high council, a body that had excommunicated her 25 years and six months earlier for apostasy, Anderson wrote in a summary of her experience for a forthcoming volume of her essays, Mercy Without End: Toward a More Inclusive Church.. The Mormon church holds two different kinds of disciplinary councils: a more elaborate process that is often reserved for those who hold the Melchizedek priesthoodgenerally speaking, all devout adult menand a simpler process mostly used for those who dontmeaning women and men who have not advanced far in the church. More painfully, as a high councilor in a Utah stake several years later, Quinn was part of courts prompted by personal sinsuch as engaging in homosexual acts. (KUTV) Peggy Fletcher Stack is the religion writer for the The Salt Lake Tribune.It's the best beat on the paper, she said.Stack fell into the job when she was hired in 1991.I have no degree in . During the hiring process, a college dean offered to protect him, Quinn says, from those peoplethe LDS leadersup in Salt Lake., Before he could be hired, though, he had to visit LDS headquarters at 47 East South Temple in downtown Salt Lake and sit for an interview with one of those peoplespecifically, a general authority, one of the 100 or so men who run the church. These dangers, Packer said, were the relatively new feminist and gay-lesbian movements, and the ever-present challenge from the so-called scholars or intellectuals.. Some, perhaps, simply regretted the bad press. [14] Along with five other reporters, she won a Pulitzer Prize in 2017 in the Local Reporting category for a series of stories about sexual assault victims at BYU. The meaning of EXCOMMUNICATION is an ecclesiastical censure depriving a person of the rights of church membership. 9:30AM EDT 8/29/2017 Peggy Fletcher Stack/RNS. Would love to hear your stories about her. Excommunication is a complicated and multi-layered process for sexual minorities in the church who choose to marry in a way that the church considers a "same sex" marriage. Hired in 1991 to cover Utah's various faiths, particularly Mormonism, Peggy has talked forgiveness with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, nearly fainted waiting for the Dalai Lama, fasted with Muslims during Ramadan and has reported on 50 consecutive semiannual LDS General Conferences. While Packers precise involvement remains a matter of dispute, what little is known hints at his interference. Though the letter from the current First Presidency made up of church President Russell M. Nelson and counselors Dallin H. Oaks and Henry B. Eyring offered no explanation for the rejection, Bowman speculates that there may be at least two possible answers history and dissent. [3][4][5] She was raised as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), with her father traveling and speaking as a member of the stake high council. (There is no conclusive evidence it took place, Quinn writes, but he does not dismiss the idea of one outright.) In the quarter-century since her ouster, Anderson consistently has attended weekly services at her Latter-day Saint congregation, the Whittier Ward. or. That was my decision. Later that evening, having dinner alone, he felt a new sense of relief about what had happened so far and what he believed was about to happen. The essay, Mormon Women Have Had the Priesthood Since 1843, cites writings by Joseph Smith and other early church documents to argue that women already possess much of the spiritual authority granted to men, and that todays LDS leaders simply fail to recognize this. He was in a wheelchair. Following the wave of media attention that greeted the September excommunications, the First Presidency defended what had taken place. [5] She then attended the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California for two years, where she studied religious history. Quinn, who later assisted the police in their investigation, did not go home for several days. This was almost certainly wrong: Romney has plenty of LDS critics, most notably Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Many religions have strictures that establish who is in and who is out, but the Mormon church draws a brighter line than most. If Peggy wanted to do some groundbreaking . Peggy Fletcher-Stack. Dated Oct. 23, 1830, the letter was addressed to an early Mormon convert named W.W. Phelps and signed Martin Harris. One of the articles came from an anthology called Women and Authority: Re-Emerging Mormon Feminism, edited by Maxine Hanks, a distant relative of Pauland his uncle Marionand, soon, one of the September Six herself. I always felt that I had Gods sanction and encouragement, so I went ahead following that path. Even early on, a fellow Mormon historian started telling Quinn he must have a death wish regarding his membership in the church. She and five other journalists at the Salt Lake Tribune won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting. Mormons devote one sacrament meeting each month to personal testimonies, and Quinn was sure this would be his last opportunity to offer his in church. The accused is called in, another prayer is offered, and the court proceeds. By Peggy Fletcher Stack. Peggy Fletcher Fletcher (Peggy Bennett Fletcher) See Photos. Believers