Related Works
| Relationship | Work | Contributors | Genre | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Published in | Significant Mormon Diaries, volume 6 | Diary / Journal |
A Ministry of Meetings: The Apostolic Diaries of Rudger Clawson
Rudger Clawson
Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1993
- Rudger Clawson: Author
- Stan Larson: Editor
Diary / Journal
Meetings of the LDS First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles are closed to outsiders. Yet apostles at the turn of the century kept detailed notes until ordered to stop by church president Joseph F. Smith. To date, the only such minutes available--and a priceless window on the inner-workings of the church hierarchy--are those found in the diaries of Rudger Clawson, published for the first time in A Ministry of Meetings. Clawson tells of how the fifteen church leaders held weekly prayers around an altar, dressed in robes; shared a sacrament of wine; and then engaged in heated discussions over church finances, doctrine, and policy. The most volatile disagreements centered on polygamy, which the church renounced in 1890, though leaders continued to perform marriages in secret. In 1903 Apostle Marriner Merrill "bore testimony to the truth of the principle of plural marriage and said that the brethren of the Twelve should . . . not wait until old age comes on. Brethren, he said, do not neglect your opportunities." Ten months later Clawson, forty-seven years old, took another polygamous wife, Pearl Udall, who was twenty-four years of age.