NEWS - AMERICANS KNOW LITTLE BUT ARE STILL WARY OF MORMONS

Americans know little but are still wary of Mormons

Church is 'totally integrated,' adherents say, but suspicions linger

By CATHY LYNN GROSSMAN • USA Today | Posted: Sunday, January 29, 2012 12:00 am 

When Mormons call themselves "a peculiar people," they mean it in the biblical sense — set aside by God, chosen.
But many Americans call them peculiar in Webster's way — strange, odd.
Now Mormons, followers of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, are in the spotlight. One of their own, Mitt Romney, is a leading contender for the Republican presidential nomination.
Suddenly, America's abuzz about "gold plates and magic underwear," says Terryl Givens, a professor of religion at the University of Richmond in Virginia and a Mormon himself.
Many Americans are suspicious of Mormon ways. That could be because:
• Mormons are unfamiliar to many. There are 6 million, adults and children, accounting for fewer than 2 percent of the U.S. population, and 76 percent live in a handful of Western states.
• Outspoken evangelical pastors call Mormonism a non-Christian "cult." Mormons disagree, saying they just center their faith on a different understanding of God, Christ, Scripture and salvation than Catholics or Protestants. Christian private schools and home-schooling associations specify that the Bible is the only Scripture, thereby excluding Mormons, who add three more holy books.
• Unlike Judaism, Mormonism is not a faith commonly studied in comparative religion classes. When Mormons show up in history books, it's generally limited to a saga of persecution (they were driven from the Midwest to Utah in the 19th century) and legal conflicts over polygamy. The church banned polygamy in 1890, but polygamist splinter groups, such as those depicted in "Big Love" and "Sister Wives," often see more media airtime than mainstream Mormons.
Joseph Smith founded the LDS church, according to church teachings, after discovering gold plates buried in upstate New York that he believed contained the words of ancient prophets detailing Jesus' visit to the New World. When translated, it became the text of The Book of Mormon, which Mormons believe is essential to restoring the original church as Christ intended. According to one of the four books of Mormon scripture, The Pearl of Great Price, Smith later returned the golden plates to an angelic guardian.
Some adult Mormons in good standing with the church wear a simple cotton T-shirt and fitted pants that have been blessed by the church.
"Once someone actually lifted the sleeve of my shirt to peek while asking, 'Do you wear the magic underwear?' Stop! I don't check your underpants!" recalls Erin Gillie, 26, who moved to Washington, D.C., from Alabama.
She wears the undergarments, she says, "as a reminder of who I am: a child of God who should live by certain standards."
"A lot of people have preconceived ideas about Mormons, and there's not much I can do to change their minds if their pastor is telling them Mormons are evil," she says.
"People will ask, 'How many moms do you have?' I've had dates who never called again once they learned I was Mormon. I figure it's their loss."
Mormons cherish their "peculiar" distinctiveness, says Michael Otterson, chief spokesman for the LDS church.
"We value and recognize and respect the values of other religions, but we very much appreciate our own. If you are a Latter-day Saint, a member of the fourth-largest (denomination) in the country, you shouldn't have to go hat in hand for acceptance while acceptance of other minorities — Jews or Muslims or Presbyterians — is taken at face value," he says.
Of course, Otterson notes, "You may not even know that the person who cuts your hair or does your taxes is a Mormon because we're totally integrated in the American mainstream."
A survey of Mormons released by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life delineated Mormons' traditionalist values — high on family and education. Most (67 percent) of adult Mormons are married, compared with 52 percent of the nation. College-educated Mormons also have the highest level of commitment to religious orthodoxy: 84 percent say they follow the teachings "wholeheartedly."
On Pew Forum's 2010 U.S. Religious Knowledge Survey, which asked 32 questions on the Bible, major religious figures and core beliefs and practices, the average score was 16 correct. Just 19 percent of Protestants knew the basic tenet that salvation is through faith alone, not actions as well. Who scored best? Atheists, Jews and Mormons.
Mormons' strong communities make them a potent organized force, whether for joining in relief programs, campaigning for a moral cause or proselytizing by those ubiquitous young missionaries knocking on doors.
Advocates of same-sex marriage still burn over the millions in donations and savvy campaigning by Mormons backing Proposition 8, which overturned legal gay marriage in California in 2008.
The Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Center turned its outrage into a moneymaker and rallying point. The center raised $70,000 in contributions. Jim Key, spokesman for the center, says, "For each donation, we sent a postcard to LDS President Thomas Monson saying a gift had been made in his name to invalidate Prop 8."
It's Mormons' religious outreach that worries Warren Cole Smith, an evangelical blogger and associate publisher of World, a Christian news magazine. He fears a Romney presidency would give credence and publicity to a "false faith."
One proof of falsehood, to Smith, is that Mormons believe the Bible didn't close the book on God's revelations. They believe present-day prophets, including the president of the church, can proclaim new teachings from God.
Smith cites two examples: The LDS church banned polygamy in 1890 (perhaps, say historians, prompted by the threats from the U.S. government and by the Mormons' wish to see Utah become a state).
And in 1978, then-LDS president and prophet Spencer Kimball overturned the church's ban on ordaining black men to the priesthood.
Smith's oft-quoted line that makes evangelicals jittery is that Mormons "may believe one thing today, and something else tomorrow."