in Denver Snuffer's Remnant movement gather in a Sandy, Utah, home for a fellowship meeting on Aug. 13, 2017, to sing songs and partake of the sacrament. [5], In 1975, following discussions with Scott Kenney and others, she helped found Sunstone, an independent magazine of Mormon studies. Hired in 1991 to cover Utah's various faiths, particularly Mormonism, Peggy has talked forgiveness with Archbishop Desmond Tutu . Being treated like an ordinary person is a gift a ward can give. The stake president, who oversees a number of congregations, remained optimistic, she said, zeroing in on the words, at this time., But the writer replied, Theres hope, and then theres experience., Besides, she said, it was a form letter.. The Salt Lake Tribune . "She might be a model for others who have been missing their Mormon community.". [15], Stack wrote a children's book about religion with artist Kathleen B. Petersen, entitled A World of Faith, published in 1998.[4][16]. That came out in early 1993. That, in any case, was his thinking. (They draw numbers to pick sides.) I love Jesus. "All they asked me about was my relationship to Jesus Christ. The Mormon intellectual community far and wide is mourning the loss of Linda King Newell. It is always harder on the loved one who has to stand by and see someone they love being hurt. A view of the Salt Lake Temple outside Olympic Medals Plaza in Salt Lake City, Utah. The other five people who were by then being referred to as the September Six had already faced their courts. He loves cities, and when he lived in New Orleans in the early 90s, he made friends in bars and in an informal group of gay professionals who gathered once a month. I couldn't help but wonder if I, too, would be excommunicated if my concerns were made public. What to him and others that is so threatening is that this [Ordain Women movement] is coming from a very faithful, devout perspective. One of the central questions in the aftermath of Septembers events was just how involved Packer himself had been in them. Quinn was convinced, in any case, that his fate in any disciplinary council was predetermined, that Boyd K. Packer wanted him out of the church and Hanks was going to make it happen. She won the Cornell Award for Excellence in Religion ReportingMid-sized Newspapers from the Religious News Association in 2004, 2012, 2017, 2018, and 2022. Vern Anderson, the AP reporter, wrote an 800-word story about the essay in January, just before Hanks showed up at Quinns apartment. Not long before Hofmann sold that forged document, he approached Quinn in the church archives, and asked about the succession crisis and the article. He has continued to publish articles about Mormon history and to participate in the Sunstone Symposium. He developed a fervent testimony not only that God exists but that God spoke to Joseph Smith face to face and that the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants are, like the Old and New Testaments, divinely inspired. He turned 65 two years later, making him eligible for Social Security and Medicare. . It was a long time coming: Quinn had known he was gay since he was 12 years old. TV and newspaper reporters came. He has occasionally attended other churches. I see her articles on here all the time and the Tribune has never really been a friend to the TSCC. He wrote a short story about two male missionaries in Louisiana who become attracted to each other and are stalked by a religious psychopath. It had been a difficult year. Bad marriages had women running to and away from . I heard she's not Mormon at all. All rights reserved. Quinns religious status wouldofficially, at leastbe decided by his own stake president, not by the higher-ups in Salt Lake City. The LDS archives became more open to scholars than ever before, and Arrington oversaw research and writing by fellow academics and graduate studentsincluding Quinn, then 28, whom he hired as an assistant. Box 15 miles from where he was staying, and in New Orleans he had it delivered to a receiving center a little ways from his apartment. Quinn refused. Her explorations gave Hanks a new level of understanding and "testimony" of Mormonism. Peggy Fletcher was raised in New Jersey, daughter of physicist Robert Chipman Fletcher and Rosemary Bennett, one of five girls and three boys. The main target of the statement, issued in August 1991, was the Sunstone Symposium, an annual gathering started by Sunstone magazine 12 years before. Religion Two decades after she was "exed," Utah writer still attends her LDS ward. West said hed been told by a higher authority to take further action to remedy the situation, Quinn says. After high school, Christian went to Stanford, and we thought, "This may be where we hear bad news." But multiple faculty members argued that, in the words of one professor, Mike was not the right person to head up any kind of Mormon history or Mormonstudies program given the fact hes very publicly excommunicated. Quinn got hate mail. The handbook doesn't say you can't speak in class, just over the pulpit. I have been doing that for 18 years. . I wouldn't give it up, but promised him I wouldn't use it. After Quinn finished his lunch at BYU, he decided not to go home. He said it was apostasy because I believed that