What is the comfort food of your childhood? Enter recipe contest to win free copies of Book of Mormon Girl and a special grand prize!

 It sounds like a Mormon cliché, but I’m not kidding when I say that some of my happiest childhood memories taste like  Jell-O.

First, there was my grandmother’s green goddess salad.  Which was not, I suppose, technically a salad:  there were no leaves involved.  She’d mix lemon and lime Jell-os, fold in sour cream, cottage cheese, and canned pineapple.  (Grandma liked hers with nuts, but in deference to us kids, she’d often leave them out.)  She’d bring it to every holiday meal, and if we were lucky, make it for Sunday dinners at her house, or even make a pan for a sick grandchild.  What was more soothing than a backscratch from my grandmother or the cool feel of green goddess sliding down a fevered throat?

Then, there was the raspberry angel ring—the special dessert my mom made to serve members of my parents’ Mormon doctrine study group when they convened once a month on Sunday nights.  She’d thaw a little square can of frozen raspberries (remember those?), mix it into warm liquid raspberry Jell-o, fold in whipped cream, and pour the mixture over pieces of a store-bought angel food cake she layered into a bundt cake pan (that was the “ring”) and a 9×13 pyrex.  While the grown-ups finished talking about fine points of theology in the living room, we kids would hover in the kitchen, hoping there was an extra piece left in the pyrex for us.  I remember the cool of the jello, the tang of the berries, the sweet of the cream, and the fluff of the cake.

Green goddess.  Raspberry angel ring.  Is it any wonder that something about that Jell-o and cream combination makes me feel inspired? The Book of Mormon Girl celebrates the delicious goodness of the worlds we grow up in, and the lasting importance of our childhood hopes and beliefs even as life gets more complicated.  Because life does get more complicated and even mixed-up—pineapple and sour cream, anyone?–but the good stuff still inspires us and carries us through.

What food says comfort and childhood to you?  What are the dishes that you most associate with family, friends, and special occasions?

Help celebrate the August 7 release of the new and expanded edition of The Book of Mormon Girl: A Memoir of an American Faith (Free Press) and win your own signed copy by sharing your childhood comfort food memories.  Post your favorite Childhood Comfort Food recipe on your own blog, or Facebook, with a picture, a short (under 300 words) description of your experience with it, and a link back to this contest announcement at askmormongirl.com.  Send me your link, and I’ll post all submissions, add your blog to my blog roll, and “pin” your post on my Pinterest board.

The grand prize winner will receive a handmade “Never Underestimate a Mormon Girl” sampler by the talented and cheeky Utah crafter “The Cotton Floozy”  (please visit her Zazzle.com shop!) and a signed copy of The Book of Mormon Girl: A Memoir of an American Faith.  Five runners-up will also win signed copies of The Book of Mormon Girl.  Contest ends August 27.

New and expanded edition of The Book of Mormon Girl out 8/7! Thank you, and help please.

Dear AMG friends:

I hope you’ll forgive a break from the regular programming for just a few days.

Because on August 7, a new and expanded edition of The Book of Mormon Girl:  A Memoir of an American Faith published by the Free Press / Simon & Schuster will hit the shelves of bookstores nationwide.

I’m writing to express deep thanks to all of you who supported the first self-published edition of The Book of Mormon Girl.  So many of you wrote reviews, told friends about it, read it, wrote me with your thoughts.  Thank you.  What you’ll find in the new and expanded edition is almost two chapters worth of new up-to-the-minute material, book club and readers’ guides, and some significant revisions too.

I hope you’ll like it.

I wrote this book for the New York City editor who told me a few years ago that “the whole Mormon thing” was too “weird” to write about.  If it’s still okay to say out loud that Mormonism too “weird,” I thought, then we need to keep telling our story—our stories—of faith, love, humor, heartbreak, and humanity, until the world sees us as human beings.

