Year: 2014

Should I Stay Or Should I Go?

by Nathaniel Givens • April 28, 2014 • 14 Comments

This post is a follow up to my two previous posts As Much As I Know Anything and What It Would Take To Not Believe. I have to start out by clarifying something that I didn’t define well enough in a previous post. I made the statement that we cannot not believe, but that depends on a definition of belief that isn’t universal and that I should have made more clear. Obviously we can choose to not believe in lots of things individually. But when I think about belief I have something more holistic and systemic in mind. Our really important beliefs tend to weave together in a web that makes it impossible for some strands to be pulled without having an effect on the entire fabric. At this point we’re not just talking about individual propositions. We’re talking about a world view, which is a cohesive whole that includes not just beliefs, but also values, emotions, and memories. I’m tempted to use the phrase “ecosystem,” but the term I like the best for this network of propositions and relationships between propositions is constructed reality. It is the working model we each have of the world around us. It governs not only what we think is true right now, but also what we think will be true in the future based on our actions and the actions of others. I went into much greater detail (and linked the topic to why…

A (Funny) Ghost Story

by Julie M. Smith • April 27, 2014 • 10 Comments

Jesus walks on the water and intends to “pass by” his disciples. What’s going on here?

Literary OTGD #15: Exodus by John Lyon

by Kent Larsen • April 25, 2014 • Comments Off

As the Mormon pioneers began their westward trek, they already saw themselves on an exodus similar to that of ancient Israel leaving Egypt for the promised land. And they faced some of the same difficulties that Israel faced—such as those outlined in Old Testament Gospel Doctrine lesson 15: complaints, backbiting, uncertain knowledge of the land they were going to, and even a promised land populated by another people. The poem below, written near the beginning of the Mormon trek, urges the Saints in England to promptly take part in the trek, despite its dangers and the misgivings of many Church members.

12 More Questions for Armand Mauss, Part 2

by Dave Banack • April 22, 2014 • 19 Comments

We continue our Q&A with Armand Mauss, LDS author and scholar. See Part 1 for a full introduction. 5. Let’s talk now about some of the issues you discussed in your memoir, Shifting Borders and a Tattered Passport: Intellectual Journeys of a Mormon Academic (U of U Press, 2012). In Chapter 6, “Recurrent Visits with the Race Issue,” you recount how you conducted research on the LDS race issue during the 1960s for your dissertation on Mormonism and minorities, filed at UC Berkeley in 1970. That put you smack in the middle of the most contentious issue in the Church during a difficult ten or fifteen years (particularly difficult for many LDS scholars) right up to the 1978 revelation. Yet you held the middle of ground of not exiting the Church or being pushed out as a harmful critic while, at the same time, publishing scholarly analysis and gentle criticism of the existing LDS policy and remaining a fully active member of the Church. How did you manage that?

A house with a gun is not a home

by Walter van Beek • April 22, 2014 • 191 Comments

Everybody was shocked by the news that on April 19 in Utah a three year old girl killed her two year old brother with a shotgun. Poor boy, poorer girl and still poorer parents, what a tragedy, also for the wider family, the ward, the community, the church, in fact for everyone. This is exactly what should never happen. Such an accident always depends on a string of improbable circumstances: the fact that the gun was within reach of toddlers, that it held still one bullet, that mother or father were just out of sight at that very moment, the improbable aim at the little brother, her finding the trigger at all, etc. Sure, each of the chains in this string can be broken if proper care is taken, but my point here is stating the obvious: there should have been no gun in the house, not in this house, nor in any home. A house with a gun is not a home. My Dogon ‘older brother’ Dogolu with his new rifle This, I know very well, is a very European reaction, swimming against the American current, but it is deeply felt and very much part of my Euro-Mormon DNA. Guns and family do not mix, just as guns and gospel do not mix. For us from across the Atlantic, the USA has become a gun crazy country, totally in love with murderous hardware. Of course, we here in the…

BYU NT Commentary Conference

by Julie M. Smith • April 21, 2014 • 7 Comments

An upcoming conference:

The Rise of Biblical Criticism and the Mormon Response

by Dave Banack • April 20, 2014 • 13 Comments

“The rise of biblical criticism” is the title of a section in Jaroslav Pelikan’s Whose Bible Is It? A History of the Scriptures Through the Ages (Viking, 2005). Those pages are a short and objective introduction to what is variously called biblical criticism, historical criticism, higher criticism, or the historical-critical method. This discussion is sort of a set up for my upcoming review of David Bokovoy’s new book Authoring the Old Testament: Genesis — Deuteronomy (Kofford Books, 2014), which I will be posting in two parts over the next couple of weeks.

