Say More: At Last She Writes It

No. 9 | February 2024

photo by Blakelee Ellis

Joy in the Truth that I’ve Changed

by Blakelee Ellis

I love to go thrift shopping.

It’s my guilty pleasure, my “me time.” I love digging for unexpected treasures and the thrill when I find a special item I didn’t even know I needed. Every thrift shopper has a preferred section of the store they are drawn to. Dedicated thrifters will rummage around for hours examining every shelf for a one-of-a-kind object to add to their collection. I’m drawn to the book section. I love books because a physical book is much more than just the story inside. I’m fascinated by the color, font, and type set, but especially by the weathering on second hand books. The frayed covers, yellowed pages, and crumbling bindings tell their own story. They bring uniqueness and a palpable nostalgia to my library shelves.

When I first started collecting thrifted books, I became particularly fond of finding vintage LDS books. I collected books on Church history, teachings of the prophets and exploration of the scriptures. I would examine their worn pages and be delighted that these books were well used. To me, they served as a physical manifestation of my spiritual heritage. I imagined the previous owners pouring over page after page in an attempt to understand the mysteries of God and the complexities of our human experience. I felt pride.

When I found myself on a faith journey, the books became a tangible representation of all the turmoil in my spiritual life. The more my soul was lightened by love and grace, the heavier their presence became on my shelves. In a small attempt to bury my hurt and betrayal, I pulled all my Mormon books off the library shelves and packed them away deep in the basement. I thought I’d never buy another vintage LDS book again.

Last week, as I was thrift shopping, a set of books caught my eye. The jackets were my favorite color blue. They were worn and beautiful, but the title is what most intrigued me. It was a set of five volumes all titled, Answers to Gospel Questions, written by Joseph Fielding Smith. I stared at their dingy covers and thought, “Joe, if only things were that simple.”

I pause because the truth is, things used to be that simple. I felt like I knew what I was doing. My path was laid out for me. My world made more sense. My marriage was less complicated. I knew what to say to my children. In moments when grief overwhelms me, I ache to return to that life of knowing. The time when I could simply read a book to find definitive answers.

When my heartache subsides, I feel joy in the truth that I’ve changed. I’ve grown, morphed, and evolved into something new. My new path has taken me away from prescribed answers and certainty and led me to search instead for peace and clarity. This search is a continuous, arduous process. A complex wrestle, sometimes with God and sometimes adjacent to God. It is an exploration of fresh, expansive ideas coupled with my humanity, lived experience and personal revelation. I no longer require someone providing answers or dictating how, where, or when to search. Now, I am the master of my journey. I am my own authority.

The highs and lows of my new spiritual path often feel vast and disorienting. I climb to spiritual peaks, then tumble into dark valleys, all the while clinging to my God, my Savior, and the promise of peace. As I fall again and again, I realize that simplicity and certainty made my spirituality flat. It was like a straight line with no character or transformative conviction. My current faith, while messy and disjointed, is vivacious and all consuming. This faith shows a diverse topography that reflects my personal journey to connect with the divine.

The books went in and out of my cart several times as I debated purchasing them. I kept yelling at myself, “Put them back and walk away! You no longer believe in the certainty these books claim to hold. You’ve matured. You’ve grown. They may look nice, but remember what they symbolize in your life: harm, distress and distrust. Do not walk back into that life.”

When my doubt subsides, I feel joy in the truth that I’ve changed.

So I bought them.

I bought them because now when I look at the antique covers, I feel reconciliation and healing. I close my eyes, inhale, and send my breath down deep. I realize that my pain is slowly being replaced with so many other wonderful feelings.

Gratification, strength, satisfaction, pride.

It is gratification in the strength I’ve cultivated to search for peace over certainty.

It is fulfillment that comes from embracing the spiritual highs and lows of my journey.

It is satisfaction in finding and embracing my own voice, my own spiritual authority.

It’s the type of pride I’m not afraid to display on my shelves.

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photo by Blakelee Ellis

When Patriarchy Dies

by Lisa Phair Fluckiger

The poet Hafiz (1320-1389) wrote that God only knows four words: “Come dance with me.” It’s a beautiful feminine image that I include at the end. I also want to acknowledge Kathryn Knight Sonntag, whom I first heard say, “Men cannot tell women who they are.”  Here’s an offering for all who are imagining—and practicing—something better. —Lisa

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photo by Blakelee Ellis

Easter Weekend

by Rhiannon

It was our family’s turn to clean the church building

Saturday morning. It was Easter weekend and my heart was still aching from the previous weekend of General Conference, because of the lack of women speakers. I had an innumerable amount of thoughts in my head, worrying about the subliminal messaging we send to our young women at church. I am in the Young Women's presidency in my ward and I considered each of the young women and grieved over the disservice they were experiencing—whether or not they realized it.

