Synchronicity is usually described as something like ‘meaningful coincidence’ which means that it must be meaningful or else it is not true synchronicity!

Therefore, since it is meaningful, we ought to try and understand what it actually means when we experience synchronicity – that is indeed one reason why we experience it. (more…)

The other day I installed a cloak hook near the entrance of the domicile I share with His Majesty.

My cloaks can be heavy, and I also thought it might be prudent to be sure the hook could support the weight of His Majesty’s winter jacket, so I took some time to install the hook securely. I located the stud (much easier with the Force than with a stud locater, by the way) and made sure the hook was screwed firmly through the drywall into the stud. I figured it would easily hold a couple of cloaks and winter jackets.

I stood back to admire my work (funny; don’t you always do that when you finish any handyman project?) and just then His Majesty came storming through the door in a frightfully sour mood. He glanced at me, glanced at the hook, and without a moment’s hesitation he grabbed the hook and tried to swing from it. That was too much weight, of course; there was a loud crack and the hook came out of the wall, doing serious damage to the stud and drywall. In fact, since this is a load-bearing wall, the damage to the stud could wind up being a significant problem.

My jaw hit the floor, or would have, if the vocorder wasn’t in the way.

It turns out His Majesty has been thinking about original sin.

(more…)

I couldn’t let some choice nuggets from this Kate Kelly interview pass without comment, because I don’t think even Kelly realizes just how damning they are. Kelly, as you will recall, is the former leader of the activist group, “Give Women the Priesthood Or I Swear I’m Going to Hurt Myself And It Will Be Your Fault.” (I’m pretty sure that was the official name, maybe someone can look it up for me). They cast themselves as faithful Mormons who just wanted the Church to correct this one little, historically contingent error in doctrine. They’re not the first group to portray themselves as such, but they were probably the most aggressive; the only people more aggressive than them have been openly apostate.

 It’s been a year since Ms. Kelly was exed, let’s see what she has to say: (more…)

Breitbart reports two things, from the Census Bureau:

“Racial and ethic minorities children under the age of five are now the majority…”

And

“More whites dying than being born.”

Insofar as Mormon theology implies a rejection of the classical metaphyics of a disembodied God outside of space and time; it seems to imply a different infinite: that space is infinite.

Because for there to be significance, there must be permanence, and permanence requires permanence of memory.

Since memory must occupy space, and there must be scope for progression; then space must not be limited – space must be infinite so that a growing reality can always accomodate permanent cumulative memories.

Either we must be always expanding into infinity; or else breaking into new infinities – those new universes of the King Follett dicourse, perhaps.

But, whenever we find ourselves referencing infinities; we should recognise that we have crossed the edge of our understanding.

For mainstream Christian theologians, the primary act of creation is making the stuff of everything; for Mormons it is perhaps the shaping of pre-existent stuff- the making of form.

But perhaps God’s primary purpose was neither of these – but to bring the stuff of existence into a relation – each with every other. Because, naturally, there is no coherence – only chaos. (more…)

The tragic vision of Mormon Christianity has four dimensions.

The first tragedy is that growth can only come through suffering and death.

The second tragedy is that free will means people can choose with finality to reject God and damn themselves.

The third tragedy is the tragedy that those we love can only grow through suffering and death and sometimes choose not to grow. Love holds us hostage to them, and it has to, or else it wouldn’t be love.

The fourth tragedy is that people miss out on growth that they are capable of, because they refuse to take the steps that would get them there. And perhaps nothing can be done about this.

That fourth tragedy deserves a little explanation. (more…)

I mean this in the Platonic sense. A computer trained to recognized squirrels, by being shown a huge number of examples of squirrel versus not-squirrel, was instructed to draw an image of a squirrel. So this is the computer’s notion of an ideal squirrel.

Occam is looking better all the time. Or Turing is looking worse.

h/t Joseph Hertzlinger

You’re doing it right.

I think stark, raving, and nuts are all thoroughly covered here.

*sigh*

Kids just don’t listen. I’ve told her over and over that it was all Tarkin’s fault, that the man was insane, but she just doesn’t want to hear it.

One of the most important and fruitful branches of higher mathematics is group theory. And one of the most fruitful branches of group theory is the theory of Lie groups and the associated symmetries.

(more…)

Thomas Traherne (1636-74) was an English Christian ‘mystical’ writer, whose prose is of unsurpassed beauty (not just my opinion – but this is what CS Lewis said; who had perhaps read more English prose than anyone of his generation).

Traherne – specifically in his prose-poems ‘Centuries of Meditations’ – might be exceptionally appealing and valuable to Mormons.

Appealing because the strongest theme for the reader, the subject of his most incandescent and memorable writing, is the natural innocence and holiness of childhood: a theme which was heretical in the Anglicanism of Traherne’s era, but which fits exactly with Mormon theology.

And valuable, in perhaps encouraging the enormous latent possibilities for Mormon ‘mystical’ writing about the everyday.

In a nutshell, Traherne could be regarded the apotheosis of the Junior Ganymede tag: On the sweetness of Mormon life!

Further reading and references:

http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=traherne

The illustration is by William Arkle and can be found at:

http://shepton.org/page/the-paintings-of-william-arkle

God is within us as well as without us: He is within us, built-into us, because we are His children.

(A mortal analogy would be that every child contains his parents’ DNA – thus, each of us contains ‘God’s DNA’.)

Perhaps this fact is neglected in our spiritual lives? (more…)

At least according to this report. (more…)