I’ll never forget Kate What’s-Her-Name

We held our quarterly Interpreter Foundation Board meeting this morning.  It was very pleasant to welcome two new members — Matt Bowen and Jim Graham —  to the Foundation’s Board of Trustees.  There are really interesting things on the horizon.  (See here for biographies of the current members of the Interpreter Board.)

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It seems that a former student of mine — Dan McClellan, who was an impressive participant in a seminar on “celestial ascents” that the late Bill Hamblin and I taught at Brigham Young University — has become a social media “influencer”:  “Mormon TikTok star debunks Bible conspiracies, misinformation: More than a quarter-million TikTok followers enjoy Dan McClellan’s unusual combination of deadpan humor and solid biblical scholarship”

Incidentally, Dan published an article in Interpreter back in 2015  — “Psalm 82 in Contemporary Latter-day Saint Tradition” — in which, among other things, he took issue with an earlier article that I myself had published on the subject.  I judged at the time that our disagreement was not so fundamental as to demand urgent response.  Should I ever return to the topic, though, I’ll certainly take his fine work into account.

I realized this evening that I haven’t heard about nor even thought about Kate Kelly, the former leader (?) of Ordain Women, for a very long time.  Maybe I just haven’t been listening or don’t move in the right circles.  But some time ago, while looking for something else, I ran across these two items from blog entries that I posted back in February 2015, and I think that they’re worth remembering:

I.

“Sadly, the Mormon faith has become a place that incentivizes the survival of the least fit. Since strict obedience is demanded and harshly enforced, only the least talented, least articulate, least nuanced thinkers, least likely to take a stand against abuse, and the least courageous people thrive in the Church today.”

— Kate Kelly, founder of “Ordain Women,” in The Guardian (6 February 2015)

II.

As I noted yesterday, Kate Kelly, the founder of “Ordain Women” has pronounced the membership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints unfit, untalented, inarticulate, unnuanced, cowardly, morally acquiescent, and conformist.

Now, it seems unlikely to me that the Saints suddenly became inferior and inadequate overnight, just when Ms. Kelley was excommunicated last summer.  Presumably, they were already low specimens of humanity even when she was still a member of the Church.

Moreover, her judgment of the Saints seems merely a superficially more civil variant of the description often given of Mormon believers on some apostate message boards, as “sheeple,” “Morgbots,” “Mor(m)ons,” and “Utards.”

So, I confess, I’ve been led to wonder why she was ever demanding to be ordained a leader among such a defective people.

Do successful corporate executives crave appointment as Boy Scout patrol leaders?

Do Nobel-laureate physicists aspire to take first prize at junior high school science fairs?

I suspect that the Lutheran theologian and martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer wanted to abolish the Hitler Youth, not to join the boys and become their leader.

But perhaps I’m failing to grasp the self-sacrificial and compassionate nobility of her offer to receive ordination and to help us.  I’m reminded of Rudyard Kipling’s famous 1899 poem “The White Man’s Burden”:

Take up the White Man’s burden—

Send forth the best ye breed—

Go send your sons to exile

To serve your captives’ need

To wait in heavy harness

On fluttered folk and wild—

Your new-caught, sullen peoples,

Half devil and half child

Take up the White Man’s burden

In patience to abide

To veil the threat of terror

And check the show of pride;

By open speech and simple

An hundred times made plain

To seek another’s profit

And work another’s gain

Take up the White Man’s burden—

And reap his old reward:

The blame of those ye better

The hate of those ye guard—

The cry of hosts ye humour

(Ah slowly) to the light:

“Why brought ye us from bondage,

“Our loved Egyptian night?”

Take up the White Man’s burden-

Have done with childish days-

The lightly proffered laurel,

The easy, ungrudged praise.

Comes now, to search your manhood

Through all the thankless years,

Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,

The judgment of your peers!

I grant that the concept of a “White Man’s Burden” is racist, and that Mr. Kipling’s poem and the Pear’s Soap ad are gender-exclusive.  Thank History that we’ve evolved beyond such sexism and ethnic bigotry.  But their unashamedly condescending statements of a felt mission to help lesser people, even at considerable cost to oneself, may be relevant here.

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I now share another of my favorite pieces of classical Christmas music, Franz Biebl’s version of Ave Maria, as performed by the male a capella group Chanticleer:

V. Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariæ.
R. Et concepit de Spiritu Sancto.

Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus.

V. Maria dixit: Ecce Ancilla Domini.
R. Fiat mihi secundum Verbum tuum.

Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus.

Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostræ. Amen.

My translation:

The angel of the Lord appeared unto Mary,.
And she conceived of the Holy Spirit.

Hail, Mary, full of grace.  The Lord is with thee.  Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Mary said, “Behold the handmaiden of the Lord.
Let it be unto me according to thy word.”

Hail, Mary, full of grace.  The Lord is with thee.  Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.  Amen.

There is horrifying evil, sorrow, selfishness, hatred, disloyalty, and ugliness in the world.  But there is also great goodness and beauty.  This exquisite piece offers a glimpse and a reminder of that.

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But let’s not leave things on such a high note.  In a season of the year when the horrors of theism tend to be disguised beneath a thick layer of sentimentality that attempts to inject religious fantasies into Xmas, its good to have access to the Christopher Hitchens Memorial “How Religion Poisons Everything” File©.  These are some  that the Hitchens File has recently coughed up:

“The Church of Jesus Christ Donates US$10 Million to Stop Polio and Maternal and Neonatal Tetanus: Half of the polio donation targets under-immunized communities throughout Africa”

“Ontario Latter-day Saints and Muslims Serve Together by Packaging Food: Joint food packaging activity in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada, helps #LightTheWorld”

“Latter-day Saints in Hemet, California, Honored for Service to Community: Members participate in JustServe projects and town Christmas parade”

“Inside Church Headquarters: A Glimpse Into the Church’s Welfare and Humanitarian Efforts: From the bishops’ storehouse at Welfare Square, the Presiding Bishopric talks about the Church’s worldwide welfare and humanitarian efforts”