bluebell

When I was in Utah, we had two apostles attend our state conferences over the course of about 11 years. I think the ratio is pretty close to the same for the Stake we are currently living in in Wyoming. That probably changes the further away you get from Salt Lake City.

Or even just presenting options would be a good thing I think. I remember the old institute lesson manuals that were adamantly anti-evolution. I understand the nuance behind why they went that direction pretty well, but we aren't still going that direction today. There is a lot of room between a literal reading or understanding of scripture and all scripture being manmade. Sometimes I wish the church was better in lessons at outlining the no-man's land between those two extremes, just to show the possibilities that are still very much compatible with belief in the gospel.

But I think 45 min. ever other week is enough time to address a few extra scriptures a few times a year.

There's a plethora of information for those who want a life lessons approach to the scriptures as well, but we still have Sunday school. I'm not talking about wanting a more nitty gritty type of study on the hard parts of the scriptures. I'm talking about wanting a sunday school type of study: a study that doesn't skip over it completely and act like it doesn't exist. People leave the church over this type of stuff because they don't know how to mesh what the scriptures are saying with what the gospel and our leaders teach. That's not a nitty gritty problem to solve. It's a pretty basic problem to solve. But so many times the correlation committee doesn't even try to solve it. Or at least they didn't. I have hopes for the future.

I like it too, very much, but I do wish they wouldn't use this kind of stuff to skip over problematic books or verses in the actual lessons. Not everyone gets to take institute classes.

If I counted right it looks like there are 8 "things to keep in mind" throughout the lesson manual. They seem to be placed in order to give context to the upcoming sections. One of them is on things to keep in mind when reading old testament poetry for example. This one is things to keep in mind about the historical books in the OT, and is placed in the middle of may when the lessons enter the books known as the historical books by scholars I guess.

Hubby and I tried to watch the last Mission Impossible part 2. He made it through the whole (almost three hours long) movie and seemed to like it. I only made it about 45 minutes. From my perspective, the whole franchise has lost the plot, similar to the Fast and Furious franchise. It's so over the top and convoluted that its become boring and you don't care about any of the characters (when you can actually remember who any of them are or figure out why Cruise cares about them). I read somewhere that they don't even do a plot with these movies. They come up with stunts that Cruise wants to do and then they write the movie around each stunt. That makes sense because the plot definitely feels low down on the list of important things when this was being made. Not to mention that the character list (and body count) is so huge now, and the action has played out over such long time frame (the first one came out in 1996 so this movie asks you to remember and care about things from thirty years ago) that it's almost impossible to keep track of it all without a guidebook. This last installment pushed into the mysticism/prophecy/end of the world/skynet stuff in a way that, in my opinion, lowers the IQ of the whole franchise. If you like cruise being cruise (with really bad hair), love practical stunts, like conspiracy movies, and/or have a soft spot for the whole mission impossible octet, then you'll probably like this one. If not, skip it.

Looks like the lessons on the chapters themselves are silent on those passages (from what I can tell, but I didn't look thoroughly). That always annoys me. But the manual does have this in a section explaining "things to keep in mind": When reading the Old Testament, as with any history, you’re likely to read about people doing or saying things that, to modern eyes, seem strange or even troubling. We should expect this—Old Testament writers saw the world from a perspective that was, in some ways, quite different from ours. Violence, ethnic relations, and the roles of women are just some of the issues that ancient writers might have seen differently than we do today. So what should we do when we come across passages in the scriptures that seem troubling? First, it might help to consider each passage in a broader context. How does it fit in God’s plan of salvation? How does it fit with what you know about the nature of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ? How does it fit with revealed truths in other scriptures or with the teachings of living prophets? And how does it fit with the whisperings of the Spirit to your own heart and mind? In some cases, the passage may not seem to fit well with any of these. Sometimes the passage may be like a puzzle piece that doesn’t look like it has a place among the pieces you’ve already assembled. Trying to force the piece to fit isn’t the best approach. But neither is giving up on the entire puzzle. Instead, you may need to set the piece aside for a time. As you learn more and put together more of the puzzle, you may be able to better see how the pieces fit together. It can also help to remember that in addition to being limited to a particular perspective, scriptural histories are subject to human error. For example, over the centuries, “many plain and precious things [were] taken away from the [Bible],” including important truths about doctrine, ordinances, and covenants (1 Nephi 13:28; see also verses 26, 29, 40). At the same time, we should be willing to admit that our own perspectives are also limited: there will always be things we don’t fully understand and questions we can’t yet answer. I guess that's better than nothing.

