You may have read the Salon article on Cleon Skousen, a great influence on the thought (?) of Glenn Beck. The article references Dialogue’s review of one of Skousen’s books, The Naked Capitalist. This roundtable review is one of the fieriest and most fun things that has ever been published in Dialogue, I think, so I’m linking to it from here so you can read the whole thing (the Salon link is to an incomplete version.) Here it is. Enjoy! Discuss!
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Skousen in Dialogue
September 16, 2009 — KristineApocalypse Whenever
June 22, 2009 — GuestThis is another in an ongoing series of posts by members of Dialogue’s Editorial Board. Eric Samuelsen is Associate Professor of Theatre and Media Arts at BYU, and Dialogue’s Film and Theater Editor.
In Sunday school last Sunday, the lesson was about the apocalypse, the End of Days. It’s always a depressing lesson for me, because i don’t want to be around for the End of Days. I don’t want anything to do with the Apocalypse. I think it sounds terrifying–death and horror and disease and war. As Mormons, I don’t think we can even take comfort in the ‘neener neener neener, I’m getting raptured and you’re not’ vibe apparently some evangelicals take comfort in, because we don’t believe in the Rapture, unless we do. Read the rest of this entry »
General Conference and the Flu
May 3, 2009 — Stirling
- Two youths in Mexico with decorated face masks
Due to flu worries, and on the advice of the United States government, LDS church services were cancelled in Mexico today.
On a historical note, how many times has the LDS General Conference been cancelled due to flu outbreaks? Read the rest of this entry »
Diablogging: Neylan McBaine
March 12, 2009 — GuestThis is the first in a regular series of guest blogs by members of the Dialogue Editorial Board. Neylan McBaine is the Personal Voices editor, and the author of Seeds of Faith in City Soil: Growing Up Mormon in New York City in the Winter 2007 issue of Dialogue. She lives with her husband and three wonderfully literarily-named daughters in Brooklyn, NY.
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“Excuse me, are you Jewish?”
I love that question. It’s one I’m asked routinely as I walk the streets of my neighborhood, Park Slope, Brooklyn. Usually, I can see it coming from half a block away: two Hasidic men, perhaps one old and one young like a father/son Home Teaching duo, waiting on the corner as I approach the intersection of Union Street and Seventh Avenue. Their black coats and hats and the abundant facial hair on the older companion set them apart of course, but it’s usually what they’re holding that draws the most attention. Read the rest of this entry »
Engineering Vision
February 9, 2009 — Steve EvansAs the Juvenile Instructor has also noted, we’ve received an invitation in the inbox:
The Claremont School of Religion, the LDS Council on Mormon Studies and the Mormon Scholars Foundation are pleased to present: “Parallels and Convergences: Mormon Thought and Engineering Vision,” a conference featuring keynote speaker Terryl Givens and a panel of LDS engineers. Read the rest of this entry »
Are conversations about feminism and heterosexual marriage now harder to have?
February 5, 2009 — Natalie B.Last fall, I began to write a post addressing an aspect of the publicity surrounding Prop 8 that did not garner much attention on the bloggernacle but seemed critical to me: what does the recent focus on same-sex marriage mean for the future of Mormon feminism and Mormon heterosexual couples? At the time, I pulled this post from publication in order to prevent unwelcome controversy from entering the BCC site. But now that the immediate impact of Prop 8 is over, I think it is time to ask how the goals of Mormon homosexuals and married Mormon feminists might support or conflict with each other. This post is not intended to pass a value judgment on any camp, and it certainly doesn’t presume to understand the complexity of desires amongst Mormon homosexuals and women, but it does seek to open a discussion. Read the rest of this entry »
Health baptisms, pond hockey, & Asherah– A New Year’s toast
January 5, 2009 — StirlingIt’s a blustery 3 degrees F (-17 C) outside right now on the first Sunday of the New Year. In a moment I need to head into the wind for an meeting. But first, two New Year examples of BCC bloggers popping up in daily life in Utah County.
A few days ago we were playing a family game of hockey on a nearby pond. While one of us chased down a puck after an errant pass, the rest of the family paused to rest, and someone commented, “Can you imagine breaking through this ice to get baptized, and doing that for 7 days in a row!” That statement stems from a family home evening lesson we had based around J. Stapley’s and Kris Wright’s Journal of Mormon History article, “A History of Baptism for Health.” If you haven’t Read the rest of this entry »
The Devil’s Mashed Potatoes
November 19, 2008 — KaimiThe moth-eaten parchment fragment fell from the false lid of the blackened old cedar chest, its letters atrophied, its ink faded. Read the rest of this entry »
Almost-seen in Provo
October 1, 2008 — StirlingA scene from the check-out stand at a local Macey’s grocery store:
I assume that behind the blue rectangles that decorate our local magazine racks there usually lie images that are thought to offend buyers because too much flesh is exposed, or too explicit a reference is made to this or that technique.