general authorities had done something wrong. She has sat quietly in the same pew as the emblems of the sacrament, or communion, have passed by her more than 1,200 times without being able to partake. He got up in front of the congregation and declared his belief in the Mormon gospel, in Joseph Smiths status as a prophet of God, and in the Book of Mormon as divine scripture. We had been home about 20 minutes when two high counselors came to our house and delivered a letter, inviting me to a disciplinary hearing two weeks from that day. Though he maintained a solemn belief in the Mormon gospel and in the sacrament partaken of by the faithful at Sunday services, he stopped attending church altogether. The kindness of my ward members has been really important. I was not surprised or angry about the outcome, Anderson said Wednesday, and she has no plans to try to open that door again. She was also the only one whose disciplinary council was overseen by her bishop, rather than her stake president. Arrington). Peggy fletcher stack excommunicated Denver Snufferpersonalbordenver Carlos Snuffer Jr.Religion (Mormon Independent) Restoration Andsupra-Denominational Christian [1] Nationality Americanhome Townmountain House, Idahochildrensisx Daughters and Two Children [2] Alma Materdaniel Webster Junior Collegemcmurry UniversityBrigham Young University (JD, 1980) That was established definitively in 1986 after Hofmann confessed to the murders of Christensen and Sheets as part of a plea to avoid the death penalty. [4], She won the 2004 Cornell Award for 'Excellence in Religion ReportingMid-sized Newspapers' from the Religion Newswriters Association in 2004, an award she also received in 2012, 2017, and 2018. But Packer certainly said similar things before larger audiences. With his background in education, he became interested in how the church taught its own past, and decided he did not like what was going on at the church historians office. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. The field has grown and appears to have moved on, even though the research that Quinn did, and the fights that he picked, were crucial to what has come in his wake. Quinn studied English literature in collegehe attended BYUbut during his three-year stint in the military he decided to become a historian, and make what had become a consuming pastime into his profession. There are other matters that I need to talk with you about that are not related to your historical writings. When they left, they said, "Have a nice day," to which I replied, "You have just assured that I will not.". Most memorably, Harris says that the spirit who appeared to Smith and directed him to the golden platesfrom which Smith claimed to have translated Mormonisms founding scriptureappeared as a white salamander and struck Smith three times. No telephone call came., On Aug. 27, McLean delivered the First Presidency denial. Her sincere belief in Jesus and determination to follow him no matter the adversity faced within or without the church should be commended, and this good and faithful servant should be rewarded, he wrote. He found me outside and was kind and helpful. Find your friends on Facebook. (These soon-to-be former Mormons were not required to attend.) Ultimately, the events of September 1993 may have helped broaden those borderlands, encouraging other members of the faith to openly question Mormon orthodoxy without entirely leaving the religion behind. She was the editor of Hastings Center Report from 1986 until 1991, when she was hired to start the "Faith" column in the Salt Lake Tribune. That has been a blessing truly fulfilled. Mike Quinn in his Rancho Cucamonga home in California this summer. It was really important to Paul and me that Christian grow up in a religious community, and the church was the one we chose. I attended the Sunstone Symposium this past summer, held on the University of Utah campus, and many people I spoke to there said that as Packers influence has waned, a more tolerant approach to dissent is taking hold. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted. Today, its Nelson, with a new counselor, Oaks, instead of Dieter F. Uchtdorf. Maybe, I suggested, he was trying to bring his full self out into the open. We had stake [regional] conference in September. Robert Kirby does this also, but much more indirectly. Most people don't know I've been excommunicated. (Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) The timing of his career, which once appeared serendipitous, now seems almost cruel. Dear Reader: When I began this series of essays on leadership, I never anticipated the final installment would chronicle recent events that have triggered the biggest spiritual struggle of my life. I didn't have to look at the councilmen and wonder what they said about me. I go over the temple ceremony and the covenants in my mind and remake them before the Lord often. And he based at least one of his forgeries on the work of Michael Quinn. In the first few days after the bombings, several people who had come into contact with Hofmann feared for their lives. Mormonism was as much an identity issue for them as it is for me. Taking the sacrament because it's an exclusion I feel every single week. Quinn wrote back more harshly this time, listing all the things Hanks had done that troubled him. The day before, a similar bomb had killed Steve Christensen, a friend and Mormon history enthusiast who had arranged for Quinn to speak at lunch and dinner engagements, paying him with generous gift cards to his fathers clothing store. Stack has been the lead religion writer for The Salt Lake Tribune since 1991. Woodruff himself said in his journal that he was acting for the temporal salvation of the church, and the 1890 Manifestoas his official statement is knownwas not immediately taken to be a divine revelation. Today, LDS leaders seem more inclined to recognize, said Wotherspoon, now host of the "Mormon Matters" podcast, "that Zion is made up of people of all types. sltrib.com 1996-2023 The Salt Lake Tribune. I just feel such heartache that the church I love is doing this to people who are sincere and trying to find ways of being Mormon and express their love of the gospel. June 17, 2014 8:59 pm . was pressured to resign from Brigham Young University and subsequently excommunicated from the faith in 1993 as part of the famed "September Six . Paul usually sits on the outside of the pew, so when the sacrament comes, he shakes his head toward me so we don't have any socially embarrassing moments. One theory on that first day of panic was that the bombings were connected with the business, an investment company called CFS. There would be quite a number of people in the Mormon community who would look unfavorably on that. Later that year, Quinn was recommended for a one-year appointment at Arizona State. disciplined Anderson and five other Mormon intellectuals, church disciplinary actions threatening Mormon feminist Kate Kelly and blogger John Dehlin. What I heard was that I would be excommunicated and that I shouldn't go. Quinn was so depressed by the experience that for a few weeks he lost his belief in God completely. The church's definition of "membership" includes all persons who were ever baptized, or whose parents were members while the person was under the age of eight (called "members . That night, we went over to our neighbors' house and watched "A Man for All Seasons" and ate popcorn. Peggy Fletcher. Where else would I be but in the church? Quinn was already on the alert for such wrinkles in the churchs history. Peggy Fletcher Stack. In many respects, Andersons affirmations mirror those of other members. There he told a story about the time Packer embarrassed him in front of fellow church leaders as apparent payback for a slight from six years before. Woodwards piece, headlined Apostles vs. Historians, called Quinns talk a stirring defense of intellectual integrity that had put Benson and Packer on the defensive. It was illustrated with a large photograph of Quinn up top, and a considerably smaller one of Packer. The stake president said I was "exed" for apostasy but I didn't really fit the handbook definition. In the early 90s, when he was living in New Orleans, Quinn, nearing his 50th birthday, tried his hand at fiction, going back to the literature he once studied as an undergraduate. He decided he would suppress that part of himself and be a good Mormon. The former LDS stake president, who oversaw a group of congregations in Tooele for eight years and worked as an architect on her faith's most sacred spaces, faced, in her mind, an . The institutional churchs position toward its intellectual community has shifted slowly and subtly but in real ways in the past 30 years; it is possible that there is a worry that allowing for her rebaptism would unearth battles the present First Presidency would like to let lie buried and spur a public relitigation of the issue., Secondly, the controversies surrounding Anderson had a great deal to do with feminism in the church and with ecclesiastical dissent, he said. Every morning he worked there was Christmas morning, Quinn says. Then I went away to my cabin for the summer and he called all the temples in Utah, saying he was canceling my recommend. In order to have her blessings fully restored, she had to meet with a general authority at church headquarters. Packers notion that those writing church history should share only those things that are faith-promoting is not just intellectually offensive nowit has become quaint, the relic of a time when information was not so freely available. Excommunication has played a significant role throughout the churchs history. We had a family devotional every night with prayer, singing and scripture reading. Stack has received and been nominated for multiple awards. c. 2014 Salt Lake Tribune(RNS) The Mormon Church insists that excommunication threats targeting activists Kate Kelly and John Dehlin were generated by their respective LDS leaders in Virginia and northern Utah.Others see the timing as evidence that the two disciplinary hearings are being coordinated from the faith's Salt Lake City headquarters.But this much is certain: If Mormon higher-ups . Hankswhose nephew Paul would show up on Quinns doorstep in 1993was himself a general authority, and he had overseen the two-year Mormon mission Quinn served in England after his freshman year at BYU. He then expressed his gratitude to the church for providing, throughout his life, a vehicle for