Simple Utah Mormon Politics

Although I am as comfortable with my testimony of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Christ's gospel as I am in my own skin, I realize that there are people who aren't. But whether someone leaves or questions their testimony of the LDS Church is not a litmus test for whether they are my friend or not.  I hope they always will be. I recently read an article about those who question or leave the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  I was especially struck by this poignant thought that the article contained: "I worry that many younger Mormons are going through a very difficult and at times traumatic break from the Mormon church without resources and support that might have better informed their decision about staying or leaving or anything in between. "

The scriptures teach that when Christ comes again to the earth, that he will be wearing red apparel. Why red ? They also teach that at Christ's coming, many of the dead will become resurrected. Will this only include members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? Not by a long shot, no matter what some Mormon might tell you.

One of the most damaging aspects of most religions is that the members of those religions heap upon themselves unnecessary burdens of guilt. In this article, I'll explain why, specifically from a Mormon perspective, this is most unfortunate.

The more I participate in ordinances for the dead in temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the more I develop an ulterior motive for doing so; nowhere do important truths impress themselves more clearly upon my mind than in the temple.

A couple of months ago, I wrote here that I prefer the style of immigration reform supported by Utah Senator Luz Robles, rather than that being proposed by Representative Steve Sandstrom. I'm not sure whether Senator Robles was involved in today's announcement of the Utah Compact, but it is what I strongly support as an excellent foundation for immigration reform in Utah--and anywhere.

I've discovered that I learn a lot more in any meeting when I take notes. Twitter works very well for this purpose. When all was said and done, I produced 31 different tweets during today's LDS Stake Conference in Santaquin, Utah. And it was NOT boring. I hope you like some of them.

I find it ironic, in light of this recent article about Mormons being intentionally kicked out as scout leaders in another Christian church, that in 1974 the LDS Church changed its policies when it found that they were having unintended consequences.

I and my family members were asked to speak in our LDS ward sacrament meeting this past Sunday on the topic of "Spiritual Preparedness".  Here are the thoughts that I conveyed in my talk.

In December 1969, the LDS Church First Presidency issued a statement stating that, while a revelation had not yet been given authorizing the priesthood to be given to black males, it is yet important to uphold the Constitutional and civil rights of all citizens regardless of skin color. Ironically, in light of the failure of the United States and other nations of that time to uphold the civil rights of all citizens, many people chose instead to focus on the supposed racism and hypocrisy of the LDS Church.

Many people think that LDS Apostle Boyd K. Packer's talk in October 2010 LDS General Conference was hateful toward homosexuals or that it encouraged hatred toward homosexuals. I don't. However, Elder Packer could have helped a lot of people if, in his talk, he had said "it".What, then, is "it"? "It" is this...

Here is a list of ten things that I resolve to be better at as a result of what I have learned and felt while participating in the October 2010 General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

We were reading in the Book of Mormon last night with our extended family, and something that I had taken for granted was something that many of my family members did not know.  That is that Book of Mormon prophets had prophesied about Columbus, the Pilgrims and Puritans, and the success of the American colonists in the war for independence.

Tweeting my #ldsconf notes on Twitter is much more fun than mere note-taking. It's also much more insightful. I have never learned so much on any one day of LDS General Conference as I did yesterday while tweeting about it. A few evenings ago, Connor Boyack and I were returning from a blogger briefing at the Sutherland Institute in Salt Lake City, when we began talking about the upcoming LDS General Conference. He mentioned that for the last couple of General Conferences he had tweeted his thoughts on twitter. I had just about given up on twitter in favor of facebook, but his idea piqued my interest. For the next couple of days I tweeted my thoughts as I listened to various talks from the April 2009 Conference. And I was hooked. Twitter has now found its firm niche in my internet toolbag. It used to be that I wrote notes in a notebook. That was helpful, but I never looked at those notes again. More recently, I've typed my notes into a document on my laptop. That at l...

