One of my regrets about our visits to Switzerland this summer has been that, for varied reasons, we’ve been unable to attend a session in Switzerland’s temple, which is roughly sixty to ninety minutes’ drive from where we’ve stayed in Grindelwald.   The importance of the Bern Switzerland Temple isn’t limited to the fact that it was the first temple in Europe, nor even that it was the first to be built away from any center of concentrated Mormon population... Read more

    The most prominent Muslim intellectual in Europe, beyond any real doubt, is the Swiss-born Tariq Ramadan:   Tariq Ramadan Official Website   His effectiveness as a spokesman and thought-leader in the West comes from the fact that, although deeply Islamic, he is also natively Western, intellectually as well as literally.  (His doctoral dissertation was on the Swiss-born philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.)   A number of years ago, in Melbourne, Australia, I chaired a plenary session at the Parliament of the... Read more

      I can think of few gifts more meaningful than this one:   http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/california-lawmakers-celebrate-juneteenth-with-family-history-event   Seriously.  Only somebody who is seriously, seriously jaded could fail to be moved by it and to take interest in it.  We all care about our families.  We all want to know where we come from.   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

    Interesting.  Some of his quirks seem potentially helpful.  Some others . . .  well, not so much:   http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170612-what-you-can-learn-from-einsteins-quirky-habits   Albert Einstein, by the way, acquired Swiss citizenship, received his education in mathematics and physics at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich, and formulated his “special theory of relativity” (among many other significant things) while working as a clerk in the Swiss patent office in Bern, roughly an hour’s drive from where I sit looking at nearby... Read more

    “The word ‘happy’ would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.” “Man needs difficulties; they are necessary for health.”  Carl Jung   “For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. . . .” “[Had Adam and Eve not fallen] they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.” 2 Nephi 2:11, 23   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland   Read more

    I’m glad that this has been done:   http://www.heraldextra.com/sanpete-county/news/discovery-road-episode-honors-sen-bob-bennett/article_d231f832-3cff-515b-8371-5005125b1a60.html   Over his time in office, I had just a few personal meetings and experiences with the late Senator Bob Bennett (R-UT).  But he impressed me deeply during those conversations.   For one thing, he was a committed supporter of BYU’s Middle Eastern Texts Initiative, which I founded and led until I was forced out of it in 2012-2013.   For another, knowing that the Middle East would be... Read more

    Something for your weekend from Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture:   http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/the-book-of-mormon-versus-the-consensus-of-scholars-surprises-from-the-disputed-longer-ending-of-mark-part-1/   Please do enjoy it.   Posted from Grindelwald, Switzerland     Read more

    My father died fourteen years ago today.   I still miss him very much.  I think about him every day.  Certain sights always, invariably, remind me of him.  There are many things that I would like to tell him, many questions that I would like to ask of him.   I brought him and my mother here to the Berner Oberland — my favorite landscape in the world — when they came to pick me up at the end... Read more

    This could be very helpful for, among others, people living in the vicinity of Vesuvius, near Naples:   http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/bulges-in-volcanoes-could-be-used-to-predict-eruptions   Posted from Barcelona, Spain     Read more

    This is a nice profile of the remarkable Sharon Eubank:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865683895/Sharon-Eubanks-leap-of-faith-led-her-to-LDS-Charities-Relief-Society-general-leadership.html   Her address at the 2014 FairMormon conference was one of the best-received presentations ever given there:   “This is a Woman’s Church”   She also provided the 2016 Christmas message for Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture:   http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/author/sharone/   Posted from Barcelona, Spain     Read more