Cutting Edge Latter-day Saint Research, October 2025

Stephen C

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I usually don’t provide any additional commentary for these, but the Anderson et al., study below showing that Latter-day Saints didn’t receive the COVID vaccinations any more than average provides some support for my earlier conjecture that the President of the Church actually doesn’t have a lot of influence when it comes to member attitudes towards politicized topics.  

Pinheiro da Silva Filho, Fernando. “Deconstructing Narratives: The New History of the Beginning of the Church in Brazil.” Journal of Mormon History 51, no. 4 (2025): 33-57.

No abstract.

Preston, Julia. “Weaving Gender: Men, Women, and the Mormon Home Manufacture Movement.” Journal of Mormon History 51, no. 4 (2025): 89-111.

No abstract.

Talbot, Bridger. “A History of Art in LDS Chapels.” Journal of Mormon History 51, no. 4 (2025): 112-152.

No abstract.

Clarkson, Corinne. “Gender Roles and Empowerment Goals: The LDS Women’s Experience in Brazil.” Journal of Mormon History 51, no. 4 (2025): 58-88.

No abstract.

Mascio, Leilani Naomi, and Ronald Smith. “A Content Analysis of Doubt: How Latter-day Saints Interact Online When One of Their Own Seeks Answers.” Midwest Social Sciences Journal 28, no. 1 (2025): 12.

This content analysis examines how members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) interact with doubting members in online forums, focusing on Facebook and Reddit. In an analysis of 1,115 comments from four public posts (August 2024–January 2025), six emergent themes were found: (1) normalizing doubt, (2) thought- terminating clichés, (3) bringing back to the fold, (4) hierarchical escalation, (5) attributing doubt to Satan, and (6) emotional reasoning. Findings reveal that LDS members overwhelmingly dominate these discussions, employing doctrinal language, personal narratives, and appeals to authority to reintegrate doubters. Notably, nonmember interference was rare, suggesting moderated or self-selected engagement. The study highlights how digital platforms serve as spaces for communal care during faith crises, though their reliance on doctrinal shortcuts may inadvertently marginalize intellectual doubt. Limitations include platform-specific dynamics and the absence of offline comparisons. This research contributes to scholarship on religious doubt, digital community-building, and the interplay of emotion and authority in online Mormon discourse.

Anderson, Cory, Shuai Zhou, and Guangqing Chi. “Religious Traditions Exhibit Heterogeneous Effects on Vaccination Uptake: A US County-Level Regression Analysis Supporting Tailored Health Outreach.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine (2025).

Objective
To examine whether specific religious traditions—rather than just “religion” itself—demonstrate significant associations with COVID-19 vaccination rates.
Method
This study analyzes county-level COVID-19 vaccination data (2021-2022) matched with religious composition data from the 2020 U.S. Religion Census for six major religious traditions. The analysis uses negative binomial regression to examine how religious adherence is associated with vaccination rates, controlling for other variables.
Results
Catholic and Mainline Protestant populations showed significant positive associations with vaccination rates (+12.4% and +25.1% respectively), while Evangelical Protestant populations demonstrated significant negative associations (-12.9%). Associations persisted when controlling for other variables, including political ideology, with Republican voting preference emerging as the strongest predictor across all religious traditions (coefficients ranging from -55.6% to -93.7%). Mormon, Black Protestant, and Muslim populations showed no significant associations, including in national and region-specific analyses.
Conclusions
Religious traditions influence preventive health measures through limited but significant group-specific processes. Church-sect positioning partially explains these patterns, with historically culturally-integrated traditions showing greater receptivity to vaccination than those maintaining some cultural tension. Given the contrasts in associations across religious traditions, public health outreach approaches should consider context of specific religious traditions rather than merely approaching “religion” as a monolithic variable.
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Campbell, Courtney S. Mormonism and Moral Life. Bloomsbury Publishing USA, 2025.
Mormonism and Moral Life is the first scholarly introduction to the approaches to moral life and the normative principles and practical ethics of the LDS tradition. It is an invaluable contribution to discussions in religious ethics and religious studies, to the growing field of Mormon Studies, and to broader discussions of religious ethics in a pluralistic moral culture. It offers a concise overview of the primary ethical considerations in the LDS tradition for people who otherwise have little familiarity with LDS moral culture and teaching.

