Mormon Stories Podcast

Latest Episodes:

706: Women of a Certain Age (WOCA) Mar 19, 2017

Show notes

We are a group of women 40+ with longer life experiences. We are grandmothers, mothers, aunts, single, divorced, widowed or married. We are LGBT friendly and feminists! Many of us are just learning feminism. Having felt the pain of patriarchy, but not having a “language” to describe our experiences, we are giving ourselves permission to flourish and grow with no limitations or constructs.

Many of us are at the beginning of a life we never imagined. We have had to make tough decisions, been tried by our choices, and some of us have lost important connections along the way. Being of a “certain age” makes it harder to make friends and to find a community of like-minded souls with whom to move forward with love, joy and friendship. We realize that our decisions can affect many generations, so our time is spent fostering relationships with our loved ones and excelling in our careers, businesses, and at home, all of which leaves little time and opportunity to make new friends.

This group is for “women of a certain age” or lovingly called WOCA (Wah-kah). We also have a group for “women of a certain age” and under. This age group, affectionally known as the UNDERS is from 30-40. The final group under the umbrella of WOCA are the COCAs. These are “Couples of a Certain Age” for those wishing to participate as couples. And housed inside of COCA is the “men only” group which meet regularly in men-only events.

WOCA activities are NOT within the paradigm of our former religious background, although themes from our lived experiences may come up. We have transitioned from our former organized religious choices and wish to create wonderful spaces where ALL people with commonalities can come together, share and find community.

If you would like to join us, please contact, from the list below, the appropriate person from your geographical area by way of Facebook messenger.

Wasatch (The Mother Ship): Christine Elkington & Kim Turner
COCA: Brett Nord
UNDERS: Ruth Tyson
Phoenix: Amy Grubbs
Boston: Amy Grubbs
Las Vegas: Christine Elkington
Bay Area: Kim Turner
Texas: Lisa Keyes
So-Cal: Lisa Durtschi
Idaho: Lisa Keyes
Sacramento: Lisa Keyes
Seattle: Nicole Bruderer
Cedar City/St. George: Nicole Bruderer
Denver: Ruth Tyson
Florida: Kim Turner
Oregon: Kim Turner

And if where you live isn’t on the list, please join our ONLINE group and be with women around the world just like you!

ONLINE: Kim Turner & Christine Elkington

705: Major Contraction of LDS Church in Europe and the Netherlands Beginning Mar 16, 2017

Show notes

Marco Meiling, active and believing LDS church member in the Netherlands, reports on the beginning of a major contraction of the LDS Church in Europe.

From Marco's original message to me:

Have you heard yet about a big push to consolidate the units in Europe.
We are having closing after closing being announced. Yesterday a closing was announced, and the Stake President stated there are 800 units in Europe which are considered too weak and would need to merge. We have 1163 units in Western Europe acc to Cumorah.com.

Holland with 34 wards will close 5 at least this year. In Holland the Church is phasing out all wards which don´t have a purpose-built Chapel.

Temple-attendance here is down 60% compared to 2000. However the amount of recommendholders went up 200%. So what do we make of this: A Temple is a way for the Church to increase revenue. So even with less people, the Church can make a higher turnover.

The main reason given is that these units are too weak to run programmes aimed at the youth. and small units demand too much from the few members. Research has shown that people and families benefit form larger wards, and families are less burdened. That why the policy direction. Of course the longer travel will cause problems for some menbers. Assistance will be needed.

704: Kim Sandberg Turner Pt. 4 - Creating and co-leading WOCA Mar 06, 2017

Show notes

Kim Sandberg Turner is the founder of Women of a Certain Age (WOCA) - a network of support groups for 40+ post-Mormon women. In this four part episode, Kim discusses:

Part 1: Her years growing up as a faithful Mormon in Salt Lake City, meeting and marrying Terry (her childhood sweetheart and husband of 42 years), and the many years her family lived in Bolivia as devout Mormons (Terry serving as a Mormon bishop twice, and Kim in multiple Relief Society Presidencies).
Part 2: How Kim and Terry's Mormon faith began to unravel as their son Josh came out to them as gay, and as they began studying LDS church history in depth.
Part 3: Kim discusses how she and Terry navigated their faith transition as parents and grandparents, exploring topics such as how they dealt with their Draper ward once they decided to leave the church, how they have handled parenting and grandparenting through a faith transition, what they do and don't believe today, and the importance of community in their transition.
Part 4: Kim shares the story of how she founded WOCA, how WOCA operates, and what WOCA means to her and to the other WOCA women.

