Our goal has been to tell the church’s history vividly, using the graphic-intensive format we created for last year’s illustrated history of the Kirtland Temple. The new book will be 74 pages long. Writing a 74-page book doesn’t initially seem like that big a deal, but some times it can be harder to write a short book than a long book.

For one thing, when writing an introduction designed for both church members and a general audience, you can’t just jump right into church jargon — you have to introduce and explain every word as you go. Take the statement, “the Temple was ultimately built on part of the original 63 acres that Bishop Edward Partridge purchased for the planned city of Zion.” There’s a lot of things that have to be introduced to make that statement. Not only who was Partridge, what’s a temple, what’s meant by Zion, but also, what’s a bishop?

The next big challenge was constructing a new historical narrative. Our historians community has done a great job deconstructing church history, but as we’ve challenged folklore, we haven’t always done a great job replacing it with an informed story that is inspiring. For me, that’s a shame, because I think the informed story has the potential to be infinitely more inspiring than the old folk tales.

So a lot of thought has gone into it, and I’m pretty proud of the results so far. I’m including here a sneak-peek at some of the 2-page spreads:

The book will be available next year from John Whitmer Books (and on Amazon), debuting at the Restoration Studies Symposium. I can’t wait!

This 48-page booklet, entitled Called to the Work, is a concise summary of the church in 1980. The photos of church leaders were the first thing that jumped out at me. These headshots take up 14 of the total pages. But out of 237 pictured leaders, there was only a single woman: Marjorie Troeh, who was a “staff executive” and “Commissioner of the Women’s Ministries Commission.” It’s incredible how recently and how completely church leadership was a boys-only club.

The institutions section includes a number of church auxiliaries that are still going relatively strong, including Graceland College (now Graceland University), the Restoration Trail Foundation (now Community of Christ Historic Sites Foundation), and Outreach International. Some, like Resthaven (now “The Groves”), have been spun off and have continued on their own. Others are gone. The “San” (Independence Sanitarium and Hospital) in 1980 had just completed a massive expansion, but it has subsequently been sold off and it was ultimately shut down. My understanding is that the church’s relationship with Park College ended badly, although I’ve never heard the full story. Finally, it’s almost crazy to imagine that as of 1980, Herald House had “nearly one hundred employees.”

For all the changes, one aspect of church culture — very apparent in the booklet — still lingers on today, but should go. When I read through old materials published by the headquarters apparatus of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, more often than not I’m stunned by the degree to which officious language succeeds in purging any potential for passion. This booklet takes that tone to its soulless conclusion. To cite just one example, concerning the new presidency of Wallace B. Smith, we read:

The church enters the decade of the 1980s with a great degree of hope and promise, resulting from the response of the people to the new program model now being brought into being by the First Presidency.

The Korean Central News Agency (the only news agency of the DPRK, i.e. North Korea) couldn’t have reported on the “response of the people” in a more inspirational way!

As we’ve entered the new millennium, I believe there’s still a great degree of hope and promise for the church. But to convey that vision, we need to finally replace the tradition of officious language with words that inspire one another and our community.