Erin Stiles is the author of The Devil Sat on My Bed: Encounters with the Spirit World in Mormon Utah. As the back cover describes:
"In the mountains of beautiful, bucolic northern Utah, many Latter-day Saints (Mormons) are visited by spirits. Local folklore is filled with stories of uncanny encounters of all kinds, and Latter-day Saint scripture and prophetic teachings emphasize the reality and the importance of the spirit world. Spirit encounters are common in this community. People report visits from the benevolent spirits of kin offering aid and also from evil spirits who tempt and harass. Combining folklore research with ethnography, the book examines many types of spirit encounters and shows that such experiences must be understood as particularly Latter-day Saint phenomena.
"Spirit encounters take place within a larger cultural and religious framework that emphasizes the important relationships between living and non-living beings. For Mormons in northern Utah, spirit lore and experiences are interpreted and understood with reference to Latter-day Saint cosmology and particularly Mormon conceptions of the nature of the person, the spirit, and the family, and the nature of righteousness, evil, and spiritual power. The book also explores how people in Utah differentiate between "Mormon culture," the institutional church, and how they understand the "true" meaning of the religion, which has relevance far beyond understanding of people's relationship to the spirit realm and spirit power, and speaks to key issues of concern―and polarization―among Latter-day Saints today."
You can listen to Multifaith Matters on your favorite podcast platform, including Podbean, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, and iHeart Radio.
Learn more about our work at https://www.multifaithmatters.org
Support this work:
One-time donation: https://multifaithmatters.org/donate
Become my patron: https://patron.podbean.com/johnwmorehead
#Mormonism #Spirits #anthropology
David J. Halperin on UFOs and Myth
Rabbi Ariel Mellul of the International Raëlian Movement
Elias D’eis, the Holy Land Trust, and the War in Gaza
J. Gordon Melton on the Church of Scientology
Matthew Bowman and The Abduction of Betty and Barney Hill
The Satanic Temple’s Unveiling Day: Pluralism and Archaic Superstition
The Covid Pandemic and the World’s Religions
Celucien Joseph on Christianity and Vodou in Dialogue in Haiti
The Christian Fascination with”Ex-Occultist” Narratives
Kaleb Graves on Psychedelic Theology
George Chryssides on Contested Concepts in the Study of Religion
Heron Michelle, Street Preachers, and Pagan Religious Freedoms
Catherine Wessinger on the Thirtieth Anniversary of the Branch Davidian Tragedy
Ida Glaser and the Reading the Bible in the Context of Islam project
Dr. Benno van den Toren on interfaith apologetics
Jack Hunter and an Anthropology of the Paranormal
James Keenan on Moral Theology, the New Testament and Multifaith Encounters
Stephen Bullivant on Nonverts and the Making of Ex-Christian America
Andrew Perriman and narrative-historical approaches to the gospel, salvation, hell and multifaith
Join Podbean Ads Marketplace and connect with engaged listeners.
Advertise Today
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Hello Heaven Podcast
Devoted To Prayer
Cast The Word
Let Me Be Frank | Bishop Frank Caggiano’s Podcast | Diocese of Bridgeport, CT
The Exorcist Files
The Ancient Tradition