Literary Worship: Sacrament Prayers

by Sarah Familia • April 18, 2014 • 6 Comments

Sometimes I have a hard time concentrating during the Sacrament. Theoretically, it shouldn’t be difficult. My squirmy, distracting babies and toddlers have grown up; in fact, I play the organ, so my husband sits with the children on Sundays. I sit on the stand by myself, and try to keep my thoughts where they belong–focused on the sacred ordinance in which I am participating. Sometimes it’s difficult. Especially lately. I’ve been going though something of a spiritual desert. The feeling of comfort and safety and familiarity that I’ve long associated with church has been partially converted into doubts and questions and discomfort. I keep coming, because the Church is my spiritual home, and I still believe, and I have hope that somewhere in the desert there is an elusive oasis of peace. But the static of problematic gender roles, historical discrepancies, and damaging cultural practices sometimes hums so loudly in my ears that I have to strain to hear the gentle, soothing message of grace, redemption and spiritual community. I don’t always want to listen to my own thoughts as the bread and water come my way, and I’m tired of hearing myself pray in my head. I long for something to quiet the chatter of my mind–something that transcends the desperately attempted reverence of my thoughts. As I was listening to the Sacrament prayers one week–prayers that are blissfully, restfully identical every time–I remembered that I’d written my own…

12 More Questions for Armand Mauss, Part 1

by Dave Banack • April 17, 2014 • 19 Comments

Way back in April 2004, almost exactly ten years ago, Armand Mauss was the very first Times and Seasons 12 Questions guest (see Part 1 and Part 2). A lot has happened in the last ten years, so Armand has graciously agreed to answer 12 more questions. He was a Professor of Sociology for many years at Washington State University (the other Cougars) and is the author of two must-read books for students of Mormonism, The Angel and the Beehive (1994) and All Abraham’s Children (2003). With Lester Bush, he co-edited a collection of essays, Neither White nor Black: Mormon Scholars Confront the Race Issue in a Universal Church (Signature Books, 1984). He recently published his memoirs, Shifting Borders and a Tattered Passport: Intellectual Journeys of a Mormon Academic (U of U Press, 2012).

The Message of Mormonism (pt. 2): Angels, Visions, Prophets, and Gifts of the Spirit

by Nate Oman • April 17, 2014 • 27 Comments

In my last post I talked about Mormonism as an answer to the question, “Which church is true?” and suggested that this question has only been compelling on a large scale in fairly limited circumstances. I ought to note here that I am not trying to come up with some kind of general explanation for why people adopt religions or even of church growth in general. I am just interested in the kinds of messages that we have given about the Restoration and why those messages might or might not be compelling in differing social contexts. Another message on which preaching the Restoration has relied is one that emphasizes the continuation of the supernatural world of the scriptures in the present. This is the message of angelic visitors, gold plates, the gifts of the spirit, continuing revelation, and a re-established and literal Israel preparing the world for an imminent second coming. It promises to believers a religious life filled with dramatic spiritual manifestations, esoteric spiritual knowledge (often with apocalyptic content), and an escape from a secular world bereft of supernatural content. Historically, there is no question but that in certain times and places this has been a potent message. Indeed, in the first generation of the Church’s missionary work the promise of the gifts of the spirit and the reports of visions, angels, and miracles had at least as much – if not more – appeal than the sectarian message…

Thinking about Miracle Stories

by Julie M. Smith • April 15, 2014 • 26 Comments

Should the stories of miracles that Jesus performed be considered historically accurate? Did he walk on water, or was there a conveniently placed sandbar that made his disciples think he was walking on water, or did Mark just make this story up?

