06.06
A history of the LDS garment. Another interesting history is the evolution of the LDS prayer circle.
What a religious debate on Facebook would look like in the Mayan pre-Columbian America.
Sincere devoutness is sometimes indistinguishable from good satire. Case in point: this Stake President’s blog. I hope it’s a spoof, and I’m pretty sure it is. But wow, it’s a very convincing parody—and funny! My favorite post is his awkward and euphemistic discussion of oral sex. [Edit: I initially thought this was real, but some commenters convinced me otherwise.]
The Scientific American on why we’re suckers for stories of our own demise.
The Vatican released a strongly-worded report demanding decisive and dramatic action to curb the effects of global climate change. The Vatican also invited AIDS experts for a two-day symposium to discuss prevention methods, including condoms.
The Catholic Church has received incredibly negative press due to the priest abuse scandal (which is still developing). But I think the Catholic Church is due some credit for tackling substantive issues like global warming, poverty, etc. One of my long-standing complaints about the LDS Church is its focus on relatively petty concerns (double piercings and flip-flops come to mind).
It’s time to reconsider graduation prayer in public high schools, writes Bruce Ledewitz for Religion Dispatches.
Greta Christina argues that all religious are equally crazy. I maintain that some religions are demonstrably more implausible than others, but I agree that religious folks should be slow to find the crazy in other religions lest they forget the crazy in their own.
It’s easy to mock Harold Camping’s failed prediction that the rapture would occur on May 21st (Camping has rescheduled the rapture for October). But Jesus was also a failed doomsday prophet, and Joseph Smith believed that the Second Coming would happen in 1890 or 1891.
A survey of nearly 15,000 people suggests that atheists have the best sex lives. Perhaps were there more atheists in Utah, it wouldn’t be the most stressed state. Relatedly, the US reports far lower levels of happiness than similarly developed but more secular nations.
MRI tests reveal that Apple triggers a religious reaction in its fans’ brains. I wrote about a similar study last summer.
An Islamic theologian and scholar says the Prophet Muhammad probably never existed.
Santa Monica residents may vote on a ballot initiative in November 2012 that would ban circumcision.
I saw a Craiglist job ad for Java engineers that was restricted to LDS applicants only. It specified further that the applicant must be temple-worthy. Unless the job posting is with the church directly, isn’t this illegal?
Nearly two-thirds of Americans now support legalizing same-sex relations, a new record high.
The top 10 myths about the brain.
Some drama in the Reddit Exmormon community: A poster is threatened by another member with being publicly outed as ex-Mormon for not being pro-gay enough.
The Mormon Chronicle writes that the public education system is antithetical to LDS teachings, and that Mormons must only be taught by other Mormons.
The far right has lionized Ayn Rand for decades, and Republicans are again giving her a lot of lip-service. What a strange bedfellow Rand makes for the Religious Right though, given how virulently anti-Christian she was.
A Saudi woman is arrested after campaigning for the right to drive.
French postmodern philosopher Jacques Derrida becomes an internet meme.
Despite the church’s past with polygamy and its entrenched, traditional gender roles, there is a feminist strain within the Mormon tradition—one that may be enjoying a resurgence. The Salt Lake Tribune recently published a piece about Mormon women’s historical ability to administer priesthood blessings. And Mormon blogger Joanna Brooks suggests that the LDS concept of Heavenly Mother may be making a comeback.
Why people stick by scandal-plagued pastors.
Sam Harris sketches out a morality without free will and its implications.
Philosophy professor Andrew Fisher of the University of Nottingham contends that philosophy needs to be taught much earlier. He has started teaching at primary schools in disadvantaged areas, teaching kids the fundamentals of logic and critical thinking.
Seventy percent of science award finalists are the children of immigrants, showing that immigration is a boon to science and math.
I’ve written at length about BYU’s use of aversive therapies (including shock therapy) in its treatment of homosexuality. In the interest of fairness, I’d like to share a more sympathetic view of this part of BYU history.
A recent neurological study finds that powerful religious experiences may actually contribute to atrophy in the brain.
A radical new birth control injection for men promises to be 100% effective for 10 years. What’s more, it has no reported side effects and is completely and quickly reversible.
How to argue on the internet.
After his mom won the lottery, an atheist converts to Christianity. Fox carries the story as ‘news’.
CNN compiles a list of popular Bible misattributions—phrases and ideas people think are in the Bible, but are not.
Is atheism just a ‘sexed-up’ version of agnosticism, or are the two terms distinct? And if the latter, are they complimentary or incompatible? Talking Philosophy analyzes the competing definitions.
Newsweek calls 2011 ‘the Mormon Moment’. Two presidential candidates belong to the faith, the Senate leader Harry Reid is Mormon, and Mormonism is the subject of a critically-acclaimed Broadway musical.
The latest presidential election poll has Mitt Romney as the Republican frontrunner, with most not caring about his Mormonism.
BYU Studies identifies the many LDS themes in Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight saga.
Richard Dawkins and 13 other academics launch a new private humanities college.
Skeptic Mormon shares some troubling facts about Mormon polygamy and debunks popular myths about the practice.
American filmmaker Vikram Gandhi made up a guru character and a phony religion, then filmed a documentary as he developed a following. The documentary illustrates just how credulous our species can be.
I thought the stake president’s blog was real but I don’t think it is anymore. If you look at some of the comments on his posts, you’ll find a bunch of exmo’s playing along with his game.
//I saw a Craiglist job ad for Java engineers that was restricted to LDS applicants only. It specified further that the applicant must be temple-worthy. Unless the job posting is with the church directly, isn’t this illegal?//
Probably, though if it is from some other non-profit organization that will be religious in nature, though unaffiliated with the Church its (consider, just as an example [but probably not who posted this Craiglist posting], FAIR) it might be an approved practice. But I don’t really know.