And I wrote this book for all the Mormons who feel it’s too difficult or dangerous to talk about our questions and struggles and heartbreaks with this amazingly compelling faith.  Too many Mormons live their questions without companionship or encouragement. I wanted to help change that.

After I self-published The Book of Mormon Girl, I heard from readers who told me that the story I told helped them feel less alone and more encouraged to keep the faith:

“The Book of Mormon Girl made me feel less alone, and most importantly, made me feel like I can be myself at church and don’t necessarily need to run away and sit on the sidelines of Mormonism.”–Tawnya in Salt Lake City, Utah

“Thank you so much for every courageous and loving page of your book! I could not put it down and read it in a day. I laughed, cried, snorted, and sobbed and felt like my story was being told. Thank you for speaking up and for being true to you and giving Mormon girls like me and my daughters hope and peace in following our hearts.”–Alyson in Arizona

“We loved The Book of Mormon Girl, and we lent it to a dear friend of ours in the ward who had been struggling for a long while. Upon returning it to us the next week, she said, “I feel for the first time that I can continue to be a part of this church.”–John in Washington, D.C.

It’s a story that’s connecting with non-Mormon audiences and reviewers too.

Let me share with you some early reviews and blurbs:

“In this enchanting memoir, Brooks…re-creates with enormous feeling the sense of belonging inculcated by the community of kindly, well-intentioned Latter Day Saints… [and] chronicles her painful years of ‘exile’…. Throughout this heartfelt work she remains braced and true to herself.” —Publishers Weekly

“Oh wow. I doubledare you to read The Book of Mormon Girl in your book club.  Bring a casserole and roll up your sleeves for an original, provocative argument about dissent in faith communities! Even if you’re not one of those fine believers who store up food for the Apocalypse, you’re likely to agree that Joanna Brooks has singlehandedly redefined the word courage. Prepare to be surprised.”

–Rhoda Janzen, New York Times-bestselling author of Mennonite in a Little Black Dress

“This gorgeously written, deeply intelligent memoir of an ordinary girlhood in an ordinary Mormon family is one of those most unusual and most valuable of personal stories, simultaneously sweeping and intimate, a book of both broad vision and precise detail. The Book of Mormon Girl is about one particular religious subculture, but it will resonate with anyone who cares about childhood and its echoes in the adult mind of a scholar who’s also a wise and innovative storyteller.”

–Jeff Sharlet, New York Times-bestselling author of The Family and Sweet Heaven When I Die

You will be able to find The Book of Mormon Girl at Barnes & Noble, Target, Salt Lake City-area Smith’s, Deseret Book, and indy booksellers.

If you liked the first edition, or if you like the heartfelt, honest writing you find at this blog, I’m asking for your help.

Can you post a review to your blog or Facebook page?  Facebook, tweet out or pin up some BOMG-related media, like this video? Host a BOMG reading, party, or book club meeting?  (I may be able to Skype in, or I may be travelling to a city near you this fall.)  Ask your local bookseller or library to stock BOMG, or host an event? Hand the book to a friend?

The reason I put my story out there was because I believe that there need to be more books by and about Mormons on the shelf of your local bookseller–beyond Under the Banner of Heaven and ghostwritten polygamy escape memoirs.

And I put my story out there because I believe good things happen when we are brave enough to tell our stories with an open heart.

Creating and sharing book has already been an amazing adventure.  If its message resonates with you, I’d be grateful for your help.

Sincerely,

Joanna

PS.  Tune into the Daily Show this Thursday night.  I’ll be talking BOMG with Jon Stewart.  Couldn’t be more thrilled.

Another special thank you to AMG readers.

Dear readers:

I’m so touched to pass along this thank you, from the father who wrote in asking for advice about baptism and his 9 year-old autistic child.

After all the good advice from your readers, we once had again a good talk with Laurens. He still wanted to proceed, so we talked to our branch president.