ARTICLE - EDITORIAL : ROMNEY HAS CAPACITY TO BUILD BRIDGES

Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012

Editorial: Romney has capacity to build bridges

MITT ROMNEY was not our first choice for the Republican nomination for president of the United States, but he was one of two candidates who stood head and shoulders above the rest of the field as sensible, experienced grownups with a history of making things work rather than pursuing ideological fetishes.
We wish he were not so willing to blend in with the political culture as the Republican Party races further right, from seeming at times to repudiate his signature success as Massachusetts governor to playing footsie with the anti-intellectuals who don’t simply disagree that anything should be done but dismiss the overwhelming scientific consensus that the earth’s climate is changing, and that human beings are playing a role in that change.
But we take comfort in the fact that Mr. Romney always has been less interested in philosophy than in problem-solving. As The Washington Post summarized the views of his friends: “obeisance to ideology would impose a rigidity that would inhibit Romney’s real talent, which is forging new ways to fix old problems.”

He has demonstrated that talent to dramatic effect, from making a fortune rescuing companies (and dismantling others) as a private-equities investor to turning the floundering, scandal-ridden Salt Lake Olympics Games into a financial success. He led Massachusetts out of financial crisis, and pushed through a landmark health reform that was seen as the conservative answer to growing demands for a government-centered program, until it became the model for President Obama’s reform package. If there’s anything we need in Washington, it’s more problem solving and less ideological purity.
We initially endorsed Jon Huntsman in Saturday’s presidential primary because he demonstrates the qualities we need in a president. With Mr. Huntsman’s withdrawal, we are endorsing Mr. Romney, because of our continued belief that he can be what we need in a president: Someone who can work within our poisonous political environment to solve our nation’s problems, not simply score partisan points. Someone who understands that negotiation is essential in a representative democracy, and that there are good ideas across the political spectrum. Someone who has a well-defined set of core values but is not so rigid that he ignores new information and new conditions. Someone who has shown himself to be honest and trustworthy and competent. Someone whose positions are well-reasoned and based on the world as it is rather than as he pretends it to be. Someone with the temperament and judgment and experience to be taken seriously as the commander in chief and leader of the free world.
What we need now is for Mr. Romney to fulfill his potential, beginning with this evening’s debate. We are encouraged by his focus on America as the land of opportunity, but he needs to avoid using his newly inspiring rhetoric to dodge legitimate questions about his political and business history. He needs to demonstrate that he can maintain his composure in the face of what likely will be the harshest attacks yet.
Mr. Romney made clear during a discussion with our editorial board that our nation’s problems will not be solved without a president who is committed to working across the political aisle. He’s right about that, and we feel sure we’ll hear more of that in the general election. But he will have far more credibility then if he starts acting like he believes it now. The Republican Party needs a leader who can pull it back from the brink, reminding voters and other candidates alike that passing ideological litmus tests is not a virtue and that negotiation and compromise are not sins, but rather the essential building blocks of a republic. In fact, that view of politics and government is what our nation needs. We will be looking for Mr. Romney to provide it.

Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2012/01/19/2119013/romney-has-capacity-to-build-bridges.html#storylink=omni_popular#storylink=cpy

NEWS - HUNTSMAN DEPARTS RACE

Huntsman departs race, impact in SC unclear

By THOMAS BEAUMONT and KASIE HUNT - Associated Press

MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. — Days before the South Carolina primary, Jon Huntsman dropped out of the presidential race Monday and endorsed Mitt Romney for the party's nomination, becoming the latest Republican to call the GOP front-runner the strongest candidate to beat the Democratic incumbent.
"I believe it is now time for our party to unite around the candidate best equipped to defeat Barack Obama," Huntsman said at a news conference, his family by his side. "Despite our differences and the space between us on some of the issues, I believe that candidate is Governor Mitt Romney."
The development added to the aura of inevitability Romney has worked to create in South Carolina and the race at large.

But Huntsman's departure and endorsement of Romney seemed unlikely to clarify the overriding question of the Republican campaign: Whether conservative voters could or would unify behind Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich or Rick Perry to create a strong conservative challenger to the former Massachusetts governor.
It also prompted at least one Perry backer to urge the Texas governor to abandon his bid in hopes of preventing conservative voters from dividing their support among several candidates and handing Romney a win.
"There are a lot of conservatives who were happy to see him get in and now who would be happy to see him get out," state Sen. Larry Grooms, an early Perry supporter, said. "When conservatives have split in the past, we end up nominating a moderate, and that's not good for our party."
In South Carolina, the eventual impact of the Huntsman endorsement is unclear.
He barely had a campaign organization here and he was all but broke, with big donors fleeing long ago. Huntsman, considered the moderate in the race because of his support for civil unions and other positions that don't sit well with the right flank, was in the low single digits in polls.
But anyone who had planned to vote for him is more likely to shift their votes to Romney rather than one of his more conservative rivals. Polls show Romney was most often the second choice of Huntsman backers. Both candidates have emphasized their business backgrounds and have espoused socially moderate positions in a state where social conservatives are an influential bloc. Both also are Mormons.
"Certainly, it will help Gov. Romney here, it's just not clear how much," said former state Attorney General Henry McMaster. An early Huntsman supporter, McMaster had not committed to another candidate after Huntsman's announcement.
Romney is leading in South Carolina polls - followed by Gingrich with Santorum and Texas Rep. Ron Paul fighting for third and Perry trailing - as the front-runner pushes toward three straight victories after winning both Iowa and New Hampshire earlier this month. A South Carolina triumph would give Romney significant momentum heading into next-up Florida on Jan. 31, and he's banking on getting a boost from South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and Arizona Sen. John McCain, winner of the 2008 primary in a state that has voted for the eventual GOP since 1980.
With the primary looming Saturday, Romney's rivals dismissed Huntsman's endorsement.
"Moderates are backing moderates," Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, said at a Columbia appearance. "No surprise there."
Gingrich, the former House speaker locked in a bitter battle with Romney, said at an event in Myrtle Beach: "Why would you want to nominate the guy who lost to the guy who lost to Obama?"
Huntsman's endorsement comes just two days after Santorum emerged as the consensus, if not unanimous, choice of a group of national Christian political activists who met over the weekend in a last-ditch effort to rally conservatives.
In recent days, pressure has been increasing on Perry, who registers in the single digits in polls here, to leave the race to allow South Carolina's influential social conservatives to unify behind either Santorum or Gingrich.
"It's important that we eventually consolidate this race," Santorum said Monday. But he stopped short of adding his voice to those suggesting Perry drop out, saying: "That's up to the candidates themselves to decide."
On Sunday, conservative author Eric Metaxas indirectly suggested Perry should quit the race while speaking at a packed prayer breakfast in Myrtle Beach. The night before he had tweeted: "Dear Gov. Perry: Do the right thing for your country; endorse Rick Santorum before the SC primary next Saturday...you'll wish you had."
Katon Dawson, Perry's South Carolina chairman, resisted the idea that there was a drumbeat for Perry to quit.
"I find it sort of offensive that some Republicans would tell us they want to hand pick the candidate before the election," Dawson said.
And Ralph Reed, founder of the national Faith and Freedom Coalition, also said he knew of no effort by the conservative leaders who met Saturday in Texas to urge Perry to quit.
"We have never asked any candidate to drop out of the race publicly or privately. And we will not do so," Reed said.
In Iowa two weeks ago, some evangelical pastors and conservative leaders had asked Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann to consider ending her campaign to allow a conservative to emerge. She did not, and Romney edged Santorum in Iowa by a razor-thin eight votes. She later quit the race.
With Perry showing no signs of departing, Santorum faces the added burden of a barrage of attack ads by an independent group that supports Romney's campaign. The group, Restore Our Future, was running almost $900,000 worth of advertising this week, more than any of the candidates' campaigns and all of it against Santorum.
Santorum complained Monday about the ads, which accuse him of having supported pork-barrel spending in Congress and supporting voting rights for felons. Santorum has defended his support for that spending. And he said Monday he supports allowing felons who have completed their sentences to apply to have their voting rights restored, a policy that is law in 48 states.
Restore Our Future spent roughly $3 million on similar anti-Gingrich ads in the final month of the Iowa campaign and was seen as contributing to his fourth-place finish in the caucuses.
A similar group that supports Gingrich was running roughly $850,000 in ads against Romney.

