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Latter-day Saint Thought


LET’S TALK ABOUT THE STATE OF ISRAEL

by Stephen Fleming • June 2, 2024 • 26 Comments

When I was 14 c. 1990, my teacher’s quorum instructor was giving a lesson (hard
to remember what the particular topic was) when he went into a diatribe about
what a horrible injustice the creation of the state of Israel was. I’d never
heard anybody say that before, but I’ve come to agree whole-heartedly with that
adviser. In 1947, the UN under pressure from the US and Soviet Union, passed
Resolution 181, giving Israelis 56% of the land of Palestine even though
Israelis only own 7% of Palestine prior to that. There’s no other word for such
an act than theft. Religiously motivated theft is even worse, I’d argue.

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


HOW LITERALLY DO MEMBERS TAKE THE CHURCH’S TRUTH CLAIMS?

by Stephen C • June 1, 2024 • 11 Comments

Stephen Cranney and Josh Coates This is one of a series of posts discussing
results from a recent survey of current and former Latter-day Saints conducted
by the BH Roberts Foundation. The technical details are in the full methodology
report here.  Occasionally in Latter-day Saint discourse people that have lost
their testimonies of the Church’s truth claims float the idea that perhaps they
could salvage their belief in the Church if it was made to be more allegorical
and less literal. At the outset we admit our own perspective that, while we
respect people’s different beliefs and ways of making the Church work for them,
this wouldn’t really work at scale, and that for the Church to actual continuing
functioning as a living, breathing, growing faith, and not just a cultural relic
of a bygone sociocultural movement of a kind of “descendents of the Mormon
pioneers” lineage-based service organization, it has to not only hold to its
literal truth claims, but to actively promote and defend them. The Community of
Christ, for example, does not have a position on the historicity of the Book of
Mormon (or of many historical questions in general). The ambivalence of
leadership towards actively promoting literal truth claims is undoubtedly sensed
by the membership, who follow suit. (And as an aside, contrary to widespread
missionary folklore, they did not “renounce” the Book of Mormon to be accepted
by mainstream Protestants.) Of course, how common the…

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


CUTTING-EDGE LATTER-DAY SAINT RESEARCH, MAY 2024

by Stephen C • May 30, 2024 • 7 Comments

Sorrell, Sydney A., G. Tyler Lefevor, Samuel J. Skidmore, Rachel M. Golightly,
and Kyrstin NL Searle. “Understanding How Religiousness Shapes Perceptions of
Compulsive Sexual Behavior.” Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy (2024): 1-16.

Read more →

Hymns


ONE DAY MORE

by Chad Nielsen • May 29, 2024 • 10 Comments

Hymns—for Home and Church will be getting its first preview tomorrow! Back at
the start of April, the Church announced that “12 hymns of the new ‘Hymns—for
Home and Church’ will be available on May 30, 2024.” We already know that “Come,
Thou Fount of Every Blessing” will be among those (that was explicitly stated in
the April announcement and has been shown in footage related to the release),
but we aren’t sure what the other ones are yet. After this first release, there
will be “new batches coming every few months.”

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


RELIGIOUS STUDIES GRADUATE PROGRAMS ARE PYRAMID SCHEMES. JUST SAY NO.

by Stephen C • May 28, 2024 • 40 Comments

Blind leading the blind I’m not saying that religious studies folks are blind to
things that matter, I just thought it was a good depiction of the religious
studies treadmill in general, and I kind of just like the picture.  I have one
of those Facebook friends who I’ve only met briefly once in real life (at
Sunstone), but with whom I’ve had enough Facebook interactions with that it’s
like we know each other in person.  I’ve been privy to a tragic trajectory of
his career that I’m seeing as becoming all too typical. He enjoys researching
and talking about religion, so he bought the “pursue your passion” line that was
ubiquitous in our generation, got a PhD in Mormon Studies (more or less, I don’t
know the exact degree title) at Claremont (not afraid to say it out loud,
they’re one of the worst offenders), and then gradually realized after the
umpteenth rejection that, when people make it sound like the Mormon Studies
academic job market is “tough,” as if with a little positive thinking and grit
you can still get that job, what they should have said is that it is
“non-existent.” He has since had to restart his professional life and seek
retraining in middle age.  Outside of BYU or the Church Office Building, I can
only think of a handful of people who are full-time “Mormon Studies” scholars:
Deidre Green at Berkeley, Patrick Mason at Utah…

