Women in Church History — Honest Questions, Real Answers
Critics cite temple covenant language, leadership exclusion, and historical restrictions as evidence the Church treats women as second-class citizens. These concerns deserve honest answers — not dismissal.
The Specific Concerns
These are not invented grievances. They are real features of the historical record that honest Latter-day Saints should be able to address directly:
The Questions on the Table
- Temple covenant language historically required women to obey their husbands (changed 2019)
- Women could not pray in sacrament meeting until 1978
- No woman spoke at General Conference for 143 years after Lucy Mack Smith
- Women cannot hold the Melchizedek Priesthood
- The Book of Mormon names only 6 women in 500+ pages
The Response
1. The 2019 Temple Changes Are Real and Significant
The endowment ceremony was updated in 2019. The change was made by the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve — acting under what they understood as continuing revelation. Critics point to this change as evidence of a problem. It is actually evidence of the living church model working correctly.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ was not restored as a finished artifact. Joseph Smith himself said: “I never told you I was perfect; but there is no error in the revelations which I have taught.” The distinction matters. Institutional practice evolves. Revealed principle does not. The 2019 change refined a covenantal structure that, for many members, had carried an unintended asymmetry. The Church identified it. The Church changed it. This is exactly what a living institution led by ongoing revelation should do.
The question is not whether the change happened. The question is what it means. A change that moves toward greater mutuality in covenant relationships is not evidence of institutional failure — it is evidence of the restoration continuing.
2. Historical Restrictions Require Historical Context
Women not speaking at General Conference in the 19th century is a product of 19th-century cultural norms that permeated every institution — not a uniquely LDS doctrine. Consider the baseline:
The Historical Baseline
- The U.S. Senate had no female members until 1922
- Harvard Medical School did not admit women until 1945
- Women could not vote in the U.S. until 1920
- Most Protestant denominations did not ordain women until the mid-20th century
Every institution of the era operated under these norms. The restoration restores the Gospel of Jesus Christ — it does not instantly override all of human cultural development simultaneously. The relevant question is not “did the Church reflect 19th-century norms?” but “is there a principle in the restored Gospel that pushes toward greater inclusion of women?”
The answer is yes — and the trajectory of the Church has tracked that direction consistently, if imperfectly, across its history.
3. The Priesthood Question — What It Actually Means
The Gospel of Jesus Christ teaches that all ordinances necessary for exaltation are equally available to men and women. Baptism, confirmation, endowment, sealing — these saving ordinances are not gender-restricted. Every covenant path to exaltation is open to both.
The organizational function of priesthood keys for governance is currently held by men. This is a stewardship arrangement — not a statement of spiritual worth or standing before God. The scriptures are explicit:
“He inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white, bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile.”
The question of whether the governance stewardship arrangement will remain exclusively male is an open one. The Church has not declared this an eternal, unchangeable doctrine in the same category as the nature of God or the Atonement. What has been declared is that the current arrangement reflects divine order as understood by those holding keys. That is a different claim, and a more modest one.
The honest Socratic response: does holding a governance title make one more spiritually valuable? The Book of Mormon answers this emphatically. Abish, a Lamanite woman, is the most Christ-like character in Alma 19. She holds no title. She holds the faith of a generation.
4. Women in Scripture — What Is Actually There
The Book of Mormon's brevity about named women reflects its narrative purpose — a covenant history of priesthood lineage — not a statement about women's worth. The same brevity appears throughout the Old Testament. Exodus names very few women despite their central roles in the narrative. Numbers, Leviticus, and Joshua are largely silent about individual women, yet no one argues this reflects a systematic devaluation.
What the restoration actually produced for women is more significant than is usually acknowledged. The Relief Society was organized in 1842. At its founding it was one of the first organizations in the United States to give women formal organizational authority and financial control over institutional resources. Emma Smith was sustained as its first president. The structure Joseph Smith established gave women an autonomous organization with independent governance — remarkable for 1842.
Joseph Smith, April 28, 1842
“I now turn the key in your behalf in the name of the Lord, and this Society shall rejoice, and knowledge and intelligence shall flow down from this time henceforth.”
This is not the voice of an institution that dismisses women. This is a prophet formally extending organizational authority to women in a culture that had not yet even given them the vote.
5. D&C 25 — The Lord Speaking Directly to a Woman
D&C 25 is addressed directly to Emma Smith. The Lord calls her “an elect lady.” He tells her she has a gift in music and writing. He gives her covenant promises. He tells her to comfort Joseph. He instructs her to compile the first LDS hymnal — a commission that shaped worship in the Church for its entire history.
“Wherefore, lift up thy heart and rejoice, and cleave unto the covenants which thou hast made.”
Then the revelation concludes with a striking expansion: “And verily, verily, I say unto you, that this is my voice unto all.” The revelation given to Emma is declared universally applicable. The Lord's personal address to a woman — with covenant promises, spiritual gifts, and specific callings — is then extended as a pattern for all.
That is not institutional dismissal. That is direct divine address.
The Verdict
The questions about women in Church history are real and deserve more than dismissal. Some historical practices were products of their era and have been refined — as they should be in a living institution led by continuing revelation. The Gospel of Jesus Christ teaches that all are alike unto God — male and female — and that both are essential to the eternal family order.
The honest case against the Church on this issue requires demonstrating that the restrictions were doctrinal in the permanent sense — not cultural — and that they reflected the actual will of God rather than accommodation to human norms. That case has not been made persuasively. What has been demonstrated is that an institution founded in 1830 reflected 1830 cultural norms in some of its practices, and has moved consistently (if slowly) in the direction its own scripture points.
The hard question is not why the Church has changed — it’s whether the changes track the direction of a living God or merely of social pressure. The record suggests both are at work, as they have always been in the restoration of all things. That is not a reason to abandon the covenant path. It is a reason to engage it with open eyes.
“All are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile.”