Ushers at the Salt Lake Tabernacle turned away several hundred women and their few male supporters who sought admittance to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints meeting for its male members, called the annual Priesthood Meeting, last evening. http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/06/us-usa-mormon-women-idUSBREA340O720140406 and http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2014-04-05/news/sns-rt-us-usa-mormon-women-20140405_1_mormon-women-mormon-church-temple-square
One report of the incident described how an usher hugged a distraught young woman who was denied entrance, advising her sympathetically to watch the live Priesthood Meeting online. The Church, a worldwide organization with more than half its membership outside the USA, broadcasts via Internet, satellite, television, and radio all of its annual and semi-annual meetings as of this April’s conference. http://www.mormonnewsroom.org
Last weekend, the General Women’s Conference of the Church was held for the first time in the same location that the General Conference was held this week. The Priesthood Meeting occurred as it has for decades on the Saturday evening in the third of five 2-hour sessions associated with the annual and semi-annual General Conferences. http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/first-presidency-announces-new-general-womens-meeting
HFS analysts note that in the General Women’s Conference, male priesthood leaders presided over and spoke along with women leaders of the Church. Those same male leaders presided over and some spoke at the General Conference, and a few women have or will speak there too. The difference is partly symbolic, that is, who sits in the seats of honor to lead the meetings. However, the difference goes much further based on what latter-day saints proclaim is direct revelation through their prophets. Specifically, LDS prophets declare that Jesus Christ heads the church, not any mortal man or woman, and He directs that only male members should be given His authority, called Priesthood authority in the Church today. Women members of the Church pressing to enter the male-only Priesthood meeting seek to pressure the presiding prophet, Thomas S. Monson, to change the doctrine that limits priesthood ordination to males, believing less in divine revelation and more in woman-made change. To HFS analysts, the implicit clash between the Church’s leaders and a few of its women seems like a Wile E. Coyote butting its head against a large desert mountain. What do you think?