Read more →

Book of Mormon, Guest Bloggers


SHEREM THE NATIVE AMERICAN

by Guest • May 27, 2024 • 4 Comments

Despite keeping the name-title of the Nephite founder in their royal name, the
outsized positive influence of that prophet-king and founder of the Nephites was
clearly quickly missed. “The people of Nephi, under the reign of the second
king, began to grow hard in their hearts, and indulge themselves somewhat in
wicked practices,” Jacob lamented (Jacob 1:15). They began to be preoccupied
with obtaining riches and indulging in immoralities. Realizing that the Jewish
immigrants were just a fraction of the People of Nephi helps many more things
make sense. After all, the multiple wives and girlfriends of the wicked Nephites
were not just Jacob’s grandkids and nieces and nephews sinning with each other. 

Read more →

Mexico, Mexico Mission Hymns


“MENSAJE DE PAZ”

by Chad Nielsen • May 26, 2024 • 0 Comments

“Mensaje de paz” by Joel Morales is notable as being the song that was sung when
Elder Melvin J. Ballard and then-ambassador J. Reuben Clark, Jr. visited with
the Latter-day Saints in Mexico in 1932. Morales is also the author of “La
Proclamación” and “Final.”

Read more →

Book Reviews, Temples


TEMPLES IN THE TOPS OF THE MOUNTAINS

by Chad Nielsen • May 26, 2024 • 1 Comment

Temples in the Tops of the Mountains: Sacred Houses of the Lord in Utah by
Richard O. Cowan and Clinton D. Christensen (BYU RSC and Deseret Book Company,
2023) helped me solve a long-time mystery about my life. You see, when I was six
years old, I went to the Vernal, Utah Temple open house. For some reason, I
walked away believing that there was only one temple baptismal font for the
whole church that they just moved between temples. I even told my Primary that
is what I learned at the open house when they asked me about it. Obviously,
that’s not the case—each temple has its own baptismal font (and the book also
informed me that there are some temples that will soon have two baptismal
fonts)—but I have always wondered what led me to that conclusion. 

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


AN ANONYMOUS BYU HONOR CODE OFFICE EXPERIENCE

by Stephen C • May 24, 2024 • 1 Comment

An Anonymous Account of an Experience with the Honor Code Office at BYU and its
Aftermath that was Submitted to T&S as a Guest Post.   Surprisingly, after the
initial rush of dread the first feeling after seeing the pop-up message on the
screen was one of relief. I had been caught, would be reported to the honor code
office, and was told to log off immediately.  It started very subtly. As a
newlywed I had a basic curiosity about this new world of sexuality that I had
just entered into, and that was the hook which led to me watching YouTube videos
that I should not have been watching. I could typically find a little corner in
the BYU computer lab against a wall. At first I tried to find some plausible
deniability in what I was typing in the search bar, but as the hunger and risk
taking grew there was little of that left. And besides, I had been doing it for
a while now, if they were actively monitoring me, surely I would have been
caught by now? (Many years later I found myself on BYU campus for the first time
in a long time, and noticed that the computer labs had signs warning users that
they were being monitored. “Now you tell me,” I thought).  We had just moved
wards so my initial introduction to my new bishop was a little awkward. (Hi, I’m
emailing…

Read more →

Book of Mormon, Guest Bloggers


NEPHITE SUCCESSION CRISIS

by Guest • May 22, 2024 • 1 Comment

It was a coup (or divine providence) that Nephi and his brothers Jacob and
Joseph were able to assert themselves as religious leaders in this new land,
spiritually guiding thousands who were already in the Americas. Emerging as the
political leaders of this large, mostly non-Jewish People of Nephi was trickier.
Nephi’s inspired leadership, however, was a tour de force.

