Sunday in Outer Blogness: World Cup Edition!

That’s my excuse for getting this done so late today — along with another billion people, we had some important watching-the-world-cup-final to do at our house. It was very exciting, especially after it went into extra innings and everything. (And Andrew thought one needs an ulterior motive to post about soccer/football! — he finds an interesting insight to comment on nonetheless.)

There was big news this week on the same-sex-marriage front! A federal judge has just ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional! Meanwhile the LDS First Presidency sent a letter to Argentina, opposing same-sex marriage. (Plus, we have a couple more coming out stories.) Meanwhile, Maureen — despite being in love with her husband and planning to stay together with him — is planning to get divorced in solidarity with the gay couples who don’t have the right to marry!

There was some interesting conflict and cooperation across belief lines in Outer Blogness this week. Yet another innocuous atheist billboard was vandalized, and a Christian pundit praised the vandals as heroes. Speaking of vandalism, here‘s a point about a famous monument that I bet you’ve never thought about. (Meanwhile, freedom to baptize the dead is still intact.) John Dehlin posted a fascinating series of interviews with Richard Packham — including one where he asked Packham for the story of his sister’s suicide — then changed his mind, out of consideration for the family’s feelings. We also have two heart–warming stories of true friendship surviving after one friend leaves the LDS church. Aerin’s kids have had a positive learning experience at a Christian pre-school. And some Reddit friends are opening up some constructive dialog between the LDS Reddit and the exmo Reddit.

On the funny side, find out why the LDS Stake Single Adults heave some ‘splaining to do and why Mormonism tastes like Spam — in poem form! (And have you heard of Most Precious Blood of Jesus Day?) It’s nice to try to respect other people’s beliefs, but some things are just begging to be mocked, like the Left Behind series. Reina was surprised by how worried folks at church were about Satan — doubly surprising considering that he’s not nearly the scariest villain of the Bible. Hmm, seems like we could use some alternate book recommendations.

In History, Runtu has researched a fascinating comparison between the actions of two churches in East Germany just before the fall of the Berlin Wall. In Philosophy, do truth and evidence matter? Let’s hear from Carl Sagan and from a pop artist called Nas.

Is everybody ready for conference season? I know some of our regular contributors will be attending the Sunstone Symposium, plus a famous guy will be there! Or consider attending the John Whitmer Historical Association Conference — that one will feature my brother and my Mom!