If you haven't heard it yet, there is a new event on facebook that is gathering some steam. It's the radical idea that people should ask the church leadership why women can't pray in general conference and/or to ask that this change. The event can be found here.

Now some of you might be surprised to realize that a woman has never said a prayer at General Conference. Some of you might think that it is bad to contact church leaders about changes to policy/practice. Well, whatever your reaction, you're certainly not alone. There are already comments pouring in. Thus far some of the vitriolic comments towards anyone who would dare to write a church leader about changing a policy looks like it might be on track to match the vitriol from the Wear Pants to Church event. I wanted to try to hit some of the primary complaints I've seen from people against this idea.

I've wanted to highlight the life of this amazing and trailblazing woman for some time now, but it's taken months to get to this point. As a result I'm just posting this as is and apologize if it is choppy and full of grammatical errors. I should note that much of this post is made up of direct quotes from this book. I would recommend it because I would like people to know more about this woman. She was part of the first wave of women to attain higher education (getting her MD in 1880 at University of Michigan, and a BS in Pharmacy in 1882 from the University of Pennsylvania, in addition to a degree in Chemistry and a diploma from the National School of Elocution and Oratory), she was the first ever woman to be a state senator, she was the first woman to be on the ballot for a US senate race, she was a mother to 3 kids, and she was a mormon. What follows is a summary of her life: