Mormon Women Protest All-Male Priesthood

Some 130 women gathered outside the Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City yesterday, after being rejected from a meeting for the faith's all-male priesthood, the Salt Lake Tribune reports. The women, members of the Ordain Women movement in the LDS Church, tried to buy tickets to the event, but were turned away. One of the women, a law student at BYU, says she thinks it's only a matter of time before the church changes its policy on women in the priesthood. "We expanded the priesthood to African-Americans and now every male can have it," she says. "As we have demonstrated, there are hundreds of women in the church who support ordination," says another woman, who is also a human rights attorney.

That may well be, though studies indicate the majority of Mormon women do not support female ordination, reports the Tribune. One poll found 90% of LDS women opposed the move—even though only 52% of men did. "Millions of women in this church do not share the views of this small group that has come and organized this protest today and some of the members feel this is very divisive as well," an LDS spokeswoman told ABC4. But Ordain Women's founder is keeping the faith. "I have faith that we will receive the priesthood that lord will listen to our prayers and that our leaders will be responsive," she says. (More Mormonism stories.)