Daniel C. Peterson's Blog, page 59

“Are religious people happier?”

  I think that, this time around, I’ll lead off with something from the Christopher Hitchens Memorial “How Religion Poisons Everything” File™.  I mean, this claim, asserted by Dr. Stephen Cranney, is so horrible and so very alarming that it really does cry out for drastic emergency action: “Are religious people happier? The science is […]

“Shall we not go on in so great a cause?”

  News from along the frontier of religious liberty: National Catholic Reporter:  “Wisconsin Supreme Court makes bad law in religious liberty case” Christianity Today:  “Must Social Service Providers Nix Their Faith to Receive Federal Funds?  Rather than follow the equal protections secured in Supreme Court decisions, the Biden administration opted for a complicated and soul-killing […]

“King Benjamin’s Sermon as a Type of Temple Endowment”

  With friends, my wife and I attended the open house this morning of the renovated Manti Utah Temple, which was built and first dedicated nearly a century and half ago.  (We were intending to go yesterday, but life intervened.)  For many reasons, the temple in Manti has long been one of my very favorite […]

“She already existed before her life on Earth began”

  I’ve lately begun reading a new book by Robert Christopher Coppes entitled Impressions of Near-Death Experiences: Quotations from Over 100 Experiencers.  Dr. Coppes is an economist who is now retired from a career spent at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, a French bank, and eventually the Dutch Central Bank, which is roughly […]

“In an instant, my heart was touched and I believed”

  Several years ago, before the devastating fire that severely damaged it on 15 April 2019, my wife and I spent a substantial portion of the day in the Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris.  At one place, in the transept to the right of the nave near the southern rose window, we saw a plaque […]

Trust the Media!

  This week is “Holy Week,” about which I wrote this column a while back.  (I have fairly strong feelings about Holy Week.)  And here are a couple of potential resources for this week for Latter-day Saints: “#BecauseofHim: New Ways to Celebrate Christ This Easter: New resources at ChurchofJesusChrist.org provide ideas and ways to share and […]

Brigham Young, Gap-Toothed Mimic

  On Saturday, here in this very space, I posted a couple of references to the alleged “transfiguration” of Brigham Young that is said by quite a few to have occurred while he was speaking to an outdoor audience of Latter-day Saints at Nauvoo, Illinois, on 8 August 1844.  (See “Two Witnesses to a Pivotal […]

“Douse the glim!”

  First of all, Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all of those out there who have ever been Irish, or thought about being Irish, or know somebody who’s Irish, or have heard of either Ireland or St. Patrick’s Day, or haven’t.  We enjoyed our corned beef, cabbage, carrots, and potatoes today, and I hope that […]

Two Witnesses to a Pivotal Event

  Recently, Adam Colvin provided me with copies of two documents from his family history.  With his kind permission, I share portions of them here.  The first extract comes from a “Life Sketch of Simeon Adams Dunn,” compiled by Nancy Dunn Watson: James Dunn, the brother of Simeon, came to their home in Van Buren […]

“Premortal Life and Mortal Life: A Fearful Symmetry”

  A new article has just been posted on the website of the Interpreter Foundation:  “Premortal Life and Mortal Life: A Fearful Symmetry,” written by Jeffrey M. Bradshaw Abstract: Bodily weakness, along with the varied circumstances into which we were born, provide the essential initial and ongoing conditions that shape the challenges and opportunities of […]