Category: Latter-day Saint Thought

  • Breathing the Breath of God

    Ben Huff

    Genesis (2:7) says that God breathed life into Adam’s nostrils. Is our life a portion of God’s? Jesus quoted a Psalm (82:6) that said, “Ye are gods,” when confronted about his claims to divinity. Mormons are usually not so bold, but there is certainly an element in our tradition that states that humans are children…

  • Asking the Right Question

    Kent Larsen

    The news yesterday was that President Obama will hold a Passover Seder in the White House tonight, the first time a Seder has been held in the White House. So, who is going to ask him to hold Family Home Evening some Monday night?

  • Sacrament Hymns

    Kaimi Wenger

    There are 28 designated sacrament hymns in the current hymnal within the page range of 169 to 197. Given that we sing one per week, for 52 weeks, basic math tells us that sacrament hymns will be repeated almost twice per year — more than six times the average frequency of other hymns. Two of…

  • I Have a Question, 1891

    Ardis E. Parshall

    These questions and answers are from the Juvenile Instructor of 1891. Some of them appear in columns headed “Editorial Thoughts,” some of which are explicitly signed The Editor, marking them as the work of George Q. Cannon.

  • General Conference redux

    Frank McIntyre

    Perhaps the Thursday following General Conference should be declared some sort of Mormon holiday, as that is when written transcripts of the sessions are due out.  Here’s the link where they should show up sometime today.  Check it out if you are looking to catch that talk you didn’t quite stay awake for (or your…

  • The Double-Minded Essence of Mormonism

    Nate Oman

    A while ago I was reading some sermons from the 1880s in the Journal of Discourses.  The 1880s, of course, is the decade when the anti-polygamy crusades were at their most intense.  Thousands of Mormons were incarcerated, the Brethren were in hiding from the law much of the time, and every time you turned around…

  • Ecumenically Missing?

    Kent Larsen

    I came across a news item (here and here) this morning that gives background on the 25 members of the President’s Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and it made me wonder a little about LDS participation in this kind of group. Shouldn’t there be a Mormon on this council?

  • The Implied Statistical Report, 2008

    Kent Larsen

    Every General Conference, the LDS Church releases a statistical report that gives a brief window into how the Church has changed over the past year. With my accounting background, I’m a bit of a statistics wonk, and I’ve long thought that there is a lot that can be gleaned from these statistics and from the…

  • Sunday Afternoon Session Notes

    Kent Larsen

    Here’s a few thoughts on Sunday Afternoon’s session of conference. We encourage everyone to take notes during each session and post their thoughts in comments here.

  • Sunday Morning Session Notes

    Kent Larsen

    Here’s a few thoughts on Sunday Morning’s session of conference. We encourage everyone to take notes during each session and post their thoughts in comments here.

  • A Long Time in Coming

    A Long Time in Coming

    Marc Bohn

    Meet Joseph Wafula Sitati, introduced today as a new member of the First Quorum of the Seventy. He is the first [black] African General Authority and only the second black General Authority (the first being Helvécio Martins, a Brazilian who served five years in the Second Quorum of the Seventy from 1990 to 1995). (Joseph…

  • Priesthood Session Notes

    Kent Larsen

    Since we’re not doing open threads during the sessions of conference, we’re trying to start comment threads at the end of the session, so that once you have heard and thought a little about the entire session and the individual talks. So take your notes during the sessions, and let us know after the session…

  • Saturday Afternoon Session Notes

    Kent Larsen

    Since we’re not doing open threads during the sessions of conference, we’re trying to start comment threads at the end of the session, so that once you have heard and thought a little about the entire session and the individual talks. So take your notes during the sessions, and let us know after the session…

  • Saturday Morning Session

    Kent Larsen

    Since we’re not doing open threads during the sessions of conference, we’re trying to start comment threads at the end of the session, so that once you have heard and thought a little about the entire session and the individual talks. So take your notes during the sessions, and let us know after the session…

  • En Route to the Field: Missionaries Aboard the S.S. Vestris, 1928

    Ardis E. Parshall

    David Henry Huish, born in the Mormon colony of Morelos, Sonora, Mexico in 1906, and Keith Wynder Burt, born in the Mormon colony of Cardston, Alberta, Canada in 1908, met in the Mission Home in Salt Lake City late in 1928, after both young men had been called to serve missions in South America. After…

  • Dow 6,000

    Jonathan Green

    One of the things people find odd about Mormons is our claim to be led by a prophet.