Read more here: http://www.thestate.com/2012/01/16/2115781/huntsman-to-quit-gop-race-back.html#storylink=Afternoon%20Newsletter#storylink=cpy

QUOTE - NEVER BE ASHAMED -Unknown

Never Be Ashamed
=================
Never be ashamed of the scars that life has left you with.
A scar means the hurt is over, the wound is closed, you endured the pain and God has healed you.
~Author Unknown~

ARTICLE - 3 CHISELED STONES & THE INCREASING EVIDENCE FROM THE ARABIAN PENINSULA FOR THE PLAUSIBILITY OF THE BOOK OF MORMON

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Three Chiseled Stones and the Increasing Evidence from the Arabian Peninsula for the Plausibility of the Book of Mormon

When it comes to evidences for the plausibility of the Book of Mormon text, the most exciting finds come from the Old World, where we have the significant advantage of knowing the precise starting point of Nephi's account and where we have far more archaeological work to draw upon than we do in the New World. As Latter-day Saints in upcoming Sunday School lessons review the stories of Nephi's journey out of Jerusalem and across the Arabian Peninsula to Bountiful, I hope some of them will learn that trek as described in First Nephi 16 and 17 is remarkably "interesting" in terms of its plausibility as an ancient record. Indeed, it is hard to imagine how some of the fine details in Nephi's account could have been written by anybody who didn't actually make the journey and experience the places he mentions.

These places include the Valley of Lemuel and River of Laman, places that until recently were mocked as impossibilities for "everyone knows" that there is no river that flows into the Red Sea as Nephi described. This Book of Mormon weakness has become a strength, a granite-walled stronghold, in fact, with the field work that discovered actual candidates for the valley.

