http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865644770/Mormon-background-helped-5-BYU-grads-make-list-of-worlds-50-most-important-management-thinkers.html?pg=all   I pass over in humble silence the fact that two of the five are represented on “Mormon Scholars Testify” (here and here) and that one of them recently contributed the Interpreter Foundation’s 2015 Christmas message.     Read more

    Just a couple of quick notes about today’s reading, in 1 Nephi 10:   1.   The prophecy recorded here of the coming of Jesus is strikingly exact, including the intervening Babylonian captivity of the Jews and their return, the number of years still ahead between Lehi’s own time and the advent of the Savior, the forerunner role of John the Baptist, and so forth.   Yet it’s also struck me that some of the language is curiously tentative (e.g.,... Read more

    On Saturday, 12 March 2016, the Interpreter Foundation will host a conference on science and religion on the campus of Brigham Young University.   Full program details are nearly finalized and will be forthcoming, but I can tell you that the keynote speaker will be Guy Consolmagno, S.J., director of the Vatican Observatory and winner of the 2014 Carl Sagan Medal.  His lecture title is “Astronomy, God, and the Search for Elegance.”   Another speaker will be the... Read more

    “I have never met a person whose greatest need was anything other than real, unconditional love.  You can find it in a simple act of kindness toward someone who needs help.  There is no mistaking love. . . .  It is the common fiber of life, the flame that heats our soul, energizes our spirit, and supplies passion to our lives.” Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (1926-2004)   Read more

    http://thefederalist.com/2015/12/31/dear-media-stop-trying-to-teach-christians-theology/   I think that this article makes a good and important basic point.  I’m quite sympathetic.  Journalists — many of them secularists — have little standing and few credentials for lecturing us on what constitutes true Christianity and real Christian discipleship.   That said, while I agree that the media should stop trying to define Christianity, I’m not very pleased with G. Shane Morris’s own attempt to do so, either:   I realize, for example, that Mr.... Read more

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/01/04/the-daily-202-mitt-romney-opens-up-on-his-doubts-about-jeb-bush/   I confess to having real reservations about the current Republican field.   Trump is an abomination.  Jeb Bush is effectively comatose.   Rubio would be okay with me, and perhaps Cruz (despite what I regard as mistaken and rather risky views on surveillance and national security), but neither has any demonstrated executive ability.   Ben Carson is a great fellow, but I see no reason why he should be president.   Carly Fiorina would probably be... Read more

    Well, the new semester — called Winter 2016 at BYU — has begun.  Yippee!   I’m routinely accused of writing on Mormon topics (and, especially, of defending Mormon claims) because I’m richly rewarded for doing so by the Church.  (I’ve even seen estimates putting my apologetic income in the seven figures!)  Actually, of course, my salary comes from being a professor of Islamic studies and Arabic at Brigham Young University.  That’s my actual job, and no part of... Read more

    But is life really better under Scandinavian-style socialism?   Maybe.  Or maybe not:   http://www.cato.org/publications/economic-development-bulletin/danish-model-dont-try-home#full     Read more

    It probably matters that I’ve been a major and very serious fan of J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis since high school, but I thought that this BYU devotional address by Elder Larry Y. Wilson, of the Seventy, was quite good:   http://www.byutv.org/watch/b27316ba-ff7e-4280-ac31-66d9127080a6/byu-devotional-address-elder-larry-y-wilson-12115     Read more

    http://www.plonialmonimormon.com/2015/12/quick-thoughts-from-patrick-mason-on.html     Read more