  • Reading Nephi Reading Isaiah at BYU

    Nate Oman

    This looks like the sort of conference that makes me sad at times that I don’t live in Utah:

  • (Beehive) Girls Just Wanna Have Fun – 1916

    Ardis E. Parshall

    In 1916, the Beehive Girls were Latter-day Saint young women ages 14 and 15 (the 12- and 13-year-olds were still in Primary). Older teens, and even the mothers of Beehive Girls, could learn the same skills and earn the same badges of honor, if they chose to. Beehive Girls from Thatcher, Arizona

  • Jensine Hostmark Grundvig: Zionward

    Ardis E. Parshall

    Jensine was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 1837, her parents’ youngest child. Her father died when she was 4, her mother when she was 12; she probably spent her youth in the household of one of her much older brothers. In1857 Jensine was married to Frants Christian Grundvig, a young joiner who had come to…

  • What My Father Did

    What My Father Did

    Nate Oman

    A few weeks ago my father retired after spending three decades working for the Church Historical Department.  I’m no doubt guilty of an excess of filial piety, but I think that the Church and Kingdom are better for the work that he did. 

  • The Salamander Letter in a nutshell

    Kaimi Wenger

    So, what is this scary Salamander Letter that the church is hiding from everybody?   

  • Forgetting, and History

    Dave Banack

    From Ernest Renan, a French 19th-century philosopher: Forgetting, and I would say even historical error, is an essential element in the creation of a nation, and that is why the progress of historical studies is often a danger for the nation itself.

  • Monument to the Restoration of the Aaronic Priesthood

    Ardis E. Parshall

    While uncounted thousands of visual artists have contributed their skills to building Zion, the Fairbanks dynasty holds a special place in the world of Mormon art history: John B. Fairbanks (1855-1940) was one of the art missionaries sent to Paris by the Church, who came home to paint murals for the temples. His sons J.…

  • Garment Rights?

    Kent Larsen

    Do we have a right to wear garments? If we do, how far does that right go? What , kind of right is it? Is it a human right? Or a legal one that might disappear and reappear as we pass national boundaries?

  • Laura Rees Merrill: Replacing Fear with Peace

    Ardis E. Parshall

    Laura Liona Rees was born in Brigham City, Utah, in 1876, to LDS parents (her father had emigrated as a convert from England; her mother was born at Council Bluffs). With only an eighth grade, district school education, she studied for and passed the test to be licensed as a grade school teacher. Then she…

  • “You Can’t Go to Heaven in Cologne Water”: A Missionary Talk by J. Golden Kimball

    Ardis E. Parshall

    If you’re going to be disappointed by a J. Golden talk that doesn’t fit the swearing-elder stereotype, stop reading now. This isn’t that kind of J. Golden story. It is a talk the future Seventy gave to a small South Carolina branch in 1891 during a period when local members – including a woman –…

  • Confidential: Have I Got a Deal for You

    Ardis E. Parshall

    The original Keepapitchinin printed this “editorial” in 1870: Confidential. We have received the following letter: ”Dear Sir: – a confidential friend having notified us that you can be relied on we send you the enclosed circular.”

  • A New Book for the Mormon Canon

    Nate Oman

    There are a number of Mormon pamphlets and books that have achieved a kind of semi-canonical status within Mormon studies. Everyone agrees, for example, that Parley P. Pratt’s Key to the Science of Theology or John Taylor’s Mediation and Atonement are key texts for understanding nineteenth Mormon thought. If any evidence is needed, both texts,…

  • Faith and Healing

    Kylie Turley

    “And again, it shall come to pass that he that hath faith in me to be healed, and is not appointed unto death, shall be healed. He who hath faith to see shall see. He who hath faith to hear shall hear. The lame who hath faith to leap shall leap.” (D&C 42:48-51)  

  • For Those in the D.C. Area

    Marc Bohn

    Richard E. Turley will be speaking at the Wesley Theological Seminary this coming Sunday. Last year I posted a couple of notices about a great series of events that Greg Prince, co-author of David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism, hosts every few months at his house in Potomac, Maryland.