At Last She Said It

Bonus Episode 190 contains all the voicemails we couldn’t squeeze into the previous episode's discussion exploring unique complexities of being a Sister missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

In Episode 189, ALSSI team member and returned missionary Katie joins Cynthia and Susan for a dive into listener voicemails about women’s experiences as sister missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. From the pressures around the decision to serve to the daily realities of mission life, there’s plenty to unpack. The rigors of mission service can pay big dividends and/or cause ongoing pain for years post-mission. Every missionary’s experience is individual—a complicated mix of hardship and reward—but is there additional complexity for women who serve?

“If you lift up a prism, depending on how you slightly turn it, the light will hit different facets, refracting and coming out in different ways. That's how I like to approach the scriptures,” explains Cynthia, “Turning them just ever so slightly to see what different meanings there could be.” In Episode 188, she turns her personal prism on the story of Jesus and the Syrophoenician woman, exploring some interpretations of the unique dialog between them. It’s a short story touching on big themes including vulnerability, growth, faith, persistence, and inclusiveness. Then Susan joins and together they dive a little deeper into Cynthia’s insights and discuss a few possible takeaways.

“Spiritual stretching ... makes you stronger, gives you more balance, and keeps you stable. It took me years to understand that my questions and seeking that stretch me, and are really difficult to wrestle with, are healthy and completely in line with our theology. [...] We need more stretchy saints.” Amy Watkins Jensen has plenty of hard-earned wisdom to share with those who may be experiencing challenges—even heartbreak—on their journey as Latter-day Saint women. In Episode 187, she joins Cynthia and Susan to talk about how her lifetime of church experience continues to fuel her faith.

“Life as a member offers relatively little social time or enjoyment,” writes Candice Wendt. “Being in the ward is mostly about passive listening and being told to follow leaders and go to the temple. [...] You’re more likely to get asked to clean our very dirty building than be asked to dinner." In episode 186, Candice joins Susan and Cynthia for a discussion of some of the ways church has changed, with more focus on things like covenants and temple attendance, and less on community. It’s a conversation about what we’ve lost, what’s important, what remains, and what it all might mean in the lives of members and the future of the organization.

Rob Bell describes interacting with scripture like this: there’s the black ink (what’s written on the page), then there’s the white space around it (where we dance with what’s written). In Episode 185, Susan and Cynthia take on what Latter-day Saints commonly call the Parable of the Talents, from Matthew 25. It’s a conversation about grace out of hand, covenant relationship, and how we may have come to think about things the way we do. If you’re a fan of the #gracepeddlers, you won’t want to miss it!

Many of us make temple covenants as young adults. Are we expected to have the same perspectives and priorities at 80 that we had at 18? In a church that emphasizes concepts like “staying on the covenant path” and “enduring to the end,” it can be hard to know how to navigate when our life experiences invite us to grow in new directions. In Episode 184, Jana Spangler joins Cynthia and Susan to discuss the challenges Latter-day Saints may face as they change and mature within an inflexible paradigm.

We asked, you answered! Of all emotions, anger might be the least acceptable for Latter-day Saint women. Many of us are not comfortable being around it, expressing it, talking about it, or even feeling it. But when we choose silence over healthy dialogue, what’s the toll on our physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being? In Episode 183, Cynthia and Susan share listener voicemails about anger. Can we create space in our church culture for women to both experience and express this natural response?

Valerie Hamaker discusses the perception of difficulty equating to righteousness in LDS faith. They explore the idea of harder not always being better, critiquing the association of suffering with holiness. The conversation delves into personal growth, autonomy in faith, and the complexities of sacrifice within spirituality. They emphasize the importance of navigating challenges for growth without external validation and explore the quest for gender equality and agency within religious contexts.

As the centerpiece of Sunday worship and an ordinance pointing directly to Jesus Christ, the sacrament holds deep meaning for many Latter-day Saints. In Episode 181, Cynthia and Susan turn their grace-peddling to a conversation about the sacrament. What matters more: worthiness, or willingness? When did this simple remembrance of Jesus become about “renewing our baptismal covenant,”  and what does that mean? How might the evolution of personal faith impact the way one thinks about and engages with this ordinance? Can a ritual that is so familiar take on new significance as we change and grow?