Mormon
scripture comfortably refers to the Saints as a collective, organic entity.
Mormon dogma does not lend itself easily to dividing and sub-dividing leadership
from laity. When Joseph Smith’s revelations spoke of the teacher-learner
relationship, he was inclined to blur the hierarchal lines: “He that preacheth
and he that receiveth, understand one another, and both are edified together”
(D&C 50:22). Joseph Smith told the Saints that the Lord was “well pleased”
with his church, with the caveat that he was “speaking unto the church
collectively, not individually.” Likewise, he placed the Church under
condemnation for failing “to remember the new covenant, even the Book of
Mormon” (D&C 84:57). By dissolving the firm walls between congregation and
leader, modern Mormons take a few steps closer to recapturing the original
spirit of the Zion experiment—and a few steps away from corporatist models
imposed upon them by late-nineteenth-century American models of corporate
leadership.
Once
we understand Mormonism as an organic entity rather than a corporation, church
leaders no longer dominate the Mormon drama. A chorus and orchestra of ordinary
men and women surround him as they try to tell their story. The lead actors’
lines are significant only within their on-stage communities. An actor might
botch a line, but a botched show requires the complicity of all parties
involved. (Russell Stevenson, Black Mormon: The Story of Elijah Ables [2013],
i-ii)