With any luck, the fellowships will be repeated in future years, assuming that they successfully lead to dissertations.

The text of the announcement, courtesy Levi Peterson, is as follows:

The Tanner Humanities Center is pleased to announce it has been awarded a grant from the George S. and Dolores Doré Eccles Foundation for $36,000 to establish the Eccles Fellowship in Mormon Studies.  The award has been designated to support two doctoral students in researching and writing their dissertations ($18,000 stipend for each), one in 2009 and one in 2010. This fellowship targets Ph.D. candidates across the United States and the world who are researching the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, its members, and Mormon culture in the fields of History, Anthropology, Sociology, Education, Economics, Business, Political Science, Religion, or Literature. Through publications, work in the classroom, and in public forums, these future academics, writers, and teachers will have an impact on the study of Mormonism and on students and the general population.

This fellowship is the first in the United States and the world to focus specifically on Mormon Studies.  In offering this opportunity at the University of Utah, the Center recognizes the important and unrivaled archival resources for research located in Salt Lake City and Utah.  It also begins to redress the imbalance of opportunities facing those who choose to study Mormonism as opposed to Judaism, Catholicism, or Islam.  This fellowship will also enhance the recent trend that seeks to raise Mormon Studies to a new standard of academic excellence.
For application forms and requirements please visit http://www.thc.utah.edu

As I mentioned on Monday, I received this unexpected and fun email message from Times and Seasons reader Last Lemming after we began selecting the 2008 Mormon of the Year. He had made his own selections for Mormon of the Year for each year since 1950!

I found the list fascinating, an entertaining look at Mormons in history over nearly 60 years, and really quite an impressive bit of work to pull together so much information. Last Lemming describes his criteria as follows:

I have generally followed a no-General-Authorities rule, except for McConkie (who was not acting in his G.A. capacity) and, arguably, Barbara B. Smith.  Otherwise, I was very flexible.  [Those selected] could be classified into three categories: 1) those influencing Mormon culture, 2) those representing Mormonism to the world, and 3) those influencing the broader culture  in ways not necessarily linked to their Mormonism.  I tried to limit [those selected] to people who were active at the time of their cited accomplishment. (Some, like Frank Moss, I would stand by even if he wasn’t really active because his accomplishment was easy to identify with his Mormonism.)

I have used my 20:30 hindsight when [making selections] (I can’t claim 20:20 hindsight when I can’t even fill all of the years).  I have not attempted to guess who might have won had Times and Seasons been around to conduct a vote.  Also, there are a fair number of people who could have won in any number of years.  I generally picked them in a year in which they had some notable accomplishment and little competition.

I did not pick anybody twice, unless their contributions were in different areas.  Thus, I gave George Romney two mentions (one for his business activities and one for his political activities), but gave Mitt Romney only one (nothing he did at Bain qualifies, and I treat his Olympics adventure as the beginning of his political career, not the end of his business career).  With regards to businessmen, I generally cited them for giving away their money, not for earning it.  Marriott is an exception, but the Books-of-Mormon-in-the-rooms phenomenon makes him different.

By posting this list, it is not my intention (nor that of Last Lemming, according to his email message submitting this information) to actually select anyone for these years. Rather, I’m posting this in part as a way for those of us who remember a portion of these people to remember, and for those who don’t to learn, and, undoubtedly, a something to be discussed.

I welcome your comments and suggested alternatives. On this particular portion, mostly before my time, I have a few alternatives to suggest. I’ll make my suggestions in the first comment. I’m sure others of you will have many more suggestions.

Like many of you readers, I have mixed feelings about some of the individuals mentioned here. But I can’t deny that all of them had a significant impact, and therefore could have been, at least in retrospect, Mormon of the Year.

1970:    Frank Moss – for shepherding through Congress (in his capacity as chairman of the Consumer Subcommittee of the Senate Commerce Committee) the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act, which strengthened warning labels on cigarette packs and banned cigarette advertising on radio and television.

1971:    The Osmond Brothers – for reaching #1 on the Billboard singles charts with One Bad Apple, while Donny reached #1 as a solo artist for Go Away Little Girl.

1972:    Jack Anderson – for uncovering the ITT bribery scandal, thereby earning a place on Richard Nixon’s enemies list.

1973:    Lester Bush – for publishing “Mormonism’s Negro Doctrine: An Historical Overview” in Dialogue.

