Visually Stunning

I want one of these. — Thanks to advanced modern technology and the support of a generous donor, the Interpreter Radio Show is now beamed directly to audiences on the moon — seen in the distance in this photograph from one of Interpreter’s communications campuses — where residents dress like Quakers and live to be a thousand years old. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Newly posted on the website of the Interpreter Foundation: Interpreter Radio Show — November 24, 2024, including The Book of Mormon in Context for Moroni 10

During the 24 November 2024 episode of the Interpreter Radio Show, Steve Densley and Scripture Central’s John Thompson hosted special guests Brant Gardner and Jeff Lindsay for a discussion of the recent book review articles that they published in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship — “Trust Us, We’re Lawyers: Lucas and Neville on the Translation of the Book of Mormon” and “Through a Glass Darkly: Restoring Translation to the Restoration?” — as well as of Come, Follow Me Book of Mormon lesson 51.

Their conversation was recorded and archived and it has now been made available for your enjoyment and delight, which will be considerably enhanced by the fact that commercial breaks have been edited out of the recording.

The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard every week of the year — every single week! — on Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640. Or else you can listen live on the Internet at ktalkmedia.com.

Austria, perhaps? — “St. Thomas Church on a winter morning” (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)
More than any other kind of landscape on earth, Alpine scenery such as this strikes me as a foretaste of heaven. And I love its music.

Every year since I launched this blog, I’ve called attention to some of my favorite Christmas music. Here’s a piece that’s at the top of my list:

I remember very clearly when and where the marvelous carol “Es ist ein Ros entsprungen” (often called in English “Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming”), which was given its classical form by the German composer Michael Praetorius in 1609 but which originated sometime before that, first hit me. (I suppose that it’s possible that I had heard the carol before, but, if I had, it hadn’t registered. Not even slightly.) I was attending a Latter-day Saint sacrament meeting in Interlaken, Switzerland, shortly before Christmas 1973. Almost exactly fifty-one years ago. Curiously, I don’t recall who sang the song. It may have been a branch or district choir.

I was enraptured. Transported. I had seldom, if ever, heard anything so beautiful in my entire life. And “Es ist ein Ros entsprungen” still affects me that way. The German lyrics vary slightly from one printing to another, but I offer here a representative version of the text:

Es ist ein Ros entsprungen,
aus einer Wurzel zart,
wie uns die Alten sungen,
von Jesse kam die Art.
Und hat ein Blümlein bracht
mitten im kalten Winter,
wohl zu der halben Nacht.

Das Röslein, das ich meine,
davon Isaias sagt,
hat uns gebracht alleine
Marie, die reine Magd.
Aus Gottes ew’gem Rat
hat sie ein Kind geboren
wohl zu der halben Nacht.

Das Blümelein, so kleine,
das duftet uns so süß,
mit seinem hellen Scheine
vertreibt’s die Finsternis.
Wahr Mensch und wahrer Gott
hilft uns aus allem Leide,
rettet von Sünd und Tod.

And here is a literal and quite unpoetic translation (partially my own) of the lyrics above:

A rose has sprung up,
from a tender root,
As the ancients sang to us.
Its line came from Jesse
And it has brought forth a small flower
In the middle of the cold winter,
In the middle of the night.

The little rose that I mean,
Of which Isaiah told,
Mary alone, the pure maid,
Has brought to us.
By God’s eternal counsel
She has borne a child
In the middle of the night.

The tiny flower, so small,
That smells so sweet to us,
With its bright gleam
Dispels the darkness
–True man and true God–
Helps us from all suffering,
Saves us from sin and death.

I’ve always loved the German lyrics. The English words just don’t move me as much — and not merely in the literal and unpoetic version supplied above. But the music is gorgeous in any language. Here’s one rendition of the song that I’ve enjoyed: “Es ist ein Ros Entsprungen”

I'll probably never own one. — Our vintage 2024 second car is beginning to look a little bit dusty and so, rather than take it to the car wash, my wife and I have been looking at a replacement from the same line of budget British imports. (The same company makes engines for jet aircraft.) Unfortunately, though, the asking price might oblige us to dip into our personal reserves of gold bullion, urban real estate, farmland, and crypto-currency. So I probably need to increase my fee for apologetics. But there’s little time, and our need is fairly pressing. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

An important note: I intend to post a Facebook fundraiser for the Interpreter Foundation tonight, with the idea that it go active tomorrow (Giving Tuesday). These Facebook fundraisers are no longer quite the wonderful deal that they used to be, but I think that many people find them convenient and, anyhow, they’re kinda fun. So I’m going to do it yet again this year. The optimal ways to give to Interpreter are outlined on the Foundation’s own website, at, appropriately enough, “Donating to the Interpreter Foundation.”

Intact families? Bah! Humbug! — If you’re looking for a single image that will effectively convey the uniquely toxic impact inflicted upon society by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, this one may well be it. Plainly, Utard — where vast mindless herds of Morgbots or Mor(m)ons roam almost unimpeded — is a kind of hellscape for women and children and other living things.

The graphic shown directly above should have clued you in already that it’s time now for the Christopher Hitchens Memorial “How Religion Poisons Everything” File™. Here are a few additional items to accompany it: