Here are some links to good technical tools for tracking the election:
Blog Archives
Homosexuality, Politics, and Looking to November 5th
On the eve of another election in the United States of America, many historic events are looming, both encouraging and daunting; Whatever happens, we will either elect our first person of color as President, or our first female as Vice President. We may see a 60-vote majority in the Senate for the Democratic party. But offsetting these historic events is great uncertainty and fear about an ongoing economic crisis unseen since the Great Depression, alarm due to serious conflicts with various nations overseas, even apprehension about possible irreversible changes in our environment. Yet, here we are again looking at...
5 Cool Things About the Community of Christ
This post is another installment in my “5 Cool Things” series. Today I’m giving a list, again in no particular order, of some things I think are really cool about our prairie cousins, the Community of Christ (formerly RLDS Church).
Are Sacrament Meeting Talks Rehashes of General Conference Talks Where You Live?
In my ward in a very LDS-heavy area of Arizona, I’ve been noticing a pattern in the sacrament meeting talks. I’m not sure how far back it has been going, but at least for this year every talk has been based on a talk from a General Authority at the most recent General Conference.
5 Cool Things I Wish the LDS Church Were Doing
This post is another installment in my “5 Cool Things” series. Today I’m giving a list, again in no particular order, of some things I would love to see happen in the LDS Church (which I attend actively). I’m not presenting this list as a set of demands or to declare what is wrong with the church. Its just a handful of things I think would be pretty cool.
5 Cool Things About the 2008 Presidential Campaign
This post is another installment in my “5 Cool Things” series. Today I’m giving a list, again in no particular order, of some things that are cool about the 2008 race for President of the United States. I have tried to make the list from the angle of not knowing or anticipating which candidate will win.
5 Cool Expressions of Spirituality Which Might Seem Weird To Mormons
I’m starting a series which I’m calling “5 Cool Things”. It will basically be a list of 5 things, not in any order, that follow a particular theme. Here’s the first edition, on the topic of methods of spiritual expression that fall outside the typical Mormon repertoire which I have found to be pretty cool, and not incompatible with Mormonism at all.
How Much Does Church Activity Have To Do With ‘Being Mormon’?
Not so long ago, when I would hear about someone who didn’t go to church at all or have any interest in returning would refer to themselves as Mormon, I would be annoyed that they still identified themselves that way. I used to see being Mormon as a choice, as a religious path, and if you aren’t choosing it then you only make a bad name for the rest of us… or so I felt at that time. Yet, it seems there is something deeply cultural about being Mormon, especially those raised or at least members from a young...
Churches are Made for the Ninety and Nine… What About the One?
Believers and non-believers. The faithful and the doubters. Religious conservatives and religious liberals. TBMs and NOMs. These are ways we describe the differences in our faith and activity in our religious tradition. These variations are not unique to Mormonism. The patterns of faith development have been documented across all religions and cultures. How does an institutional church serve and support both groups? How does it care for the ninety and nine, without neglecting the one? Can it go after the one without neglecting the ninety and nine?
An Act of Violence
And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God and another book was opened, which is the book of life And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. -Revelation Ch. 20 (vs. 12-15) Love is a burning thing and it makes a fiery ring. Bound by wild desire, I fell into a ring of fire. -Johnny Cash In the LDS church, members are written into the book of life with their baptism and confirmation. For some, the love affair with the gospel can truly become a fiery...
The Other Half of the Circle
I am an over-analyzer. As a musician I listen to music in a different way than a lot of folks. I pick apart each instrument and criticize the cleverness of lyrics (or lack thereof). I was briefly interested in screenwriting and read some books about it, and now I pick apart the plotlines of movies. Things that many people enjoy in a simple way become an exercise in academic frustration for me. This is the blessing and curse of humanity. We think. Recently I heard Robert Kirby say, “Humans are the only species than can actually think themselves stupider.”...