There are some pretty wacky things in the Bible. That's why I'm glad that my Church teaches that "we believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly." The other night we were reading about the exploits of the steroidally strong Samson in the Old Testament. He fell in love with some floozy from another country, and she got him to reveal a secret, which ultimately ticked him off as only Samson could be ticked off. In the last verse of Judges chapter 14 he dumps his wife out of spite. And you know... That's the first time in my entire life that I realized that before the tart named Delilah came along, there was another bimbo. And how are these stories of a muscular, oversexed monster supposed to be spiritually uplifting? In his book, The God Delusion , Richard Dawkins points out some the more bizarre entries in the Old Testament. Dawkins chortles: To be fair, much of the Bible is not systematically evil but just plain weird, as yo...

In 1996, the number of LDS converts was just over 321,000. In 2004, 80,000 fewer people were converted to the Church. I was surprised to learn that in 2008, the numbers were only about 265,000--still a far cry from the trends of previous decades. What gives? There are many reasons. But I have a theory that most people probably haven't thought about. It's called "we don't live our religion very well anymore." Various estimates in the last few decades projected that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would have between 75 million and 175 million members by the year 2030. At previous growth rates, That's our biggest problem. It's not that it's hard to be a Mormon. It's not that people are spreading lies about our doctrine. It's that we don't have anything unique to offer. Mormons have become just like everyone else, and in doing so, we have become our own worst enemy. this goal would still seem probable. At the current...

If I had been the one to make the mistake, I would have been mortified. But if I'd been a member of the LDS First Presidency or the Quorum of Twelve Apostles, I'd have laughed about it. I haven't heard anything about their reactions yet, but I hope I'm right. It's a joke that should probably only be told once or twice, because it would become disrespectful over time, but man this one was funny. Yesterday, the BYU Daily Universe published a front page picture with a caption referring to the "Twelve Apostates" ( click here, then scroll down for article updates ) instead of the "Twelve Apostles". As soon as the error was discovered, all newspapers (several thousand) were removed from the racks on BYU campus. A reprint of the edition appeared late yesterday afternoon. I had an interesting conversation with a few of my BYU co-workers today. I was surprised by their reactions to the mistake. First of all, this isn't the first time that mistak...

I predicted that someone from South or Central America--a hispanic--would be the next member of the Quorum of 12 Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Instead, it was Neil L. Andersen, another caucasian Brigham Young University graduate. Some people have intimated that Andersen was a poor choice, because it perpetuated the image of an exclusive white-man's club. What do you think? Update 4/6/09 - Twelve " Apostates "? Was it just a faux pas at BYU's Daily Universe? Update 2: Yes it was. ;-) During President Thomas S. Monson's inaugural press conference following the death of Gordon B. Hinckley in early 2008, Does it matter that 12 white guys, 11 of which graduated from Utah universities, comprise the Quorum of the Twelve? It shouldn't. a member of the press asked what the leadership would do to change the perspective that Church leaders are just a bunch of white men from Utah. The choice of Neil Anderson to the Quorum of Twelve did ...

On March 28th, the LDS Church participated in Earth Hour by dimming the lights of the Salt Lake temple for one hour. On April 2nd, church leaders met with globalist global warming crusader Al Gore. Rumor has it that the LDS church leadership will make a statement on global warming in General Conference this weekend. Do you think that LDS Church leaders have lost their marbles? The Earth Hour web site says YOUR LIGHT SWITCH IS YOUR VOTE This year, Earth Hour was transformed into the world’s first global election, between Earth and global warming. Earth Hour began in Sydney in 2007, when 2.2 million homes and businesses switched off their lights for one hour. In 2008...50 million people switch[ed] off their lights. In 2009, Earth Hour was taken to the next level, with the goal of 1 billion people casting their vote for Earth. [We urge you] to VOTE EARTH [by dimming your lights] and reach the target of 1 billion votes by the time world leaders meet in Copenhagen for the Global Climate...