He was OK with it too and we invited the full time missionaries (since Laurens is already 9 years) and they teached him the normal lessons. I was always with my boy, in order to “translate” the things the missionaries said and explained, giving more explanation.

Last weekend Laurens had his baptism interview with the branch president and with the zone leaders. Each time they allowed me to sit with hi mto help when needed, but I hardly had to do anything.

If anybody would need to see the Holy Spirit at work… well, I’ve seen it. Definitely… Our Laurens is just been diagnosed again with a degree of autism much harder then anybody ever expected, but when we talk about the Gospel, we do have a sincere connection with him. You should hear his prayers… 

So I just wanted to let you know (and your readers too) that thanks to your and theirs help, Laurens will be baptised next Saturday. 

Thanks to all of you for helping us.

I hope that our Heavenly Father blesses you all.

Met vriendelijke groeten,

David

A thank you to AMG readers, from the Mormon mother of a 12 year-old daughter attracted to girls.

Dear AMG readers:  This post is for you.  It’s a letter from the mother who sent in last week’s query:  “My 12 year-old daughter says she is attracted to girls.  What’s a Mormon mother to do?”  Please read.

I found myself weeping first through your tender merciful words, then the truly insightful reader comments. I truly hadn’t anticipated that at all. Of course there were I few I could have done without, but I had expected that. But most of them were so helpful, and brought so much experience and knowledge. I myself at the moment have felt that even with my sincerest efforts I am simply just grappling alone in the dark with this, until this past week that is. Its amazing the difference that knowing you aren’t the only one dealing with a situation like this makes to coping. Your readers are just extradordinary, and way above the usual level of internet commentary and should be commended for it. 

I really wanted to share with you is the experience I had with sharing this all with my sweet daughter. I made a decision to show her my letter and your response, and selected some of the best comments for her to read. She wept as she read your account with your father. She related on a deep level with your struggle and we had a long talk about that, and that parallel with Abraham and Isaac. Afterwards she read the reader comments I selected and was especially touched and surprised that strangers took so much time to respond with so much love and support, and found her brave for standing up for who she was. She was purely radiant at that moment. For a mother who has watched her a daughter battle daily with self-image, and seen her literally look in the mirror and say,”I wish I was anyone but me.” It was one of the best days of a mother’s life to see her totally assured of herself, feel so loved, and for once not so very alone in the world. Thank you seems not enough, but thank you from the bottom of my heart…and also please thank your readers who have done more than they could imagine for one little girl at a cross roads, and the mother who loves her more than life. 

Thank you, readers, for being so attentive, and tender, and thoughtful.  Good things happen here at AMG.  You are the reason why.

I’m back in the LDS ward I grew up in, and my mortifying teenaged past haunts me. Help?

Dear AMG:

I was raised Presbyterian in Tennessee, started dating a Mormon boy, and was baptized in August 2003 at the age of 17. I dated him for two years, until I found out he had been cheating with numerous other girls–and in a town this small, everyone knew but me. I was embarrassed and hurt, and I hightailed it to Utah.  I am now 25. After graduating from BYU, I have moved back to this small town in Tennessee and am now living in the ward I was baptized in with my husband of two years.  (My ex-boyfriend eventually served a mission and is now happily married.)  But I am still mortified to be surrounded by his mother, cousin, brother, aunts and uncles, and friends.  My family is here, and I have a job with benefits, so I can’t move.  But I serve on the ward Christmas party committee, and four out of six women on the committee are related to my ex-boyfriend!  I know this sounds childish, but it really is driving me crazy.  Help? 

Mortified

Dear Mortified:

Let me tell you a true story.  There once was a Mormon boy who was cute and smart and perfect, and a Mormon girl in his ward who was a few years younger and also cute and smart.  And from the time she was seven years old, the girl was totally crushed out on the boy.  Dedicated.  Destroyed.  Wrote about him in her journal.  With hearts and stars around his name.  Froze when he whispered witty remarks under his breath during Sacrament Meeting.  Fast forward:  same ward, eight years later.  On the eve of leaving for college, after dating every other no-count female in the stake, boy shows up on girl’s doorstep and admits that he might like her back.  And what does she do?  Fifteen year-old girl fumbles.  Miserably.  Then cries.  Fast forward: same ward, eight additional years later.  Mormon boy’s mother holds a wedding reception for her son and his new bride.  Mormon girl is too nauseous to attend.  Fast forward another decade, stake reunion:  Mormon girl has a smashingly happy marriage and an interesting, adventure-filled life.  She enters stake youth reunion prepared to exhibit smashing happiness and adventurousness but finds herself instead utterly speechless when Mormon boy strikes up a conversation at the punch bowl.

Ah, wards.  The small towns of Mormondom.   No matter how far I travel, when I return to the Orange, California Stake, I might as well be fifteen years old and sporting a bad perm.  And I tell you this story from the Ask Mormon Girl personal archive to help you feel not so alone.  Inside every one of us lives an utterly mortified teenaged girl.   You can move across the city.  Grow out your perm. Dye your hair.  Change your name.  Marry.  Travel the world.  Earn degrees.  Win prizes.  But she lives on—awkward, moody, embarrassed, and self-despising.  And ready to leap out at the most untimely moments.  There’s nothing we can do but pity her, pity ourselves, have a good laugh with a girlfriend, and then move on.

But there’s a crucial difference between your story and mine.  I was mortified by my own desperately poor communication skills.  You were mortified by the rank perfidy of a no-good boyfriend! You were a sweet young thing, and he was a lothario!  You have nothing to be ashamed of!  And you have returned to your hometown victorious:  with a husband, a job, and (most impressively) health benefits!  You win!  When you enter that ward Christmas party in a few weeks, I want you to say a few reassuring words to that mortified teenager inside of you, but forbid her to speak. Hold your head up high.  Be your most charming and delightful self.  Behold your ex’s relatives with a regal but undetectable form of condescension.  They are, after all, the relatives of the young scoundrel who ruined his family name by running around with all the girls in town, and you are the girl he wronged years ago, and this, my dear, gives you one of the most powerful forms of cultural currency in the Mormon universe:  rightness.   Use it sparingly, and with mercy, for you must remember that inside every one of them too there lives a mortified, self-loathing teenager.  We all have embarrassing elements of our pasts.  The most gracious gift we can bestow upon our fellow wardmembers—the fellow inmates of our Mormon small towns—is to pretend we remember only the good parts.  We call that gift dignity. Claim it!

What about you, dear readers?  Any mortifying moments your inner LDS fifteen year-old is dying to admit?  What words of courage do you have for Mortified?

Send your query to askmormongirl@gmail.com, or follow @askmormongirl on Twitter.

 

Welcome to the world of Ask Mormon Girl!

Greetings!  Stopping by after listening to All Things Considered today?  So glad you did.  This is Ask Mormon Girl, a question-and-answer column I write for folks (non-Mormons and Mormons alike)  from my own *personal* *unorthodox* *not-official* *flawed* and *human* point of view.  This site has also grown a wonderful community of commenters who often give better answers than I do.  I thank them all for their kindness and wisdom.

If you’d like to stay in touch and get news about the January release of The Book of Mormon Girl: Stories from an American Faith on Audible.com and iTunes, please be sure to follow @askmormongirl on Twitter, or send a “howdy” to askmormongirl@gmail.com.  I’ll be sure to message you when the audiobook is out.

Here are links to two recent columns that will give you a feel for what we do here.

A few weeks ago, a non-LDS AMG reader asked “What do Mormons believe about African-Americans?”  My answer is here.

And this column gets lots of questions from folks inside the faith who are experiencing a faith transition–a change in the way they are thinking or feeling about their relationship to Mormonism.  Many Mormons experience a time when they need to step away from the faith and evaluate their beliefs.  And many of us come back.  Here’s a question from an LDS reader:  ”After seven years away from Mormonism, I’m hungry to come back.  But how?“

For writing on Mormonism and politics, please visit my column at Religion Dispatches. The Ask Mormon Girl column also runs every other Monday at the legendary Feminist Mormon Housewives.  I am very proud to be a part of the FMH community.  Mormonism is our home, and places like FMH and AMG strive to make it a place welcoming of honest exploration, kindness, humor, and humanity.

Thanks for stopping by. Please come back soon.

My daughter is bringing her girlfriend home. What’s a Mormon mom to do?

Thanks for stopping by Ask Mormon Girl. We’ve been up and running for almost two years. It’s a place where people who find themselves alone and in a religiously sticky spot can find a little company–from me, and more importantly from the kind souls who frequent the comments sections.

For those of you who haven’t visited before, I thought I’d repost a query from a few weeks back that captures some of the good things that happen here. To see the original post with comments, click here.

Our 20 yr. old daughter told us 2 1/2 yrs. ago that she was gay. Considering she had just broken things off with a not so great relationship with boy and she has always dated boys, this was a shock. This was during a very rebellious time in our daughter’s life and she left home twice. We are LDS and have lived our faith and been very involved and active in the church her whole life. No one can believe she’s gay. We continue to support our daughter in those positive endeavors; college, sorority, she comes to dinner every Sunday and I send her little cards with positive, uplifting things written and we go to lunch, shopping etc…but for me this lifestyle is wrong and so I don’t want it in my face or around me…which means I prefer she not talk about it, partners are not allowed to come over, etc. We let her know that she gets to choose the lifestyle she wants to live – it’s her life. But we also get to decide what we will or won’t allow around us – it would be hurtful to her father and I to see her with another girl and out of respect to us we feel she should not bring them around. The church doesn’t have any clear-cut guidelines for How Parents Can Best Handle Dealing with this type of situation…and I wish they did. We really feel like we’re trying our best to keep our family together and strong in love but I see that not being enough on down the road. I fear that as each year passes and we continue to stand firm that no partners are to be brought around – our relationship will begin to deteriorate and we don’t want that. We extend our love to our daughter always – but will not allow her to bring her partner to things – will this further alienate us from her? Are we not being fair? What about respecting our feelings and beliefs?

DT

My mom is driving me crazy. Help?

Summer greetings, readers, and happy fourth of July. This week, we have a double-header, and it’s on the subject of mothers. (I can hear the fireworks already.) My, do we have a lot to say about our mothers. Read on:

Dear AMG:

I’m a senior in college pursuing a degree in English, and after graduation this fall I’ll stay at my alma mater to earn a Masters in English. After serving a mission for the LDS church in Europe, I married a wonderful man about nine months ago, and we’re both still in school. During our engagement and really ever since then, we’ve been praying about when to start a family. The answer has been consistent: go to grad school. Although we both want kids, it would be difficult (not impossible, but difficult) to swing financially since we’re both in school. Given the state of the economy, we’re also reluctant to incur major debt. I also would love to get a masters because it would allow me to more easily jump back into some kind of career after kids are grown. All of these reasons would be thrown to the side, however, if our answer from prayer were to have kids right now.

Ouch! I’ve just survived a Facebook fight with a fellow Mormon. Can you help develop a Mormon netiquette code?

Dear AMG,

I’m your average “orthodox”, NPR-listening, college educated, straight-laced and very imperfect Mormon housewife. My personal politics fall somewhere in the middle, but I’m always happy to listen to well-thought out, respectful arguments from any viewpoints. I occasionally get wrapped up in “facebook fights” with other Mormons over political issues. I usually only get involved when I feel a side is being grossly underrepresented or people are being rude. Still, even on fairly basic topics, I’ve found myself getting accused of picking and choosing my doctrines and sometimes I get told that “even the elect can be deceived.” I’m a pretty sensitive and very straight-laced kind of person, so that really hurts.

