A new SunstoneClassic podcast is out (produced by yours truly). It features a presentation given by Jan Shipps, from the 2001 Washington D.C. Sunstone Symposium. It was released around the time that the LDS church made the formal announcement regarding how they wished to be referred to in the media (LDS Church, not Mormon Church, etc). I quite enjoyed it, and if you are interested AT ALL in Mormon Studies, you must get to know Dr. Shipps.
In her presentation, Jan spends some time analyzing this PR move by the church, but also provides her view of the LDS "state of the union" from a variety of perspectives–always with insight and wit.
Click here to enjoy!
Jan Shipps is professor emeritus of history and religious studies at IUPUI, and research associate at The Polis Center. She is generally regarded as the foremost non-Mormon scholar of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Her first book on the subject was Mormonism: The Story of a New Religious Tradition published the University of Illinois Press. Recently, Illinois published her book Sojourner in the Promised Land: Forty Years Among the Mormons, in which she interweaves her own history of Mormon-watching with 16 essays on Mormon history and cultu