Should Mormon women wear pants to church?

“Death threats.”  From the New York Times:

A call for Mormon women to wear pants to church, begun this month by a small group of women, has stretched across the globe, but not before creating a backlash and even generating death threats.

“Wear Pants to Church,” an event on Sunday, was meant to draw attention to the role of women in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, using attire as a symbolic first salvo in a larger struggle over gender inequalities.

Though the Mormon Church has no official policy against women wearing pants to church, many say they feel peer pressure to wear a dress, particularly in the Western United States, organizers said. So on Sunday, thousands of Mormon women arrived at church in pants in places like Cambridge, England; Heidelberg, Germany; Austin, Tex.; the Marshall Islands; and Kotzebue, Alaska. A number of the women posted their photos on Facebook and other Web sites. Others said they could not participate because they were fearful of ridicule or reprimand….

At a suburban church in Green Valley, Nev., less than 10 miles from the Las Vegas Strip, women filed into church on Sunday morning, most wearing dresses (most men wore coats and ties). Bishop Michael Durham was somewhat dismissive of the pants idea. “I think wearing pants is not liberating,” he said. “Liberation comes from inside. I’m not sure they have a clear understanding of the church’s position on gender.”

Soraya Cordeiro said she wore pants because she had to take a long bus ride to her job at the Venetian hotel after church and found wearing a dress to be “a hassle.” She said she had never faced rebuke for her choice of attire.

On Monday, a private All Enlisted Facebook page had collected about the same number of “negative experiences” as “positive experiences” from women across the country. Julie Tuovi Baker Hansen, a lawyer in Burbank, Calif., who participated while visiting a Salt Lake City suburb, said she was surprised to see a man raise his hand and say, “Women who want to wear pants, they just don’t know how to follow the Lord.” …

More here and here.