Not so this time. Read the rest of this entry »
Mexico research question
April 12, 2008 — Stirling
Recently a sociology graduate student in Mexico posted a question to the ASPMS list asking for pointers to articles discussing the church’s system for youth education (or CES in general), or to discussions of “institutions of socialization within the church.” He is working on a master thesis project which compares religious education among Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses in a particular region in Mexico (Veracruz). He also asked for recommendations on how to make a comparison between socialization strategies of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Mormons.
A BYU history professor and student provided a bibliography with some relevant texts. Others pointed him to the half a dozen recent Dialogue articles on the Church in Latin America. But, even in these bibliographies, and in Read the rest of this entry »
Pink Cadillac
March 18, 2008 — Stirling
Of the various articles in the Spring 2008 Dialogue, Bushman’s essay, “Should Mormon Women Speak Out? Thoughts on Our Place in the World,” is available free to nonsubscribers.
There, Claudia Bushman, as professor, historian, and consummately-involved church member, briefly reviews the history of women’s roles in the church and the development of the Summer 1971 “pink” issue of Dialogue (dedicated to women’s themes). And, almost 40 years after she wrote the introductory essay to that issue, she asks herself and the rest of us for a status report and issues a call for involvement:
“…Mormon women were among the first and best at learning to stand and speak…. But where have we gone since then? Somehow in our liberated society, we have remained as dutiful and quiet daughters and wives. In our Church society where women are valued as daughters of God, as noble followers in the pathway of Eve, we still do not speak out. We know that there are dangers. People don’t always understand. Some take umbrage. Instead of being embraced as sisters, we can be shut out. So I propose a practical program of action for Mormon women to encourage them to speak up and out….”
Dialogue’s Kindle contest
December 11, 2007 — Stirling
[Announcing a promotion by the Dialogue Foundation]
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Win an Amazon Kindle with Dialogue!
The Contest: Purchase an electronic subscription to Dialogue and enter to win the $400 Amazon Kindle electronic book reader.
Read the rest of this entry »
Dialogue and Amazon Kindle contest
December 7, 2007 — StirlingThe Dialogue Foundation plans to begin this promotion next week. If any of you have a hankering to be part of the marketing team on this, we’d appreciate your comments.
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Read the rest of this entry »
FHE and New England
December 3, 2007 — Stirling
Growing up, I can remember that at least occasionally our weekly Family Home Evening was regarded as a burden by some of the 12 children in our family.
There were various reasons for that, including the dynamics of teaching/entertaining an audience of children with a wide range of ages. Sometimes the issue was a function of the subject matter of the lessons. Unfortunately, an important factor was sometimes the less-than cooperative/energetic/willing attitude of some older siblings towards activities that presented an impediment to maximum time spent playing sports, or reading.
Sorry mom, sorry dad.
Now, a couple of decades later, I pursue my path towards repentance by Read the rest of this entry »
Tribal justice at Mountain Meadows
November 9, 2007 — bccleviI probably should be ashamed of the fact that I paid my own airfare to Salt Lake City for an interview with Helen Whitney during her preparation of the PBS documentary on the Mormons. That’s just another evidence of my vanity. However, the airfare cost me less than $200 and I had almost no other expense. I stayed with Lavina Fielding Anderson, and Whitney’s associate Jane Barnes picked me up at the airport and drove me around. The guestroom in the Anderson house is an immersion in Mormonism—hundreds of books by and about Mormons from early to late line the shelves. And Jane Barnes consented to write an essay for Dialogue about her impressions of Joseph Smith, which will be published in our spring 2008 issue. You don’t want to miss that one. Read the rest of this entry »
The vanishing sister missionary?
October 9, 2007 — StirlingReceived by mail:
Dear Father of a Senior Primary son,
The Primary is preparing for our musical program to be performed in
sacrament meeting on November 18th.
We will close our program with the Senior Primary boys singing with
their fathers “I Hope They Call Me on a Mission.” We invite you to
join your boy in singing this song.
