A new sociological study strongly suggests that churches that teach a fairly literal reading of scripture and that proclaim faith in a God who actually intervenes in the real world in response to prayer do better, on the whole, at retaining members and even growing than do more liberal churches:   http://www.weeklystandard.com/new-study-ties-church-attendance-to-conservative-theology/article/2005468   https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/17/literal-interpretation-of-bible-helps-increase-church-attendance   T’hat’s not altogether surprising, of course.  Already in 1972, Dean M. Kelley’s famous book Why Conservative Churches are Growing made a similar point.   Moreover,... Read more

    If nature leads us to mathematical forms of great simplicity and beauty—by forms I am referring to coherent systems of hypothesis, axioms, etc.—to forms that no one has previously encountered, we cannot help thinking that they are “true,” that they reveal a genuine feature of nature. . . . You must have felt this too: The almost frightening simplicity and wholeness of relationships which nature suddenly spreads out before us and for which none of us was in the least... Read more

    I’ve made it my policy to post nothing political on Sundays and to try to avoid political conversations, whether on this blog or on Facebook, on that day.   I feel especially strongly about my policy this weekend.  For some reason, there’s been a great deal of passion and considerable unpleasantness over the past few days regarding politics.   One might have thought that, with the election behind us, things would get better.  But, instead, at least in my... Read more

      Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms. Aristotle (384-322 BC)     Read more

    http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/donald-trump-meets-rival-mitt-romney-he-races-fill-cabinet-n686241   http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/19/politics/donald-trump-mitt-romney-secretary-of-state/index.html   There’s no word yet about what, if anything, will come of the meeting.  But it does appear (from the clues given in the articles) to have centered on world affairs and foreign policy, which seems to strengthen the notion that the position of Secretary of State might indeed be in play.  And it might be significant that Mike Pence, the Vice-President-Elect, was also there.   We’ll see.  I’m ambivalent.     Read more

    Way back in 1952, Hugh Nibley published this little parable about the Book of Mormon in his book Lehi in the Desert and the World of the Jadeites.  It still seems to me to fit a great many responses to the Book of Mormon (and, for that matter, to the Book of Abraham):   A young man once long ago claimed he had found a large diamond in his field as he was ploughing. He put the stone on display... Read more

    Jeff Lindsay provides his own summary or note on his most recent article in Interpreter:   http://mormanity.blogspot.com/2016/11/dusting-off-chiasmus-in-alma-36-loose.html     Read more

    I’m not a fan of “political correctness.”  I think that Barack Obama’s failure to be clear about the threat poised by extremist political Islam has been detrimental to American policy.  I favor candid speech.   But I want it to be accurate, to the maximum extent possible.   And the link below was supplied to me by a person who leans strongly leftward (even hard leftward), so I don’t take it as the final word on this matter:... Read more

    Thanks to Mary Thompson Vogwell for alerting me (a few days back) to this interview with Never-Trumper Glenn Beck, who must be a secret agent of the New World Order or something:   http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/15/politics/glenn-beck-bannon-appointment-white-nationalists-anderson-cooper/index.html     Read more

    The study of science is the study of something eternal. If we study astronomy, we study the works of God. If we study chemistry, geology, optics, or any other branch of science, every new truth we come to the understanding of is eternal; it is a part of the great system of universal truth. It is truth that exists throughout universal nature; and God is the dispenser of all truth. Orson Pratt, Journal of Discourses 7:157 (12 February... Read more