ALSSI Newsletter
March/April 2022
In my ward yesterday a man in a leadership position spoke about something he's learned that he described as having changed the way he sees everything. He explained that there is black in the world, and there is white in the world. Then he said, "Anywhere there is gray, you can be sure the Lord is not in it." I almost laughed right out loud in Sacrament Meeting. It's hard to imagine someone seeing life on earth more differently from how I see it. Looking around, I couldn't find an all bad or all good person or thing anywhere in that chapel.
I'm much more aligned with Dutch writer Etty Hillesum, who wrote, "Everywhere things are both very good and very bad at the same time. The two are in balance, everywhere and always." In other words, this life is basically all black and white at once: gray.
Etty Hillesum died in Auschwitz in 1943, at the age of 29. She left behind diaries describing her spiritual development, personal theology and relationship with God, as well as the escalating persecution she endured that eventually led to her death. Etty somehow managed to keep her faith in humanity and her appreciation for the beauty of this world. She didn't believe in a God that could or would intervene, but she clung to faith in a God that enriched her inner life, and often addressed God in her diary. She wrote, "...one thing is becoming increasingly clear to me: that You cannot help us, that we must help You to help ourselves. And that is all we can manage these days and also all that really matters: that we safeguard that little piece of You, God, in ourselves. [...] Alas, there doesn't seem to be much You Yourself can do about our circumstances, about our lives. Neither do I hold You responsible. You cannot help us, but we must help You and defend Your dwelling place inside us to the last."
Whether or not God could have prevented Etty’s death at the hands of the Nazis, I don't know. I don't have a lot of answers about how God blesses us—or maybe doesn't—but I do feel personally invested in defending God's dwelling place inside me. I feel blessed when I come to the end of what I know, reach inside my pocket of self, and find tiny seeds of faith, hope, or love there. I feel blessed when I am aware of beauty not in spite of imperfection, but because of it. These feelings give me something to work with when I'm navigating so much that's clearly outside my control. I feel blessed when I become a partner in my own growth.
Etty’s theology focused on God’s influence within her rather than God’s control of her external circumstances. That’s resonant for me, because while I’ve felt God’s hand in my life at times, I can’t explain it, earn it, duplicate it, or demand it. But what's going on inside me impacts everything about how I see the world and interact with the people in it.
I want to be always in the wrestle of an evolving relationship with God. Always asking the next question, always holding space open inside my heart for what I don't know—or don't know what to do with—yet. Always trusting that God is smack in the middle of the gray, where I live. A God of the black, the white, everyone and everything in between.
— Susan
“I spent a lot of years trying to outrun or outsmart vulnerability by making things certain and definite, black and white, good and bad. My inability to lean into the discomfort of vulnerability limited the fullness of those important experiences that are wrought with uncertainty: Love, belonging, trust, joy, and creativity to name a few.”
— Brene Brown
A note for your social calendar:
Imagine being in a Relief Society room where you can say anything you need to say. Anything! Too good to be true? It’s a pretty good description of Ladies’ Night In. Our last meeting was our biggest yet—we thank everyone who attended and participated, either through sharing or showing up to support those who did. These meetings are becoming one of the best parts of the ALSSI project. Whether you want to tell your own story or just feel less alone, we hope you’ll join us.
April Ladies’ Lunch In
Friday, April 29
12:00 noon, Mountain Time
Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYrceqgqT0qEtAR9JKMgcA_SbkjoAouKdIR
After registration, you’ll receive a confirmation email containing info and a link
Gloves, hat, and lipstick optional…in fact, you don’t even need to put on real clothes!
New features coming to our website!
We get asked for episode transcripts sometimes, but the truth is there isn’t enough interest to justify the time involved in producing good ones. (For now, we also prefer not having everything we’ve ever said on a podcast available online in writing.) We previously included a transcript with each newsletter, but the transcripts weren’t getting much traffic, so we’re discontinuing that.
However, because we have the most wonderful listeners…two women have volunteered to help us add episode summaries to the website! Hopefully, this should help make the episodes more searchable if you need to find something you heard but can’t quite remember when you heard it. Big thanks to Anne Pimentel and Lindsay Hillam for so generously volunteering their time to produce these summaries. We hope you’ll use them!
In addition, going forward our Notes section for each episode will become Notes & Quotes. You’ll find every quote we use in the episode on our website in full, in addition to the link to its source. You can now have all those wise words from our favorite smart people at your fingertips!
