The roster
Historians, theologians, builders, poets, and community organizers — drawn from across the Restoration's many branches, and from beyond it. The list grows as confirmations arrive.
Featured for the Autumn Gathering
Historian of American Religion·Independent Scholar
Working from a small archive on the Mississippi, Ashford writes about the early Restoration's many branches and what their disagreements still teach us.
TopicWhat the Schisms Knew
Theologian & Translator·Lagos Reading Circle
Okeke leads a study group reading the Book of Mormon in Igbo and English, asking what the text says when read outside an American frame.
TopicReading the Book of Mormon Without America
Writer & Community Organizer
A founder of a small intentional community in the Black Hills, Young Bear writes essays on covenant, land, and inherited promises.
TopicCovenant Without Empire
And in conversation with them
Architect·Studio Deseret
Haight designs sacred and civic spaces with a focus on how buildings teach. His recent essays trace temple architecture across the Restoration's branches.
TopicHow a Room Teaches
Philosopher·Visiting Fellow, Claremont
Pratt works on Joseph Smith's theology of matter and what it might mean for environmental ethics today.
TopicMatter, Spirit, and the Land
Software Engineer & Essayist
Mendel writes the newsletter Latter-day Letters and builds tools for primary-source study of the Doctrine and Covenants.
TopicSources, Annotated
Musician & Liturgist·Independent
Whitmer composes hymns and small-ensemble pieces drawn from nineteenth-century Restoration texts, performed in chapels of every kind.
TopicA Hymnal for No One Church
Lawyer & Historian
Rigdon writes on dissent, schism, and the legal afterlives of religious movements. He is finishing a book on the Reorganization.
TopicDissent as Inheritance
Educator·Founder, The Liahona School
Pierce runs a small school whose curriculum reads the Book of Mormon alongside the wider canon of religious literature.
TopicTeaching the Text
Documentary Filmmaker
Call's films profile small communities across the Restoration — Strangites in Wisconsin, Cutlerites in Iowa, and others who kept going their own way.
TopicThe Other Saints
Poet·Fellow, Iowa Writers' Workshop
Thorne's recent collection Plates draws on Mormon scripture for an audience largely outside the tradition.
TopicScripture as Source Material
Economist
Bennion studies cooperative economics and the United Order's long shadow over American utopian thought.
TopicWhat the United Order Was Actually For
More speakers will be announced through the spring. To propose a talk or working session of your own, see the participate page.