Do you worry about illegal immigration and porous borders?  Do you believe in God?   For centuries, people have had to suffer under such ghastly burdens.  But there’s good news!  A medical cure may be on the horizon!   “Scientists claim zapping brains with magnets can treat belief in God”   This article, written by the statistician William Briggs and kindly brought to my attention by Charles Steinman, points out a few of the problems in the study... Read more

    The latest Hamblin/Peterson column for the Deseret News:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865639218/Are-Halloweens-roots-evil-and-satanic.html     Read more

    Tariq Ramadan quoted this hadith from the Prophet Muhammad in his remarks tonight at the Utah Islamic Center:   “The strong man is not he who defeats his adversary by wrestling; the strong man is he who controls himself at a time of anger.”     Read more

    An entire week has passed without an article from Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture.  However, from its very deathbed, Interpreter has managed to publish one last piece:   http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/image-is-everything-pay-no-attention-to-the-man-behind-the-curtain/   Or maybe it’s not the last.   Maybe it’s nowhere near the last.   Whatever.   The danged thing was supposed to have been dead years ago.     Read more

    http://ldsmag.com/round-table-re-visiting-an-article-that-stirred-controversy/     Read more

    Tariq Ramadan is, very arguably, the most significant Muslim intellectual in Europe.  Tonight, though, he’ll be speaking in Sandy, at the Utah Islamic Center, which is located at 9000 South 225 West.   He’s here, I presume, in connection with the 2015 Parliament of the World’s Religions.  There’s no particular reason that he would recall it, but I chaired a panel discussion that included him at a plenary session of the 2009 Parliament, in Melbourne, Australia.   Space at... Read more

    Matthew 20:17-19 Mark 10:32-34 Luke 18:31-34   Luke’s comment, that the apostles “understood none of these things; this saying was hid from them, and they did not grasp what was said,” is puzzling.   Jesus’ statement seems perfectly clear, entirely straightforward.  There’s nothing in it that’s difficult to grasp, conceptually.  It’s not Hegel or Kant.   So what does it mean that they didn’t understand or grasp what Jesus was saying?   I suppose that one possibility is... Read more

    Wow.  Here’s a bracingly frank statement of a perennial Christian viewpoint:   http://www.theblaze.com/contributions/no-christianity-should-not-welcome-or-include-your-sinful-lifestyle/   Thanks to Bianca Lisonbee for bringing it to my attention.     Read more

    John 11:54-57   “Many went out of the country up to Jerusalem.”   I published a column in the Deseret News back on 30 April of this year about the seemingly mundane but quite important concept of “going up” to Jerusalem:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865627563/Going-up-to-Jerusalem.html?pg=all     Read more

        http://gazette.com/parliament-of-world-religions-convenes-in-mormon-country-at-last/article/1561261   I was intending to head up to the Parliament tonight — I’d been invited to a reception there — but, at the last minute, reality intervened.  (For one thing, I teach until 5:30 PM.  And I didn’t get a neat launch even then.  And, finally, what with needing dinner and considering traffic on I-15 and etc., I concluded that I’d get there just about in time to park, get out of my car, find... Read more