Welcome back to the True Blue Mormon Podcast!

At 3:18, Will gives a mea culpa for mixing up his Book of Mormon antichrists, but makes up for it by following up on some his thoughts from Episode 3 about Satan’s plan and why our interpretation of it matters.

At 20:32 we discuss the recent retirement of Anthony Kennedy, and why the Supreme Court matters to Mormons, including a discussion at 41:40 about freedom of religion for institutions like BYU.

Errata: at 39:14 MC says that Justice Gorsuch wrote a concurrence on free speech grounds in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case with Justice Thomas joining. The opinion was actually written by Thomas, with Gorsuch joining. Just keeping you listeners on your toes!

This book is being recommended by our local stake and ward leadership:

Crucial Conversations: Tools for talking when the stakes are high.
by Patterson, Grenny, et. al.
ISBN: 978-0-07-177132-0
Available used on Amazon for around $7 including shipping. (I’m intentionally leaving out links.)

The stake pres works for a Fortune 500 company, so if he didn’t pick it up through church-channels, I suspect he got turned on to it there.  (more…)

Thank-you to the guys who encouraged me on the back-channel email list to post the previous Sociality blog post, because it elicited Ron’s sagacious comment.

I’ve been having “What the use?” feelings/thoughts about my BoM-slinging project. Many seeds have been planted, but no fruitful, or even apparently healthy plants have sprung up. 

But I have continued in offering people Bibles and copies of the Book of Mormon, in at least a lackluster way (compared to the almost daily encounters of the mid-oughts), due to having to “obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul.” (Hat tip to G for turning me on to that memorable line from a Calvin and Hobbes comic strip.)

But, it’s the occasional spiritual prompting (when obeyed) that results in a “Wow-moment” kind of encounter that actually confirms to me that the overall project is still a bona-fide one, and not just the random misfiring of my brain cells.

The second half of G’s recent post, which is on Elder Packer’s talk about effects across generations, reminded me that obvious or big results may take a generation or more to be obvious or big. (more…)

(Update, July 21, 2018: They raised the price. It’s no longer free, so I don’t recommend it any more.)

In the style of Monty Python, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and P. G. Wodehouse, a Kindle ebook that is free for at least a while.  When I got the first belly-laugh from a Wodehousian line in a Pythonesque scene,  I knew I had to recommend it.  The author may even be copying MP, HGttG and PGW a little too closely. (more…)

Hard truths:

(more…)

From Thomas Sowell

(Part 1. Part 2.)

I’ve been cogitating about sociality/insularity on the ward level as it relates to attracting and retaining investigators and converts. 

My thesis is that some wards aren’t getting investigators and converts because, collectively, the ward can’t handle (properly receive and care for) investigators and converts.

It also ties into my light-versus-heat observation in a comment somewhere. The saints are a pretty righteous people, but there’s something missing in the warmth/heat category at some chapels on Sundays. Too many come in late, or at the last second, and leave at the first opportunity. The only people who sit with investigators are the missionaries; etc.

Am I putting too much emphasis on chapel-socializing? (more…)

Search for Miriam Grossman on Youtube and watch a couple of her videos.  One of her famous books is “You’re Teaching my child WHAT?  :  A Physician Exposes the Lies of Sex Ed and How They Harm Your Child.”  You can see/hear the gist of it in a couple of videos of her talks.  She laid the groundwork, at least for me, in explaining how libertinism is bad psychology. (more…)

Historian Michael Vlahos has been talking to radio show host John Batchelor about the New American Civil War for quite some time.  

That link takes you to Audio Boom, where you can listen or download. Batchelor’s radio show (on WABC) is also available via podcast via Itunes.

New Jersey drops all pretenses:

http://dailycaller.com/2018/07/02/new-jersey-state-funded-media/

At least with NPR, CPB, etc, there was a veneer of it being “educational” or “artistic,” and “for the children.”

Cushing ran down the last of his guns to the battle-line.
The rest had been smashed to scrap by Lee’s artillery fire.
He held his guts in his hand as the charge came up the wall
And his gun spoke out for him once before he fell to the ground.

–From the only true epic poem to come out of America

  …weird little origami-looking Japanese bikes that sound like a really pissed-off kitchen appliance

Thank goodness.