This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Titles are important, says the Mormon women's journal, SquareTwo, so it's time to rethink some of the standard ones for LDS organizations associated with women.
Thus the magazine, created by former Brigham Young University professor Valerie Hudson, is asking readers for new naming possibilities.
Is there a better term for:
• LDS women's organizations such as the Relief Society and Young Women than "auxiliaries"?
• Young Women age groups that are called "Beehives," "Mia Maids" and "Laurels"?
• A mission president's wife?
• The "Young Womanhood Award"? It's the highest achievement for Young Women in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Yet the highest honor for the Young Men is called the "Duty to God" Award.
• "Sister training leaders" among Mormon missionaries?
• "Temple matron"?
SquareTwo also joins other LDS feminists in asking readers if they would approve changing the current Young Women theme from "We are daughters of our Heavenly Father, who loves us and we love him" to "We are daughters of our Heavenly Parents, who love us and we love them"? (The Utah-based faith has publicly and emphatically embraced its belief in a Heavenly Mother.)
The journal is looking for terms that reflect, it says, "a truly equal partnership between men and women in the church."
Peggy Fletcher Stack