Who is Lying? Kate Kelly or her Bishop?

[_consiglieri]

I was able to read the bishop's letter excommunicating Kate Kelly. (It is linked to over at Common Consent in a comment, though it appears to come from the Deseret News.)

http://www.deseretnews.com/media/pdf/1365030.pdf


I was struck by the fact that the bishop lays out several meetings with Kate Kelly regarding the issues surrounding her participation in Ordain Women.

This strikes me as conflicting with what I remember Kate Kelly saying in her interviews; that her bishop never talked with her once about Ordain Women before she moved out of the Virginia Ward.

Now, maybe I am misremembering something somewhere along the way, and I would appreciate any clarification people can give me.

In spite of the thread title, I am not at this point making any judgments.

But if I am recalling things correctly, it does sound like Kate Kelly has a very different story in regards to how many times she met with her Virginia bishop to talk about OW and the bishop's version.

The bishop also puts in his letter details regarding the several meetings he claimed to have had with Kate Kelly, including the names of others present.

Is there a genuine issue of material fact presented by these different accounts?

Does one of the parties have to be fabricating?

Have I gotten something wrong somewhere?


Any help you can give in figuring this out would be appreciated.

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[_bcspace]

Anyone who says she's merely asking questions or even questioning or that either is what this is all about is most certainly lying.

[_Bazooka]

Excerpt from the letter Kate Kelly submitted to the disciplinary hearing as her defence.

I was in your ward for over three years and faithfully served in callings for that entire period. While we interacted frequently in passing, none of you know me well. I am saddened by the fact that you never took the time to ask me questions or get to know my heart while I was living in your ward. Despite the fact that I emailed you in March 2013, August 2013, October 2013 & again in April 2014 regarding my Ordain Women activities, you never bothered to respond or follow-up on my repeated invitation to engage in an open dialogue in person.

http://ordainwomen.org/wp-content/uploa ... efense.pdf

From the same letter, Kate confirms that she did have a meeting with her Stake President, following which she was placed on probation.

I want to communicate with perfect candor, as I have always done. As I made clear to President Wheatley when we met on May 5th, I will continue to lead Ordain Women, the group I founded. I will not take down the website ordainwomen.org. I will not stop speaking out publicly on the issue of gender inequality in the church. These things President Wheatley instructed me to do, I cannot do in good conscience. I cannot repent of telling the truth, speaking what is in my heart and asking questions that burn in my soul.

[_Equality]

Excerpt from the letter Kate Kelly submitted to the disciplinary hearing as her defence.

I was in your ward for over three years and faithfully served in callings for that entire period. While we interacted frequently in passing, none of you know me well. I am saddened by the fact that you never took the time to ask me questions or get to know my heart while I was living in your ward. Despite the fact that I emailed you in March 2013, August 2013, October 2013 & again in April 2014 regarding my Ordain Women activities, you never bothered to respond or follow-up on my repeated invitation to engage in an open dialogue in person.

http://ordainwomen.org/wp-content/uploa ... efense.pdf

From the same letter, Kate confirms that she did have a meeting with her Stake President, following which she was placed on probation.

I want to communicate with perfect candor, as I have always done. As I made clear to President Wheatley when we met on May 5th, I will continue to lead Ordain Women, the group I founded. I will not take down the website ordainwomen.org. I will not stop speaking out publicly on the issue of gender inequality in the church. These things President Wheatley instructed me to do, I cannot do in good conscience. I cannot repent of telling the truth, speaking what is in my heart and asking questions that burn in my soul.

So she says she emailed him four times. Did he produce his email responses to her emails? If he did that, it would show she was lying. That he didn't seems to support her contention that she emailed him but he did not timely respond.

[_Mayan Elephant]

Anyone who says she's merely asking questions or even questioning or that either is what this is all about is most certainly lying.

it could also be a delusion.

i have been sober for quite a while. i do not want to ever have another drink. tried that and it didn't work for me, or it really worked, but i think i would rather go back to the bottle than keep agreeing with space. Jesus h Christ on a cracker of the body of Christ with whiskey and cheese with weed jelly, space. go back to being ridiculous for the love of god and me.