I know these incredibly vocal people are probably a minority, and that I am a worthy, good person. But, I felt, and still feel, really discouraged by the conversation. On some issues, it seems impossible for Mormons to have civil discourse because we are so caught up in jargon and not in truth. So, I was wondering if you could help write a list of rules or “netiquette” for Mormons who want to participate in political discussions online. My first rule would be “don’t use language also found in the Temple to make an argument that a political idea is unsound.” Can you help develop others?

Sincerely,

CM

No one at work knows that I’m Mormon. Is it time to come out of the closet?

Dear AMG:

I am a convert of 14 years. But I still have a hard time identifying myself as a Mormon in public. I started my current job in August and I haven’t “come out” yet as a Mormon, partly because I work in a field where revealing my religion would provoke a lot of discussion I’d like to avoid. But I also am proud to be a Mormon and want to be a full member-missionary. Advice?

SC

Dear SC:

It never fails to amuse me: the reaction I get when folks learn that I’m Mormon. The polite pause. The raise of the eyebrow. The cock of the head. The subaudible gasp. I can see Big-Love-Warren-Jeffs-Proposition-8-Mitt-Romney-Donnie-and-Marie-Osmond-Glenn-Beck flashing before their eyes. And, then, the puzzled looks as they try to reconcile all that against me, the liberal feminist college professor who (it’s true) has been heard to use salty language sometimes. Even when wearing her “I LOVE JIMMER” wristband.

Ah, Mormonism. One of the last exotic identities in America. And one that many of us still feel obliged to closet from time to time. Of course you’re worried about the “discussion” a revelation of your Mormon identity would “provoke.” Thanks to popular culture, saying the word “Mormon” instantly conjures up a range of sensationalistic (and oddly suggestive) questions about polygamy and temple garments. Who wants their coworkers speculating on and discussing their underwear? Mormonism also provokes a set of political associations, and I sense you may be just as concerned that your coworkers will automatically associate you with our culture’s most conservative voices or stances (present or past), especially on deeply personal issues like LGBT equality. Who wants to put their co-workers on the defensive?

Alas, at the end of the day, we have no control what others think of us, and the truth is that what others think of us is actually less important than how we make people feel. If you’ve telegraphed through your everyday behavior that you’re a gracious, respectful, and open human being, folks will be less afraid to follow-up with questions that will help them resolve their own concerns and questions.

I think the answer to your question depends in large part on the nature of your workplace. As a college professor in a liberal arts field, I work in a place where being “out” about your identity is a generally accepted part of the professional culture. But other workplaces have different social norms. So my best advice to you is to do a little workplace anthropology: observe the most effective and dignified way that social information is communicated through your office, then develop a strategy for gradually outing yourself. Maybe you hop up on your desk like Norma Rae and hold up a big sign saying “MORMON.” Maybe you find a way to drop a hint to the workplace-gossip-with-a-heart-of-gold and let him or her do the talking for you. Maybe you borrow my I LOVE JIMMER wristband (I have an extra!) and wear it to work. Maybe you let someone catch you reading the “Ask Mormon Girl” column on your iPhone. Or maybe you acquire some subtly Mormon-rific office decoration: perhaps a lovely beehive-themed folk art tzotchke you picked up in Salt Lake City, and put it in a prominent (but not too prominent) place on your desk.

However you go about it, Sister SC, get on with it soon, because whatever other people think about Mormonism, you have nothing to be ashamed of, and lugging around a secret identity can be a real drag, especially if its something that brings a lot of joy to your life. Turn up the Donna Summer “I’m Coming Out,” and get ready to shout “Yup, I’m a Mo,” even if it’s in your own quiet way.

Right, readers? Or wrong? Are you out about your Mormonism at home, at work, at play? What have your experiences been with faith in the workplace? What advice do you have for SC? Send your queries to askmormongirl@gmail.com, or follow askmormongirl on Twitter.