1974:    Douglas Wright & Lex de Azevedo – for getting Saturday’s Warrior staged at BYU, thereby putting it on the Mormon radar screen.
Runner-up: Wayne Owens – for voting for Richard Nixon’s impeachment as a member of the House Judiciary Committee.

1975:    Lowell Bennion – for his humanitarian efforts in Salt Lake County.  (Another lifetime achievement award that fits here because of a lack of competition.)

1976:    Leonard Arrington, James Allen & Glen Leonard – the former for presiding over the Camelot years at the Church Historian’s Office; the latter for publishing The Story of the Latter-day Saints under the auspices of that office, official (but unwarranted) displeasure with which eventually led to the demise of Camelot.

1977:    Barbara B. Smith and Sonia Johnson – the former (who was the General Relief Society President) for instigating the Church’s opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment, leading to this year’s IWY Conference fiasco; the latter for organizing support for the same, leading to her eventual excommunication.
Runner-up: Donna Hill – for publishing Joseph Smith: The First Mormon.

1978:    Joseph Freeman – for being the first person of African heritage to be ordained to the priesthood after the revelation announced in Official Declaration #2.
Runner-up: Glen Larsen – for introducing “Kobol” to the world through Battlestar Gallactica.

1979:    Jack Welch – for founding FARMS.
Runner-up: Sam Battistone – for moving the Jazz to Salt Lake.

1980:    Paula Hawkins – for being the first Mormon woman and the first Mormon of either sex from east of the Rockies (in her case, Florida) to be elected to the U.S. Senate.

1981:    Rex E. Lee – for becoming Solicitor General of the United States, in which capacity he would argue 30 cases before the Supreme Court, winning 23 of them.

1982:     William deVries and Barney Clark – the former for performing (at the University of Utah) the first artificial heart implantation; the latter for receiving said heart.
Runner-up: Jake Garn – for shepherding through Congress (in his capacity as Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee) the deregulation of the savings & loan industry, thereby facilitating the crisis of 1989 and subsequent federal bailout.

1983:    Dale Murphy – for winning his second of two National League MVP awards.

1984:    LaVell Edwards – for coaching BYU to a national championship in football.
Runners-up: Valeen Tippets Avery & Linda King Newell – for publishing Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith.
Peter Vidmar – for winning multiple medals (including an individual gold and a team gold) in gymnastics at the Summer Olympics.

1985:    Sharlene Wells – for winning the Miss America pageant immediately after the Vanessa Williams scandal.
Runners-up: Mark Hoffman – for achieving notoriety as a forger of historical documents and a murderer.
Jake Garn – for being the first Mormon and the first member of Congress to fly in space, where he established a new standard for motion sickness (which is now measured in fractions of a Garn).

1986:    Orson Scott Card – for winning the Hugo Award for Ender’s Game and the Nebula Award for Speaker for the Dead.

1987:    Carol Lynn Pearson – for publishing Goodbye, I Love You.  (This is more of a lifetime achievement thing, as this book alone probably doesn’t merit the award).

1988:    Evan Mecham – for being impeached as Governor of Arizona.

1989:    Steven R. Covey – for publishing The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People. (He would be a plausible winner in any year between 1989 and 1996, when he was named one of the 25 Most Influential People by Time magazine, but 1989 seemed to offer the least competition.)

Call for Papers: “Upon All Nations – Religious Pluralism”

The Society for Mormon Philosophy and Theology invites papers on any aspect of Mormon belief, including its philosophical ramifications. We particularly encourage submissions on this year’s theme.

While claiming exclusive authority, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints also takes a strikingly inclusive view of other religious traditions as loci of revealed truth and of God’s work. For example, in 2 Nephi 29:7 God says, “I bring forth my word unto the children of men, yea, even upon all nations of the earth.” We will explore the contours and implications of distinctively Mormon views of pluralism, as well as the particular questions for pluralism raised by the LDS church.

Possible topics falling under this theme include:

• The Holy Spirit’s work in differing spiritual traditions
• Cooperation between religious groups
• Interreligious dialogue
• The place of pluralism within the church
• Missionary work and respect for other faiths
• Differences in teaching and/or practice within or among distinct historical dispensations (e.g. Adamic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, Lehitic)
• The relationship of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to other Christian denominations
• Comparative theology
• Analysis of LDS texts on religious pluralism—e.g. Jacob 5, 2 Nephi 29, and Alma 29
• Implications of continuing revelation for religious pluralism
• The role of religion in public life

Authors may submit either (a) a full paper, or (b) a précis:

(a) Papers should be suitable for a reading time of 25–30 minutes (3500 words maximum). Longer papers may be submitted in full, with the understanding that they will be revised for presentation.
(b) A précis should be about 1000 words in length, and summarize the argument of the paper.

Please send submissions by email attachment in RTF, PDF, or MS Word format to Benjamin Huff at BENJAMINHUFF@RMC.EDU. Include author’s full name, contact information, title, and word count for the paper or précis.

The Society welcomes submissions by students. At least one program slot is set aside for an outstanding student paper. Students should indicate student status.

Submission deadline: 13 February 2009
Authors will be notified of acceptance by 5 March 2009

The call is also listed on the SMPT website, with a link to a
printable flyer in PDF.

To be kept up to date on announcements of other conferences and calls for papers like this, or to publicize your Mormon Studies event, visit MormonConferences.org.

Speaking personally, I attended three and a half years of release time seminary and half a year of early morning, and there was a marked difference. Now I had some great release time seminary teachers who were certainly better-trained than the ward member who was called to teach my early morning class, but I probably absorbed more from that semester of getting up at 5:45am than I did in all of my other seminary classes combined. If I were to pin-point a reason, I’d say it was probably because I was more invested in it. My attendance was more consistent as there was less of a temptation to skip (I did benefit from a mom who ensured I got there in the morning though). I participated a lot more (for me it was harder to blow off a ward member than some seminary teacher). It also just felt more spiritual. I’ve thought a lot about why that is and think it could be for a number of reasons. First, it was first thing in the morning before my mind drifted on to the million other distractions that make up high school. Second, it was at our chapel, which just felt more like Church than the seminary building a stone’s throw from school. Third, the class was smaller and more intimate. I knew the teacher and kids who attended well and worshiped with them week in and week out. I think the end result was an environment where I felt more spiritually stimulated. Had you asked me at the time, I would have said I preferred release time seminary, but this was because it demanded so much less from me. I didn’t have to wake up in the morning. I didn’t know those I attended with as well and could disappear into the crowd more easily. By the time I usually had seminary, I was so wrapped up in what was going on at school that day that it was a challenge to jump into the scriptures (and then head right back to school). Ultimately, instead of an hour or so of spiritual study, I think I ended up seeing it more as a gimmie period that was just a break from school.

Which brings me back to the letter. It seems to see the prospect of losing the fight in this Idaho school district as a slippery slope that could lead to the elimination of release time everywhere. Given my experience at seminary, I guess I have a hard time not saying “so what?” Am I alone here?

Dear Parents,

As many of you know the State of Idaho Board of Education has increased some of the requirements needed for graduation effective 2009-2010 school year for the class of 2013. As a result of this decision District 91 feels it necessary to modify the school schedule for the students in order to allow them more class time to master the subjects and be prepared to move on to higher education. A committee was formed called the ‘steering committee’ to study various schedules and make a proposal to the District Board of Education in January 2009 for their vote. Five different versions were proposed but emphasis has been placed, by the committee, on one which would eliminate Released Time Seminary beginning this upcoming school year FOR ALL GRADES 9-12! The other entails retaining trimesters at the high school and modifying the schedule at the Jr. High Schools in order to better align those schedules.

Aside from informing you of these changes the purpose of this e-mail is to invite you to do a few things:

1) Will you please go to the district website http://www.d91.k12.id.us/ and study the issues at hand regarding “high school re-vision” including reading the meeting notes? [Note: The proposed school schedules at issue can be found here]

2) If you see the need to preserve Released Time Seminary as it currently exists as part of the daily school schedule, will you please plan to attend, with your 9-12 grade student(s), at least one of the High School Graduation Requirements Public Meetings listed on that home page, preferably at the meeting held at [Name of School]? (see further instructions below)

3) If you see the need to preserve Released Time Seminary as it currently exists as part of the daily school schedule will you please e-mail EACH of our District 91 board members respectfully stating your desires and any accompanying concerns? On the SUBJECT line please type: “I support Schedule C” in case they are unable to read and respond to the entire message?

Instructions for those who plan to attend:

1) Please be respectful during the entirety of the meeting by being punctual and not leaving early. While there please refrain from any outbursts of ANY kind ie. Applause, shouting or murmuring approval or dissent.

