Church History Matters 196 - Do Men and Women Share the Priesthood? | Church History Matters I Women & Priesthood Series
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Mar 17, 2026 Lisa Olsen Tait, historian of Latter-day Saint women’s history, traces 19th-century debates about women and priesthood using Relief Society minutes and archival sources. The conversation covers early meanings of ordain, Nauvoo temple roles for women, evolving language about women ‘holding’ priesthood, reforms that separated office from priesthood, and mid-20th-century shifts toward priesthood-motherhood ideas.
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Nauvoo Temple Priesthood Included Women
- Early Nauvoo priesthood concepts included women as temple administrators and part of an eternal priesthood of kings, queens, priests, and priestesses.
- Joseph Smith linked priesthood to sealed familial networks, making women essential for administering temple ordinances to women and restoring the human family.
Brigham Young Shaped Temple Liturgy With Male Headship
- Brigham Young reorganized and expanded temple ordinances after Joseph Smith, incorporating male headship elements into temple liturgy.
- These changes introduced rhetoric like the curse of Eve and women's covenant of obedience, which later shaped temple practice until recent revisions.
Priesthood Evolved Into Held Divine Power
- In the late 19th century priesthood language shifted toward priesthood as 'power' or 'holding' a delegated authority from heaven.
- Leaders like Brigham Young, Wilford Woodruff, and Lorenzo Snow used phrases framing priesthood as Godlike power held by men.
