"Equality is Not a Feeling." - Joanna Brooks

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http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/joannabrooks/7334/_equality_is_not_a_feeling_/

October 7, 2013 2:37am
Post by JOANNA BROOKS

Hours after top-ranking LDS Church leaders made national headlines with a public acknowledgment that past Mormon leaders had “made mistakes” and a call for greater acceptance of Mormons who question controversial aspects of the faith, Church representatives turned away nearly two hundred Mormon women seeking stand-by tickets to a restricted men’s-only session of the faith’s semi-annual global conference.

Mormon women travelled from as far away as New York, Florida, and Germany to take part in the collective action organized by the group Ordain Women as a gentle and symbolic demonstration against pervasive gender segregation in LDS Church administration and leadership.

All observant men and boys over the age of 12 are eligible for ordination to the Mormon lay priesthood, and the Church’s theological, liturgical, financial, and administrative decisions are made by an exclusively-male chain of command.

“I have heard from many women, ‘I see nothing wrong with the status quo. I feel equal,’” said Ordain Women founder Kate Kelly to a pre-demonstration gathering in a downtown Salt Lake City park. “To them I say: you can feel respected, supported and validated in the church, but equality can be measured. Equality is not a feeling. In our church men and women are not equal.”

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