“Truth is eternal. Knowledge is changeable. It is disastrous to confuse them.”
— Madeleine L’Engle
Speaking of thanks —
Our gathering in Phoenix was delightful! The food, the company, the weather, the venue, the speakers…it all came together perfectly. We hope everyone who attended had as good a time as we did. The event would not have been possible without the tireless efforts of Cindy Hill and TeriDel Davis.
We can’t thank these two enough for not only thinking of everything, but making sure it happened just the way it was supposed to. If you ever have a chance to attend a party put on by these women, you should be sure to go.
Special thanks also to Liz and Eric Macdonald for so generously opening their home to us, and to C.A. Larson and Liz Macdonald for delivering amazing content. (And thanks to Becky Edwards for the photos!)
And to all of you who attended and made new friends, or raised your hand to comment or ask questions, thank you for taking time to be there for us and for each other.
Season 4 is a wrap!
Since our last episode of the season was a recap, we won’t offer one here. If you haven’t listened yet, you can find a discussion of our takeaways from Season 4 as well as a P.S. for each episode here.
We’re already busy planning and gathering topics for Season 5. If you have something specific you’d like us to discuss, or maybe a guest you’d like to hear, feel free to leave us a voice message here or send us an email at atlastshesaidit@gmail.com.
Here are a few recent comments from listeners:
“As much as I continue to mull over and theorize to myself how much scriptural historicity and accuracy matters, the question that forces the issue for me is what I will teach my children now. What I’ve decided on for now is to point out that since Jesus often taught in parables, scripture stories don’t have to be historical to have power and relevance. I acknowledge to my kids (who are teens and young adults) that I can’t vouch for the historicity of any of the scriptures, and I also don’t know for sure which parts contain pure revelation, and which parts have human error. I encourage them to focus on asking themselves which messages that they read resonate as good and uplifting and wise, as well as which parts don’t. And I share that from my experience, I believe that pondering the scriptures can have power to help us access divine promptings for our own lives. (And for me, this has been especially the case with the Book of Mormon.)”
— Tori on our website
”I find truth and inspiration in books and articles, in song, in poetry, and in podcasts. Even our ‘official’ scriptures tell us to ‘seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom’ and I take that to heart.”
— @marierleslie on Instagram
“I am learning to listen when people come to me and share their differing experiences they have had in the church. My first thing I want to do is defend the church or the issue. I’ve learned that they are coming to me and they trust me enough to come to me and express their experiences. Now I’m still working on this but I’m evolving and learning as I go.”
— @edlerpatty on Instagram
“Thank you! I think it's a human thing, not a God thing to put women in a separate box. I suspect we aren't hearing the divine answers to this primarily because we didn't realize we were supposed to be listening for them.”
— K.B. on Facebook
Refreshments time!
This month’s recipe is better than it has any right to be, given how easy it is. The first time I baked it, I’m sure I annoyed everyone by blabbing about what an amazing cake I’d made for the next 3 days. — Susan
Amazingest Easy Banana Cake
1/2 cup shortening
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup mashed ripe banana (about 4 small/3 medium)
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
Preheat oven to 350°. Cream shortening and sugars until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each. Beat in bananas and vanilla. Combine flour, soda, and salt; add to the creamed mixture alternately with buttermilk, beating well after each addition. Pour into greased 13x9” pan. Bake 25-30 mins.
Frost with your favorite cream cheese icing, or top with whipped cream or ice cream and caramel sauce, like we do.
Before we go…
Thanks so much for showing up for another season of At Last She Said It. We loved having all those conversations with each other, but we’ve loved the opportunity to hear from and talk with so many of you even more. Thanks for all the ways you lift us, and each other. Enjoy the break! And keep looking for us online as we rest up—and gear up—for Season 5. Happy Spring!
With love,
Cynthia and Susan
Last week, I commented in Relief Society that less emphasis should be placed on saying, we "KNOW" and more on we, "BELIEVE". Crickets in the room.....it felt very lonely. The teacher just looked confused. I wanted to say believing is a gift of the spirit. The scriptures even say that. But, I decided I didn't have the energy to try that day.
I had Stake Conference on Sunday where the “visiting authority” said 1. If your personal revelation doesn’t align with the prophet, it’s not revelation. And 2. You cannot be a disciple of Jesus Christ if you don’t believe in Joseph Smith. My jaw was on the ground! I’m still processing what comes over the pulpit. Appreciate you guys!!