A Break from the Pedestal: Notes on Benevolent Sexism

Growing up in the LDS Church, I was flooded with messages about the glistening, angelic nature of women. I heard heartfelt, tearful declarations from the pulpit about the altruism of wives and mothers; the Relief Society sisters were the true glue of the ward, and the Primary girls would grow up to be excellent homemakers and mothers one day. During General Conference, the men speaking would often gush over their heaven-sent wives, causing a collective ripple of admiration throughout the listening congregation. Surely, this organization is one that uplifts, empowers, and gives women every opportunity to lead, right? 

And yet, in spite of all of the shiny praise passed around within LDS congregations, the structure of the LDS Church is indisputably patriarchal, down to its bones. At the age of twelve, a boy is bestowed with more authority and power than a Mormon woman will possess in a lifetime of perfect servitude. But when one is bombarded with messages about a woman’s celestial nature and holiness, how does one reconcile this with the fact that the Church is nearly exclusively led by men? 

Benevolent sexism, or the belief that women are so innately good that they simply don’t need power, is imbued into every part of Mormon doctrine and culture. As a woman who grew up in the Church for nearly two decades, I experienced so much cognitive dissonance about this concept. During my time at Brigham Young University, I became educated about feminism and felt a sprawling love and advocacy for women take root in my heart. It became what I was the most passionate about, in tandem with the gospel of Jesus Christ. In order to hold both of these sacred truths at once, I often fed myself common (albeit faulty) narratives in an attempt to calm the dissonance. 

I assured myself that my femininity was so godsent, so glimmering and pure, that possessing any semblance of power wasn’t a necessity. There’s a narrative within Church culture that men need to hold the priesthood, that they need all of the responsibility of leadership, in order to catch up to the goodness that women already innately possess. I clung onto this narrative tightly and chose to believe that women are, from the womb, so pure that they don’t need to do anything but exist as wives and mothers. 

I began to feel this worldview shift and crumble beneath my feet as I meditated on the implications of purity. Women in the Church are taught to be chaste, reverent, pure, and obedient to the guidance of priesthood holders. As I got older, I felt myself tremble beneath the weight of having to flawlessly perform these requirements. The truth is that benevolent sexism places women on an incredibly narrow pedestal. It does not leave room for women to be complex, messy, angry, loud, irreverent, assertive, or a plethora of other things. It does not allow for the humanization of women. 

With my head still swimming with contradictions about God and femininity, Isearched vehemently for answers about Heavenly Mother. I’d grown up hearing whisperings across pews of a female deity too sacred to really know, one too holy to even regularly acknowledge. Who was she, other than a mother and a wife? I remember feeling dejected when a professor told me it was “sacrilegious” to pray to her; but my soul ached to be close to this divine feminine enigma. Though many women in the Church hold her sacred, my view of Heavenly Mother began to dissipate as I realized how benevolent sexism was heartbreakingly reflected through her. The LDS faith has a female deity, but She is deemed too sacred to pray to, too sacred to worship, and too sacred to know. I came to the gut-wrenching conclusion that the female God mirrors Her devotees: divine, but ultimately voiceless. 

Can true female divinity and patriarchy actually coexist? The gender ideology of the Church seems to insist that the answer is yes. But as I examine my own experiences, I look back on the calculated praise as an intentional way of distracting women from the patriarchal power structure unfolding in front of them. 

When I think about the bright little sunbeams in Primary and the elderly widows in the pews, I want more for them. When I think about the mothers who were taught for decades that motherhood is their highest and holiest calling, my heart cracks in my chest. When I think about the innumerable women who’ve devoted their entire souls to a church that deems them too holy to lead, I’m filled with unspeakable rage. The truth is that women are good, sacred, and worthy of so much praise. But women are also deeply complex human beings who deserve a break from the pedestal.