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Jana Riess: Why it’s important that Latter-day Saint women can now be official witnesses to a baptism

It seems like such a small thing: Women and girls of a certain age can now act as official witnesses to baptisms and temple sealings in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They’re not getting the priesthood themselves; they’re just watching and recording the actions of men. No big deal, right?

It’s not even an unprecedented thing, though women have not performed this role at all recently. One example is when Camilla Kimball, wife of church prophet Spencer W. Kimball, acted as an official witness when her husband baptized a new convert, Mangal Dan Dipty, in the Yamuna River in India in 1961.