Should post-pandemic Sunday services adopt a new normal? | Episode 190

07/16/21 • 28 min

As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints return to in-person worship after more than a year of COVID-19 restrictions, the question has become: Which pandemic-era changes should stay and which should go? Will members who are homebound or don’t feel comfortable in crowds still be able to watch services via Zoom? Will extra health precautions like hand-washing by deacons continue? Will anyone wear masks again, especially during flu season or when germs are prevalent? Rebecca Jensen, a longtime blogger with By Common Consent, wrote recently about those questions and more. On this week’s show, she talks about post-pandemic Mormonism.

Previous Episode

Puncturing the mystery of Emma Smith, who loved Joseph but loathed polygamy | Episode 189

She was church founder Joseph Smith’s first scribe. She created the first Latter-day Saint hymnal. She was the first president of the women’s Relief Society. She was, indeed, the faith’s first first lady. Yet Emma Smith, beloved wife of Joseph Smith, remains a mystery to many members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Jennifer Reeder, a historian for the Utah-based church, seeks to break through that mystery and the myth in her new biography, appropriately titled “First: The Life and Faith of Emma Smith,” revealing Emma’s undying love for her prophet-husband and her feeling of betrayal at his practice of polygamy, exploring her painful loss of young babies and her lifelong commitment to surviving children, examining her fractious relationship with Brigham Young and the Utah church and her eventual embrace of the Reorganized Church (now called the Community of Christ). On this week’s show, Reeder talks about Emma Smith, the “elect lady” of early Mormonism.

Next Episode

Why we might need to view Pioneer Day differently | Episode 191

This week, Utahns and members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are remembering the 1847 arrival of Mormon pioneers in the Salt Lake Valley. Not everyone, however, believes this epic migration is cause for unmitigated celebration. After all, these settlers ended up displacing Native Americans and transporting slavery to the region. On this week’s show, W. Paul Reeve, head of Mormon studies at the University of Utah, and Elise Boxer, coordinator of Native American studies at the University of South Dakota and a Dakota from the Sisseton and Wahpeton bands, discuss how we should treat Pioneer Day.