This book includes:
· a brief overview of the LDS religious tradition, its foundational scriptural texts, and its prophetic teaching authorities;
· a discussion of the moral visions and primary sources for ethical reflection and moral teaching in the tradition, including scripture, ecclesiastical authority, moral communities, family, personal experience, divine inspiration, and the moral wisdom of other cultures and traditions;
· an explanation of core ethical principles that differentiate LDS ethics and moral teaching, including covenantal responsibility, gift ethics, agency, virtues of moral character, and the moral community of “Zion”;
· short, lucid chapters that address various aspects of practical and applied ethics, such as the ethics of family and marriage, the ethics of work and the prosperity gospel, healing and medical ethics, civic responsibilities including ethical government, environmental ethics and climate change, the ethics of refugee assistance, and the ethics of non-violence and warfare.

Rackley, Eric D. “‘Reading the scriptures and stuff is a big thing’: sponsors of literacy in a faith-based learning environment.” Ethnography and Education (2025): 1-21.

Scholarship focused on sponsors of literacy examines how individuals support and shape readers’ experiences with texts. Contemporary youth religious literacies research examines young people’s faith-based meaning-making practices. This study puts these two scholarly communities into conversation to explore how six Latter-day Saint youth in the United States were taught to read sacred texts in a faith-based learning environment. Inductive qualitative analysis identified how Brother Jones, the youths’ religion teacher, acted as a sponsor of religious literacy by (a) creating opportunities and conditions for youth to engage with sacred texts, (b) providing youth with an interactional scripture-reading structure, and (c) facilitating youths’ affective experiences with sacred texts. As one of the first empirical investigations of its type, this ethnography advances the potentially profitable construct of sponsors of religious literacy and can improve literacy educators’ fluency in the language of religion and religious literacy from diverse spiritual perspectives.

Comments

2 responses to “Cutting Edge Latter-day Saint Research, October 2025”

  1. Ivan Wolfe

    Here are your missing abstracts:

    Deconstructing Narratives: The New History of the Beginning of the Church in Brazil.
    By: Pinheiro da Silva Filho, Fernando
    The article focuses on the complexities and inaccuracies in the historical narratives surrounding the early presence of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) in Brazil. It critiques the traditional accounts that have often overlooked the nuanced realities of missionary efforts, particularly the role of Elder Melvin J. Ballard and the German immigrant communities in southern Brazil. Through a critical examination of primary sources, the author aims to reconstruct a more accurate history that acknowledges previously marginalized figures and events, emphasizing the importance of deconstructing established narratives to reveal a more pluralistic understanding of the Church’s beginnings in Brazil. The article also highlights the contributions of earlier researchers, such as Mark L. Grover, in providing a reliable foundation for this critical engagement.

    Weaving Gender: Men, Women, and the Mormon Home Manufacture Movement.
    By: Preston, Julia
    The article examines Brigham Young’s vision for economic independence in the Utah Territory, particularly through the promotion of home manufacture and textile production among Latter-day Saint women. Young, as the leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the territory’s first governor, emphasized the need for local production to reduce reliance on imported goods, framing this as a religious duty. The discourse surrounding home manufacture was notably gendered, with Young and other male leaders critiquing women’s consumption habits while urging them to engage in textile production, particularly silk. Despite the push for home industry, women’s responses varied, with some embracing the call for economic self-sufficiency while others resisted or critiqued the expectations placed upon them. The article highlights the complexities of gender roles and economic independence within the context of 19th-century Mormon society.

    A History of Art in LDS Chapels.
    By: Talbot, Bridger
    The article examines the evolving relationship between the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the use of artwork in chapels, highlighting a significant policy change that officially prohibited artwork in these sacred spaces in the late 1970s. Historically, from the mid-1800s to the 1980s, artwork in chapels varied in quantity and style, reflecting broader cultural trends and the church’s Protestant roots, which often viewed visual art with skepticism. The article details how local congregations historically commissioned and displayed art, often depicting church history, landscapes, and scriptural events, before the decline of such practices due to institutional standardization and changing aesthetic preferences. Despite the current prohibition, recent developments indicate a renewed interest in incorporating art into meetinghouses, suggesting a potential shift in the church’s approach to religious art in the future.

    Gender Roles and Empowerment Goals: The LDS Women’s Experience in Brazil.
    By: Clarkson, Corinne
    The article focuses on the complex dynamics of female empowerment among members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) in Brazil, particularly through the experiences of women involved in the Relief Society, the Church’s women’s organization. Despite the Church’s patriarchal structure and traditional gender roles, many women report feeling empowered through their religious participation, which provides emotional, spiritual, and material support, as well as a sense of community. The study highlights how these women navigate their roles within a society marked by machismo and gender inequality, often finding strength and identity in their faith, while also acknowledging the contradictions between their lived realities and the Church’s teachings. The findings suggest that cultural context significantly influences perceptions of empowerment within religious frameworks.

  2. Stephen C.

    Thanks as always! (I should start asking you before I post anything from JMH).

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