Guest Post by Non-Arab Arab
BiV’s recent post “Sod, Seed, Salvation: Abrahamic Covenant and the Claim to Palestine” brought me out of my normal lurking. Modern Palestine and what I firmly believe to be the erroneous interpretation most members of the church have regarding events there always riles me up. Usually I do the smart thing and bite my lip, but every once in a while I choose to enter the fray in full combat mode. As I’ve found on most issues of debate, it doesn’t really matter how right I think I am the noise of the argument rarely does more than highlight who already believes what. So my wish here is not to re-argue the questions of Palestine which I’ve already done enough of on this blog. Instead, I’d like to talk about shoes. No, not the famous Arab shoes, rather walking a mile in another’s shoes. Continue reading…
I want to let everyone know of a very unfortunate situation in Romania. According to this Deseret News article, Elder McKay Choy Burrows, 20, of Highland, Utah, and Elder Jace Edwards Davis, 20, of Logandale, Nevada, died from accidental natural gas asphyxiation due to a gas leak in their apartment sometime Friday night in Romania. It’s terrible that such a seemingly preventable tragedy happened to these 2 young men.
Lately more and more Church members have begun to wonder why the Church is so supportive of the United States military. We’ve experienced a long tradition of this, beginning with the Mormon Battalion in 1846. When the U.S. Army requested 500 men to join the service in the conflict with Mexico, Brigham Young responded positively despite the fact that our people were in the middle of a forced exodus from the country. This story is proudly retold in our Church lessons and manuals, making it a seminal moment in the formation of our military philosophy. Isolation in the West kept members physically separated from the conflict of the Civil War. But by the time of World War I, Mormons had become involved in the military machine. Continue reading…
If you were in downtown Salt Lake City today, you may have noticed a large rally of over a thousand peacefully protesting polygamists. What is happening to the financial affairs of the FLDS right now seems completely inexplicable, but I need to try to understand what is going on. And it seems to me to behoove every citizen of the United States to do the same. Continue reading…
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David Carradine died today in a hotel in Thailand.
Go with God, Grasshopper. Continue reading…
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OK Paul technically isn’t exactly an international DJ, not unless you consider that you can listen to his interviews on line.
Continue reading…
Someone mentioned in a blog post that I read recently about how accessible materials and information about the Church are for us these days: blogs, books (official and unofficial), news, the internet in general. I couldn’t agree more. There’s a wealth of information about the Church at our fingertips and goodness knows that many of us spend hours reading, analyzing, discussing, and debating it all. I’m often surprised that more Mormons don’t take advantage of it.
There is one problem, however. This wealth of information is NOT equally available to members of the Church.
Continue reading…
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Many view the Second Coming as a time when Jesus will personally and politically reign, not just host lamb & lion mixers. So what do you think? Will Jesus govern politically? Or is the notion that Jesus will govern politically more of the same wishful thinking that people had the first time around when they thought the Messiah would free them from political oppression by the Romans? (Weren’t they disappointed!) Continue reading…
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There was an interesting article in Time recently about Facebook’s censorship of pics with nips, specifically eliminating pictures of breastfeeding moms (and, in their defense, a few of topless women who just happened to be holding babies). But, this brought up an age-old question of Mormondom: why are there no nipples on the Nephites in the BOM vids? Continue reading…
http://www.mormonstories.org/
MormonStories, the site that hosted dozens of audio and video podcast interviews, was retired this weekend. John Dehlin announced he is taking the opportunity to focus his energizes on his family and pursue new opportunities in life. It sounds like it was a complex and difficult decision for him. Many people involved in Mormonism on the internet are familiar with his work. He interviewed prominent Mormon scholars, activist Mormons on the internet, and just everyday members about their beliefs. The result was a sampling of the colorful rainbow of faith, doubts and hopes in the world of Mormon religion. He was also noted for his candid treatment of historical topics and issues. This last part is what a lot of people appreciated — the liberating sense of openness. Continue reading…