The church's correlation committee does make some dumb decisions sometimes. Lots of missed opportunities. I wonder if the new lesson manual will handle it differently?

Thanks for clarifying your earlier posts. I see it as the link you shared expressed it, especially where it says "At times, the medications and doses needed for symptom control may shorten the time to death because of their impact on sedation level and respiratory drive; such risk may be acceptable given the goal of comfort and symptom management. However, prescribing medications with the intent to hasten death is unethical and illegal." Two very separate things, one being ethical and one not.

Yes I believe it's ethical to give nonlethal medication to someone who is going to die, that may shorten the time of life they have left, as long as the medication isn't given in order to shorten the time they have left. But that is different than where you said "You really can’t think of any circumstances where it might be better for an infant to die sooner rather than later and therefore you would make the move to kill in mercy". I can't think of any circumstances where it would be better to make the move to kill the infant, even if the intention was mercy.

I don't believe any human has the future knowledge or moral authority required to know when it is more moral to kill an infant. I know a lot of people believe that euthanizing humans can be the moral decision, but I've never been in that camp. Especially for children.

I can think of many circumstances where it would probably be better for an infant to die than to live. But I can’t think of any instances where it would be better for someone to kill an infant than to allow it to live.

This is a good reminder to me to spend more time trying to discover my own blind spots.

Merry Christmas!

I agree. I think if the church went into apostasy there would have to be another restoration. Maybe that’s one of the reasons we are promised. It won’t go into apostasy again. Maybe there’s not enough time before the second coming for another restoration.

From my perspective, I don't think it implies infallibility. Especially when considered in light of D&C 1. 24 Behold, I am God and have spoken it; these commandments are of me, and were given unto my servants in their weakness, after the manner of their language, that they might come to understanding. 25 And inasmuch as they erred it might be made known; 26 And inasmuch as they sought wisdom they might be instructed; 27 And inasmuch as they sinned they might be chastened, that they might repent; 38 What I the Lord have spoken, I have spoken, and I excuse not myself; and though the heavens and the earth pass away, my word shall not pass away, but shall all be fulfilled, whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same.

That's a perfect way to put it.

I agree. I've always leaned toward 'leading astray' meaning leading into apostasy, because that is the one place the scriptures teach God's church will not go in the last days. But that certainly isn't an authoritative take on it.

I think it depends on how someone defines 'astray'. Obviously it can mean 'won't let the president make mistakes' because we don't believe in an infallible prophet. So it has to mean something else. It would probably be most helpful to know how Pres. Woodruff defined or understood the word, since he is the one who used it. I'm not sure we have access to his thoughts on the matter though.

Just wanted to clarify that this is true except in primary. The primary presidency is always women and they are over all the male primary teachers in their ward. Elders are never over women in a ward unless an elder is called as a ward mission leader or in a Sunday school presidency. A male is always over females, but that male is rarely an elder. Most of the time it’s a high priest.

Right.

Not to argue, but where did you get the distinctions between the definitions for plural marriage and polygamy? It’s something I’ve never heard before and when you look up plural marriage in Webster’s dictionary it’s the same definition as the one for polygamy. I’m just wondering if you read it in a church source somewhere?

If they’ve been dead long enough, it doesn’t have to be a close family member. Just a family member. But since not all people follow the rules, we can probably guarantee it’s not 100%.

Ah, yeah. That clarifies. I thought you were talking about his son. No one should’ve done his parents names without his written permission (or that of any siblings if he has them) since he would be there closest living family member.