deidre green

Diedre GreenThe week following the Mormon Theology Seminar held in Williamsburg, Virginia, I deviated from how I had anticipated spending my time. I thought I would be back to my normal scholarship, immersed in archives and writing a book. Yet, headed into the archives, something gnawed at me—there would be no one there who wanted to talk about Abinadi or the suffering servant. Instead, I would be in a quiet space poring over texts other than LDS scripture, alone.Although I could not change this situation, I fought back, spending my early mornings poring over Mosiah 11-17 and noting things I wanted to add to my presentation during the seminar, as well as emailing colleagues in order to point out new discoveries I had made relevant to their presentation topics. Further, even as I was cloistered in the archives reading reflections on the Atonement and incarnation from a significantly different perspective, every text I read seemed to have some relevance to the unique way in which Book of Mormon prophets like Abinadi choose to speak about the Atonement. I found myself not doing something wholly removed from reading LDS scripture but rather discovering new lenses and frameworks through which to understand it.Just as reading collaboratively with other LDS scholars lends itself to deeper insights about LDS scripture, reading the text in light of other theological and philosophical texts can push forward, subvert, and explode more staid readings of the text. Reading the text anew, both in community with others and in community with other traditions, has allowed me not only to expand my intellectual or spiritual understanding of the canon, it has further challenged me in my life of discipleship.In examining the striking way in which Abinadi speaks about the Atonement, I keyed in on the fact that he moves quite fluidly between talking about the Atonement as though it is something that has already happened and as though it will only be realized in the future. I compared the way he speaks with other passages in the Book of Mormon and with the New Testament as well. I believe there are incredible lessons to be learned about how we are to understand and relate to the Atonement as we pay to attention to the ways in which the Book of Mormon prophets and authors point us to this particular aspect of it.I look forward to continuing to think and study about this issue and what the Book of Mormon is uniquely able to teach us about it. What was once a text I felt some ambivalence towards, I now read with a greater appreciation of its complexity and profound messages. My communal and intertextual study of Mosiah 15 has provoked reflection in me in ways that have, in turn, deepened my religious practice. The 2017 Mormon Theology Seminar recently wrapped up at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. We asked seminar participants to reflect on their experiences, offering a glimpse at what the Seminar is all about. This post features Deidre Green., a Maxwell Institute postdoctoral fellow who specializes in religion and philosophy. See more reflections here.

Jesus commanded his disciples to 'love one another '(John 13:34). How can a Christian disciple fulfill this obligation in cases where they are being threatened or abused? Should a victim of domestic violence passively endure suffering, or does the gospel provide a better way? In this lecture, Maxwell Institute visiting scholar Deidre Nicole Green discusses problems with a Christian ethic of self-sacrifice and offers solutions by drawing on scripture and Christian philosopher Søren Kierkegaard. “Christian love calls us both to name injustice and prevent victimization. Kierkegaard puts it thus, ‘it is part of love’s work, that with the help of the loving one it becomes entirely clear to the unloving one how irresponsibly he has acted so that he deeply feels his wrong.’ He opines that it would be ‘a weakness, not love, to make the unloving one believe that he was right in the evil he did.’” —Deidre Green Green's lecture, 'Saving Self-Sacrifice,' is now available on the Maxwell Institute's YouTube channel. Watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZFNlxDVnOg About Deidre Green Deidre Nicole Green is an adjunct professor of religion at BYU and a visiting scholar at the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship. She is author of Works of Love in a World of Violence (Mohr Siebeck, 2016). Green earned a PhD in Religion from Claremont Graduate University, after receiving a Master of the Arts in Religion from Yale Divinity School and a Bachelor of the Arts in Philosophy from BYU.

Deidre GreenDeidre Green would like to see more women in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints thinking about theology. Not only thinking about it, but also contributing to it. As a scholar of Danish Christian philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, Green understands the value of individual perspectives in a community's efforts to understand God: 'Women’s experience is not ancillary to, but rather foundational for, the articulation of theology...Lifting up women’s experience seems fitting of an LDS framework, in which revelation and doctrine often derive from questions that arise from embodied encounters with the world.' ((Deidre Nicole Green, 'Becoming Equal Partners: Latter-day Saint Women as Theologians,' Mormonism in the Academy: Teaching, Scholarship, & Faith, June 8, 2016. Watch her presentation here. This paper is scheduled for publication in the forthcoming book based on this colloquium.)) For Green, understanding God's purposes requires the mutual participation of women and men, everyone involved offering and learning from diverse perspectives. The Maxwell Institute is grateful that Green brings her perspective as one of this year's visiting fellows. Having completed a PhD in Religion from Claremont Graduate University, she also currently teaches part-time in BYU's Religious Education department.Green is encouraged by historical examples of women contributing to LDS theology, as well as by current efforts by the LDS Church to increase the participation of women: 'As women increasingly feel confident in their knowledge of LDS doctrine, appropriate it, and assume the authority both to teach and shape it, they can better fulfill the imperative given to them by Russell M. Nelson, president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, to 'speak with the power and authority of God!'' ((Russell M. Nelson, “A Plea to My Sisters,” General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, October 2015.)) We're thrilled to have Green with us at the Institute. You can read more about her historically grounded and philosophically informed ideas about women and LDS theology in a forthcoming book based on last year's Bushman colloquium. Her contribution is called 'Becoming Equal Partners: Latter-day Saint Women as Theologians.' Stay tuned for more information.