2) While there is no need to wear Sunday best please dress in nice casual clothes.

3) There will likely be members of the media present. Please feel free to answer their questions but make it very clear to them that you are in no way a spokesperson for the Church.

The e-mail addresses of the Board Members for District 91 are:

1. maryannhs56@msn.com
2. lent@cableone.net
3. ernest@ifcpa.com
4. jerry-wixom@leavitt.com
5. deidre@deidrewarden.com

Remember to type “I support Schedule C” in the subject line!

Finally, we have been informed that those opposing a schedule which will allow released time seminary are rallying forces to attend the meetings as well. If released time seminary ever done away with it will be EXTREMELY difficult, if not impossible, to ever get back. Elder Kim Clark, our Area Authority and the Stake Presidents in our area are concerned that passing such a change could stimulate mass changes in other areas which could eliminate or alter released time as we know it.

The meetings are as follows: (Your support at [ Name of School ] is encouraged, at any others would be welcome also)

December 1, at Clair E. Gale Jr. High at 7p
December 2, at Eagle Rock Jr. High at 7p
December 4, at Taylorview Jr. High at 7p

Thank you for your support for your students. If you have any questions feel free to contact me via any of the following means: [ Contact Information ].

[Name]
[Position]
Seminaries & Institutes
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

P.S. As an aside, I would personally like you to know that my involvement in rallying support is by direction of our local Priesthood leaders and is in no way self-serving. Though my assignment could be modified or changed my employment is not at risk in any way regardless of the outcome. I do know the value and influence of the Released Time program and I personally feel a need to put forth every effort to maintain it; but in encouraging you I am acting out of obedience to the voice of our Area Authority, Elder Clark as well as our local Stake and Ward leaders.

July 17 and 18, 2009 at the Brigham Young University Museum of Art and in the BYU Richards Building dance studios.

The symposium will explore the relationship between the discipline of dance and the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Proposals in all areas of the discipline will be considered, including but not limited to creating, performing and teaching as well as proposals of a variety of dance styles. Selection will be made on the strength and relevance of the proposal to the symposium theme.

In addition to the papers, panel, movement sessions and an evening of choreography the symposium will include an introductory address, a keynote evening speaker, a banquet, and interludes of dance that are specifically related to works of art that will be on display in the museum.

Possible topics and questions to be considered (but certainly not limited to) are:

• Dance creation and performance as an act or expression of faith.
• How do doctrines that concern the body inform the aesthetic, practice and moral choices that we make regarding what we put on stage?
• The joys and/or difficulties of being a Latter-day Saint dance artist.
• What it means to be a member of the church and a dancer. What guiding principles issue forth from that knowledge, understanding.
• Writing the histories of significant Latter-day Saint dance artists and educators.
• Documenting programs and performances that move dance forward as artistic endeavors or recreational pursuits.
• Why does the Church support touring to the extent it does and in the present global economy is the ratio of resources between what is expended and what is gained as significant as it has been in the past?

Proposal Requirements:
Please submit a one-page, double-spaced description of your proposal. Follow the guidelines below according to the type of presentation:

• Paper presentations—Verbal presentations of topics that are relevant to the field and the theme. Note that papers will be limited to 15 minutes with a 5-minute question and answer period.
• Panels—Panels are discussions by three to five individuals on topics related to the theme.
• Movement session—Movement sessions will be 45-minute participatory activities related to the theme.
• Choreography—Choreography, either live or dance for camera, (solo or group work), 4 to 8 minutes long, that demonstrates how your artistic work and your commitment to the Gospel unfold. The works do not have to be overtly “religious” in nature, but it should be clear that the work emanates from your commitment to the principles of the restored Gospel. The works selected will be for an evening sharing in the RB Studio Theatre.

A panel of dance professionals from several different dance styles will review submissions.

Submission Requirements: Please include, as a title page, the following information with your proposal.

• Your name
• Proposal type
• Title of presentation
• Program description of your submission – not to exceed 30 words
• If pertinent, your title or designation
• A brief (100 word or less) biography for each participant
• Contact information: address, phone number, email

Deadline:
Proposal must be postmarked by January 15th, 2009. Decision notification will be during the first week of February.

Proposals can be emailed to pat_debenham@byu.edu (preferable) or sent by post to Pat Debenham, 2224 Richards Building, BYU, Provo UT 84602.

If you have questions that you’d like answered by phone, please contact Pat at 801-422-3340, and please pass this information on to others that you think might be interested.

Click to download a printable Call for Papers Flyer (PDF)

Latter-day Saints tend to look to Mormon history in the search for their own origins. Hence, we tend to read Mormon history as being the story of the beginning of our church and community. We take the present church as our implicit point of reference and then decide what is central and what is peripheral in the past on the basis of the present. I think that this tendency generally pushes Mormon historians to place the story of building Zion at the center of the Mormon historical experience. It is in this quest for Zion that we find continuity from the past to the present. We understand that building Zion meant something different to a nineteenth-century Mormon pioneer than it does to us, but ultimately it was that impulse to build up the expanding Kingdom that led to us and that continues to animate our contemporary lives.

We often forget, however, that it is possible to look at the Mormon past as the prelude to a different future. Consider, for example, the work of Jon Krakauer. His ultimate interest is in a violent strand of modern polygamists. Accordingly, he sees in Mormon history the origin of his contemporary subject. This changes his interpretation of what constitutes the essence of nineteenth-century Mormon experience. Where Latter-day Saints see the story of building Zion at the center, Krakauerr sees the essence of nineteenth-century Mormonism in terms of plural marriage and violence. On this view, Mountain Meadows becomes a paradigmatic case of Mormonism as opposed to a horrific outlier case. Mormon critics of Krakauer rightly point out that his historical research is sloppy and derivative. But this is not what ultimately raised hackles. Rather, it was that he defined the essence of the Mormon past in terms of the origin of a different present.

Today, it is estimated that there are nearly 7,000 spoken languages in the world, of which some 2,600 have a writing system.

He goes on to say:

Equally impressive is the effort to provide translations of the Book of Mormon to the world. Today, the complete Book of Mormon has been translated into seventy-nine languages, and selections are available in another twenty-three languages. This represents 99 percent of the languages spoken by Latter-day Saints. Efforts continue to translate this book into more languages to fulfill the Lord’s command.

What he doesn’t say is that, in terms of the work still to be done to fill the directive in D&C 90:11, that “Every man shall hear the fulness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own language.”

There are several ways to look at this, several different levels at which language is a significant factor in how the Church operates, or in the experience of LDS Church members. First, language is a crucial factor in missionary work–in how we reach out to others. Second, language is an important part of how the Church is run day-to-day. And third, language is an important part of the culture that surrounds the Church.

In each of these cases, the amount of resources and how well Mormonism is doing in meeting the needs of the World and of members differs greatly. Take these 7,000 languages, for example. As Holzapfel notes, just 2,600 of these languages have an associated written language. But, even more importantly, they vary widely in number of speakers. Just ten languages are spoken by more than 100 million native speakers, and at least 266 (per Wikipedia) and possibly as many as 347 languages (per Ethnologue) that have at least 1 million native speakers. While on the other end of the scale, more than 500 languages have less than 10 speakers and nearly 2,000 are spoken by less than 1,000 people. These latter languages will, of course, require the most resources.

But if we are to teach every man the fulness of the gospel “in his own tongue, and in his own language,” then somehow we must figure out how to reach those that speak even small languages. Unless I’m reading the scriptures wrong, it doesn’t say “in a language he can speak.”

For members of the Church, once they have heard the gospel and joined, the need for materials in their language only increases. Under the current model, where virtually everything in all languages is translated from English, the amount of translation resources needed is substantial. Translating the scriptures and missionary materials is more or less a one-time process, while General Conference and the Liahona require an ongoing effort. We’re fortunate that only 75+ languages (those that have full Book of Mormon translations) are needed to cover 99% of the Church population. Even so, lds.org has the pdfs of the Liahona in just 12 languages, and the majority of the 75+ languages with full Books of Mormon available also have only General Conference available (no Liahona, no manuals, no proclamation on the family, etc.) I don’t know how many translators and interpreters are needed to provide everything the Church provides in English (or even what is provided in Spanish), but I’ll bet its several translators and interpreters per language (just think what this would require for the 3,000 languages with more than 10,000 speakers).

In addition to materials, the distribution of language use among Church members can also be a significant concern. Here in the U.S., we have more than 600 Spanish-language units alone, often in  English-speaking stakes, and many other congregations have sizable populations that speak other languages. But this doesn’t exist just in the U.S.–many other countries also have these language problems, and many areas of the world (especially parts of Africa) will have these problems as the Church grows there. In all these cases, the local units have to expend the resources to translate material and interpret what is said in meetings for those that speak minority languages.

Beyond the Church itself, the culture among members of the Church can also require some additional resources due to multiple languages. Culture is built on commonalities, and translating allows different languages to have the same items in common. But unlike what the Church provides, there isn’t a clear source of funding for translating other items. Fortunately, in an ideal world, each language would develop its own culture around the Church, and only the most useful items would be translated from one language to another.

I’m not sure where this leaves us. If you can’t tell, it looks like quite a lot of work. And the resource demands will only get worse as the number of languages grow, probably with smaller and smaller audiences benefiting from these resources. Unfortunately, language use in the world follows a fat-head and long-tail distribution, with the largest languages accounting for most speakers and the smallest accounting for very few. Its relatively easy to serve the largest languages, and stunningly time-consuming to serve the smallest. I wonder if some kind of analog to the long tail model that Chris Anderson has written about will be necessary to really serve the smallest languages.

It will be interesting to see what happens over the next few decades as we work towards every child of God hearing “the fulness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own language.”

I am sick at heart that I have offended anyone in the gay community…you are treasured to me…I’ve been a member of the Mormon Church all my life and I responded to their request. This was a personal donation, not the El Coyote’s. In like fashion, any employee can support anything of its choosing…The restaurant does not support any political group…I don’t know of another place on earth where such diversity exists in harmony, joy and mutual respect. I know boycotts are planned…It saddens me that my faith will keep you away from the Coyote. I cannot and I will not, no matter what, change my love and respect for you and your views.

Another member who has born a high personal cost is Scott Eckern, the artistic director of a major theater company in Sacramento, whose $1,000 donation to Yes on 8 caused a firestorm which led him to resign yesterday. In a statement released yesterday, Eckern said:

“I understand that my choice of supporting Proposition 8 has been the cause of many hurt feelings, maybe even betrayal. It was not my intent. I honestly had no idea that this would be the reaction. I chose to act upon my belief that the traditional definition of marriage should be preserved. I support each individual to have rights and access and I understood that in California domestic partnerships come with the same rights that come with marriage. My sister is a lesbian and in a committed domestic partnership relationship. I am loving and supportive of her and her family, and she is loving and supportive of me and my family. I definitely do not support any message or treatment of others that is hateful or instills fear. This is a highly emotional issue and the accusations that have been made against me are simply not true. I have now had many conversations with friends and colleagues,and I am deeply saddened that my personal beliefs and convictions have offended others…. I chose to express my views through the democratic process, and I am deeply sorry for any harm or injury I have caused in doing so. I want to support not only my friends and loved ones, but everyone in their efforts to receive equal rights so I will be making a comparable donation ($1000) to the Human Rights Campaign. I hope that through future conversations bridges may be built and healing can occur that will allow us to arrive at a better place of understanding for all involved.”

The situation these members find themselves in is not an enviable one. The debate has been framed without nuance as a battle of absolutes, either oppose Prop 8 and your Church or you’re a bigot, and they’ve been forced to try to stake out some middle ground without betraying their religious convictions.

This rhetorical balancing act has been especially difficult for Mormons in the public eye, many of whom have sought to avoid taking a public position on the issue. Shortly before the election, Steve Young was forced to address his own personal position on Prop 8 after his wife’s opposition to the measure got considerable press and was attributed to him. In response to questions about her support, Barbara intially said: “We believe all families matter, and we do not believe in discrimination, therefore, our family will vote against Prop. 8.” She later clarified her remarks, stating: “I am very passionate about this issue and Steve is completely supportive of me and my work for equality. We both love our Church and are grateful that our Church encourages us to vote our conscience. Steve prefers not to get involved politically on any issue no matter what the cause and therefore makes no endorsement.” When that failed to put an end to the news stories, Steve issued this additional statement:

“Barb and I love each other very much. It is that love of each other and the Savior that helps us come to the decisions we do. For Barb, who has a remarkable and enviable compassion for others, those political activities are far more public than mine. Those who know me, know I chose long ago not to be publicly active in the political process. I do have strong opinions. I do vote and will vote on Tuesday, but those matters are private. Barb and I and our children love our church and our faith, which allows for a wide diversity of political discourse. In our case, our diversity does not diminish in any way our or my love, respect and sustaining of the leadership of our church, which is deep and profound.”

More recently, as calls for a boycott of the Marriott International hotel chain were being bandied about, Willard J. Marriott Jr. made a post on the Marriot blog laying out “The Facts About Marriott and California’s Proposition 8” which stressed that neither he nor his company had contributed to the Prop 8 campaign:

As many of you may know I’m a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Some might conclude given my family’s membership in the Mormon Church that our company supported the recent ballot initiative to ban same sex marriage in California. This is simply untrue. Marriott International is a public company headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, and is not controlled by any one individual or family. Neither I, nor the company, contributed to the campaign to pass Proposition 8.

The Bible that I love teaches me about honesty, integrity and unconditional love for all people. But beyond that, I am very careful about separating my personal faith and beliefs from how we run our business.

I am personally motivated to speak now because Marriott was built on the basic principles of respect and inclusion. My father, who founded this company along with my mother, told everyone who would listen: “Take care of your employees, and they’ll take care of your customers, who will come back again and again.”

For more than 80 years, our company has grown and changed, but that basic principle still holds up. We embrace all people as our customers, associates, owners and franchisees regardless of race, sex, gender identity or sexual orientation.

Our principle is backed up with a formal diversity program, which we established more than 20 years ago. Our Board of Directors has also focused on this priority and helped us be a leader and a better company. We were among the first in our industry to offer domestic partner benefits, and we’ve earned a perfect 100% score on the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index for two years in a row. Many of our hotels have hosted LGBT community functions and events for years.

One of the problems that these various experiences highlight is the rhetorical difficulties faced by members, both in and out of the public eye, who discuss their positions on Prop 8. Members who have supported the measure have the near impossible challenge (given the absolutist framework they’ve been given to work within) of trying to explain how they are “not anti-gay, but pro-marriage” without being portrayed as narrow-minded bigots. And members who either are trying to stay publicly neutral or who might oppose Prop 8 face the equally daunting challenge of expressing that neutrality or opposition in a way that does not cast aspersions on the Church. All three groups, those who support, are neutral, or oppose, also face a similar challenge of expressing support for gays and lesbians without suggesting that the many Americans who are not in favor of gay marriage must necessarily be uncompassionate, disrespectful and intolerant. From this one might justifiably conclude that the triumph of ideology on this issue has left little room for genuine discussion. The ideological rhetoric that has emerged as a result does not appear to be seeking, through careful deliberation, to arrive at the “truth” (since it claims eo ipso to already possess it), its goal instead seems to be for power; that is to mobilize mass support and limit opposition. This has left members of the Church, regardless of their views, in a pretty tough spot when discussing Prop 8.

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The Penguin book itself is based on the 1840 edition of the text rather than our current edition of the scriptures. The text was chosen because this was the last version that Joseph Smith was personally involved in editing. Also strictly speaking there is no standard 1830 version of the text for the simple reason that Grandin edited the book as he was printing it, with the result that different copies of the 1830 edition contain different versions of the text. Our current edition, in contrast, contains an elaborate set of interpretive aids that were added long after Joseph was murdered. Hence, the Penguin edition is printed without versification or the current chapter breaks, both of which were added in Utah by Orson Pratt. Rather, it is printed as regular prose – much like a novel – with the original chapter breaks, which were much longer than our current chapters. The Penguin edition retains the colophons that were in the 1840 edition of the text, but does not contain any of the chapter headings that are part of current LDS editions. I actually think that reading the text in its original format is a useful way of escaping the framing that the textual apparatus of current church editions imposes, as well as providing a better guide to the underlying structure of the narratives, as broken up by the original chapters. Previously the only way of doing this was by either getting a facsimile copy of the 1830 edition or else by using Grant Hardy’s expensive reader’s edition. The Penguin Classics version will provide a convenient and low price way of reading the Book of Mormon in its original textual format.

Maffly-Kip’s introduction is one of the more interesting things about this edition. For those unfamiliar with her, Maffly-Kip is a non-Mormon religious studies professor at UNC, who for the last several years has been teaching a course of Mormonism. Her introduction is fascinating for how it tries to situate the Book of Mormon. Most of it is taken up with telling the story of the coming forth of the Book of Mormon as given by Joseph Smith and his associates. She then provides a brief summary of how the text is used today by Latter-day Saints and members of the Community of Christ. It is a compact and elegant survey, but nothing that she has to say here will be much of a surprise to Mormons. The more interesting part of the introduction comes at the end. She writes:

Like all books that spur the imagination, the Book of Mormon presents new ways of viewing the world. Believers from the nineteenth through the twenty-first centuries continue to take it as divine truth. But whether one accepts this judgment or prefers to read the text as an inventive exercise in time travel that allows one to reflect differently on the present era (as in reading Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court or Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward, for instance), the Book of Mormon gestures to a remarkably complex layering of human civilizations, historical records, and editorial tasks.

She offers two suggestions in terms of interpretative approaches. The first is to focus on the intertextuality of the Book of Mormon and the Bible. The Book of Mormon obviously quotes extensively from the Bible, as well as employing a host of biblical tropes and story forms. “This intertextuality,” she writes, “offers the motivated reader a way to read between the two books and in doing so, provides an excellent example of the ways books come to be understood as ‘scripture.’” Her second suggestion is for “[t]hose who read the text as a work emerging from the imagination of Joseph Smith himself.” For these readers, she suggests that the Book of Mormon might be seen as an ingenious exercise in making new meaning in a new landscape, in reshaping the world by placing oneself, and one’s family and friends, in a world charged with sacred meaning and divine inspiration.”

Maffly-Kipp’s introduction is part of a larger struggle by both Mormon and non-Mormon scholars to understand the place of the Book of Mormon in intellectual discussions. Paradoxically, the Book of Mormon suffers from both a super abundance of canonicity and a dearth of it. Among believers, of course, it occupies a hallowed place beside the Bible as a repository of Holy Writ. To Latter-day Saints, however, the Book of Mormon is also canonical in the sense that we have quasi-ritualized readings. In short, we proof text or read particular stories – say Alma 32 or the missionary stories of the Sons of Mosiah – in isolation and according to very conventional patterns. In contrast, the complex totality the book’s narratives are seldom given a rigorous exegesis. Among non-believers, of course, the Book of Mormon is not scripture, but it is (as of yet?) also non-canonical in the broader sense of the term. The Qua’ran and the New Testament are not considered scripture by the non-Muslim or the non-Christian, but they are recognized as texts having a heft worthy of the interest of an intelligent mind. They are thus canonical in the sense that War and Peace, Emerson, Whitman, or The Federalist are canonical. The Book of Mormon in contrast remains a book that few non-Mormons would consider reading. In part this is no doubt linked to the fantastic claims made about its origins, and in part it stems from the marginal status of Latter-day Saints. Even Harold Bloom, an immensely sympathetic interpreter of Joseph Smith, concludes that there is no call for even a student of American religion to actually read the Book of Mormon. The result is that the non-Mormon is likely to accept Mark Twain’s quip that the book is “chloroform in print” and turn her attention elsewhere. There is thus an important sense in which the paradoxical status of the Book of Mormon’s canonicity tends to foreclose a careful reading of it.

There are developments, such as the nascent flowering of serious interpretative — as opposed to purely apologetic — LDS scholarship on the Book of Mormon, that suggest that this state of affairs might change. The Penguin Classic’s edition of the Book of Mormon may be part of this, but in order for the book to make its way firmly into the canon we are first going to need to come up with a much richer set of interpretations for the text than we have hitherto offered. I wonder what other avenues we might take other than the two offered by Maffly-Kipp. One possibility is comparative. For example, Jared Hickman, who was recently hired at Johns Hopkins University is a master of seeing how the Book of Mormon and other LDS texts — most notably the sermons of Joseph Smith — can be brought into dialogue with other texts, such as the canonical works of American pragmatism. Any other suggestions?

National Student Dialogue Conference II will take place in the UVU Student Center. Full program information is available on the UVU Religious Studies page. Registration information is available from Standing Together.

Per the press release, “Presenters will include Elder Robert Wood (Quorum of Seventy, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), Dr. Del Tackett (Focus on the Family), Dr. Robert Millet (Brigham Young University), Dr. Jerry Root (Wheaton College), Dr. Spencer Fluhman (Brigham Young University), Dr. Dennis Okholm (Azusa Pacific University), Dr. Brian Birch (Utah Valley University), and Dr. John-Mark Reynolds (Biola University).”