Whining at Moses

by Frank McIntyre • April 14, 2014 • 12 Comments

Now that we’re up to Exodus in Sunday School, I am reminded once again of how much murmuring and whining the Children of Israel do. Clearly the major theme of Exodus is God’s power to save. But packed in there is a pretty strong message that God’s people:

What It Would Take to Not Believe

by Nathaniel Givens • April 14, 2014 • 47 Comments

There was one question in response to my last post that I particularly wanted to answer, but wasn’t able to at the time. This is the question, which was posed by Sebastian Dick: “What would it take to convince you that (in as much as you know anything) propositions such as God exists or the BoM is historical are false? Or do you consider such propositions unfalsifiable?” This post is my answer. It is not a trite cliché that everyone has to believe in something. It is the literal truth. When your life has ended and you look back and see the decisions that you have made along the way, the pattern of choices will imply a corresponding constellation of beliefs. Those facts and principles that you affirm as relevant and true because they are made logically necessary by your actions are the things that you believe. This perspective is a generalization of the economic theory of revealed preferences, so we can call it the theory of revealed beliefs. It eschews subjective feelings about what is true for the simple reason that we often do not know our own feelings. We sometimes think that we believe in something, but then behave in ways that contradicts that belief. These instrumental or fictitious beliefs are not, in my mind, the genuine article. For the same reason, Paul Samuelson (who invented the theory of revealed preferences in 1938 and became the first American…

Sexism and Ordination

by Julie M. Smith • April 12, 2014 • 81 Comments

I recently participated in a TribTalk about Ordain Women. Pretty much the first words out of Neylan McBaine’s mouth were something along the lines of “ordaining women won’t end sexism.”

The Message of Mormonism (pt. 1): Which Church is True?

by Nate Oman • April 11, 2014 • 24 Comments

This is the first in a series of posts in which I lay out some of my thoughts on what Mormonism’s message to the world has been and what it might become in the next generation or two. It’s a big topic, and I’m likely to yammer on at some length. You have been warned. Since the beginning of the Restoration Mormonism’s central message to the world has been “Join us!” We are and have always been a missionary religion. From an internal perspective missionary work serves three basic purposes. The first is to assist individuals work out their cosmic salvation by persuading them to make and keep sacred covenants under the authority of the priesthood as instructed by God. The second is to make the lives of converts in the here-and-now better by giving them a set of disciplines that will allow them to avoid much of the misery of the world for themselves and their families. Finally, missionary work builds the Kingdom of God on Earth, expanding and strengthening the Church as an institution and a community. As the Church grows stronger it can more effectively carry out those tasks committed to it by God. So much for the internal perspective. Here I am far more interested in the messages that we give to potential converts. One way of thinking about this is to say that we offer Mormonism to the world as an answer to a question.…

Martha’s Sacrament

by Wilfried Decoo • April 10, 2014 • 12 Comments

Times & Seasons used to post, from time to time, something “From the archives”. So is this one. *** Martha was one of the older sisters in our branch. We counted a scant dozen of them, singles and widows, making more than half of the congregation and being its very backbone. When I got to know her, Martha was in her sixties. Huge by nature and strong from her lifelong labors as a market woman, she lived in a modest but sunny apartment, four flights high. Rent and utilities took most of her tiny pension, but she managed. Every Sunday the happy woman rode to church on her big black bicycle, rain or shine. She entered our old rowhouse as if it were a palace, beaming faith and friendship. In the living room, meaning our chapel, she gave talks and testimonies with a stentorian voice, developed during her years on the market place, praising Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon like she had exalted her Jonagolds and luscious tomatoes grown in the summer sun. Each time, at the end of her tribute, emotion would fracture her fluency to a choking whisper and tears would flow. Ah, Martha, what a force you were in our Primitive church! Then came the stroke, one night. Only hours later a neighbor heard her moanings. Hospital. Next Martha had no choice. Paralyzed from the waist down, incontinent, with neither family nor savings, she was consigned…

Five Things I Liked

by Julie M. Smith • April 9, 2014 • 8 Comments

Here are a few things from General Conference that I loved:

Elder Oaks on Women, Priesthood, and the Temple

by Julie M. Smith • April 8, 2014 • 44 Comments

There is a lot that could be said about Elder Oaks’ conference talk about the relationship of women to the priesthood. In this post, I’m going to look at just one issue: the relationship of women, priesthood, and the temple.