That was early in the long journey of Lehi's group, a journey that, though described in brevity, is given numerous specific details such as the specific directions traveled: south-south east, followed by a sharp turn to nearly due east after Ishmael is buried in a place called Nahom. Following that eastward direction, the group eventually hits the coast and finds Bountiful--one of the biggest barriers to plausibility that the Book of Mormon suffers from. Or rather, suffered from, until people did field work and gave the Latter-day Saints at least one and perhaps two excellent candidates for that lush, green, abundant place that Nephi and his family found in that part of the world that "everyone knows" is nothing but barren sand dunes. If only Joseph had lived in the day of movies and had seen Lawrence of Arabia, he would have known what a ridiculous blunder his description of Bountiful was. Today, we have the luxury of knowing that it might be plausible after all. Now, of course, the argument of the critics must switch to arguing how obvious it was to come up with directions, descriptions, and even place names. Joseph the Blunderer who couldn't even get the birthplace of Christ right (per the standard anti-Mormon attack on Alma 7:10, now handily refuted with the help of modern discoveries such as the Dead Sea Scrolls) has become Joseph the Erudite, apparently armed with his vast frontier library and an international network of scholars, carefully building detailed "evidences" of authenticity into the text that, uh, he and his fellow-conspirators didn't seem to know about. Chiasmus and other Semitic literary tools, ancient covenant formulas, the details of the Arabian Peninsula, civilization and its Mesoamerican discontents, and other evidences were carefully woven in so that future generations might be impressed. If only Joseph had bothered to trot out some of these evidences in his lifetime, it might have helped. Highly-publicized reports of ancient American civilization in Mesoamerica did come in the 1840s and created a positive stir among the Saints, over a decade after the Book of Mormon came out, but we would have to wait for over a century before the real fun would even begin.

Yes, I mentioned not just directions and descriptions, but placenames. Foremost on the list is Nahom. The argument here is missed by many critics, who seem to think that we are arguing that there is exciting new evidence that Nahom as an ancient Semitic name. No, of course we know it's a Semitic name since it is a book in the Bible. But as a place name, it is rare, exceedingly rare. More interestingly, it is a specific placename in the Book of Mormon associated with some very specific details: a) it is a specific place in the Arabian Peninsula where one can turn nearly due east after having traveled south-south east from Jerusalem; b) it is a place that was not named by Lehi but apparently was already called that name by others in the area; and c) it is a place where Ishmael was buried (he died somewhere, and then was buried at Nahom). Given those specific, how fascinating it is that we now know that these details are remarkably plausible. There is an ancient Arabic tribe in Yemen with the name Nihm, having the same Semitic root NHM as Nahom. We know that the location of that tribe fits extremely well with the one place where a survivable eastward turn to the sea can be made to depart from the ancient incense trails that were south-southeast from Jerusalem. And we now know, based on archaeological finds from Yemen, that the Nihm tribal name was in existence all the way back to the 7th century B.C. or so, making it possible that Lehi's group did in fact bury Ishmael in an ancient burial location called Nehhm, Nihm, or, as it may have sounded to Nephi, Nahom--a name that in Hebrew nicely fits the concept of mourning as described in the text.

The Nahom story is an important and exciting part of the growing body of evidence for plausibility of the Book of Mormon as an ancient text. A key part of this story comes from the discovery of several ancient altars bearing the tribal name Nihm. Here are some links for those interested in learning more:

"Newly Found Altars from Nahom," Warren P. Aston, Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, volume 10, no. 2, pp. 56-61, 2001. (PDF)

"In Search of Lehi's Trail—30 Years Later," Lynn M. Hilton.

"New Light: 'The Place That Was Called Nahom': New Light from Ancient Yemen," S. Kent Brown.

Book of Mormon evidences (my page)

PEOPLE I KNOW WHO MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN YOUR WORLD - TEACHER HIGH ON ROMNEY : EVA ADDISON

Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012

Teacher high on Romney

 

By ADAM BEAM 

Eva Addison is not a Republican. But she is a conservative – a conservative who, since 2008, increasingly has become upset with the policies of President Barack Obama, a Democrat.
While Addison says she did not pay attention to the 2008 election, she is paying attention now. And her candidate is Mitt Romney.
“I feel like he’s got family values and that he’s honest with his dealings, and I don’t think there are many politicians that are honest,” she said. “I believe, with all my heart, he has the integrity it is going to take to turn America around economically and morally.”