[Guest]

Consiglieri,
Check out these two links:
http://ordainwomen.org/excommunication/
http://ordainwomen.org/wp-content/uploa ... -Kelly.pdf

But for further fun, let's set out a timeline according to OW and these letters:
March 17, 2013- OW launched
December 12, 2013- KK meets with Bishop and President Wheatley, telling her to stop
March and April, 2014- Meeting again, telling her not to march on Temple Square
April, 2014- KK marches on Temple Square (I'm sure there were other marches in there, at other general conferences)
May 5, 2014- Meets with President Wheatley and Bishop again, placed on INFORMAL probation
May 22, 2014- Letter to confirm INFORMAL probation.
June 8, 2014- Notified of disciplinary council
June 22, 2014- Excommunicated.

To me, the timeline seems odd. After all that she "did", even after the last general conference, the local leadership went from nothing, to INFORMAL probation, to excommunication? In about 7 weeks? When OW had been around, and active, for over a year? Seems odd to me.

[_Bazooka]

I was able to read the bishop's letter excommunicating Kate Kelly. (It is linked to over at Common Consent in a comment, though it appears to come from the Deseret News.)

http://www.deseretnews.com/media/pdf/1365030.pdf

I note from the letter that Kate was offered a number of reasonable alternatives that would have enabled her to represent herself at the hearing in person. That seems to grind against Kate's complaint about the hearing being held in absentia.

[_Fence Sitter]

I was able to read the bishop's letter excommunicating Kate Kelly. (It is linked to over at Common Consent in a comment, though it appears to come from the Deseret News.)

http://www.deseretnews.com/media/pdf/1365030.pdf

I note from the letter that Kate was offered a number of reasonable alternatives that would have enabled her to represent herself at the hearing in person. That seems to grind against Kate's complaint about the hearing being held in absentia.

I think they all entailed being by herself and one of her requests (demands?) was to have others (her husband?) present at the trial. That is a frequent request in trials such as this but from the ones I have read about, it is denied. It reeks of not allowing witnesses to her side at her own trail, just like they will not produce a transcript of the trail. Must be nice to be the accuser, jury and judge all wrapped into one person at trail who proceedings are kept secret. Yea this is fair.

What is going to happen at one of these proceedings is someone will record them and upload the actual trial to the internet. The instant effect of such an action will be those high and mighty accuser/jury/judges will be held accountable to how they determine a verdict.

[_Bazooka]

Excerpt from the letter Kate Kelly submitted to the disciplinary hearing as her defence.

I was in your ward for over three years and faithfully served in callings for that entire period. While we interacted frequently in passing, none of you know me well. I am saddened by the fact that you never took the time to ask me questions or get to know my heart while I was living in your ward. Despite the fact that I emailed you in March 2013, August 2013, October 2013 & again in April 2014 regarding my Ordain Women activities, you never bothered to respond or follow-up on my repeated invitation to engage in an open dialogue in person.

http://ordainwomen.org/wp-content/uploa ... efense.pdf

Having read the communication of the decision from the Bishop, he provides clear dates and attendee's for meetings that Kate states did not happen.
December 12th 2013 - President Wheatley & Bishop Harrison
March 2014 - President Wheatley
April 2014 - President Wheatley
May 5th 2014 - President Wheatley & President Lee

I doubt that the Bishop is lying, I could be wrong, but it seems highly unlikely.

[_consiglieri]

I appreciate everybody's help with this.

I do not think what the church did was right, and I especially do not think that the way they went about it was right.

I am just trying to get to the bottom of this one issue.

I had no problem seeing the church was being disingenuous in many of their tactics.

I was taking Kate Kelly's word that she was being open and upfront by contrast.

I would hate to think that Kate Kelly was being less than candid.

It would tend to make her lose the moral high ground in this action.

All the Best!

--Consiglieri