Author: Gordon Smith
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Welcome New Guest Blogger, Jed W.
I am very pleased to introduce our newest guest blogger, Jed W. Besides being the Scoutmaster in my ward, Jed is a third-year doctoral student at the University of Wisconsin, where he is studying the history of education on his way to a dual degree in American history and educational policy. He is originally from…
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The Church as a Franchise System
In my class on Law & Entrepreneurship, I teach a section that focuses on franchise agreements. We just completed that section last week, and it occurred to me that the Church is a lot like McDonald’s.
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Simple Things
Over the past few days, I have been engaged in some much-needed family immersion. Among other things, I rediscovered the joys of eating jello pudding with children, playing an impromptu “turkey bowl” football game (with players ranging in age from eight to forty-something), and whipping some teenagers at the board game Risk.
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“Ministers of Justice”
Today’s NYT features a story on law schools that promote a religious perspective on law. Not surprisingly, BYU isn’t mentioned.
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Sinning Alone
At a recent conference, I was klatsching with law professors, mostly from my school, when a young law professor in the group related how she was being pursued by another conference attendee. “I always attract married men,” she lamented. “Of course, they all say that they have a bad marriage, but this one is Mormon!”
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A Disturbance in the Force
I was feeling a little jealous of all of these Bloggernacle get-togethers, so I flew to Washington D.C. to meet Matt, Nate, and Kaimi.
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The Election and SSM
I have generally avoided posting on same-sex marriage, and I am not attempting to initiate another debate on the merits. But I believe that one of the huge stories of the presidential election will be the importance of this issue. While most people I know thought this election would be a referendum on the war…
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Mormon Senator Harry Reid
One of the so-far-untold stories of the election is that Mormon Senator Harry Reid will almost certainly assume leadership of the Democratic Party in the United States Senate. Senator Tom Daschle appears to be going down in South Dakota, thus providing an opening for Reid. Of course, the Democrats are a minority in the Senate,…
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Reverence
We had an excellent discussion of reverence in our combined Priesthood-Relief Society meeting yesterday. At the end of the meeting, I made a comment which provoked mixed reactions after the meeting, and now I am wondering about that comment.
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Teen Apathy
Now that I no longer teach Seminary, one of my biggest challenges is getting my daughter to Seminary on time. She has a driver’s license and would be happy to go on her own, but we can’t spare the car. So I am up at 5:30 (or so) every morning, just like last year. This…
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The Nauvoo Printing Office
I went to Nauvoo this weekend and found this, which reminded me of all of you.
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Prayer Rolls
Did you know that you can add a name to the Salt Lake Temple prayer roll by calling an 800 number? Our priesthood instructor mentioned this today, and it started me thinking again about the nature of prayer. And I admit, I am stumped by the prayer roll.
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Open Thread on General Conference
Want to discuss General Conference? Use this thread, but please remember that the T&S Comment Policies still apply.
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New Apostles: Uchtdorf & Bednar
Dieter F. Uchtdorf and David A. Bednar (President of BYU Idaho) were just called as the new apostles.
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Political Discourse
During this election season in the U.S., I have been troubled repeatedly by the tone of political discourse among my friends, in my community, on the internet, and in the mainstream media. I have been astonished by the extent to which the dominant motivation for political action has become hate. Most people I know are…
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Sweet Boldness
The first part of this post is taken from a comment that I posted just after Elder Maxwell’s death. The story that follows those thoughts is new. During my mission, while serving in the office, I found notes of a talk that Elder Maxwell had delivered to missionaries in Vienna about a decade before. The…
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Withdrawal of the Spirit
Here is a very simple question on which I have no priors: is there a difference between withdrawing from the Spirit and having the Spirit withdrawn? On the former, see Mosiah 2:36. On the latter, see Helaman 13:8. I can visualize us withdrawing from God, but I have a harder time visualizing the circumstances under…
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Confronting Religious Bigotry
This evening I was having dinner with a well-known professor of sociology from Stanford. Near the end of the dinner, he was discussing genetic research in Utah. He said the only problem is that the research is entirely focused on the men because the Mormons don’t care enough about women to keep their genealogy.
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Jewish Standard Time?
I was running late for a meeting today when I encountered a staff member at the law school. When I explained quickly that I was 10 minutes late, she commented, “No problem. Jewish Standard Time.” Well, I thought it was a strange comment to make to me, a conspicuous Mormon, but I was also intrigued…
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So, what did you do today?
This is a 911 call in which one of my former colleagues at Lewis & Clark, Jack Bogdanski, is receiving instructions for assisting his wife in the delivery of their baby. This is absolutely incredible, and I dare you to make it through the whole tape without crying.
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A Matter of Taste
I just received an announcement for a talk next week in our business school. The title is “Practicing Polygamy with Good Taste: The Evolution of Inter-organizational Collaboration in the Life Sciences.” The paper on which the talk is based has a different title, but the reference to polygamy has me wondering about this person’s perception…
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Fairies & Ectoplasm
Over the past few weeks, I have been listening to a biography of Houdini as I drive to and from work. Among the many things that I have learned is that Houdini was acquainted with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes. In his later years, Doyle became interested in Spiritualism, a religion of…
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Racist by Association
More than once in my career, I have been told by colleagues that they had me wrong. They had assumed, because of my religion, that I had unkind feelings toward racial minorities. After observing me in various settings, however, they had concluded that their initial assumption was unfair. These moments are always bittersweet. On the…
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Countering Pornography
My impression is that pornography is a widespread problem among members of the Church. While women sometimes fall prey to its enticements, the overwhelming majority of pornography consumers are men. The perils of pornography are of particular concern for those who work with the young men, but many Elders and High Priests also suffer from…
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Hobbies
Last week I had an interesting conversation with a young father in my ward about hobbies. He was lamenting the fact that he has none. He used to have hobbies, but the press of family, work, and Church has squeezed all self-indulgence from his schedule. I was interested to hear this because I had said…
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Are you embarrassed?
Many of you have heard about the latest sex scandal associated with BYU’s football program. For those who haven’t, four members of the football team are being investigated in connection with the following events: The 17 year old told detectives she met the men at the mall on Sunday August 8th, and willingly went to…
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Scouting v. Personal Progress
My son — with significant prodding from his mother — has been an inspired Boy Scout, and he just completed his Eagle Project. Actually, this is not unusual in our neck of the woods, as almost all of the young men in our ward attain the rank of Eagle. Having missed the scouting experience myself,…
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Temptation
In the thread on suicide below, several comments have raised this idea from 1 Cor. 10:13: “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way…
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Suicide
Not long ago, I sat in an emergency room with a friend who had been musing about suicide. My experiences with such matters are limited, but I wasn’t taking any chances. This man had lost his job and was being evicted from his apartment. He was at risk of losing custody of his children to…
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Dead Man Walking
Sister Helen Prejean, a Catholic nun, published Dead Man Walking in 1993. I am just finishing the book, which reinforces my long-held disdain for the death penalty. I have not seen the movie, but the book is a powerful accounting of Sister Helen’s experiences counseling death-row inmates in Louisiana.