service. The church declined to comment on the decision. I could imagine the First Presidency thinking that this is not an episode worth revisiting, Bowman wrote in an email. It was the papers second article in two weeks about a series of church courts held across 13 days in September and reported in media outlets across the country. He had, after all, believed for many years that he would someday be a leader of the church, knowing that if this were true he would have to forever suppress an essential part of himself. On March 23, 2018, Andersons husband, Paul, died of heart failure. . There have always been dissidents in the Mormon ranksthe religion itself is one particularly dramatic dissent from the rest of Christian traditionbut a new community of Mormon intellectuals had coalesced in the 1960s and 70s. Using the familiar Christian metaphor of a lost sheep who listens for the one voice that can guide it back home, Oaks said Mormons should beware of alternate voices whose avowed or secret object is to deceive and devour the flock. Among the voices Oaks warned about were the ones heard in magazines, journals, and newspapers and at lectures, symposia, and conferences. At the same General Conference, another apostle said that a true stalwart of the church would not lend his or her good name to periodicals, programs, or forums that feature offenders who do sow discord among brethren. , When the Sunstone Symposium next convened, in the summer of 92, Lavina Fielding Anderson presented a paper on this growing conflict between leaders and intellectuals. Gileadi was not part of the Sunstone and Dialogue circles that the others moved in; he had been writing and teaching popular workshops about biblical and Book of Mormon prophecies, which appear to have been deemed false doctrine by LDS leaders. Hofmann eventually became, in the words of one expert, the most skilled forger this country has ever seen. For LDS leaders nervous about church history, he was a nightmare personified: a lying, murderous man hell-bent on embarrassing the religion while glorifying and enriching himself. The bombings and subsequent murder trial cast a pall over the practice of Mormon history. It took several hoursa vigil was held outside for the first few, with candles and hymns and hot chocolate. . So she met with local and high Mormon leaders and, after several months, they set a baptismal date. From an early age, he felt within himself the presence of God, this burning of the spirit, as he says. As Quinn writes, the Manifesto inherited ambiguity, was created in ambiguity, and produced ambiguity.. But nothing else has driven him to contribute to the lives of others the way the faith in which he was born and raised once did. How have the members of your ward treated you? Or a great one, if possible: Since childhood, Quinn had been told by his grandmother that someday he would be an apostle of the church. . By Peggy Fletcher Stack. The Salt Lake Tribune's Peggy Fletcher Stack, a . Like Robert Kirby, it would be a shit storm to ex her. He makes fun of the church by making fun of himself and stodgy rank and file, as well as cultural absurdities. A member of that sect told Quinn about a since renounced bit of theology once preached by Brigham Young, referred to as the Adam-God doctrine. Youngs notion, roughly speaking, was that God and Adam are one and the same. I felt they were not going to drive me away. But he could no longer go to the temple. Knowing that our Heavenly Parents are both male and female teaches me that our potential as women is limitless. Hanks became less diplomatic. That's like solving obesity by turning MacDonald's into a gym. When his mother died in 2007, she left him the condo. How is she still a practicing member after all this exposure to the truth? She has been visited by all her ward and stake leaders since 1993, she said, but this was the first time anyone had ever proposed it. Then she was accused of apostasy for editing an anthology, Women and Authority: Re-Emerging Mormon Feminism, which included a discussion of the all-male LDS priesthood and women's relationship to it. A candlelight vigil was held outside the Salt Lake City meetinghouse where it took place. In a detailed confession, Hofmann said that he had secretly stopped believing in Mormonism as a teenager and had hatched a plan to embarrass the church by creating fake documents that exposed uncomfortable facts about early Mormon history. Michael Quinns final disciplinary council was held on Sept. 26, 1993, in the Salt Lake Stake Center, the headquarters for the oldest stake in Utah, founded by Brigham Young in 1847. I accuse that committee, England declared, of undermining our Church.. Salt Lake City Laurie Lee Hall was excommunicated from the LDS Church for being a woman. Log in or sign up for Facebook to connect with friends, family and people you know. Packer, the second-most senior among the 12, was the substitute president of the Quorum of the Twelve whenever Hunter was sidelined for medical reasons. Just go to . Two decades ago, Maxine Hanks could not have imagined where her spiritual journey would take her, but she knew this much: She would not likely be walking into the waters of Mormon baptism.
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