The church has initiated a new online profile campaign on mormon.org in which those interested in the church can “meet” actual members who’ve posted pictures of themselves, personal experiences with the church, and their own answers to a variety of questions about Mormonism. A few of those questions are on more controversial topics, and it is interesting to read answers that members have posted.
Posts Tagged ‘ mormon ’
A New Church? — The New Mormon.org PR/Marketing Campaign
Hey. If you haven’t seen it yet….a new Mormon.org PR campaign is upon us…and all I can say is…”Wow.” Seriously. Wow. An “independently minded womn”. A priesthood-holding black man in an interracial marriage. Working moms (too many to link to here in one sentence). An apparently non-garment-wearing skateboarding photographer of partially naked women who claims that God wants us all to be individualistic and not robots or chess pieces. Awesome. Seriously. So……awesome. This is a brand of Mormonism I can stand squarely behind.
Why Do People Struggle? (With Poll!)
Through my time in the church, I’ve known many who have left the church, many others who have seemingly never had an issue, and a vast majority who struggled with one aspect or another yet remained active (or resumed activity after a period of inactivity). What’s your experience with struggling?
Pyramids-R-US
Last week I spent a supper hour (it took that long) reading an article called “America’s Ruling Class – And the Perils of Revolution” by Angelo Codevilla. The overall article is well worth reading to better understand current political debates, but that wasn’t what called my attention to it as a possible subject for Mormon Matters. Rather, the following paragraph toward the end of the Article startled me: “Nothing has set the country class apart, defined it, made it conscious of itself, given it whatever coherence it has, so much as the ruling class’s insistence that people other than...
Spiritual Guidance: A GC Talk Review
I wanted to try a new feature – going through some of the previous GC talks to discuss some of the ideas put forth. I decided to start with E. Scott’s talk from the Oct 2009 GC session: To Acquire Spiritual Guidance. This was a talk I enjoyed when it was first given, although the last 3rd got a little repetitious on the whole porn thing (Did you notice that porn has now gone mainstream? New motto: Porn, it’s not just for Priesthood session anymore.)
The Divided Kingdom Today
OT SS Lesson #27 “Take an old piece of clothing,” our SS lesson advises, “or a piece of paper that is cut in the shape of a piece of clothing and tear it into 12 pieces. Explain that toward the end of Solomon’s life, the prophet Ahijah prophesied that Jeroboam, one of Solomon’s 12 superintendents over taxes and labor, would take over much of the Israelite nation. To illustrate this, Ahijah seized the garment from the back of Jeroboam, tore it into 12 pieces, and gave 10 of the pieces to Jeroboam.” The lesson teaches that the influence of...
Understanding the Atonement
The atonement is to Christianity what enlightenment is to Buddhism: the foundational concept. How do you feel about the atonement? I admit to some mixed feelings on the concept of atonement.
Free Will vs. Determinism…FIGHT!
One of the most basic and fundamental premises of Mormonism is the idea of free will. While we take this for granted in Mormonism, in the secular world the debate is far from settled. In fact, the debate over determinism vs. libertarianism (not the political philosophy but the metaphysical philosophy) has raged on and on for centuries.
Song Practice: Not Music to Our Ears
“We have learned by sad experience that it is the nature and disposition of almost all Song Practice Ladies, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion.”—Fabricated Quote from Joseph Smith circa 1842. Today’s guest post is by Matt Workman.
Faith, Knowledge, Belief, and Stochastic Theory Part 4: Finding Truth – An Optimization Problem
In part two of this series I discussed Bayesian inference. Specifically, I discussed how Bayesian inference provided us with a mechanism for deciding in what we should place our confidence given all the information we possess and will yet obtain. This was all framed in the context of confidence. I’d like to discuss an alternative way of looking at Bayesian inference – namely optimization.
Priesthood as a Puberty Rite
A unique aspect of Mormonism is that all males over age 12 can hold an office of the priesthood, and that they are expected to use that priesthood in service to both the community (sacrament, callings) and to individuals (healings, blessings, and acts of service). When the church was first organized, most of the offices of the Aaronic priesthood were held by adult males, not teens. Has teenage priesthood ordination evolved into a form of puberty rite?
Mormonism: Nature Religion or Social Religion?
“God against Man. Man against God. Man against Nature. Nature against man. Nature against God. God against nature–very funny religion!” ~Dr. D. T. Suzuki. Is Mormonism as a restorationist church a “nature” religion or a “social” religion or something in between?
How Many Mormons Does It Take to Screw in a Lightbulb?
Today’s post is by Matt Workman. I waited backstage with my small troupe of comedians. One more act to go, then it was our turn to perform. Would the act on before us whip the crowd into a frenzy? Take all the steam out of the room? Perhaps overshadow our under-rehearsed sketch? The performance started and it took us a while to figure out what was happening, but soon it was painfully obvious: our lead-in act was a PowerPoint presentation. It may not surprise you to learn that the venue for this particular comedy performance was a church activity...
Faith & Doubt
Today’s guest post is by Glenn. When I was at BYU, I got interested in the study of folklore – the way that traditional culture informs our understanding of the world. I worked in the BYU folklore archives cataloguing missionary stories – encounters with the three nephites, miraculous experiences (some easier to believe than others), initiation stories of greenie missionaries, cautionary tales — just a whole bunch of really interesting stuff. I was hooked.
Faith, Knowledge, Belief, and Stochastic Theory Part 2: Inductive Reasoning
Deductive reasoning is a form of reasoning in which the conclusion can be drawn directly from the premises. The idea is to show that the conclusion necessarily follows from the premises. For example: Bridges built using sound engineering principles are safe. The Bay Bridge was built using sound engineering principles. Therefore, the Bay Bridge was safe (at least when it was built). This form of reasoning is reliable, at least as far as logic goes, producing correct conclusions from the premises.
Equal Parenting: Feasible or Not?
There was an interesting article in NYT about the parenting equality in Sweden. Sweden’s practices are probably the most advanced in terms of creating parental equality, although they go a little too far for my tastes. As a business person things like 120 paid days of sick time per year for child care seem a little tough to work around. Nevertheless, the article highlighted some of the obstacles to creating true equality in parenting.
Mixed Belief Marriages
What should a church member do if their spouse is a non-believer? This is something that many couples encounter, either because one spouse ceases to believe or because one spouse converts and the other does not. What should the church advise these believing spouses who ask? What is the “doctrinal” implication in these situations? Does this put the believing spouse’s salvation at risk as some fear?
Eternal Progress vs. Eternal Increase: A Poll
One of the distinct LDS doctrines is that of eternal progression: the idea that we continue to grow and develop as individuals throughout eternity unless through our own choices we stop progressing. But there are two different interpretations of this doctrine that both seem to be supported by authoritative statements. Are both interpretations correct? Or is one correct and the other incorrect?
Does God Squash ETs: How Human is Human?
Distinctly Mormon doctrines relating the physical appearance of humanity to God’s own “preferred” form grew gradually in early Restoration history rather than springing forth in full. Although there are references in the Book of Mormon to the Brother of Jared seeing the “finger” and then the full vision of Christ (the earliest recorded of Joseph Smith’s prophetic writings), even the earliest published accounts of the First Vision do not feature descriptions of two personages appearing as does the “official” version eventually recorded several years after formation of the church. This doesn’t mean that later descriptions were contradictory to the...
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