{"id":39262,"date":"2017-01-19T23:21:58","date_gmt":"2017-01-20T06:21:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=39262"},"modified":"2017-01-20T12:01:47","modified_gmt":"2017-01-20T19:01:47","slug":"can-come-home-now-steve-smoot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/01\/can-come-home-now-steve-smoot.html","title":{"rendered":"You can come home now, Steve Smoot!"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_39263\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-39263\" style=\"width: 597px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2017\/01\/Quiet_Winter_Evening_Toronto.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-39263\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-39263\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2017\/01\/Quiet_Winter_Evening_Toronto.jpg\" alt=\"A winter evening in Toronto's High Park\" width=\"597\" height=\"448\"><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-39263\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">High Park, Toronto, on\u00a0a hot summer day in\u00a02004 \u00a0(Wikimedia Commons)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Permit me to introduce two people to you.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The first is\u00a0Stephen Smoot. \u00a0He is an exceptionally bright and relatively recent graduate of Brigham Young University. \u00a0He\u2019s\u00a0currently pursuing studies\u00a0in Egyptology at the University of Toronto. \u00a0He\u2019s also been, among other things, a significant contributor to both\u00a0<em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mormoninterpreter.com\/author\/stephens\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture<\/a><\/em>\u00a0and <a href=\"https:\/\/bookofmormoncentral.org\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Book of Mormon Central<\/a> and a participant in a substantial number of the Interpreter Foundation\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mormoninterpreter.com\/category\/scripture-roundtable\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">scripture roundtables<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The second character is one of the more bizarre\u00a0residents in my menagerie of obsessive anonymous internet critics. \u00a0(So far as I\u2019m aware, he and I have never met.) \u00a0Among this oddball\u2019s\u00a0signature activities are such things as fabricating ridiculous\u00a0statements\u00a0and attributing them to me, pretending to be a currently-serving but unbelieving bishop, claiming\u00a0to have traveled internationally with me in order to record\u00a0my various stupidities and misdeeds, publicly apologizing for my sundry gross offenses against humanity, and sorrowfully\u00a0lamenting\u00a0the many innocent lives that I\u2019ve blighted and ruined.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s his latest, referring to the academic discipline of Egyptology. \u00a0He and his small but credulous audience\u00a0have decided that the subject is worthless to society and that studying it guarantees\u00a0disaster\u00a0for Stephen Smoot:<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>Daniel C. Peterson really tried hard to encourage and push young Smoot into this field.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>Another life\/career destroyed by Daniel C. Peterson. What a shame.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This critic\u2019s\u00a0claim has finally pricked my long dormant conscience, so I\u2019m posting an open\u00a0letter to Stephen Smoot:<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>Stephen:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>Do you remember all those conversations we had, in which I tried to persuade you to do graduate work in Egyptology? \u00a0(Don\u2019t feel bad\u00a0if you can\u2019t, because I can\u2019t either. \u00a0Not a single one.)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>I understand, though, that it\u2019s really, really cold now in Toronto, and I\u2019m beginning to feel terribly guilty about having\u00a0forced\u00a0you to move there. \u00a0I want you to know that you can come back to Utah at any time. \u00a0I\u2019ve decided to abandon\u00a0my efforts to pressure you into becoming an Egyptologist. \u00a0You\u2019re welcome to study absolutely anything you choose. \u00a0I hope that, someday, you can find it in your heart to forgive me.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\"><span style=\"color: #800000;\"><strong>-dcp<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0 \u00a0 Permit me to introduce two people to you. \u00a0 The first is\u00a0Stephen Smoot. \u00a0He is an exceptionally bright and relatively recent graduate of Brigham Young University. \u00a0He\u2019s\u00a0currently pursuing studies\u00a0in Egyptology at the University of Toronto. \u00a0He\u2019s also been, among other things, a significant contributor to both\u00a0Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture\u00a0and Book of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>You can come home now, Steve Smoot!<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"&nbsp; &nbsp; Permit me to introduce two people to you. &nbsp; The first is\u00a0Stephen Smoot. \u00a0He is an exceptionally bright and relatively recent graduate\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/01\/can-come-home-now-steve-smoot.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"You can come home now, Steve Smoot!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&nbsp; &nbsp; Permit me to introduce two people to you. &nbsp; The first is\u00a0Stephen Smoot. \u00a0He is an exceptionally bright and relatively recent graduate\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/01\/can-come-home-now-steve-smoot.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sic et Non\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-01-20T06:21:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-01-20T19:01:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/files\/2017\/01\/Quiet_Winter_Evening_Toronto.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dan Peterson\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/01\/can-come-home-now-steve-smoot.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2017\/01\/can-come-home-now-steve-smoot.html\",\"name\":\"You can come home now, Steve Smoot!\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2017-01-20T06:21:58+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-01-20T19:01:47+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/#\/schema\/person\/77113e9b09701bd1599fa272c4f65045\"},\"description\":\"&nbsp; 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