After cleaning the bathrooms, I walked into the gym to see a group of men setting chairs up. The next day was our stake-wide Easter service. Men from another ward were asked to help set up chairs in addition to some tables for the sacrament. Part of the Easter service was to include the distribution of the sacrament, and each ward was asked to bring trays and cups and their own young men to help distribute the sacrament on Sunday. I started setting out chairs and invited my 9-year-old twin boys to do the same. If I see people who are working and I am in a position to do so, I like to help out.

After a short time, I stepped into the lobby and I noticed a man with his arms full, entering the church building. He looked a little overwhelmed. I resisted the natural urge to want to help at first. My hesitancy stemmed from the fact that his arms were overloaded with white tablecloths and several sacrament trays. There seems to be an unspoken taboo when it comes to women's participation in the sacrament.

For a split second I wondered if it was okay for me to ask him to carry the trays but I shrugged it off as silly, and like I would with anyone else with arms full entering a building I simply asked, "Is there more in your car, and can I help you?" The man seemed eager and pleased that I asked. He thanked me and I went to his parked car. I grabbed one of my sons and we grabbed as many sacrament trays and white table cloths as possible from his vehicle.

This next part was interesting. Depending on the level of difficulty and convenience, I like to help see the task through. It would have been easy to just dump a heap of trays and walk off, but it's just as easy to lay out the white table cloth and organize the trays. It just makes sense!

The man really didn't have anyone else assisting him. So then without prompting, I laid out the white cloth, organized the trays in appropriate rows and continued onward, directing my son how he needed to systematically place each cup into the tray.

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At one point the man made some joke about how tedious placing each cup in the tray was, I wanted to respond, "I wouldn't know. I have NEVER done this."

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At one point the man made some joke about how tedious placing each cup in the tray was, I wanted to respond, "I wouldn't know. I have NEVER done this." But I only smiled. I fully understood and knew what I was doing while doing it. It wasn't lost on me that I was preparing the sacrament in a gym full of plenty of "worthy" priesthood holders. Most of those men were setting up chairs in their Saturday clothes of jeans or sweats. Many of them were talking about sports brackets and watching movies with grandchildren. It was usual Saturday banter. Any of them could have volunteered to help and had they seen the gentlemen with arms full they probably would have, but it was me who volunteered first.

At first, as I helped carry the trays in and lay out the white cloth I was feeling energized that my simple offer to help somehow was "sticking it" to patriarchy. I also fumed wondering why the Young Women weren’t asked to help lay out the trays for this weekend or really anytime the sacrament is being prepared.

As I placed each cup into each circular hole in the tray I thought about all the people who would take one cup off the tray and think about Christ and commit to being better the following week. I thought of my baptismal covenant. I thought about the blessing given on the water and I was surprised how included I felt, empowered even. And humbled. I felt I was a tool in the hands of God. Somehow my efforts would allow others to feel closer to divinity because of the plastic cup that my hand had personally placed in that tray.

It would be Easter Sunday the following day, the day we rejoice in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ and what that means for us. A day where we discuss His grace and His mercy and His unconditional and limitless love for all.

As I stood in the gym observing and watching the men set up chairs, tables, and laying out white table cloths, I could feel the love of our heavenly parents. Independent of who we are—male or female—they see us and love us individually.

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At some point the whole experience became less about "sticking it" to patriarchy and more about me.

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At some point the whole experience became less about "sticking it" to patriarchy and more about me. I felt like the Lord was personally ministering to me. I had arrived at the church heartsick, my mind combing through the discomfort of what the lack of female representation at General Conference means for women in this institution.

However, the action of being able to set up the sacrament trays, in and of itself, was almost too perfect a comfort, too perfect for what my heart longed for.

I felt like Christ himself was wrapping His arm around me, comforting me as I needed to be comforted. It may not have been a big deal to other women or even men, but I was being ministered to individually.

I still felt hurt, but the burden of my heartache was lightened. This experience reminds me of Alma 7:12

"And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities."

This was my Easter Miracle.

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A Woman’s Plea

by S. Parker

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Come as You Are

by Rachel

The first time I put on a dress after months of wearing

my Covid-19 lockdown casual, I almost threw up in my bathroom sink. I wore what had once been a favorite silk wrap dress in tones of bright fuchsia that matched the colored streaks in my long blonde hair. The dress was sleeveless, but that’s what a black cardigan was for! Yet standing in front of my bathroom mirror to fix my hair and makeup, I felt revulsion and bile climb in my throat at the sight of my reflection. The outfit I wore, chic and appropriate for a modest Mormon woman, didn’t match who I felt inside. I fought through the nausea as I did my makeup. Yet the self-loathing only deepened. In the end, I ran to my room, stripped out of the offensive outfit, and hurried to don a different dress. The nausea didn’t stay away. I hoped that ignoring my mirror would negate it over time; I hoped in vain.

This initial brush with gender dysphoria was not my last. During the pandemic, I had found comfort in cozy slacks and button-up shirts over graphic tees; I had learned that clothing could be both fun and gender-nonconforming. I had begun to experiment with dressing in ways that felt true to me: fun and flowing when I felt more femme, solid with strong lines when I wanted to present more butch. Feeling free to avoid dresses and traditionally “feminine” clothing freed me to feel more myself.

When the world reopened and wards began to meet in person, my struggle with my mirror became a regular occurrence. Any time I saw myself in a dress, I thought I looked more like my mother than myself. Every dress I wore made me look more like a Salt Lake suburban Mormon mom than who I was inside. I looked like someone who had been raised to be a second-class citizen in my own faith. And, I will admit, I felt it: a single, queer woman with a pained gynecological history, I would probably never marry in the temple or be a mother in Zion. During the pandemic, I thought I had come to terms with that idea; but after spending so many months celebrating my gender nonconformity, I then felt myself strangled by performative femininity.

The weight of my dysphoria and my anxiety over my appearance grew so immense that I stopped going to church. I still cherished my faith and kept the covenants I had made in the temple. I yearned to be able to take the Sacrament again. Yet the pain of the self-loathing that my gender presentation brought in me wasn’t worth it. At the time, I blamed chronic migraines for my need to stay home, leaving unspoken the fact that my dysphoria aggravated that pain.

What saved my life and my faith then was discovering the ALSSI project. I especially took to heart Cynthia’s message about curating a custom-fit faith. I still have a testimony of the love of my heavenly parents and my Savior; it’s just the cultural church things that I struggle with, especially the gender-aligned rhetoric. It was time that I learned to come to church as I was. I cropped my hair to a pixie cut that required considerably less maintenance than my long, colored curls. I donated almost all of my dresses to a thrift store and stocked up on the slacks I loved. I started going to church in pants, reasoning that my heavenly parents would rather have me here in pants than not here at all. I decided that the only thing worse than coming out in church and talking about my queer identity was being silent about it.

To my surprise, very little changed at my ward. The members I lived among loved me and reached out to me. If anyone was uncomfortable with my transformation, they kept it to themselves. No, only one very important thing changed: I came to love myself.

This endeavor taught me something important: if, as Cynthia has said, “Who we are is the language we speak,” I could no longer be silent (“What do you need?”). Allowing myself to speak my truth, and BE my truth, has brought me closer to God.

I occasionally wear skirts now, cute prints over leggings. But only when I feel like it. I’m taking the invitation to come to church as my best self, whether I fit the feminine mold or not.

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Contributors:

Blakelee Ellis

Blakelee is an energetic, creative, extrovert who loves dance, photography, cooking and baking. Her favorite form of self care is reading a good book in a comfy chair. She continues to deconstruct, grow, love and learn more about herself. She has been married for 15 years and has three children.

Blakelee is so thankful to be a part of the ALSSI team and connect with so many other women.

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Lisa Phair Fluckiger

Lisa trained as a chemist and teacher (BYU ‘91) and currently helps her husband run a family bakery. She also enjoys reading, writing, and running with her dogs.

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Rhiannon

Rhiannon loves to garden, especially very large flowers like Mammoth Sunflowers, Dinner Plate Dahlias, and very big Zinnias. She is married and has 3 boys.

She also does work with Meetinghouse Mosaic (@meetinghousemosaic) and wants to help people find ways to diversify religious art at church.

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S. Parker

S. has a literature degree from Westminster College but has worked in the sciences since high school. She’s currently a project manager for a medical device company in Utah. She loves learning, trying new things, and making lists. Though a lifetime feminist, it was being a mother of four daughters that caused her to connect her feminism with the faith tradition she grew up loving. 

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Rachel

Rachel’s life is one of apparent contradictions: she’s a queer LDS woman, she teaches English and physics, and she loves summer and skiing. She lives in the Salt Lake valley with her cats and her yarn stash.

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