A Community for Anyone Interested in Mormonism.
by Johnny Townsend On the surface, Mormons are generous. They give a full ten percent of their income to their church. They donate countless hours every week to various “callings,” as Sunday School teachers, Nursery leaders, temple workers, and janitors. The bishop of every congregation may volunteer 20 hours each week tending to the members […]
Continue ReadingCaught this interesting article in Forbes about a Mormon who hasn’t been paying his taxes. Â He’s currently trying to negotiate with the IRS the rate at which he will pay his back taxes. Â He wants to pay them at a pretty paltry $3,000 a month, claiming his lifestyle requires that he “survive” on $15,000 a […]
Continue ReadingHatch pleads for his job and proves he will say anything to avoid Bennett’s fate: Tea Party members I know by and large are good, honest, decent people, but out of anger should not disrupt the few GOP [candidates] who can win, he said. He said the Republicans need to organize and pull together just […]
Continue ReadingBack in the days when I paid attention to General Conference, I always attended the priesthood session with my wife’s father and brother. I enjoyed the tradition of returning to report some fantastic fictional revelation to my wife and her mother. I call this a tradition because I did it every time, but I was […]
Continue ReadingIn line with my earlier post about the LDS ranch in Florida, I just caught wind of this: The LDS Church owns two hunting preserves in Utah. Turns out the Deseret News has profiled the preserve and the missionaries who staff it. (Yep, you read that right – missionaries staff the LDS owned hunting preserve.) […]
Continue ReadingInspired by a new news article about land development by the LDS Church in Hawaii, I did a little more property searching. Unfortunately, Honolulu County doesn’t allow searching by name, so finding all the property of Hawaii Reserves, Inc. and Property Reserve, Inc. (two of the holding companies of the LDS Church) in Hawaii is […]
Continue ReadingMy brother-in-law came to visit last weekend. As science geeks, we tried to see a shuttle launch while he was here (the launch was canceled 11 minutes before liftoff because of weather – ugh!). On the way to watch the launch we stopped by Deseret Citrus and Cattle Ranch to see the Mormon Church’s ranching […]
Continue ReadingI caught this article while reading my science news this morning: Bankruptcy Rates Reflect Policy, Not People. Basically what the article says is that the different rates of bankruptcy filings by state are not due to spending patterns or characteristics of the people in those states but rather policies regarding bankruptcy filing. In other words, […]
Continue ReadingAccording to the philosopher Mircea Eliade, of whose work I learned at BYU, every community, tribe, or nation requires an origin myth. The account of a community’s or practice’s origin has far reaching consequences because it implies how they relate to the cosmos, which is necessary for human beings to imbue their world with shared […]
Continue ReadingI heard this story on Friday on NPR. I support the Utah LDS church’s movement towards openness and honesty. I admit, this effort seems a little like a drop in the ocean. Yet I have to acknowledge the attempt. One of the comments Quentin Cook made was that they were “surprised” by the reaction from […]
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