Episodes 94 & 95 (bonus): Everyone Back to Church…Maybe?
Part 1
Part 2
The pandemic that interrupted attendance for all members forced an unprecedented change in our personal church habits and activity. It blurred the distinction between work, education, church, and family lives. Many saw the shift to “home-based, church-supported” as a prophetic precursor to this change, and leaned into the opportunity presented by it. For some normal attendance has resumed, while others are choosing to reengage differently in church activity going forward. For this episode, Cynthia and Susan asked women how the pandemic affected their personal faith journey and relationship with the Church. What changed? What didn’t? And what opportunities for personal and institutional growth might we find by examining our individual and collective experience?
Notes & Quotes:
Are You Sleeping Through the Restoration?, by Dieter F. Uchtdorf, April 2014
Elder Bednar says pandemic is a “wake-up call” for religious freedom, BYU University Communications News, by Kaylee Esplin, 06/20/2020
God Will Do Something Unimaginable, by Dieter F. Uchtdorf, October 2020
Navigating the Mysteries, Emergence Magazine, by Martin Shaw, 05/12/2022
“In reality, the Restoration is an ongoing process; we are living in it right now. It includes ‘all that God has revealed, all that He does now reveal,’ and the ‘many great and important things’ that ‘He will yet reveal.’” —Dieter F. Uchtdorf
“This is the Lord’s work. He invites us to find His ways of doing it, and they may differ from our past experiences. This happened to Simon Peter and other disciples who went fishing on the Sea of Tiberias. ‘That night they caught nothing.’ But when the morning [came], Jesus stood on the shore. …’And he said unto them, Cast the net on the [other] side of the ship, and ye shall find.’ They did cast their nets on the other side and “were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes.” —Dieter F. Uchtdorf
“I’m not interested in what worked as a storyteller two years ago, only what is being disclosed now. Not all stories will be returning, and some in a new shape. I don’t know what will happen next.
“So as I approach the mystery of telling these stories again, the uncertainty of working into my mythmaking, I wonder if we could do something similar with our own narratives. What are we bored by, what needs to stay buried? What deserves to be re-imagined, re-seeded, re-beheld?
“That’s where the joyful work is. I’m handing you a spade.
“This is a moment of unexpected possibility.” —Martin Shaw