Thanks,
The Primary Presidency and Chorister
Read the rest of this entry »
Parody in Dialogue
July 15, 2007 — Stirling
To read past issues of Dialogue I usually leaf through my collection of the hard copy journals, or I open up my copy of the DVD archive. But right now the Dialogue team is exploring how we might enhance readers’/researchers’ online experience. To that end, for this post I spent a half-hour using our new index and the search engine for the online archive to explore discussions of parody http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parody (my sample research topic) within Mormon studies. (1)
What did I find? In “Poetic Borrowing in Early Mormonism” (18:1, Spring 1985), though parody isn’t the main thrust of the article, Michael Hicks provides some examples of early Mormon parodies. These included “The God That Others Worship” (parodying “The Rose that All are Praising”):
“The God that others worship / is not the God for me;
He has no parts nor body / and cannot hear nor see;
But I’ve a God that lives above / A God of Power and of love,
A God of revelation / O! that’s the God for me…”
Affirmative Action in Zion?
June 6, 2007 — GuestPatrick Mason is one of ourDialogue guests. He may or may not be related to one of our permabloggers.
In March 1961 President John F. Kennedy issued Executive Order 10925. It dictated that any contractor doing business with the federal government “will take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin.” Read the rest of this entry »
Curses (on Cain and Ham), foiled again!
June 5, 2007 — Stirling
It’s going to take me a few paragraphs to get there, so here’s advance notice that this post is intended to be a pointer to recent scholarship on how biblical curses associated with the stories of Cain and Ham came to be misinterpreted by some Christians as applying to dark-skinned Africans.
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In 18th and 19th century America, prior to the Civil War, the Cain and Ham curses were interpreted by many Christians as explaining the skin color of black Africans and as justifying the practice of African slavery. After slavery ended, and as late as the 1960s, the curse on Ham continued to be put to work by some Christians to justify ethnic segregation. (1)
Given Mormonism’s geographic beginnings, it’s not much of a surprise to find occurrences of Mormons making the same uses of these stories. For example, the early Mormons swung back and forth between fairly strong abolitionist tendencies to the eventual 1850s legalization of slavery in the Utah Territory. (2) In lobbying for the territorial law, Brigham Young is quoted as stating “In as much as we believe in the Bible, inasmuch as we believe in the ordenances of God, in the Preisthood and order and decrees of God, we must believe in Slavery- Read the rest of this entry »
A Cherishing So Deep
May 6, 2007 — Molly BennionSpeaking from the grave, the main character of the film American Beauty, Lester Burnham says he doesn’t feel regret for his death, only intense gratitude “for every single moment of my stupid little life.” Read the rest of this entry »
Mormons Believe _________________.
May 3, 2007 — GuestA guest submission by B. Bowen, a good friend of BCC.
That Mormonism has been placed under the contemporary American microscope is old news. First the Olympics. Then “Under the Banner of Heaven” and Warren Jeffs. Harry Reid’s assumption of the role of minority and then majority leader in the Senate. The Napoleon Dynamite phenomenon. And, of course, the Romney campaign has provided bountiful fodder for bloggers, pundits, and mainstream media outlets for months now (speaking of which, Battlefield Earth? What have you been smoking, Mitt?). Read the rest of this entry »
Graduation Day, 2007
April 26, 2007 — Stirling
VP Cheney’s speaks at BYU’s commencement later today (at 4pm). At noon BYU students and faculty demonstrated in a “Go Forth – Establish Peace” rally. It was held at the west entrance to campus, at the “Enter to Learn – Go Forth to Serve” sign.
In general, it was focused on peace. The most prominent signs were 10’ tall scrolls with Peace written in 28 languages. Some of the other signs were:
“Support this: “Therefore, Renounce war and proclaim peace. D&C 98:16”
“If we’re going to fight a war, let it be a war on poverty”
“1/2 the world lives on less than $2 a day”
There were a few signs that targeted Cheney such as, “Was it Divine Inspiration to Vote Bush/Cheney…or just Temporary Insanity.” Read the rest of this entry »
The Genius of Councils
April 19, 2007 — GuestPatrick Mason is one of our newest Dialogue guests. He may or may not be related to one of our permabloggers.
Priesthood organization isn’t a very sexy topic. I mean, who really gets excited about the reorganization of the Quorums of the Seventy? When BCC readers get all starry-eyed about Joseph Smith, it’s usually for his metaphysics, or his radical challenge to individualism and market capitalism, or something along those lines. The architecture of priesthood government? Yawn. Somebody wake me up with a little King Follett Discourse (or KFD, as the kids say). Read the rest of this entry »
Sit-in at BYU’s JFSB Quad
April 4, 2007 — Stirling
Demonstrators, April 4, 2007, BYU
Some of the signs hoisted by the participants were:
“One Nation under…..Surveillance.”
