Preside
Man, this gets exhausting sometimes. Just when I start to feel like I'm making some strides getting to the heart of these issues, getting out exactly what I feel I need to express, I get a comment or read someone's blog post that makes me feel like I'm just swimming against the current.
The biggest problem with having this feminist conversation in the LDS internet world is that we are not communicating. We are not all even speaking the same language. The word feminist alone gets so mangled and misused that it's a constant battle just to define what you mean by that, let alone words like equality, visibility, power.
So I'd like to talk about the word 'preside." A very Mormon word and one, the semantics of which, I hope non-feminists and feminists alike can agree.
For me, all of the feminist issues in the church boil down to this word. There has been a lot of amazing progress in the sexist rhetoric that once passed as doctrine in the church. Brigham Young once said, "What is the glory of a woman? It is her virginity until she gives it into the hands of the man that will be her Lord and master to all eternity." Sermon, October 8, 18661, in Hardy, Doing the Works of Abraham.
So, yeah. That happened. Brigham Young's presidency coincided with a period of retrenchment on the rights of women in the United States. American men were very concerned with maintaining their patriarchal rule, what with ideas such as the universal rights of men floating around. So during the period of Brigham Young and Orson Pratt, we see these jaw-droppingly horrifying statements about men and women. At about the same time period, Orson Pratt made the statement, "Let no woman unite herself in marriage with any man, unless she has fully resolved herself to submit herself wholly to his counsel, and to let him govern as the head." "Celestial Marriage," in The Essential Orson Pratt, 276.
This is the same time period during which we had such language in the temple as "obeying the law of your husband." Or, as Orson's wife put it, "the wife is bound to the law of her husband. She honors him, calls him lord, even as Sarah obeyed and honored Abraham. She lives for him, and to increase in his glory, his greatness, his kingdom, or family." Defense of Polygamy, 7.
Why am I sharing these nauseating statements? To prove that the philosophies of men have indeed mingled with scripture in regards to the doctrines that the church has accepted regarding gender in the past. Now we don't see such language anymore.
What gendered language we do see, usually uses the more more palatable word, 'preside.' I'm not going to talk too much about what we believe about the presiding power of the priesthood. I think we've all had that Sunday school lesson before. It's D&C 121, basically, "you're in charge, but you have to be really nice about it and listen to her too."
Non-feminists are totally fine with this. In my estimation, this is precisely why they don't believe sexism exists in the church. In their view, men, via the priesthood, have been given this presiding role that is "different but equal"ly honorable as the role of women which is to be presided over by kind, Christlike men and to be mothers, serving in their respective callings.
This is the crux of the issue for me. When I read the scriptures, there are all sorts of practices that are different than modern day life which we chalk up to the culture of ancient civilizations. We don't stone people or crucify them anymore. We don't think disabled people were born in sin. We don't sacrifice animals. We don't keep kosher. I would say that most leaders of the church don't buy Paul's extremely sexist comments about women. Why? Because they were written by a 1st century Roman citizen and they are reflective of his CULTURE.
I believe this insistence on holding on to the priesthood's right to preside is steeped in a similar cultural assumption. Our society has been this way for pretty much ever, so we just assumed it was God's will. It's interesting how we like to pick and choose which parts of the world are worldly and devillish and which are divine. I'm not saying that priesthood offices that we currently have will/should be extended to women. I am saying that I don't believe they necessarily should be associated with the right to preside over women and the church. Maybe administrative powers don't need to be associated with priesthood powers at all.
I'm saying that I don't believe my husband's priesthood ordination gives him a God given right to preside over me, even righteously. I find that demeaning. I am an adult. I am his equal. We preside together over our home as co-equals, with Christ as the true Head of our household.
The biggest problem with having this feminist conversation in the LDS internet world is that we are not communicating. We are not all even speaking the same language. The word feminist alone gets so mangled and misused that it's a constant battle just to define what you mean by that, let alone words like equality, visibility, power.
So I'd like to talk about the word 'preside." A very Mormon word and one, the semantics of which, I hope non-feminists and feminists alike can agree.
For me, all of the feminist issues in the church boil down to this word. There has been a lot of amazing progress in the sexist rhetoric that once passed as doctrine in the church. Brigham Young once said, "What is the glory of a woman? It is her virginity until she gives it into the hands of the man that will be her Lord and master to all eternity." Sermon, October 8, 18661, in Hardy, Doing the Works of Abraham.
So, yeah. That happened. Brigham Young's presidency coincided with a period of retrenchment on the rights of women in the United States. American men were very concerned with maintaining their patriarchal rule, what with ideas such as the universal rights of men floating around. So during the period of Brigham Young and Orson Pratt, we see these jaw-droppingly horrifying statements about men and women. At about the same time period, Orson Pratt made the statement, "Let no woman unite herself in marriage with any man, unless she has fully resolved herself to submit herself wholly to his counsel, and to let him govern as the head." "Celestial Marriage," in The Essential Orson Pratt, 276.
This is the same time period during which we had such language in the temple as "obeying the law of your husband." Or, as Orson's wife put it, "the wife is bound to the law of her husband. She honors him, calls him lord, even as Sarah obeyed and honored Abraham. She lives for him, and to increase in his glory, his greatness, his kingdom, or family." Defense of Polygamy, 7.
Why am I sharing these nauseating statements? To prove that the philosophies of men have indeed mingled with scripture in regards to the doctrines that the church has accepted regarding gender in the past. Now we don't see such language anymore.
What gendered language we do see, usually uses the more more palatable word, 'preside.' I'm not going to talk too much about what we believe about the presiding power of the priesthood. I think we've all had that Sunday school lesson before. It's D&C 121, basically, "you're in charge, but you have to be really nice about it and listen to her too."
Non-feminists are totally fine with this. In my estimation, this is precisely why they don't believe sexism exists in the church. In their view, men, via the priesthood, have been given this presiding role that is "different but equal"ly honorable as the role of women which is to be presided over by kind, Christlike men and to be mothers, serving in their respective callings.
This is the crux of the issue for me. When I read the scriptures, there are all sorts of practices that are different than modern day life which we chalk up to the culture of ancient civilizations. We don't stone people or crucify them anymore. We don't think disabled people were born in sin. We don't sacrifice animals. We don't keep kosher. I would say that most leaders of the church don't buy Paul's extremely sexist comments about women. Why? Because they were written by a 1st century Roman citizen and they are reflective of his CULTURE.
I believe this insistence on holding on to the priesthood's right to preside is steeped in a similar cultural assumption. Our society has been this way for pretty much ever, so we just assumed it was God's will. It's interesting how we like to pick and choose which parts of the world are worldly and devillish and which are divine. I'm not saying that priesthood offices that we currently have will/should be extended to women. I am saying that I don't believe they necessarily should be associated with the right to preside over women and the church. Maybe administrative powers don't need to be associated with priesthood powers at all.
I'm saying that I don't believe my husband's priesthood ordination gives him a God given right to preside over me, even righteously. I find that demeaning. I am an adult. I am his equal. We preside together over our home as co-equals, with Christ as the true Head of our household.
I think the church is using the word "preside" as a back door way of telling women to be submissive. It is like we are trying to be Evangelical Christians and push modesty and submission to husbands, rather husbands preside in the home. Wouldn't it be nice if we just focused on continuing revelation?
ReplyDelete