Episode 5: Mormon Feminism, Women, and Claudia Bushman Part 2

I just finally had time to listen to these. I’d like to chime in with my hopes for the rest of the series. (And I know that I’ve said this before, so pardon me while I beat the drum again.) I hope that you won’t do a couple more podcasts about women’s issues and then just drop it. I hope you’ll continue to interview a variety of women, about women’s issues and other subjects.

I’d add two other impressions here– actually both about her comments about church not being very good anymore. I’m old enough, just barely to remember pre-Correlation lessons. I used to lie on my parents’ bed and read my dad’s old priesthood manuals, the ones which had a single author. They were so different from the current ones. For example, I remember one lesson in particular about the concept of infinity and eternity. It used scriptures and science together to explain the ideas. I can’t imagine my 13 year old self being interested at all in the current manuals.

The other impression is that both your respondents were probably too young to understand what she meant about church not being fun anymore. We did a lot of things in primary and SS which would be frowned on today. We did some more “secular” things than are allowed now, and Primary, in particular, was much more physically active and child-appropriate than it used to be. It’s true that for some people, in some places, there’s still a lot of community, but it’s much more dependent on the individuals themselves doing something together, like signing all the kids up for ballet together or something– rather than everyone, of all ages, and not necessarily in the same friendship groups, going off together to learn to tango.