The Danzig Case: Does the LDS Church Influence Members to Oppose Same Sex Marriage?
Many of you may be aware of an ongoing case in Utah involving Peter and Mary Danzig. I’m not going to summarize here, as you can read about the details on various sites, but I’ll post links to the back-stories below. This post is just about opening a conversation. The core issues I feel are under debate are about how much involvement the LDS church officially has in the opposition of same sex marriage. The Danzigs resigned their membership because they felt the church was pressuring them to act against their own consciences. The church says (in a very...
Cultural Doctrines: The Unsaid Sermon
In 1991, Dr. Robert F. Bohn gave this great talk at the Sunstone Symposium titled “Cultural vs. Gospel Doctrine and the ‘Unsaid Sermon Phenomenon’”. I recently listened to the recording and found it poignant, practical, helpful, and encouraging. As an illustration of the topic, here’s an example: Original quote from a sermon: “When that earthquake hit when I was on my mission, there were many deaths, but I felt calm because I knew that God protects his faithful missionaries.” The false notion, or Unsaid Sermon: “My son was killed on his mission. I wonder if he was unfaithful.“
Peculiar People: Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses
For a religious community that is often misunderstood and sometimes maligned or mocked, we don’t learn much from our experience. I can’t tell you how often I hear underhanded remarks about other religious groups. Its not a common topic of conversation, but when the subject turns to Jehovah’s Witnesses, and in almost any setting, you are bound to hear jokes. Like Mormons, the faithful really do stick out in a crowd. With my background in having studied with them, I thought it might be fun to examine the “peculiar” similarities between Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses. We may be more...
Cool Website Enables Collaborative Timelines
We recently discovered a nifty little website called xTimeline which allows people to collaborate on-line in a similar fashion to a wiki. Folks sign up to be able to create or edit timelines for whatever subject catches your fancy. John Dehlin started one off called Critical Moments in Mormon History. Go to the “Editors” tab on John’s timeline and submit a request to become and editor (after signing up of course). I should probably mention its free. What events do you find most important in Mormon history?
Reconstruction Part 2: Abandoning “Being Right” In Search of “Having Joy”
In part one of this reconstruction journey, I talked about how being hyper-focused on being right intensifies the impact when you come to see that ambiguity (essentially the opposite of right/wrong clarity) is inseparably interwoven into the LDS gospel. I’ve been taught my whole church life to “choose the right” and I have heard testimony born time and again that we are so fortunate to have the whole truth (as compared to other partial-truth-holding faiths). Coming face to face with the reality of ambiguity is like diving into a very cold pool of water on a very hot day....
Reconstruction Part 1: Like a Wave, Driven and Tossed
Not so long ago I thought I knew certain things were true and wavering was a self-inflicted condition. I also really thought I was an independent thinker who had chosen to be a conservative Republican, and to believe that homosexuality was an illness, and that the priesthood ban was imposed by God for some reason we just couldn’t understand, and that polygamy was a holy practice when it was sanctioned, and that church leaders past and present were inspired in all things and represented the will of the Lord. I thought I chose those positions because they were simply...
“I don’t know that we teach it”
In the latest LDS manual for priesthood and Relief Society sunday meetings, it features the teachings of Joseph Smith and will be in use for the next two years. Today’s lesson is on the topic of God the Father. There is a particular passage in the manual that I was surprised to see, especially in contrast to the famous comment quoted in this post’s title made by Gordon B. Hinckley in Time magazine.
God as Codependent
If there is something truly unique about Mormon doctrine, it is the image of God. I agree with Sterling McMurrin, that its not always easy to tell these days what the mainstream LDS church really teaches, or at least how much it actually resembles the church Joseph Smith founded. Nevertheless, there was a time in our past when leaders were much more willing to voice their opinions and theories, especially Joseph himself. The nature of God was no exception. Lately in General Conference, I get the impression that the canonized First Vision is the official standard for the nature...