Yesterday, I cited the testimony of a “Mrs. Palmer,” who knew Joseph Smith in Palmyra.   Others agreed with Mrs. Palmer in their judgments about Joseph’s character. “I knew all of the Smith family well,” said the non-Mormon Orlando Saunders. “They have all worked for me many a day. They were very good people. Young Joe (as we called him then) has worked for me, and he was a good worker; they all were.”[1] “My father,” recalled Joseph... Read more

    Wow.  Without intending to do it, of course, this article actually provokes some theological reflections in me:   https://medienportal.univie.ac.at/presse/aktuelle-pressemeldungen/detailansicht/artikel/reducing-our-own-pain-is-also-reducing-empathy-for-pain-in-others/   I need to learn more about the study upon which it’s based, but it seems to me to have some potential bearing upon the purpose of our entire learning experience here in mortality.   And perhaps it’s not unconnected with the incarnation and atonement of the Savior himself:   And behold, he shall be born of Mary, at Jerusalem which is... Read more

    “It is never too late to be what you might have been.”  (George Eliot)   Posted from New York City     Read more

    It seems that the Lord doesn’t take dictation from newspaper commentators, bloggers, and academics, nor even from political correctness and ethnic quotas.   I’m especially delighted with the appointment of Elder Stevenson, whom I knew slightly before his call as a General Authority and even as a mission president in Nagoya, Japan — where one of my sons served under him.   I was actually in the underground lobby of the Church Administration Building when he and his wife... Read more

    We spent the bulk of yesterday (Friday) at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum at “Ground Zero,” where the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center once stood.  (The Pope was there at the Memorial and Museum about a week ago.)   At first, I found it interesting, and, of course, more than a little sobering.  But then we reached a portion — it’s much bigger than I had at first realized — that was absolutely moving.... Read more

    Kevin Taylor reminds me of this wonderful letter from Hugh Nibley to Sterling McMurrin, a philosophy professor at the University of Utah and an old sparring partner of Professor Nibley’s whose religious views could be described as, at most, non-orthodox Mormon — or, perhaps more accurately, as agnostic:   https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SpEu5zputSwuA-QG6WTiRM7MpUuVjzMmTsfpo7zbgpk/edit#heading=h.arolcxe0i15c   Posted from New York City     Read more

    The Islamic State is now being hammered by both Iran and Russia, as the realities of power in the Middle East shift dramatically:   http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/10/03/russian-warplanes-strike-central-and-northern-syria-in-new-raids/?intcmp=hplnws   Posted from New York City   Read more

    Opposition to the Smith family, well beyond opposition to Joseph Smith himself, began early, as friends turned against them. Lucy Mack Smith, with her two sons Hyrum and Samuel, had joined the Presbyterian Church. Some time later, during the printing of the Book of Mormon, a delegation came from their church, intending to persuade them to disavow the book. The spokesman for the group first addressed the mother. But he received no satisfaction from her. “Deacon Beckwith,” Lucy said,... Read more

    This is a really stimulating (and brief) article.  It’s not often that one sees criticism of the very idea of such things as the Nobel Prize.  But the author’s case is intriguing and worthy of consideration, though I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for such exalted awards to be abolished:   http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/03/opinion/the-folly-of-big-science-awards.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fscience&_r=1   And I think its argument works equally well against the fetishization (that I’ve observed in some quarters) of membership in the elite National Academy of Sciences... Read more

    It’s likely that one or more new apostles will be announced this weekend (probably today) at the October general conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.   A look at one ancient method used to fill an apostolic vacancy seemed appropriate, in that light, for this weekend’s Hamblin/Peterson column in the Deseret News:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865638130/The-casting-of-lots-in-ancient-Israel.html   Posted from New York City     Read more