Why I Am A Mormon, Part IV (Temples)
When I was in my last year of graduate school at Berkeley, I was given the opportunity to teach a class I had designed on the various meanings of genealogy in American literature. I was intent on...
View ArticleMormonism, Cosmology, and Environmental Stewardship
I just returned from a marvelous gathering at the Yale Divinity School where scholars and theologians met to discuss the story of the origins of the universe and of life on earth, as told by...
View ArticleReview: First Principles and Ordinances: The Fourth Article of Faith in Light...
Sam Brown has written an important and beautiful book. Every Mormon serious about deepening their understanding of their most fundamental commitments should read it, and any Mormon who feels adrift in...
View ArticleIf Truth Were A Child
We live in the age of polemics. Choices are presented to us as mutually exclusive, and you are not given the time to listen, to be reflective and careful in your judgment, or to acknowledge nuance and...
View ArticleExperience and Understanding
Two friends recently independently mentioned to me that it seems that at every turn, their friends and family, many of whom have left or are leaving the church, are expecting them to have an answer for...
View ArticleThe Hope of Stewardship: A Review of Joseph Spencer’s For Zion: A Mormon...
There are those who are infected by nostalgia and yearn for a nineteenth-century Mormonism because, I suppose, they imagine that the prophets then seemed more willing to condemn capitalism or to preach...
View ArticleTheology, Ecology, and the Word: Notes from Halki Summit, Part I
I have arrived this week for the Halki Summit II, a meeting co-sponsored by the Patriarch Bartholomew and Southern New Hampshire University at the island of Halki off of the coast of Istanbul. The...
View ArticleTheology, Ecology, and the Word: Notes from Halki Summit, Part II
I have a few things to report that deserve commentary from the Halki Summit II co-sponsored by the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of the Orthodox Church and Southern New Hampshire University. It is...
View ArticleTheology, Ecology, and the Word: Notes from Halki Summit, Part III
The Halki Summit ended after a provocative and fruitful discussion of the role the arts can play in helping religious cultures to address climate change. I still think the most impassioned and well...
View ArticleThe Sabbath Day and Earth Stewardship
The LDS Church has recently rolled out new training for members about the central importance of the importance of observance of the Sabbath Day and of the sacrament. My thoughts here are inspired by...
View ArticleThe Quest for Renewal and the Religious Life
There is a paradox at the heart of the practice of religion. Religion is designed to produce rich experiences of spirituality both individually and in communities—experiences that are often...
View ArticleOn the Spiritual Joy of Academic Work
(Adapted from comments I shared recently with the College of Humanities at BYU) Grading, I am convinced, is a circle in hell. And maybe an even deeper circle in hell is dealing with student complaints...
View ArticleLed by Revelation
It is a clear and central tenet of Mormon belief that we are led by revelation, by living prophets. It is less clear perhaps to everyone what this means. I know it probably baffles many of my academic...
View ArticleMy Journey as a Scholar of Faith, Part I
I was invited by the Faculty Center to share my journey as a scholar of faith. I share here, in three parts, the content of the talk. I have wrestled with my feelings these past few weeks because I am...
View ArticleMy Journey as a Scholar of Faith, Part II
My first experiences with criticism, compassion and charity were in family life at home. As Mormons, we lived as a very small minority outside of New York. We were taught to love human diversity and...
View ArticleMy Journey as a Scholar of Faith, Part III
I wouldn’t have gone to Stanford, majored in Comparative Literature, or taken my career path as a professor without my brother Bill’s example, encouragement, and brilliance that lighted every step of...
View ArticleThe Gift of Friendship
I can remember my mother’s boisterous laugh when I was a little boy. I can remember my older brothers teasing me at the ripe age of five about a girl I liked who lived next door. I remember us...
View ArticleOn Disagreements at Church
Tone can make a great difference in how effectively we communicate, especially when we are trying to offer correction or criticism. We might be right and we might have the truth on our side, but if we...
View ArticleLiterature and the Art of Friendship
I didn’t ever expect that in 2016 we would be struggling as a nation with the very idea of the universal brotherhood of God’s family. Of course, I expected that we would still have difficulty rising up...
View ArticleObedience as Gratitude
(This is a talk I gave at this year’s Women’s Conference at Brigham Young University.) For Thanksgiving each of us in the family has to make a pie—because you can never have too many pies—and this year...
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