GenCon: Sunday Afternoon Session

by Kent Larsen • April 6, 2014 • 6 Comments

Welcome to T&S’ fifth and final round of coverage of General Conference. We welcome your comments. President Dieter F. Uchtdorf is conducting this session of Conference. Chorus: Sweet is the Work. Prayer: ? Chorus: I Stand All Amazed. President Boyd K. Packer — The Witness “Almost mid-sentence it happened. I could not describe to you what happened if I were determined to do so. It is beyond my power of expression, but it is as clear today as it was that night more than 65 years ago. I knew it to be a very private, very individual manifestation. At last I knew for myself. I knew for a certainty, for it had been given to me.” “Like most things of great worth, knowledge which is of eternal value comes only through personal prayer and pondering. These, joined with fasting and scripture study, will invite impressions and revelations and the whisperings of the Holy Spirit. This provides us with instruction from on high as we learn precept upon precept.” “Parenthood is a sacred privilege and, depending upon faithfulness, it can be an eternal blessing. The ultimate end of all activity in the Church is that a man and his wife and their children can be happy at home.” “After all the years that I have lived and taught and served, after the millions of miles I have traveled around the world, with all that I have experienced, there is one great truth…

GenCon: Sunday Morning Session

by Kent Larsen • April 6, 2014 • Comments Off

Welcome to T&S’ fourth round of coverage of General Conference. We welcome your comments. Chorus: Come We that Love the Lord President Henry B. Eyring is conducting this session of Conference. Chorus: On This Day of Joy and Gladness Prayer: Élder L. Whitney Clayton Chorus: Let Us All Press On President Dieter F. Uchtdof — Grateful in Any Circumstance “There is one thing we can do to make life sweeter, more joyful, even glorious. We can be grateful.” “Could I suggest that we see gratitude as a disposition, a way of life that stands independent of our current situation? In other words, I’m suggesting that instead of being “thankful for things” we focus on being “thankful in our circumstances”—whatever they may be.” “When we are grateful to God in our circumstances, we can experience gentle peace in the midst of tribulation. In grief we can still lift up our hearts in praise. In pain, we can glory in Christ’s Atonement. In the cold of bitter sorrow we can experience the closeness and warmth of heaven’s embrace.” “We sometimes think that being grateful is what we do after our problems are solved, but how terribly shortsighted that is. How much of life do we miss by waiting to see the rainbow before thanking God that there is rain?” “In light of what we know about our eternal destiny, is it any wonder that whenever we face the bitter endings of life,…

Priesthood Session: A Personal View

by Dave Banack • April 5, 2014 • 23 Comments

I attended priesthood session at my local chapel. About sixty men and boys in attendance. One woman. It was snowing when I left home. I decided to reward my choosing the right with good consequences, so I stopped by my local Wendy’s and bought a small vanilla Frosty. On the way I listened to a few minutes of my current audio CD, Neptune’s Inferno, about the US Navy at Guadalcanal. Right now (in the CD) the US heavy cruiser San Francisco (which survived the fight) is trading fire with the Japanese battleship Hiei (which didn’t) in the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal. There were a dozen ships on each side in a wild, confusing night melee. A lot of good young men on both sides died that night, November 12, 1942.

GenCon: Saturday Afternoon Session

by Dave Banack • April 5, 2014 • 4 Comments

Welcome to round two of T&S sort-of live coverage of General Conference. President Eyring conducted this afternoon session with President Monson (in attendance) presiding. Opening prayer by Ian S. Ardern, a Seventy, and music by an Institute Choir from Orem, Utah. Direct quotations of a speaker are given in quotation marks; other text represents my own summary.

GenCon: Saturday Morning Session

by Dave Banack • April 5, 2014 • 36 Comments

Welcome to T&S sort-of live coverage of General Conference. President Uchtdorf conducted this opening session with President Monson (in attendance) presiding. Opening prayer by Carl B. Cook, a Seventy, and music by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Direct quotations of a speaker are given in quotation marks or blockquote form; other text represents my own summary of their remarks or, where noted, my own comments.

A Short Post on How It Feels to Be a Moderate

by Ben S. • April 5, 2014 • Comments Off

The Book of Mormon as Literature

by Dave Banack • April 3, 2014 • 9 Comments

One can read the Book of Mormon as canonized scripture, to guide the Church and its members in doctrine and practice, or as a sign of Joseph Smith’s calling to bring forth new scripture and establish a restored church. Then there is the possibility of reading the Book of Mormon as literature, to enlighten, uplift, and inspire the reader. So, how literary is it? How exactly does one read the Book of Mormon as literature?

NBA strikes deal with LDS Church for Jabari Parker

by Matt Evans • April 1, 2014 • 49 Comments

Today the NBA announced a landmark agreement with the LDS Church to ensure that Jabari Parker’s desire to serve a mission does not interfere with his draft prospects, saying the church has agreed to their proposal to call Parker to serve as a missionary in the city of the NBA team that drafts him. While the official statement is brief, sources close to the negotiations report that because the NBA considers Parker to be a certain star, league officials, including new commissioner Adam Silver, went to unprecedented lengths to ensure that Parker enters this year’s draft. The deal stipulates that Elder Parker will proselyte and live with missionary companions, like other volunteer Mormon missionares, except that, since Elder Parker will be an NBA player, he and his companion will attend all of the team’s practices and games. The NBA has even given permission for Elder Parker’s companion to sit on the team bench in missionary attire during games to comply with mission rules, and has guaranteed that the companion will be shown at least twice during every televised game. The league also made other concessions to secure the church’s cooperation, including donating a box suite for the local mission to use for entertaining investigators. Joe Dumars, President of Basketball Operations for the Detroit Pistons, is excited about the proposal, saying it raises Parker’s draft prospects even higher, “There’s not a GM in the league who wouldn’t like having two clean-cut Mormon missionaries…

As Much As I Know Anything

by Nathaniel Givens • March 31, 2014 • 28 Comments

“Out of curiosity, what makes you believe in Mormonism? Or God for that matter?” This is a question I got from a close friend, more or less out of the blue, the Wednesday before last in a Facebook conversation that had been—up to that point—mostly about how much I love Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files. It’s not like it’s the first time I’ve been asked that, but it’s a question I’ve struggled unsuccessfully to answer in the past. I’ve tried on more than one occasion to sit down and write out my reasons, but I always failed. Eventually I gave up. And then, last week, I found that the answer had been there all along. And it was pretty simple. Looking back, I’d say that was the problem. For all I love to write about epistemic humility, doubt, and uncertainty I have just about the simplest and most conventional Mormon testimony that it is possible to have. And maybe, in the past, I’ve been a bit ashamed to admit that there’s nothing special, profound, or unique about my testimony. I guess I just thought I was too good for my own testimony. That was half the problem, but there’s another half, too. My other dirty little secret is that for all the time I spend talking about doubt and uncertainty, when it comes to my religious faith I just don’t have serious doubts in the way that most people understand the…

Literary Joseph Fielding Smith #09: James H. Hart’s Interview with David Whitmer

by Kent Larsen • March 30, 2014 • Comments Off

I think that we often think of witnesses as something outside of the event, added to fill a particular need or satisfy the desires of the world. But I wonder if this perception might not be incorrect, if witnesses are not, in fact, an important part of the process of communicating truth. A testimony is, after all, what a witness provides, and, at least in the church, it is hard to imagine communicating truth without testimony. In the fourth D&C Gospel Doctrine lesson witnesses to the Book of Mormon are an important part of the story of the scripture’s preparation. And the following poem provides, I think, an idea of the role of the witness, along with a lot about one of the three witnesses, David Whitmer.

Where is the door? How do WE knock?

by James Olsen • March 30, 2014 • 98 Comments

One of the gems of my mission was the opportunity to spend an evening with a Bishop from the RLDS (now Community of Christ) Church

So Who Gets a Press Conference in Front of the Tabernacle?

by Nate Oman • March 28, 2014 • 77 Comments

One of the aspects of the Church’s recent statement to OW regarding the priesthood session that strikes me as eminently sensible is the insistence that OW not invite media on to Temple Square and confine their demonstrations to public property. It’s worth noting that the letter didn’t say that OW members could not come on to Temple Square as worshipers. It said that they couldn’t conduct a press conference in front of the Tabernacle during a General Conference session. There are three reasons that this makes good sense to me. First, inviting television crews onto Temple Square and holding a press conference during a session of General Conference actually is inconsistent with the spirit of the event. This really isn’t a difficult call. We are not talking about wearing pants to church. (Something that I didn’t even realize was a thing until it was a thing.) We are talking about a media event. On Temple Square. In front of the Tabernacle. During a General Conference Session. The claim that this is not going to be inconsistent with an atmosphere of worship isn’t the sort of thing one can say with a straight face. I understand that one might think the cause is more important than the atmosphere of worship, but it doesn’t seem unreasonable for the Church to prioritize the latter over the former. Second, allowing OW to hold a second press conference on the threshold of the Tabernacle puts…

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