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


MY “SACRED ENVY” LIST

by Stephen C • May 21, 2024

“Sacred Envy” is the well-known idea (at least in Latter-day Saint circles) of
having the humility to recognize some positive attributes of other faiths, so I
thought I would make my “sacred envy” list.  To be clear, the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints is my faith because I think it is the best and it is
what it claims to be, to speak rather bluntly. It’s not my faith because of
inertia or because I feel some kind of sociocultural connection. Still, I’m open
to recognizing places where other faiths get it right, even if in recognizing
these points I’m not necessarily saying that I think we should adapt the same.
Buddhism, Jainism, or other religions based around ahimsa or non-violence: While
most Western faiths have some history of religious/ethnic entrepreneurs using
religion as a justification for violence, I’m going to go out on a limb and say
that that’s quite rare in faiths based on ahimsa, or non-violence towards living
things. If you’re part of a faith that covers your drinking water in a cloth so
that you don’t inadvertently hurt insects, or who doesn’t engage in farming
because it might hurt some worms, you’re probably not going to be burning people
alive in the name of your faith, no matter how creative the exegesis. They
simply don’t have the seeds for religious violence in their theology.  Of
course, combined with other things (e.g. Buddhism in militaristic,…

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


THE ORIGINAL SINS OF MORMON BLOGGING

by Jonathan Green • May 20, 2024

If the discussions here and at sites like this one are sometimes less than
satisfactory, it’s partly because of unstated conventions and informal norms
that got started nearly two decades ago and that we’re often barely conscious of
today. Two especially need to be rethought.

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


ADDRESSING ONE PART OF THE FEMALE ORDINATION QUESTION

by Stephen C • May 17, 2024

And yes, if women ever receive the priesthood I’m sure it will also be given to
sisters with extra fingers.  Female ordination is one of those issues that is
built on so many premises that are themselves so potentially polemical that it
would take a ten-part series to walk a true believer and a true non-believer
through every point of fundamental disagreement about gender roles, gender
essentialism, etc. Consequently, I’m not going to try to digest the whole issue
here. Rather, I want to address a particular line one sometimes hears in regards
to this issue without claiming to holistically tackle the entirety of the female
ordination debate.  A common narrative goes something like this: A woman, maybe
the woman herself or the daughter of the person speaking, recognizes that,
unlike in the Church, women in the workforce sometimes have ultimate,
autonomous, organizational authority. [Although, sidebar, I think in practice
this actually happens less outside the Church than such interlocutors imply, but
that’s another issue].   She recognizes that there’s no equivalent in the
Church.  Therefore, because she wants to “BE SOMEBODY” and do something grand
with her life, she’s going to leave the Mormon space where there are limits to
her organizational power by dint of her chromosomes.  Often this argument then
goes into the old motherhood-versus-careerism, whether women can in fact have it
all, whether we truly value motherhood, etc. but these are third rails I’m not
touching…

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


THEOLOGY IN MOSIAH

by Chad Nielsen • May 15, 2024

One of my favorite sets of publications in recent years are the Brief
theological introductions to the Book of Mormon. James E. Faulconer’s excellent
contribution to the series is the volume focused on the Book of Mosiah. In a
recent interview at the Latter-day Saint history blog From the Desk, Faulconer
shared some of his insights related to this book. What follows here is a copost
to the full interview (a shorter post with excerpts and some discussion).

Read more →

Book of Mormon


“ALL THOSE WHO WOULD GO WITH ME”

by Guest • May 14, 2024

As the Lehites increasingly mingled with the locals, there eventually arose a
division, accelerated upon the death of their patriarch Lehi. Part of Lehi’s
family (led by Laman) was attracted to a hunting and gathering lifestyle.
Likely, this way of life was common among the Native Americans they were
interacting with in the Land of First Inheritance. Laman and his clique possibly
saw this as the easier way to make a living and adopted the ways of the locals.

