Details regarding the approaching 2025 FAIR conference can be found here. I hope to see you there, although it’s very likely that I won’t be speaking on the topic that’s currently listed for me online. I’m not even sure where that title came from. Did I suggest it? If I did, I don’t remember it. I also hope to see you at this coming Saturday’s second (and last) day of the Interpreter Foundation symposium on “Abraham and His Family... Read more
We conducted a very good series of lengthy and substantial interviews today at the Church History Library, which sits directly to the east of the Conference Center, directly to the northeast of Temple Square. The interviews, of course, are for the Interpreter Foundation’s forthcoming series of short video features, which are being produced under the title of Becoming Brigham. Our first was with Matthew Godfrey, the Senior Managing Historian for Outreach and Engagement in the Church History Department of... Read more
I wrote the other day regarding the approval of a temple in Texas about which considerable and acrimonious controversy has swirled. (See “Quick Thoughts Occasioned by the Fairview Texas Temple.”) I’ve received some email responses to my position and I’ve seen some online reactions to the agreement that has evidently been reached, and I think that I want to reply to them, very briefly and perhaps only on a single point. The Fairview city council has evidently suggested —... Read more
I’m obviously very late with calling attention to them — see below for the reason behind my delay — but these items went up on the website of the Interpreter Foundation on Friday afternoon, and I heartily commend them to your attention. Two of them appear in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship: “Anachronisms: Accidental Evidence in Book of Mormon Criticisms: Introduction,” written by Matthew Roper [Editor’s Note: We are pleased to present the Introduction from... Read more
Bukhara and Samarkand, where I’ve spent pretty much the past week, lie in what the West has long called Transoxiana (roughly, “beyond the [River] Oxus”). The name was first coined by Alexander the Great [“the Great”!) — or, anyway, by somebody in his entourage, in the fourth century BC. I’ve always been amused by the corresponding Arabic term for the area, which is Mā Warāʾ an-Nahr (ما وراء النهر, “what is beyond the river”). The corresponding Chinese term for the... Read more
Even over here in Uzbekistan, I’ve seen the report that, on a vote of 5-2, the city council of Fairview, Texas, has given grudging conditional approval for construction of a proposed Latter-day Saint temple in their small town, which is located in the greater Dallas-Fort Worth area. The approval comes after a lengthy and often rather acrimonious process that involved refusals, compromises by the Church, architectural modifications and reductions in size, and considerable commentary, not all of which was... Read more
Tuesday was the last day of the “Diplomacy of the Heart” conference. The morning began with a “breakfast conversation” led by Brent Bishop of the Sharetix Foundation on “Purposeful Planning: Aligning Values, Vision, and Action for a Fulfilled Life.” The first morning session was chaired by Gregory C. Hill, who is the Chief Administrative Officer and Dean of Faculty at the University of Utah’s Asia Campus, in Incheon, South Korea. (I had been unaware, until a couple of days... Read more
It’s difficult to overstate the historical and cultural importance of the place where I’m sitting at this very moment. For one thing, Samarkand is located on what has come to be called, quite famously, the “Silk Road.” The term was originally coined in German, in the nineteenth century, as die Seidenstraße. It entered English and other languages not long thereafter, although some prefer nowadays to term it — a little less attractively, I think — the “Silk Routes.” Why?... Read more
I was the respondent in the first full, public session of the conference today. (The overall conference title is “Diplomacy of the Heart: The Power of Intercultural Dialogue and Education in Peacebuilding.”) Given the fact, as discovered and announced over on the Peterson Obsession Board, that I’m a religious and cultural bigot and something of a white supremacist who despises all things non-Western, it’s not at all clear to me why I was invited to participate in such meetings.... Read more
Wow. I flew over Bandar Abbas on the night that this happened: “Massive explosion at Iranian port kills 14 and injures hundreds” The topic of fluctuations in religious faith and commitment continues to interest me: “Gen Z is finding religion. Why? 3 theories for Gen Z’s return to God and faith.” “The Plateau Of The Religious Nones Continues” “This Just In: Traditional Religion In The US Now ‘Obsolete’” I cannot imagine anybody who would deserve this award more than... Read more
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In