There’s been a lot of stories about Church activity in Houston and other places where members have stepped up to help people in the hurricane. You’ve probably seen a lot of stories. I’ve even linked to a lot myself. I’ll…
Author: Clark Goble
PRRI Poll Numbers on Mormons
I love religion polls and surveys. I think they tell us a lot about what has been a rather transformative period in American religion the past 20 years. While I’m still eagerly awaiting the next ARIS survey, PRRI came out…
Future Mormon: Chapter 4
Welcome to the fourth week of the reading club for Adam Miller’s Future Mormon. For general links related to the book along with links for all the chapter discussions please go to our overview page. We’ll be trying to discuss a chapter…
The Evidential Problem of Evil
The problem of evil is a long standing issue in philosophy and theology. More or less it’s the recognition that there is something wrong if God is all loving and all powerful yet we experience all the evils of mortality.…
Guest Post: Justifying Visions
Mark Bukowski got degrees in philosophy and psychology at UCLA, studying with the noted scholar of German idealism Robert Solomon and Angela Davis, a student of Marcuse. While an undergraduate he became a bit of a student radical, marxist and…
Did Nephi Know of the Return from Exile?
I was rereading some of Nephi’s sermons tied to his incipient Christianity. It struck me that it’s not clear Nephi knows about the 2cd temple period and restoration from Babylon. Now I’m still not 100% sure of this. So I…
The (In)Consistencies of Church Employment
In 2012 a BYU religion professor named Randy Bott created a firestorm when he made fairly racist comments justifying the priesthood ban to blacks in an interview with the Washington Post. Many called for Bott’s firing. Shortly thereafter Bott took…
Future Mormon: Chapter 3
Welcome to the third week of the reading club for Adam Miller’s Future Mormon. For general links related to the book along with links for all the chapter discussions please go to our overview page. We’ll be trying to discuss…
Future Mormon Reading Chapter 2
This is the second week of the reading club for Adam Miller’s Future Mormon. For general links related to the book along with links for all the chapter discussions please go to our overview page. We’ll be trying to discuss…
How Pro Trump are Mormons?
Over at BCC there were a few people claiming in the comments how Mormons were for Donald Trump for President. Now I completely understand why people would say this, given that Trump won Utah in the election. However I think that…
Future Mormon Reading Chapter 1
This is the inaugural reading club for Adam Miller’s Future Mormon. For general links related to the book along with links to each reading chapter please go to our overview page. We’ll try roughly each week to deal with a…
Future Mormon Reading Club
The person who probably comes closest to my own views on many matters is Adam Miller. Back in the heyday of LDS-Herm we had tons of fantastic discussions on theology and philosophy. Ever since Adam’s last book came out I’ve…
Religion as Consumerism
We’ve talked a lot about recent LDS growth numbers here including my post on the drop in missionary numbers and Wilfried’s post on the controversial consolidation of units in Europe. Since then the Salt Lake Tribune has weighed in as…
On Those Latest Missionary Numbers
There’s been a bit of controversy in social media over the recent missionary numbers that have leaked. Deseret News has up a story about missionaries that mentions there being 68,500 missionaries out. The new numbers shocked some people but actually…
The Problem of Mormon Art
I’ve long been a critic of Mormon artwork. The main problem is that artists tend to portray a superficial connection to the events they are portraying. That’s perhaps somewhat understandable except for the problem that people have a habit of…
How Do We Tell Doctrine?
“Doctrine” is one of those funny words where it seems inevitably to shift in meaning even within a single discussion. I’ll confess whenever I hear it spoken of I often put myself on guard. Not because I don’t have a…
Some Thoughts on Nephite Baptism
Nephite baptism is to me quite mysterious. We know they do it but the practice seems to evolve over time a fair bit. It’s worth noting the differences between baptism in Palestine and among the Nephites. First, the baptism of…
In Defense of Checklist Mormons
The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. (John 3:8) I think a common self-criticism…
Church is Partially Pulling Out of Scouts
The Church announced today that it’s pulling out of scouts for all the 14 and older boys. So no more Eagle Scout projects. Overall I think that a positive thing. Trying to do both young men [i]and[/i] scouts is pretty…
Mormon Knowing
When I first got invited to blog I had several topics I was really excited about. Then life came at me fast and most of those projects fell between the cracks. What I want to do is return to them…
The False Dichotomies of Membership
One thing I’ve noticed a lot is people creating simple divisions of people within the church. I’m sure you’ve heard many of them. Liahona Members vs. Iron Rod Members. Chapel Mormons vs. Internet Mormons. Intellectuals vs. Fundamentalists. I’m sure there’s…
Easter Traditions
Back home Easter was nearly as big a holiday as Christmas. I was quite shocked when first moving to Utah to attend BYU at just how marginalized Easter was here. Part of that I figured was due to it typically…
Converts per missionary revisited
Last year around this time I had one of my first posts here at T&S on an analysis of the number of converts per missionary. I thought, given the latest data from the Church, it would be worth revisiting the…
Conference Predictions & Discussion
Any conference predictions out there? I’m pretty bad with predictions but here are a few of mine.
Utah Keeping the The American Dream Alive
There was a gushing story about Utah and particularly the Mormon influence there in today’s Bloomberg. The issue was how Utah deals with poverty. Particularly how Utah is near Denmark in economic mobility figures. It’s not the first time Utah…
Shape of Agency Part 2
In my last post I went through the foundational metaphor for agency in the scriptures. I argued it was a space that was cleared or opened so that people could be free. I want to continue this investigation a little…
The Shape of Agency Part 1
Agency is one of the most fundamental concepts in LDS thought. Often people confuse agency and free will. They are not necessarily the same thing. I’m going to avoid all those sorts of nuanced discussions here. What is interesting to…
Can Mercy Rob Justice?
We’re all familiar with Alma 42 and the notion that mercy can’t rob justice. I was reading this today at church and was struck by a context that often doesn’t get mentioned. In the ancient world relationships often determined actions.…
Deutero-Isaiah in the Book of Mormon
Several parts of the Book of Mormon are highly influenced by the text of deutero-Isaiah. The traditional problem here is that deutero-Isaiah (chapters 40-55) are usually considered to be written fairly late – usually dated to during the exile in…
Benedict Option
Rod Dreher at The American Conservative in response to significant losses on cultural issues in the US suggested that social conservatives should adopt what he calls the Benedict Option. More or less it means those who cease trying to make…