Conversations about the religious and spiritual life on the other side of fundamentalism
 
130:  Jerilyn Hassell Pool:  Plumbing the Depths

130: Jerilyn Hassell Pool: Plumbing the Depths

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In this marriage of minds Jerilyn and I get down and dirty about growing up, growing down, being bad, being good, being married and messing things up, and loving and hating being a Mormon.  Its an earthy banter with a surprise chat after the closing hymn (which probably isn’t appropriate with children in the car).

Jerilyn is a quirky Mormon social media presence who has a knack for making her friends smile, for siding with great causes and saying awesome things in short sentence fragments that make you think.

8 Comments

  1. A Happy Hubby

    Gina and Jerilyn – thanks for letting us eves drop on the conversation between two good friends.

    You were almost guilty of causing the guy in the next seat in front of me on the airplane to get a mouthful of Diet Coke with that comment about, “men with a narrow world view coming out of one small hole”!

    Gina – you need to let the listeners of the podcast know what your middle initials of “F. N.” stand for. ?

    And the blooper at the end just proved Frued right. Your gender DOES have envy!

  2. S

    MADE IT TO THE END. Loved when J talked about why she is in the church. So many of us are trying to figure out what we love about it and it that is enough to stay. Love learning from both you of ladies.

  3. Janson

    Glory be, Jerilyn, the sister and girlfriend you never had turns out to be Gina f*ing Colvin! Oh you two are a pair for the eternities. As I listened to this most delightful of conversations it occurred to me that perhaps this is what it was like for David and Jonathan in the Old Testament whose hearts were knit together as one.

    Given your inclination to follow your heart and the direction of the spirit, your choice to stay with the Church™ is heroic, Jerilyn. Regardless if you’re allowed to stay or if someone with a penis insists on expunging you, God has a work for you, sister. The future belongs not to a rusting vision of American right-wing religious patriarchy but to a vision of each of us yearning for the happiness and well-being of one another and being willing to sacrifice ourselves for that happiness.

    I was touched by your willingness to talk about your struggles with your beloved and Gina’s thoughtful questions throughout.

    The theory that control in the Church™ depends on who has a penis has not always worked out. It apparently didn’t apply to church patriarch, Joseph F. Smith, who was quietly fired and sent to Hawaii in 1946 when it became know that he was gay.

    “1946– Church leadership discovers that the Patriarch of the Church, Joseph F. Smith had had intimate relations with younger men. President George Albert Smith wrote in his journal that the First Presidency and Twelve Apostles met in his office where they discussed the issue. George Albert Smith wrote in his journal 10 July 1946, “Jos Patriarch case considered. Bad situation. Am heartsick.” Joseph F. Smith was quietly released from his calling and sent to Hawaii. David O. McKay instructed the stake president in Hawaii to “rehabilitate” Smith.”
    (George Albert Smith diary, 10 July 1946; Joseph Fielding Smith diary 10 July 1946; D. Michael Quinn, Same-sex dynamics among nineteenth-century Americans: A Mormon Example (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1996), 370-371)
    (Seth Anderson, Timeline of Mormon Thinking About Homosexuality, Rational Faiths, November 3, 2013 http://rationalfaiths.com/timeline-of-mormon-thinking-about-homosexuality/)

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