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


CHRIST-LIKE LIVING ACCORDING TO “THE GODFATHER”

by Stephen C • May 13, 2024

In the Godfather Part III (I know, I know), in response to his protege
threatening to knock off a competitor, Mafia don Michael Corleone quips “never
hate your enemies, it affects your judgment.”  This is a common theme throughout
the Godfather series, also embedded in the (in)famous “it’s not personal,
strictly business” line. The cold-hearted calculation for self-interest that
requires people to put personal or petty grudges on the side. Incidentally, this
is a theme in the book too. For example, the scene where the pedophile/movie
producer–his pedophilia is hinted at in the movie but is much more explicit in
the book–loses his temper with Tom Hagan is accompanied by an internal monologue
where Hagan is stunned that somebody so accomplished would let his emotional
desire for vengeance drive his actions.    You see this in politics, diplomacy,
business, and other high-stakes games where people who would otherwise hate each
other are willing to turn and collaborate on a dime if it’s in their own
self-interest. On the opposite extreme, I’ve seen people in the professional
world burn all their bridges down because they could not get in control of their
personal spite, and one’s ability to be the former and not the latter is a sign
of mature emotional regulation. You just don’t pick fights or make enemies
unless you have to, because antagonists can hurt you later down the road,
sometimes in unpredictable ways. I remember seeing an interview…

Read more →

From the Desk Co-posts, New Testament, Old Testament


SEPTUAGINT

by Chad Nielsen • May 11, 2024

When Jesus and the early Christians talked about the scriptures, they were using
a version that is different from the manuscript basis of most English
translations, including the King James Version that is so often used in
Latter-day Saint circles. In a Hellenistic world, they relied on the
Septuagint—a Greek translation of the Tanakh (Old Testament). In a recent post
at the Latter-day Saint history blog From the Desk, Philip Jenkins (professor of
history at Baylor University) discussed more about the Septuagint. What follows
here is a copost (a shorter post with some commentary).

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


MY SPIRITUALITY STACK

by Stephen C • May 10, 2024

I’m a sucker for those lifestyle influencers that show off their green smoothie
stacks. Even though I know that 99% of supplements are scams that don’t pass the
double blind, RCT standard, at the very least it’s still health-motivating to
see somebody cram a bunch of greens into a blender (although, to save you time,
the only health/muscle/workout supplement that is really worth the cost if
you’re already eating your fruits and veges is creatine). Similarly, I’d love to
see somebody put together a sort of collation of spiritual “stacks” of
spiritually powerful people, including but not exclusively Church leaders. I
suspect they would shy away from this kind of thing because beyond the basics of
prayer, fasting, and scripture study it’s highly individual, and people might
take a particular individual’s personal routine as gospel, but I don’t think
there’s any risk of that coming from me, so… My personal spiritual “stack”
Prayer at night: My Mission President told us a story about how his MP would
require that they set a timer to pray for five minutes every night, and how he
thought it was dumb thing to require, but that when he actually tried it and
realized that when you have five minutes you have to use, it helps you sit and
center your thoughts and not feel any kind of rush. So he did not require us to
do the five minute timer, but strongly suggested it,…

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


RETHINKING THE OT NARRATIVE

by Stephen Fleming • May 9, 2024

Christians expressed concerns about stories and divine commands in the Old
Testament since early in Christian history. Setting aside Isaac and Abraham,
things get so much worse with the conquest of Canaan and all the genocidal
commands. Christians have long attempted to make sense of the contrast of the
significant difference between the divine commands in the OT and NT: “the
schoolmaster to bring us to Christ” (Galatians 3:24-27), allegory, Gnostics who
said the OT God wasn’t the highest God but was the lower, problematic demiurge.
I heard growing up that God gave the law as a result of the rebellion of the
golden calf (sort of like DC 84:24-26 and Exodus 32:19 mixed together). I’ve
heard the idea in Mormon circles of Jesus as Jehovah got a lot nicer after he
lived on earth.

