Elder Oaks’ talk has seen the most reaction from the bloggernacle. Since the church takes a while to transcribe these, I have decided to transcribe his talk from yesterday. You can also see it on the official church website by clicking below. What are your thoughts?
https://www.lds.org/general-conference/watch/2014/04?lang=eng&vid=3436246697001&cid=3
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This post originally appeared at Wheat and Tares from Guy Templeton under the title Are We Properly Prepared to Enter the Temple? I thought it was worth sharing, along with some insightful comments.
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I’ve been reading a book, Your Endowment by Mark A. Shields. The book claims to be from “an experienced gospel teacher, casts new light on the symbolism inherent in the temple ordinances and provides a wealth of insights that well change the way your worship.” I was intrigued by a story early in the book. Continue Reading »
There has been a lot of chatter on the Bloggernacle this week about whether it is appropriate for Kate Kelly and proponents of female priesthood are employing proper methods in seeking to bring attention to female ordination. Kate has organized the group Ordain Women. According to their website, “Ordain Women aspires to create a space for Mormon women to articulate issues of gender inequality they may be hesitant to raise alone. As a group we intend to put ourselves in the public eye and call attention to the need for the ordination of Mormon women to the priesthood. We sincerely ask our leaders to take this matter to the Lord in prayer.” Continue Reading »
I don’t think Tom is smiling about this court ruling.
The Deseret News is reporting that a British judge has rejected Tom Phillips’ lawsuit against the Church, and called the lawsuit “an abuse of the process of the court.” Tom’s lawsuit alleged that the Church committed fraud because it lies about its origins in order to obtain tithing receipts.
“I am satisfied that the process of the court is being manipulated to provide a high-profile forum to attack the religious beliefs of others,” Westminster Magistrates’ Court Senior District Judge Howard Riddle said in a written ruling. “It is an abuse of the process of the court.”
Comments?
We like to complain about human rights abuses in Communist China or North Korea. However, it is the United States with the highest incarceration rate in the world, and it is more than 6 times larger than Communist China. (The U.S jails 743 per 100,000 Americans; China jails just 122 per 100,000.) It seems that the United States is breeding criminals at a rate 6 times faster than China, and we have the highest incarceration rate in the world. Are we doing something wrong?
Now that Seasons 3 and 4 are on Netflix, I’m catching up on Sister Wives again. Season 4 Episode 4 was a Q&A titled You Asked, They Answered, in which viewers ask all sorts of questions of the Browns. One question in particular gave me much pause, and I thought it might be a nice discussion.
Janelle, “Ok, Sarah’s asking ‘how would you react if one of your children came out to you?’ and I’m assuming this means came out as a homosexual. And, you know, I’ve thought about this because the odds are, with as many children as we have – the odds are that we could have one or two. And I’ve really thought about this, and I don’t think it would disrupt my world any.”
We would like to think that we would always choose good over evil, but is that always the case?
This is part 3 of my series on a documentary, The Science of Evil. In Part 1, I discussed Jeffrey’s Dahmer and his baptism. In Part 2, we discussed whether there is a soul, or whether the soul can be identified based on parts of the brain that control decision-making. In Part 3, I want to look at the circumstances of good and evil. Do the circumstances we are in help us make good or evil decisions?
As we look at the world, how quickly things deteriorate can be startling: the 1965 Watts Riots, the Rodney King Riots of 1991, the overthrow of Libyan leader Moammar Khadafy in 2013, the revolution in Egypt, even the sectarian violence of Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Serbia. It is rather startling how friends can instantly become enemies.
I wanted to continue my series on a National Geographic documentary, The Science of Evil. (A few days ago, I discussed serial killer Jeffrey’s Dahmer, and his baptism in jail following his horrific murders.) In this post, researchers at Harvard and Princeton try to see how the brain processes moral judgment. But how do we quantitatively define evil?
National Geographic has a very interesting documentary, The Science of Evil where they look at evil from many points of view. It was a very thought-provoking documentary, and I think I will put together a series of posts on the documentary. My first post will deal with Jeffrey Dahmer, the notorious serial killer. From Wikipedia, Dahmer Continue Reading »
Mormon Heretic 