{"product_id":"your-sister-in-the-gospel","title":"Your Sister in the Gospel","description":"\u003cp\u003e\"Dear Brother,\" Jane Manning James wrote to Joseph F. Smith in 1903, \"I take this opportunity of writing to ask you if I can get my endowments and also finish the work I have begun for my dead.... Your sister in the Gospel, Jane E. James.\" A faithful Latter-day Saint since her conversion sixty years earlier, James had made this request several times before, to no avail, and this time she would be just as unsuccessful, even though most Latter-day Saints were allowed\n\u003cbr\u003eto participate in the endowment ritual in the temple as a matter of course. James, unlike most Mormons, was black. For that reason, she was barred from performing the temple rituals that Latter-day\n\u003cbr\u003eSaints believe are necessary to reach the highest degrees of glory after death.A free black woman from Connecticut, James positioned herself at the center of LDS history with uncanny precision. After her conversion, she traveled with her family and other converts from the region to Nauvoo, Illinois, where the LDS church was then based. There, she took a job as a servant in the home of Joseph Smith, the founder and first prophet of the LDS church. When Smith was killed in\n\u003cbr\u003e1844, Jane found employment as a servant in Brigham Young's home. These positions placed Jane in proximity to Mormonism's most powerful figures, but did not protect her from the church's racially\n\u003cbr\u003ediscriminatory policies. Nevertheless, she remained a faithful member until her death in 1908.Your Sister in the Gospel is the first scholarly biography of Jane Manning James or, for that matter, any black Mormon. Quincy D. Newell chronicles the life of this remarkable yet largely unknown figure and reveals why James's story changes our understanding of American history.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Oxford University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43972360470766,"sku":"9780199338665","price":53.21,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0630\/9612\/7726\/files\/9780199338665.jpg?v=1709447690","url":"https:\/\/bookland.com.au\/products\/your-sister-in-the-gospel","provider":"Book Land AU","version":"1.0","type":"link"}