Published in Mormon,
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Squaring the Circle is a geometry problem and a spiritual puzzle. It dates back at least 4,000 years. All of the great cultures that expressed advanced mathematics and philosophy approached this problem and had a mythology to give it meaning. On one hand, it is a practical, geometric exercise exploring approximations of PI and Phi. On the other hand, it is a philosophical puzzle to combine opposites and find the perfect balance. Can a human find their way through the maze of different extremes that we encounter in our mortal experience? We must navigate between light and darkness, health and sickness, pleasure and pain, life and death, good and evil. The greatest minds in history have expressed pleasure and enlightenment from this geometry exercise. A famous Greek philosopher included a statement in his work “On Exile” referring to one of his fellow countrymen who worked the squaring problem:
“There is no place that can take away the happiness of a man, nor yet his virtue or wisdom. Anaxagoras, indeed, wrote on the squaring of the circle while in prison.”
-Plutarch
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Published in Culture,
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Everybody blogs, right? Why not me? Looking for my niche, my angle, and the one thing that seemed to make me stand out in my corner of the world. I found it: Being single. And 40. And Mormon. In a family ward. In a town where EVERYONE is under 30, sealed in the temple and constantly reproducing. The best humor is found in our painful life experiences. Read about mine and laugh with me. Or at me. Whichever Continue reading…
Published in Anti-Mormon,
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Recently I drove up Little Cottonwood Canyon with my brother and nephew. This is the canyon in which many of your ancestors pulled out the granite for the construction of the salt lake temple. As soon as we passed the granite facings on the side of the canyon my nephew played a song on his iPod by Corb Lund Brother Brigham Brother Young and it brought mental flashes into my mind of men working on the side of the mountain blasting granite out of it. It made me think of the struggles that men and women had even back then with the faith in many ways very similar to our day. From what I have read Mr Lund isn’t LDS but has relatives that are. Im assuming one of his relatives is a historian buff? Its probably safe to presume this song will never be played in a chapel 
but I can’t help liking it! You can listen to his song Here Continue reading…
I’ve always taken it as a given that Mormonism’s view of the afterlife shuffle has always been more universalizing than most of the other alternatives. Our formulation of heaven intuitively accommodates for the varying levels of understanding people can achieve in this life and in the spirit world: instead of a binary — heaven and hell — we have glories of heaven. So, we can safely say that although most people aren’t Mormons, most people won’t go to “Hell,” or at least, not the kind of Hell that many non-LDS religious people want to posit for nonbelievers of their religions. Regardless of people’s disagreements with the particulars of exaltation for the celestial aspirants, things actually look pretty good for the rest of us non-celestial people.
That being said, we do know that there is a divider between the glories and the non-glories. We have that ominous concept: Outer Darkness. But what does it mean? Who is it for? Continue reading…
Could God evolve?
As part of a discussion group, I have been reading Robert Wright’s The Evolution of God. My group isn’t anywhere near finished (the “heart” of the book focuses on the three major Abrahamic religions — Judaism, Christianity, and Islam — yet we’ve only finished through the part on Judaism that sets the stage for Christianity), but as I blogged about on my personal blog, I already have concerns about the arguments that Wright presents.
Some of my comments, however, may not necessarily apply to Mormonism. For example, Wright seems to rely on this idea of a God that can evolve. The big issue is that many believers are constrained to believing that God is constant and thus ineligible for evolution. However, Mormons — through ideas like eternal progression — may not have that reservation (depending on whether or not eternal progression is “in” or “out” of the theology du jour.)
So, what does Wright say?
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Published in Culture,
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Published in Beatitudes,
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A week ago, I attended the viewing and funeral of a man in our stake who died of an unexpected heart attack. He was in his 50’s, had just been to the doctor and been pronounced fit as a fiddle, was losing weight and feeling great.
He was the Bishop of his ward, and his wife had been cancer free for just over a year. His son flew home for the weekend, after which he returned to finish his mission. Continue reading…
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My home teacher (who is very cool) came by yesterday to drop off some starter cables for my car and as one does in that short interlude we discussed the celestial kingdom and being Gods after this life. He believed that those who don’t make it to the highest kingdom in the Celestial Kingdom won’t have any sexual relationships and if you don’t have sexual relationships their will be no need for sexual organs.
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A while back, some of us had an interesting discussion on my blog called “The Faith Gene.” We were examining the possibility that certain people were born with such a gene, while others weren’t. Continue reading…
This is a post written initially on my own blog. It was reprinted on Feminist Mormon Housewives a while back. It created a very lively discussion and even got some comments from a few people who had personally been through a transgender operation. I have edited the original post to make it more up-to-date and to include some of the comments it generated.
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Sometimes I find it hard to reconcile certain Church teachings with real-life stories. I was reminded about this after catching an old episode of Oprah a few weeks ago.
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The LDS doctrine of Baptism for the Dead is unique within Christianity. 
The explanation for the doctrine and additional references on the LDS Church website can be found here. There is also a fairly lengthy explanation on Wikipedia here. It is a controversial doctrine and many groups have protested this vicarious work for the dead, including Jews, Catholics and others. I find a certain ironies in their protestations.
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Just about every day in the news, we hear of an advance in modern medicine that can prolong life that might otherwise be lost if the person is left without this medical treatment. Whether it is a new treatment for an otherwise terminal illness or the ability to save an infant that might not survive after birth, the advances in medicine have been breathtaking in their ability to prolong and improve quality of life. In many cases, a religious person might consider such things as modern miracles. I know that I do. Continue reading…
Published in Asides,
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To the teachers out there, sorry if this one is coming a day late and a dollar short. Our ward is a month behind on these due to Stake & Ward Conferences. Mea culpa.
Sometimes we forget that the early restored church focused a lot on the millenium, which many of them believed was imminent. As if they didn’t have enough stress! Continue reading…
As part of my graduate program in counseling I have to write a personal theory, which includes process and goals of therapy, explanations for personality, psychopathology, etc. The first part, however, forms the basis for everything else: the nature of the person. I have been working on it for a while, trying to pin down exactly what I believe about the human race, and what is true about people across time and cultures. Here is what I have, with brief explanations: Continue reading…
Squaring the Circle is a geometry problem and a spiritual puzzle. It dates back at least 4,000 years. All of the great cultures that expressed advanced mathematics and philosophy approached this problem and had a mythology to give it meaning. On one hand, it is a practical, geometric exercise exploring approximations of PI and Phi. On the other hand, it is a philosophical puzzle to combine opposites and find the perfect balance. Can a human find their way through the maze of different extremes that we encounter in our mortal experience? We must navigate between light and darkness, health and sickness, pleasure and pain, life and death, good and evil. The greatest minds in history have expressed pleasure and enlightenment from this geometry exercise. A famous Greek philosopher included a statement in his work “On Exile” referring to one of his fellow countrymen who worked the squaring problem:
