This presentation discusses how I as a student of philosophy and religion am able to be an honest skeptic and still have a testimony of the Gospel. Using a combination of models that illustrate rational, empirical, and mystical approaches to religion as well as different spiritual temperaments, I will discuss Latter-day Saint connections to the …
Event: Southwest Symposium 2005
THE BATTLE OF CROOKED RIVER: ETHNIC CLEANSING IN 1838 NORTHERN MISSOURI
A large volume of poor Mormons moved into Missouri in 1838, and the resulting economic, social, and political tension terminated in a series of small skirmishes which occurred in August through October of 1838. This presentation examines in summary the Mormon raid and cleansing of non-Mormons from Daviess County, Missouri, and will examine in detail …
THE INSISTENT CALL OF MY MITOCHONDRIAL DNA: ONE WOMAN’S PRIMER IN FEMINIST GENEALOGY
While DNA science challenges such Mormon beliefs as Israelite ancestry for Native Americans, it promises fresh pursuits for genealogists. Particularly suggestive is our ability, notably publicized by Cambridge geneticist Bryan Sykes’s Seven Daughters of Eve, to track mitochondrial DNA mutations to seven European “clan mothers”, and beyond them, to African ancestresses. Traditionally overshadowed by surname-conferring …
INTUITION, QUANTUM HOLOGRAPHY, EPIGENETICS, AND THE BOOK OF MORMON
One of the questions not satisfactorily answered by critics of the Book of Mormon who see the book as a product of Joseph Smith’s mind and imagination and his nineteenth-century environs is how he could have found many of the elements in the Book of Mormon (e.g., a knowledge of olive horticulture, Egyptian names, ancient …
JOSEPH SMITH, WILLIAM MILLER, ELLEN G. WHITE, AND MARY BAKER EDDY: FOUR AMERICAN PROPHETS’ PERSPECTIVES ON SLAVERY, RACE, AND ETHNICITY
This presentation compares and contrasts Joseph Smith’s views and practices regarding slavery, race, and ethnicity with those of William Miller and Ellen G. White (founding leaders of Seventh Day Adventism) and Mary Baker Eddy (founder of the Christian Science movement). These issues figured prominently in all three religious movements, but while all four leaders were …
PANEL. MORMON FEMINIST LITERATURE REVIEW
Join panelists for a lively discussion of our favorite, provocative, thought-provoking, revolutionary, inspirational, and faith-enhancing books in the field of feminist spirituality. Re-discover the classics, and hear about newer volumes too good to keep to ourselves! A list of our top picks will be available for the audience. Mary Ellen Robertson, Carol Lynn Pearson Lavina …
THE FIRST TWO OF FIVE BRIEF ESSAYS ON THE ATONEMENT
In these two essays, I work to lay out the rationale and groundwork for any serious LDS consideration of the atonement of Christ. The first essay explores the context of the project. Why should we engage in such speculation as this? What is the LDS view of the role of reason in religious and spiritual …
THE SAN FRANCISCO BRANCH OF THE CHURCH IN THE 1850’S: INSIGHTS FROM THE CAROLINE BARNES CROSBY DIARY
Caroline Crosby was one of the most detailed chroniclers of events related to the Mormons in California from the time of her passing through on her way to a mission in the Society Islands in 1850 until her family moved back to Utah at the end of 1857. For a year and a half, from …
CREATIONISM, POSTMODERNISM, AND MORMONISM
LDS writers addressing the challenges of modern science, ranging from evolution and cosmology to Book of Mormon historicity, have frequently resorted to arguments derived from either the creationist or the postmodern science studies communities. The literature of these two groups, while poles apart on most intellectual and social issues, exhibits characteristics of poor scholarship, including …
PANEL. SPIRITUALITY IN MUSIC, OR THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO PETER, PAUL, AND MARY
Music, and the lyrics connected with it, can express many emotions, moods, and spiritual depths and heights. One part of this session will look at what creates spirituality in music and it will also look at how varied music we define as spiritual can be, from towering peaks of Western classical music to hymns, spirituals, …