Yeah, I am fairly certain the Stake President’s blog is a spoof. Like Chris says, there are some reoccurring characters in the comments sections whose own blogs look like spoofs, such as the young woman Aurora, who lists her occupation as a super-spy.
It’s a good spoof, though. Possibly too good? It takes a read through several of the posts and comments sections to catch on. Otherwise it does look like the real deal.
Sorry, dude, but the SP blog is totally fake. Go look at the FB page, and it becomes painfully obvious that it’s a spoof, but even in the blog posts, there is a self-righteousness present so thick that it would be overkill to describe most of the people I know that went to BYU, and that’s saying something.
The LDS prayer circle article was fascinating since I went through the modern process a few months ago for the first time. But when the author claimed, “it would not look out of place in any other Christian gathering,” I think he meant to say Pagan gathering. Seriously, my wife and I were in shock for the rest of the week after experiencing said events because its so alien to everyday Mormon or Christian activities.
Brethren, please cease the evil speaking of the Lords anointed.
Just a note, I was threatened to be outed as an exmormon, for not being pro gay enough… not outed as gay fro not being anti-mormon enough.
Oh, my mistake, Mithryn. I’ll fix that.
Also, I also received a job offer that was a contract position for the church, but was not under the church’s employ where a temple recommend was suggested, and active in the faith required.
One thing, its a bit off topic but mentioned above.
The Jesus as failed doomsday Prophet really doesn’t work for me. Yeah yeah I know, in Mathew 16:28 Jesus predicted the world would end in that generation and it didn’t. He said some were standing there who would see the Kingdom! That settles it, Jesus made a false prophecy about the world ending in the generation that he spoke to, some 2000 years ago, and yet he has not come yet again to set up the Kingdom, so it’s a false Prophecy.
I’ve heard the argument often and think it needs to be on the bad Atheist argument list. It really does.
If you read the relevant passage, then read how it was understood by the Church Fathers, you begin to see that its not actually saying the world would end in the lifetime of those hearing Jesus. It says Jesus’ Kingdom would be established in the lifetime of those who heard. This may seem like it’s the same thing, but only because we are so use to Evangelical Christians, especially in America, and tend to argue against their Theology. But, the thing is, in order for this to be a False Prophecy, the Kingdom of Christ has to have not been established at the Time, and most Christians historically have said it was. Most of Christian History has said the Church itself is that Kingdom, and was established on Pentecost 40 days after the ascension and only about 2 or 3 years after Jesus said this. I’m sure people who heard him say that some standing there would live to see him coming in his Kingdom were still alive two or three years later, so from that end his prophecy was actually true.
It’s only in the 19th century and with the growth of modern Evangelical Christianity that people began to separate the Kingdom of Christ from the Church and taught that the Kingdom of Christ will be established at his Second Coming. For today’s Evangelicals, the Kingdom of Christ is going to be established Physically on Earth, its capital will be Jerusalem, and Jesus will personally reign physically from Jerusalem for 1000 Years. To them, the time we are in now Is “The Church Age”. The Church being an organisation of believers who follow Jesus as Christians, which’ll be operating till the Rapture or whenever the second coming is. To them, the Kingdom is clearly distinct from the Church.
So, if you follow their Theology, then sure, it’s a failed prophecy, and I even think the explanation that “This generation” means “The generation that see’s the signs” is just a rationalisation.
However, by the time the Gospels themselves were written in 75-80 AD, about 50 year had passed and most of the original audience Jesus told this to would be dead. I really don’t think the Gospel writers would include such an obviously false Prophecy in their Religious materials.
Besides, its also pretty obvious from the Gospels that the Church was the Kingdom. After Pentecost they stopped saying things like “The Kingdom of God is coming” and started telling people instead how to be part of the Kingdom. The Kingdom is treated as an actualised reality, not some distant hope in the future.
Given this, and how the Church Fathers, and most of Christendom till the 1800’s, never made a distinction between the Church and the Kingdom, or taught that Jesus was going to come back to Physically set up a Kingdom, its just not possible for me to say this was a Failed prophecy. More likely it’s a Prophecy fulfilled after-the-fact than that.
Oh, not to be a pest but, I just read the “Religious experience makes the brain atrophy” link and was a bit disappointed. Actually the findings were that certain religious peoples Hypothalamus, as well as the hypothalamus of nonreligious people seems to shrink in Brains of older people over 58. The suggested cause was not that religion itself made the hypothalamus shrink, but that stress from being in a religious minority caused the reaction.
As the reaction is actually the same in nonreligious people, and is not present in mainstream protestant test subjects, it seems illegitimate to jump on the bandwagon of saying this proves religion is harmful to the brain, and intellectually dishonest.
That’s a good call out, Arden. But a couple things: I never claimed the study was conclusive, (let alone claim that this “proves religion is harmful to the brain”). As the article notes, it has it’s limitations, and there are compelling, competing hypotheses that may explain the atrophy that aren’t causally related to the religious experience itself. The article nonetheless presents the study’s findings as an intriguing and possible hypothesis. Second, I don’t think the bandwagon view is that religion is harmful to the brain. The consensus is to the contrary: that religion affords some psychological benefits.
By bandwagon I just meant on the whole “Skeptic” community. I am an Atheist myself, but you gotta admit, a lot of the arguments you see from Atheists on the old internet, or even now in public, simply suck.
I’m not saying all Christian arguments are better, and I know a lot of crappy apologetics, but that just speaks of why I think we need a better educated populace.
I just wanted to add the clarifier in here because the way its presented in this blog can cause a casual reader who doesn’t follow the link ( lets face it there are too many to follow all) wouldn’t catch the other possibilities.
I have been so bewlidreed in the past but now it all makes sense!