The Restoration of Primitive Christianity and the emergence of Mormonism as a world religion is a story worthy of an epic poem. Now Mormon poet Ron Wilcox has written the first books of such an epic, with Joseph Smith as the latter-day odysseus-achilles hero at the center. Wilcox’s poem captures Joseph’s soul and the beginnings …
Speaker: Clifton H. Jolley
Made-Up Missionaries, Fake Faith, & Concocted Conversions: The Alchemy Of The Book Of Mormon Musical
The Book of Mormon musical plays to sold-out audiences who leap to their feet for standing ovations as the show ends; the play has earned critical raves and won “Best Musical” in the 2011 Tonys. Whether “God loves Mormons and he wants some more,” as the lyrics to “Two by Two” declare, Broadway seems to …
Sibbrich’s Tale
In this portion of a longer memoir that examines my connections to the lives of lineal ancestors in sixteenth-century northern Germany, I draw on historical events to imagine what life would have been like for the daughter of a ferryman ancestor named Edde Feerman. Records of the time primarily document the lives of the region’s …
Searching For Gene England
Eugene England is remembered by tens of thousands as one of twentieth-century Mormonism’s most significant influences on culture, literature, and practical religion. When Gene participated in the founding of Dialogue, elder Joseph Fielding Smith said it would not be good for the Church. And Gene’s essays and sermons were as troubling to some as the …
THE BOOK OF MORMON IN LIGHT OF DNA STUDIES: WHERE ARE WE NOW?
William Lobdell’s 16 February 2006 Los Angeles Times story is the latest in a string of stories over the past four years in which journalists have focused public attention on how DNA research on Amerindian ancestry has impacted discussions of Book of Mormon historicity. Until now, the impact of these stories on typical Mormon discourse …
Native American Genetics and Other Paper Tigers, or, Indians are Lamanites No Matter What the LA Times Says
Native American Genetics and Other Paper Tigers, or, Indians are Lamanites No Matter What the LA Times Says Taking the recent Los Angeles Times article on Book of Mormon and DNA debates as his launching pad, Clifton Jolley turns his sharp eye toward the differences between historical, scientific, and Mormon truths in a not-entirely-serious examination …
Suicide Conversations With My Son
Suicide Conversations With My Son Our most significant moments are least discussed. Partly out of reverence. Mostly out of fear. If we live long enough and try hard enough, we may find time and opportunity to talk about everything: the sacred, the secret, the hard. Clifton Jolley has needed six children and two religions to …