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


HOW DO MEMBERS EXPLAIN THE PRIESTHOOD AND TEMPLE BAN?

by Stephen C • May 7, 2024

Black man ordaining another Black man in the style of African folk art Stephen
Cranney and Josh Coates This is one of a series of posts discussing results from
a recent survey of current and former Latter-day Saints conducted by the BH
Roberts Foundation. The technical details are in the full methodology report
here.  The provenance and maintenance of the priesthood and temple ban against
Black Latter-day Saints is one of the more if not the most sensitive subjects in
the modern Church. Of particular sensitivity is the question of whether the ban
was inspired or not and, if not, why it took as long as it did to rescind it.
Both David O. McKay and Harold B. Lee were reported to have sought revelation to
remove the restriction, but were told that it was not time. Although the Church
published an essay in 2013 that condemned past and present racism and disavowed
theories of the past, it did not make a statement as to whether or not the
restriction was inspired by God.  We suspected that this question of the
priesthood ban still divides the membership, with a lot of members on one side
or the other. Because of its complexity, we could have asked myriad questions on
race in the survey: how many members believe in the “Curse of Cain?” How many
members think that Joseph Smith started the ban? How many members think that
Black people were…

Read more →

Book of Mormon, Guest Bloggers


LEHI’S THANKSGIVING

by Guest • May 6, 2024

I envision Lehi and his family encountering some curious native villagers near
their initial landing beach in the Promised Land. I can imagine that the first
Native Americans to see these strangers from the Middle East sailing to their
shores in a vessel larger than any canoe may have viewed them as gods. From
Christopher Columbus in the West Indies to Hernando Cortés riding into
Montezuma’s Mexico, it was natural for the locals to view these otherworldly
newcomers as gods. The righteous Nephites would have dissuaded any worship or
being treated like gods. Like Ammon later before King Lamoni, they would have
denied that they were “the Great Spirit” (Alma 18:18-19). However, it would have
been natural for this party of prophets and priests to evangelize to their new
friends about the Lord who guided them there.

Read more →

Church History, From the Desk Co-posts


ON WILLARD RICHARDS

by Chad Nielsen • May 3, 2024

I’ve written previously about the reality that many of the counselors in the
First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have a huge
impact on the Church, but they may not always be remembered by the general
membership after a generation or two. I made that remark specifically with
George Q. Cannon in mind, but Willard Richards is another example that was
recently explored in an interview with Alex Smith at the Latter-day Saint
history blog From the Desk. What follows here is a co-post to the full
interview.

Read more →

Book of Mormon, Guest Bloggers


THE TRIBES THAT GREETED THE LEHITES

by Guest • May 2, 2024

As we read the Book of Mormon, we will better appreciate its authenticity if we
see its stories in the context of the Nephites and Lamanites continuously
bumping up against Native American tribes who were already in the Americas. The
Promised Land was not an empty land, as many throughout Church history sometimes
imagined. In fact, our testimony of the truths taught within its pages are all
the more powerful when we look at this ancient record with eyes wide open to the
cultural world it actually took place in.

Read more →

Latter-day Saint Thought


WHAT HISTORICAL CLAIMS DOES GOD INSIST WE BELIEVE?

by Stephen Fleming • May 1, 2024

I mean that question in terms of scriptural claims, especially related to the
Old Testament. Readers may be aware of scholarly skepticism of the existence of
major biblical figures and events and I’ve often gotten the sense from my fellow
members and other Christians of seeing scholars with such views as problematic,
secular people not properly holding biblical claims as they ought. I’m well
aware of the limits of historical study, but also think that historical methods
and lots of work by scholars as a whole do tell us something. I don’t think
scholars in any field go about what they do as some kind of malicious pact with
the devil. Scholars are happy to debate with each other so though I’m not
arguing that scholarly consensus is anything like infallible (consensus can
certainly be overturned), but for, me, scholarly consensus suggest a whole lot
of work and evidence. Thus if there is consensus on something, I believe
scholars have come to that position in good faith. I do not feel the need to
hold doggedly to all scriptural historical claims, nor do I believe that God
insists that I do so.

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NOTES FROM ALL OVER

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Chad Nielsen @orsonite ·
27 May


"Mensaje de paz”


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Times and Seasons @timesandseasons ·
26 May


Temples in the Tops of the Mountains


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25 May


An Anonymous BYU Honor Code Office Experience

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23 May


Nephite Succession Crisis
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