703: Kim Sandberg Turner Pt. 3 - Navigating our Mormon faith transition as grandparents Mar 06, 2017

Show notes

Kim Sandberg Turner is the founder of Women of a Certain Age (WOCA) - a network of support groups for 40+ post-Mormon women. In this four part episode, Kim discusses:

Part 1: Her years growing up as a faithful Mormon in Salt Lake City, meeting and marrying Terry (her childhood sweetheart and husband of 42 years), and the many years her family lived in Bolivia as devout Mormons (Terry serving as a Mormon bishop twice, and Kim in multiple Relief Society Presidencies).
Part 2: How Kim and Terry's Mormon faith began to unravel as their son Josh came out to them as gay, and as they began studying LDS church history in depth.
Part 3: Kim discusses how she and Terry navigated their faith transition as parents and grandparents, exploring topics such as how they dealt with their Draper ward once they decided to leave the church, how they have handled parenting and grandparenting through a faith transition, what they do and don't believe today, and the importance of community in their transition.
Part 4: Kim shares the story of how she founded WOCA, how WOCA operates, and what WOCA means to her and to the other WOCA women.

702: Kim Sandberg Turner Pt. 2 - The unraveling of our Mormon faith Mar 06, 2017

Show notes

Kim Sandberg Turner is the founder of Women of a Certain Age (WOCA) - a network of support groups for 40+ post-Mormon women. In this four part episode, Kim discusses:

Part 1: Her years growing up as a faithful Mormon in Salt Lake City, meeting and marrying Terry (her childhood sweetheart and husband of 42 years), and the many years her family lived in Bolivia as devout Mormons (Terry serving as a Mormon bishop twice, and Kim in multiple Relief Society Presidencies).
Part 2: How Kim and Terry's Mormon faith began to unravel as their son Josh came out to them as gay, and as they began studying LDS church history in depth.
Part 3: Kim discusses how she and Terry navigated their faith transition as parents and grandparents, exploring topics such as how they dealt with their Draper ward once they decided to leave the church, how they have handled parenting and grandparenting through a faith transition, what they do and don't believe today, and the importance of community in their transition.
Part 4: Kim shares the story of how she founded WOCA, how WOCA operates, and what WOCA means to her and to the other WOCA women.

701: Kim Sandberg Turner Pt. 1 - The believing years, including our time in Bolivia Mar 06, 2017

Show notes

Kim Sandberg Turner is the founder of Women of a Certain Age (WOCA) - a network of support groups for 40+ post-Mormon women. In this four part episode, Kim discusses:

Part 1: Her years growing up as a faithful Mormon in Salt Lake City, meeting and marrying Terry (her childhood sweetheart and husband of 42 years), and the many years her family lived in Bolivia as devout Mormons (Terry serving as a Mormon bishop twice, and Kim in multiple Relief Society Presidencies).
Part 2: How Kim and Terry's Mormon faith began to unravel as their son Josh came out to them as gay, and as they began studying LDS church history in depth.
Part 3: Kim discusses how she and Terry navigated their faith transition as parents and grandparents, exploring topics such as how they dealt with their Draper, Utah ward once they decided to leave the church, how they have handled parenting and grandparenting through a faith transition, what they do and don't believe today, and the importance of community in their transition.
Part 4: Kim shares the story of how she founded WOCA, how WOCA operates, and what WOCA means to her and to the other WOCA women.

699: Honoring Grant Palmer Pt. 3 - Honoring Grant Palmer Feb 20, 2017

Show notes

In this three-part interview, we honor Grant Palmer, former LDS seminary/institute instructor, and author of "An Insider's View of Mormon Origins" - which provides a plausible explanation for how the Book of Mormon was authored by Joseph Smith.

This interview has three parts:

Part 1: Grant reflects on his experience authoring An Insider's View of Mormon origins, discusses his disfellowshipment and ultimate decision to resign from the LDS (after threats of excommunication). Grant also reflects upon the impact of An Insider's View on the LDS church.

Part 2: Grant discusses his new, yet-to-be-published book, "Restoring Christ." Within the book he discusses why he continues to believe, how he justifies belief in Christ and the Bible after losing faith in the LDS church and in the Book of Mormon, what the atonement does and doesn't mean to him, how he deals with the God of the Old Testament, etc. He also discusses in-depth his conversation with an LDS general authority who claims that modern LDS apostles receive $1 million once they become apostles, and that many of them do not believe the LDS church to be true (a claim that I challenge).

Part 3: Participants in the evening share with Grant what his work has meant to them. In addition, Tyler Glenn (Neon Trees) sings two songs in honor of Grant from his new album, Excommunication.

698: Honoring Grant Palmer Pt. 2 - Restoring Christ (Grant's New Book) Feb 20, 2017

Show notes

This interview has three parts:

Part 3: Participants in the evening share with Grant what his work has meant to them. In addition, Tyler Glenn (Neon Trees) sings two songs in honor of Grant from his new album, Excommunication.

697: Honoring Grant Palmer Pt. 1 - Reflecting on An Insider's View of Mormon Origins Feb 20, 2017

Show notes

This interview has three parts:

Part 3: Participants in the evening share with Grant what his work has meant to them. In addition, Tyler Glenn (Neon Trees) sings two songs in honor of Grant from his new album, Excommunication.

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