Like Romney, Addison is a Latter-Day Saint. She attended Brigham Young University in Utah for three years before dropping out to get married, which she says “is a real typical Mormon thing.”
But that’s not why she is voting for Romney. In fact, she first strongly considered Texas Gov. Rick Perry, an evangelical Christian. But Perry’s performances in the debates last fall changed her mind.
“I don’t think (Perry) has the intelligence, and I don’t mean that in a bad way,” she said. “I don’t think he’s quick enough or has the intelligence on spur-of-the-moment stuff to make things work – and that has bothered me.”
Addison, 50, lives in Anderson, where she teaches fifth grade at a local elementary school. Her unhappiness with Obama stems from what she calls a “sense of entitlement” that she says Obama fosters among some people who take advantage of government programs like welfare.
“Obama wants to make things a whole lot easier on them as though they deserve (it),” she said.
In Romney, however, she sees a person who is “willing to sacrifice things we may want in order for our grandchildren to have things (they) may need.”
Romney was criticized last week for saying “I like being able to fire people,” a comment he made while campaigning in New Jersey. Romney was talking about health insurance companies and how he wants Americans to be able to “fire” them if they are unsatisfied with them.
But opponents used the comment to criticize Romney, calling him cold and out of touch with the needs of Americans, many of whom were fired during the Great Recession. (Perry’s campaign went so far as to make the comment a ringtone available for people to download to their phones.)
Addison, Romney’s supporter, is more forgiving.
“At first I thought, ‘Oh my goodness Mitt, you just said something terrible!’ ” Addison said. “But if someone is not doing their job, we have the right to go somewhere else to get somebody competent. I love that idea.”

TCHNOLOGY - TESTERS NEEDED FOR INTERACTIVE BOOKS & MAGAZINES TABLET APPS

Testers Needed for Interactive Books and Magazines Tablet Apps Posted: 14 Jan 2012 11:50 AM PST The Church's Media Services team released the LDS Ensign and The Coat apps for iPad and Android tablets in December to experiment with a new platform for digital content, and now they’re looking for feedback on the LDS Ensign app in addition to future help on similar testing. The Ensign app is an interactive digital magazine, but it is much more than just a PDF of the Ensign that you can read on your tablet. The LDS Ensign app provides audio and video features that enhance your experience with the Ensign. You can read, watch, or listen to each talk, and there are biographies of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles at the end of the issue.

A tutorial at the beginning will tell you everything you need to know about using the app, so it should be pretty easy to download and use right away. To download the LDS Ensign app, open your tablet's application store and search for “LDS Ensign.” Download and install the LDS Ensign magazine from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The app icon is as follows: Note that downloading the magazine requires an internet connection, but once you’ve downloaded it, you can use the app entirely offline. You can also download the app of The Coat—a true story from Heber J. Grant’s childhood—and see the same technology at work in an interactive, animated storybook.  The Coat has a number of animations, such as zooms, shifts of perspectives, and even snow angels, each triggered by finger swipes across the screen. To download the coat, search your tablet’s application store for “The Coat" and look for this app icon:   The technology for the Ensign and The Coat could be used in the future for other applications, so the Media Services team wants to know what you think of both the platform and—more specifically—the LDS Ensign iPad app. At this point, the apps are only for large-screen devices, like tablets. They are available on iTunes and the Android Market. How to Get Involved To give feedback on the LDS Ensign app, take the short survey that’s located in the Table of Contents in the app. If you are interested in future testing on similar apps for 7” tablets—such as Amazon Kindle Fire, Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet, and other 7-inch Android tablets—then join the Interactive Books and Magazines project to be notified of these opportunities when they arise. To join the Interactive Books & Magazines project: Go to LDSTech.org and sign in with your LDS Account user name and password. You will be brought directly to the Projects page. If you are not directed to that page, click Projects in the top navigation bar. Under available projects, search for Interactive Books and Magazines. Click Interactive Books and Magazines. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Join button. (If you see a Leave button, it means you’ve already joined this project. You’ll be redirected to your Projects page, and Interactive Books and Magazines will appear under My Projects. You can also go to the Interactive Books and Magazines Forum to check up on the progress of the new project or visit the Interactive Books and Magazines wiki page for more information.