I published this Christmas-oriented column three years ago in the Deseret News:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865591818/Pleased-as-man-with-men-to-dwell.html?pg=all     Read more

    I intend to join in this effort.  I hope that you will, too:   http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/church-launches-light-the-world-christmas-initiative     Read more

    1 Now the Philistines gathered together their armies to battle, and were gathered together at Shochoh, which belongeth to Judah, and pitched between Shochoh and Azekah, in Ephes-dammim.  2 And Saul and the men of Israel were gathered together, and pitched by the valley of Elah, and set the battle in array against the Philistines.  3 And the Philistines stood on a mountain on the one side, and Israel stood on a mountain on the other side: and there was a valley between them.  4 ¶And... Read more

    It completely slipped my mind, as I spent almost all of the day in airports and on airplanes, but I had a little article published yesterday in Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture.   Once again, the hopes of certain critics were dashed.  We’ll probably miss a week of publication sometime.  It’s bound to happen.  But it hasn’t happened yet.     Read more

    Fidel Castro has been a prominent figure in my consciousness for as long as I — even I, now far advanced into my own dotage — can remember.  He became the ruler of Cuba in 1959.   I’ve never understood why so many in the West found him cute, even inspirational.  I’ve never understood the chic and closely related of Che Guevara.  Fidel and Che created a murderous and oppressive tyranny that is still a blight on Cuba itself... Read more

    My friend and former BYU colleague Bill Hamblin and I write a jointly authored column that appears in the Deseret News every other Saturday.  The most recent installment was published this morning:   http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865667931/Two-Majorcan-saints-with-very-different-origins.html?pg=all     Read more

    This is an especially interesting area of contemporary astronomy:   http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21710789-finding-exoplanets-has-become-routine-next-step-try-photograph     Read more

    “Act as if what you do makes a difference.  It does.” William James (1842-1910)     Read more

    “Truly, God will not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves.”  (Qur’an 13:11)   I like this thought.   And it seems to me to work well in dialogue with a comment made by President Ezra Taft Benson during his October 1985 conference address:   “The Lord works from the inside out.  The world works from the outside in.  The world would take people out of the slums.  Christ takes the slums out... Read more

    We’re just barely past Thanksgiving, and, already, some critics of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are rolling out their annual claim that Mormons celebrate “Smithmas,” the birthday of the Prophet Joseph Smith (23 December), with more enthusiasm and vigor than they celebrate the mainstream Christian holiday of Christmas.   For many, I think it’s just a rather bitter and not particularly funny joke.  Some, though, seem to take the claim seriously — or, at least,... Read more