The good folks of Outer Blogness seem to be having some mixed feelings about facebook lately. But nobody seems to be opting out completely. Like cell-phones, facebook eventually gets adopted by everybody…
In the interfaith relations department, Runtu has resolved to play nice with the faithful, and not paint them all with the same negative brush. I should probably take a page from him myself. The folks at Mormon Coffee did a post about historical evidence, and I just couldn’t restrain myself from questioning some rather odd assertions (“If historical sources can demonstrate that the Jewish holocaust did indeed take place then they can demonstrate that Jesus of Nazareth claimed deity (contra the claim of Islam).”), and apparently I pissed them off. Oops. This sort of thing is probably why they deleted their link to MSP. But to keep the discussion lively, we have a dissenting opinion from Evolutionary Middleman, who advises ridiculing those “who claim to know with certainty what those mysteries are, how they affect us and how we should live our lives in order to achieve harmony with these mysterious forces.” On a (somewhat?) related note, Philocrites reports a hate crime against liberals (a murder) which strangely enough has gotten very little press coverage…
In Mormon lifestyle discussions, the Swearing Elders report that BYU is is the second most popular university in the U.S. because “If you apply to BYU, you damn darn sure wanted to go there!” Craig is examining his residual Mormon side, and Andee posts some great Book of Mormon book reviews, one classic, and one I’d never seen before.
And in non-so-Mormon-related lifestyle issues, Kombucha Chic is offering a free e-book One Week Raw which is “a day-by-day guide to the raw food lifestyle” with recipes and other information on eating only raw foods. This may help John — who’s planning to move beef from his staples to being a special-occasion-only choice. Jana asks for advice on non-toxic cleansers. And let’s close with an interesting tale from our bold, new economy…
Hey, thanks for the shout out! It turned out not to be so difficult; the only things I really cut were certain Italian dishes (the kind with meat sauce or ground beef). I’ve mostly been eating chicken or grains/fruits/veggies anyway.
After reading the Mormon Coffee article, I’m glad you posted in the comments.
I think it’s funny how this author was so critical of Mormons and their ability to always rationalize what might seem to be problematic, but then the author does the very same thing with Christianity. As if it is just *obvious* that the claims of Christianity are reasonable.
*reads through rest of comments at Mormon Coffee*
LOL, that conversation was SO painful to read!
John — no problem, sounds like a good system!
Andrew — lol, I know…
p.s. to all:
There was actually a bit of a point-counterpoint on my reading list this week that I should have highlighted more explicitly:
Evolutionary Middleman says:
while Good Reason says:
Weirdly, I kind of agree with both of them, even though they seem to be somewhat conflicting positions… Opinions?
The Knoxville UU shooting got a ton of press back in July when it happened. I even blogged about it–one of my old professors at UTK was the one who tackled the shooter.
Kullervo — That’s interesting, I’m not sure how I missed your earlier post about it.
The point about the press coverage (see the post I linked) was just that — back when it happened — the motive wasn’t known. Blogger (((billy))) argues that the story might have hit the national news again if the motive that came to light had been, say, a Muslim killing Christians, as opposed to a right-wing conservative killing liberals. But who knows? I’m just noting here that he makes an interesting argument.
I’m just saying, I remember plenty of hubub about his motive back in July.
chanson –
I don’t think those positions are logically contrary because they describe different things. The first statement is about belief and the second is about discourse. I think that, especially on the internet, the more liberal mormons are relatively likely to either be apologists or to have substantial exposure to and quasi-training in apologetic methods. Open and thoughtful discussion can be very difficult with an apologist.
Especially in the context of mormonism, these “so-called liberals” are still a type of fundamentalist. They cannot/will not concede certain points, eg anything that contradicts an official statement made by a still living prophet (in contrast to a statement made by a now dead “living prophet,” which may be rejected when convenient).
Chris — That’s a really intriguing point, and one I hadn’t considered before: that the “nuanced-belief” Internet liberals (who massage the details however is necessary to keep the core faith intact) aren’t the same category as the more laid-back (perhaps quasi-agnostic) believers who are “willing to live with less literalist beliefs about the universe.”
Hey thanks for the link! I hope you enjoyed the ebook!
-Heather aka KombuchaCHIC
Heather — no problem! I downloaded the e-book (actually twice, the second time by accident…), and it looks great! The recipes look delicious!
This degree of dietary change is a little out of my league for the moment (since I don’t usually prepare my own food), but I considered it for a few minutes after reading your e-book. đ