Episode 99: We Don’t Believe Our Own Stuff—Heavenly Mother Edition
Who we pray to and how we envision God is personal, but the Church organization can and does limit our collective discourse about Heavenly Mother. Many feminists have been disciplined for speaking and writing publicly about Her. What does this silencing say about the importance of the doctrine? And is an unwillingness to allow deeper engagement with the feminine divine in our teaching and worship indicative of the organization’s regard for women generally? Why don’t we seem to believe our own stuff about one of the most unique—and for many compelling—aspects of our theology?
Notes & Quotes:
The Never Ending Story of Mormon Feminism, Matriarchal Blessing, by Celeste Davis, 04/28/2022
There Is Always a Struggle: An Interview with Chieko N. Okazaki, Dialogue Journal, by Gregory A. Prince, 11/15/2005
Mary Magdalene Revealed: The First Apostle, Her Feminist Gospel & the Christianity We Haven’t Tried Yet, by Meggan Watterson
Celebrating Our Divine Mother — A Conversation with McArthur Krishna and Bethany Brady Spalding, Faith Matters podcast, 05/07/2022
Your Divine Nature and Eternal Destiny, by Dale G. Renlund, April 2022
The Mother Tree: Discovering the Love and Wisdom of Our Divine Mother, by Kathryn Knight Sonntag
“It seems LDS women wake up to patriarchal inequality in cohorts. Each cohort believing they are the first to wake up. Each waking up largely without the wisdom and experiences of previous generation’s awakenings, who are usually long gone. Unsurprisingly these women are not discussed at church.” —Celeste Davis
“Her existence is dangerous to patriarchy, for which reason I should think the whole effort was to keep the issue about Her very quiet. The less people think about her, the less they will question her position, the church’s position about Her. The less, in short, they will question male rule. I like to imagine what would happen if Mormons really began believing in Her and Her equality with Father: polygamy, the all-male priesthood, all aspects of patriarchy would be in deepest jeopardy.” —Sonia Johnson
“Because when we have direct access to female divine, we start questioning the need for so many male middle-men. Because when Heavenly Mother leaves Her silent, invisible pedestal and emerges as a deity with a personality and power, women begin to leave their silent, invisible pedestals too, and step into their own power.” —Celeste Davis
“It’s not that an idea of god the father was so upsetting to me, it was that it was so incomplete. God as the father and Jesus as his only son made zero sense. It just felt like one side of a far more inclusive and radical love story.” —Meggan Watterson (MM Revealed, p. 47)
“As children of heavenly parents, we embody traits from each parent. Because we have come to understand God as He, the majority of our discussion about divine attributes we seek to emulate originate from a male deity. We have had little experience thinking of God as feminine and masculine, let alone considering Mother God as an autonomous, whole being with unique traits that we, as her spirit children, have also inherited. We are less experienced at seeking out the Mother’s attributes. I believe that a knowledge of her character, power, and purpose creates wholeness in ourselves, in our relationships, and in our theology. Harmonizing Their divinely feminine and divinely masculine principles inside our souls leads to unity with Them.” —Kathryn Knight Sonntag
“Here’s how I can best explain what it’s like for me sitting in the pew when only god the father is preached. Remember how in the 1980s, we still thought it was OK to smoke on planes? The statistics had already been reported about the harmful effects of smoking, and even secondhand smoke, but there we were picking our seats in the smoking or non-smoking section.
“And here we are in 21st century rife with all the statistics on the status of women the world…… here we are in an age of information about the psychological impact on a girl who only ever hears God referred to as male and as the father. Here we are in the world that practices or reinforces within its culture what is preached in its places of worship.
“This is what it’s like for me to sit in a church that’s filled with only “God of the fathers”. It’s like sitting in the smoking section of an airplane in the 1980s. Everyone around me thinks we are golden. And I’m sitting there choking on the fumes.” —Meggan Watterson (MM Revealed, p. 48)
“I believe asking questions and exploring possibilities are indispensable ways to show love and reverence for revealed truth.” —Kathryn Knight Sonntag