“Why are the heavens silent?”

Episode 2o in the Interpreter Foundation’s series of mini-documentaries has now gone up online: Becoming Brigham, Episode 20 — Why are the Heavens Silent?  Initially, Episode 21 had appeared on Meridian Magazine, out of sequence.  But that has now been corrected, and Episode 21 will go up a week from today.  (There is method in our madness.)

I hope that you’re watching, enjoying, and spreading the word about these short video lessons — today’s installment is less than eleven minutes long — in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

And this item, written by Kyler Rasmussen, went up today on the website of the Interpreter Foundation:  “Interpreting Interpreter: Evaluating Zelph”:

This post is a summary of the article “A Scientific Evaluation of the Zelph Revelation” by Jerry D. Grover Jr. in Volume 69 of Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship. All of the Interpreting Interpreterarticles may be seen at https://interpreterfoundation.org/category/summaries/. An introduction to the Interpreting Interpreter series is available at https:/interapreterfoundation.org/interpreting-interpreter-on-abstracting-thought/.

A video introduction to this Interpreter article is now available on all of our social media channels, including on YouTube at https://youtube.com/shorts/0j_W7UEqgGk.

The Takeaway: Grover outlines what we know and can infer about the story of Zelph, suggesting the information provided by Joseph could fit in an authentic historical setting, and that the events he described are unlikely to be connected with the Book of Mormon.

As membership retention and membership attrition in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints continue to be burning topics of discussion online (and probably elsewhere), this article, written by Justin Dyer, is essential reading:  “Opinion: Moving from a deficit-oriented to a data-driven perspective on Latter-day Saints: A BYU Studies report collects data from Harvard, the Pew Research Center and others to share a more complete picture of Latter-day Saint faith, well-being and retention.”  I hope, eventually, to get to the BYU Studies article on which it draws.

A week ago Sunday, I announced a prize (the precise nature of which still remains to be determined) for the zaniest answers to the following urgently burning questions about my just-completed trip to Discovery Bay, Washington, out on the Olympic Peninsula:

1. For what disreputable purpose is Peterson now in the State of Washington?
2. What specific unhealthy foods is Peterson consuming in mass quantities during his stay?
3. Whom did Peterson defraud and/or browbeat into paying his expenses for this trip?
4. How does his being in the State of Washington once again demonstrate him to be both depraved and a buffoon?

As I explained, the competition was principally designed to gratify the interests of the folks at the Peterson Obsession Board, although participation wasn’t restricted to them.  All, I said, were welcome to propose answers to the questions.  Even sane people.

I’m now in a position to reveal the true and factual answers to the four questions that I posed and that are reproduced above without alteration:

• For what disreputable purpose was Peterson up in the State of Washington?

With his wife, two second-generation units, and a tag-along third-generation unit, Peterson traveled to Port Townsend, Washington, in order to empty out the storage unit of one of the 2GUs and thereupon to drive its contents to a temporary location in Utah. (The names and genders and other identifying information of the others involved in this disreputable operation have been concealed so as to protect them, insofar as such protection is even possible, from exploitation and weaponization by the holy warriors of the Peterson Obsession Board.)  That, at least is the cover story.  At this early stage of the investigation, it remains impossible to know what the real motive for the journey was.

• What specific unhealthy foods did Peterson consume in mass quantities during his stay?

Unbelievably, Peterson ate food during every single day of his trip to, from, and in Washington.  For example, he consumed cereal in the morning and then, in the evening, some seafood (it being an area surrounded by seawater), and, one night, a couple of tacos.  Weird and indefensible stuff like that.  For those who may be eager to invest the research time to acquire more detailed information on his food intake, the Peterson crime family’s receipts from local eateries and grocery stores are probably still retrievable from area landfills, along with the relevant packaging materials (where relevant).  It’s conceivable that items connected with specific members of the clan can still be distinguished from one another on the basis of residual DNA.

• Whom did Peterson defraud and/or browbeat into paying his expenses for the trip?

This is a silly question.  The fact that Peterson fraudulently financed this trip isn’t a matter of induction from particular empirical data.  Rather, it’s a conclusion that inescapably follows by logical deduction from (a) his low character and (b) the sheer fact that he took the trip.  As President Trump explained to Kristen Welker of NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday when she rudely suggested that no evidence exists to demonstrate that the 2020 presidential election was rigged and that the California gubernatorial primary and the Los Angeles mayoral primary are currently being stolen, “All I have to do is look, and I listen.”

• How does his having been in the State of Washington once again demonstrate Peterson to be both depraved and a buffoon?

Seriously?  How does anything about his trip to Washington fail to prove him both a buffoon and depraved?  Really.  Come on.  If you’re not willing to play the game, just get out of the building.  Of course, you’ll first need to obtain Dr. Arkham’s signature on your discharge papers.  And be sure to pick up your street clothes and your personal effects at the guard desk on the way out.