It is so important that we, as members of the church, are literary. Literature creates a space of shared meaning and commonality which is important for us in a general context, within our own faith tradition, and within ourselves. Literature allows us to work through our ideas and thoughts and shared them with others. One of the things that was particular impactful for me, was our conversation we had about the relationship between the early church and literature. I loved that we studied different works of literature and that we wanted "our own Miltons." Through this class I feel like I have gained a much greater understanding of the place that literature has in our own faith tradition.
I first think the literature is important to us, because it helps us connect to others. Currently, I am an English teaching major, but before this I strongly considered teaching math. I loved math and am much better at it then English. Ultimately though I decided to go with English, because I wanted to be able to teach morals and value to my students. In a lot of ways, literature is the religion of the modern world. I feel like literature is a way that we can bridge gaps between us and our brothers and sisters who have different beliefs than ours. I feel like F. Scott Fitzgerald put it best when he said, "That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longer are universal longings, that you're not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong." When I feel those connections that Fitzgerald explained, I am reminded that we all a part of the family of God.
One example of this that I found in our class was Martine Leavitt's My Book of Life by Angel. This book was woven with threads of LDS thoughts and theology. Like our unique ideas about the fall, our belief in guardian angels, and the belief that God answer's prayers. Yet it connected with people of all faiths and ideologies. It allowed us together to explore hard topics and an ugly issue that exists in our world right now. As we strive to connect with the world around us, I feel like literature is a way we can do it.
I feel like literature can connect us as members of the Church of Jesus Christ as well. The greatest example of this would be the Book of Mormon, of course, which is the keystone that keeps us all together. However other texts can do that for us as well. In some of my research for my job, I have looked through Exponents magazines (which we looked at in class too) and it was interesting to see how important that those were to them at that time. Women of the church really felt connect through those magazines. I also feel like Darlene Young's Homespun and Angel Feathers is another great example of this. Her poem "Utah Mormon" really resonated with me and in that moment I realized I wasn't alone in the feelings I was feeling. I also think that the Happy Little Secrets play demonstrated a different aspect of this, because it was a safe way for us to work through difficult aspects of our beliefs.
Continuing this theme that it helps us to connect to each other, I think it also helps us to rethink ideas we already know and believe. The doctrine of the gospel is unchanging, so I feel like are focus is on deepening our understanding of it, instead of widening it. When we are able to work through the cliques in our language and find new analogies and metaphors, we are "all edified together." I really enjoyed Dr. Burton's "Creativity and New media Mormonism" speech, because he did that within his speech and also explained the concept of continually finding awe in the gospel. I think we have an obligation to use literature to explore our own faith and then share that with others.
Finally, I feel like literature helps us to connect with ourselves. Another impactful moment for me in this class was when Ashley Mae Holiand came to class. She talked about how she tried to just write for herself. Then she talked about how she is writing about her experience with an illness as she is experiencing the illness. It was clear that writing was a way that she processed life and tried to understand the world around her. Then we had that class conversation and activity where we explored the idea that writing can help us process doubts and problems we have. I feel like this class has really helped me to understand that concept and idea. I have an increased desire to write my experiences and share my thoughts and ideas through literary means.
From this class, I learned that literature really does plays an important part in our faith tradition. We need to have it to connect us to the world around us, to others and to ourselves. My all time favorite quote from this semester was something Darlene Young said. I probably am not going to get it exactly, but she said we write not to get to a destination, but to allow someone to have an experience. The gospel, for me, is all about the experiences that we have in this life. Repentance is a change of perspective, and I think literature helps us to accomplish that.
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