A few years back, my ward celebrated the Relief Society’s
birthday by having several women perform a brief biography in character and
lead a breakout group discussion following. I was asked to do Emmeline Wells
because, well, I have an unhealthy obsession. Remember my 6-part series on her?
Yes, obsessed.
In my table’s discussion, I was honest about both her
successes and her heartbreaks. She had a lot of both. After hearing the
heartbreaks, a friend of mine asked, “Wait, so she was essentially the
red-headed stepchild wife and died heartbroken over her release as general RS
president? Why am I supposed to leave this meeting feeling empowered about the
Relief Society?”
I gave a short and inadequate answer at the time, so this is
my more articulate answer. Because I have covered her life in great detail earlier,
this post will be an exploration of why having Emmeline Wells’ story in my life
matters, rather than providing new details about her.
Emmeline Wells speaks to me because her life was an example
in taking the world in its messiness and seemingly impossible choices and creating
a space where she can have what matters most. When Emmeline Wells was baptized,
she assumed she’d be giving up a lot. She did. But she also maintained the
things that were most important to her – her intellect, her desire to cause
positive change, and a deep spiritual life.
I encountered Emmeline Wells’ story during a period when I
was exploring what it meant to be an LDS woman of faith, what I wanted out of
my life, and how those two explorations fit together. I felt like the narratives
presented to me were too rigid and narrow, too either/or, and that I would have
to shrink or deform myself to fit within any of them. Emmeline Wells just wrote
a new narrative and took the women around her along for the ride.
Wells possessed a deep and life-changing faith in the gospel,
and felt God powerfully in her life. She used that faith to enrich all the
things she valued before joining the church. Her faith enriched her suffrage
work, her mind, her service, and her leadership. She worked tirelessly to use
her leadership and intelligence to better the women around her and improve her
church.
Something that I only began to comprehend when I encountered
Wells, but I have thought deeply about in later years, is the way that being a
part of something larger than yourself both expands and restricts you. When you
become a part of something larger than yourself, you are given opportunities to
become and create something larger, more powerful, and more beautiful than you
could on your own. At the same time, you are pouring your soul into something
you can influence, but ultimately not control. It is rarely a perfect fit. So, what
do you do?
Wells claimed what was good and beautiful and could not be
had any other place. From there, she took the opportunities she had to build the rest. She taught me to live within seeming contradictions,
and shattered my notion that faith meant shoving myself into what I saw, rather
than working with God to see what we could create together. Not that I’ve done
anything revolutionary, but still, the world is a beautiful place when you can
see it as both/and, and when you are given freedom to create a narrative of
your mutual choosing.
Emmeline Wells taught me that faith is complicated.
Polygamy, and her church membership as a whole, both expanded and limited her
life. It would be a mistake to disregard either side of that equation. But I love that she opted for the path that expanded her life and built from there.
