My freshman year at BYU I volunteered at BYUSA, the student leadership and government organization, as an assistant to the vice president of communications.  We met with various department chairs and student organization leaders about campus concerns, and trained them how to come together to create unity within their organizations. The motto  “A Zion University” hung on the banner over our cubicle.

So many years later I can not tell you any details of we preached. I can recall some of the details I worked on: a t-shirt design, playing the piano at a conference, and making a dutch oven dinner in the canyon (and maybe the receptionist I dated for one hot month).  But I remember Trevor, the vice president I played sidekick to, and Neil Diamond. He took me in tow around campus and to meetings and welcomed me as a friend, asking me about my high school glory days and how my crush at reception was coming along. In his beat up Toyota he played Neil Diamond tapes, and I forgot to scoff because I saw how much he loved them, how his face lit up as he sang along, so instead I listened to him, to Neil, and sometimes I sang along too. 

Zion doesn’t mean much as a word or office banner; what we bring to it, the people we’re with and what we do together, that has meaning. A Book of Mormons: Latter-day Saints on a Modern Zion, edited by Emily M. Jensen and Tracy McKay-Lamb explores the idea that Zion is ever so much more than a place or far-flung idea. Each personal essay and narrative in the book pulls the idea down from the clouds of some unobtainable someday, into snapshots of where it has been, what it looks like, and what it means in our modern Mormon context.

This subject is well-suited to the format of a variety of authors, each speaking for themselves, their voices personalizing the association of Mormon Zion. I confess I got excited just thumbing along the table of contents: so many thoughtful writers, artists and thinkers I’ve appreciated in the past were present in the collection. George Handley, Luisa Perkins, J. Kirk Richards, Neylan McBaine, Julie M. Smith,  Ann Edwards Cannon, Steven Carter and so many more. Segullah sisters, past and present, Kathryn Lynard, C. Jane, Linda Hoffman Kimball and Heather Bennet Oman all represent with the humor and poignant storytelling. The anthology essays are an mix of experience, insight and academic thought.

These ideas of Zion personified filled my head and heart with the thing I find equally sustaining and challenging about the Mormon faith: that we are charged to create Zion together where we are. Melissa Wei-Tsing Inouye sees it so beautifully in the participatory folding chair culture, “In the Mormon section of the orchestra pit, we stumble on, season after season: learning to play new instruments as needed, struggling to stay in tune, loyally attending rehearsal, folding and unfolding an endless array of chairs.” Contributor Kalani Tonga writes: “Zion means coming home.”

Many of the essays speak of Zion as more than a place that isn’t literal, but as a people and a place of being. I particularly appreciated the room for Mormons of all stripes, that we can all belong together in our shared identity, no matter the divergence within, as evidenced by the inclusion of a informative and intriguing piece by Community of Christ member, John C. Hamer, and other pieces that spoke of those often marginalized out of Zion. There were pieces that I loved initially and others that I want to return to, but overall the wide array of perspectives made the collection equally diverse and approachable. I would freely recommend it to members and non-members wanting to see a more fleshed out, writerly version of the “I’m a Mormon” campaign.

As Mormons we know well enough by now Zion as a place didn’t really happen as we thought it would, but it can work in our hearts and in our minds and relationships. And sometimes to the tunes of Neil Diamond.