“That’s Ok, I didn’t need my civil rights anyway.”
“Cheney should go to…..BYU.”
“You Lied [under large photo of Cheney] — They Died [with large photo of Bush made up of 1" photos of what may have been servicemen and women].”
“Enter to Learn, Go Forth to Torture.” Read the rest of this entry »
RFK at BYU in 1968
March 29, 2007 — Stirling
As bloggers have pointed out in the recent discussions over the prospect of Vice-President Cheney speaking at BYU, Senator Robert F. Kennedy spoke at BYU on March 27, 1968. Read the rest of this entry »
Making your life’s story credible
February 17, 2007 — bccleviA friend recently told me that her autobiography lies irretrievably scattered throughout the world in the multitude of personal letters she has written to loved ones and friends. Personal letters are, of course, a kind of autobiography, and they are invaluable when it comes to writing a formal account of a person’s life. For reasons I do not entirely understand, I began to save a carbon copy of all my letters, invariably written on a typewriter, immediately upon returning from my mission in 1957. It used to amaze me that mother-in-law would promptly answer any personal letter she received and thereupon drop it into the waste basket. Somehow it seemed unnatural to me to destroy the record of her friends and loved one’s lives so callously. Read the rest of this entry »
Maori, Mormons, and Metagenealogy
February 8, 2007 — StirlingIn December, my family had the chance to spend several weeks with my sister-in-law and her family, who, fortuitously, happen to live in New Zealand.
Aside from the usual daily chores (sea-kayaking, snorkeling for kina, fishing for snapper, collecting and cooking shellfish, cavorting in the waves, hiking, bone-carving, photography…), one of the activities we enjoyed most was visiting Maori historical and cultural sites.
Imagine my surprise when I kicked up a post-tour conversation with a Maori guide about the Treaty of Waitangi and heard him tell of how some 19th century Maori drew theological support for bloody resistance to British rule from a belief that the Maori were Israelites, and that the Old Testament provided those Maori both hope and permission for a violent uprising against their perceived oppressors.
Since returning home, I’ve researched some of my NZ blind spots so I’ll be better prepared next trip (for example, I couldn’t prepare sea urchin roe so that it was consistently excellent, and I obviously hadn’t absorbed lesson 18 of the 1937 LDS Junior Genealogical Class manual, titled “Maori Traditions and Genealogies,” and I couldn’t have answered that lesson’s question #9, “Can you show that the natives of New Zealand are also of the covenant people of Israel?”). Read the rest of this entry »
Translating Correctly
January 21, 2007 — K. PettyA young man gave a talk in our Sacrament Meeting that was a first for me, in that instead of using scriptures and written notes, he used his PDA. He said he had come to appreciate the Old Testament, as he discovered how New Testament writers (he focused on Paul especially) had drawn from the Old Testament, particularly the Psalms. He was using his hand-held devise to track himself from one testament to the other, showing how a phrase in Paul had its match somewhere in the Old Testament. My thoughts strayed from his presentation to wonder if he was using a computer program that would search and match phrases for him, and then to think about problems of translation. Read the rest of this entry »
Celebrating those who serve
December 15, 2006 — Molly BennionThis morning my Relief Society president and I bought goodies to fill Christmas baskets for many in need in our ward. At her suggestion, we also bought for some of those who particularly generously serve other ward members all year long. My husband and I have usually given a homemade thank you gift to the bishop at Christmas, but my RS president really has the right idea. We don’t say enough thank yous to the workhorses of the ward. So, along with my wish for the merriest of Christmases to you all, I send the suggestion you or your wards might say a special thanks to the givers this week.
Milk and Meat
December 4, 2006 — Molly BennionTwo articles in the latest, Winter 2006, Dialogue dovetail nicely. Writing of the Church in Japan today, Jiro Numano treats challenges of cultural paradox and of historical information on the internet. He argues that the fact that only 25,000 of 120,000 Japanese members are active can be traced in part to the dissonance resulting from comparisons of official and online Mormon histories. Numano’s article is posted on the Dialogue website, dialoguejournal.com.
Challenged for printing 2 historically groundbreaking Dialogue articles, David John Buerger’s on second anointings and D. Michael Quinn’s on post-manifesto polygamous marriages, Jack Newell’s Personal Voices essay, unfortunately not available on our website, sets forth the criteria he and Linda used for publication when they edited Dialogue. They were three: “(1) Is the evidence unimpeachable? (2) Is the interpretation responsible? and (3) Is the issue important to a rounded understanding of the Mormon experience? Read the rest of this entry »
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