Daniel C. Peterson's Blog, page 841

Steven Spielberg on some Mormons

    I’m still  not sure how this happened:   http://www.ldsliving.com/Steven-Spiel...   Posted from Brockwood Hall, Cumbria, England    

On feeling the Spirit?

    “I have felt a presence that disturbs me with the joy of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime of something far more deeply interfused, whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, and the round ocean, and the living air, and the blue sky, and in the mind of man . . .”  William [Read More...]

On the airport attack in Istanbul

    The news out of Istanbul is horrific.  It was meant to be so.   The international terminal there is a place that we know fairly well, and Istanbul is a city that we dearly love.   I’m told that tourism in Turkey has plummeted by roughly 45% over the past year, given the [Read More...]

BOM Alma 40

    There are few chapters of scripture that are more comforting to believers than Alma 40.   I’ve had to cite this passage at more than one family funeral:   11 Now, concerning the state of the soul between death and the resurrection—Behold, it has been made known unto me by an angel, that the spirits of all [Read More...]

“Polls are telling Donald Trump the truth, but he’s not listening”

    He’s running against one of the weakest, least charismatic, most vulnerable Democratic candidates in the history of that party, and yet he’s likely to snatch defeat from the very jaws of victory:   http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/byr...   If Mrs. Clinton were a stronger candidate, it would already be completely over.   Posted from Brockwood Hall, Cumbria, England [Read More...]

“Mormon Welfare Program”

    An outside perspective on the Church’s efforts to promote temporal human welfare:   http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandet...   The late Christopher Hitchens claimed, over and over again, that “religion poisons everything.”  He appears to have been mistaken on that point.   On another note, I’m pleased to belong to an organization that does so much good. [Read More...]

“How Many Books in a Preexilic Israelite Library?”

    Some of the more sophisticated critics of the Book of Mormon have occasionally argued that literacy was virtually unknown among pre-exilic Israelites — which, if true, would seem to compromise both the claims to historicity of the early books of the Bible and of the Book of Mormon.  (After all, Lehi and Nephi [Read More...]

“Video Series Helps Mormons Defend Religious Freedom While Respecting Differences”

    Some pointers from the Church, as introduced by Elder Von Keetch of the Seventy, on how to deal with sensitive social and religious issues:   http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article...   Posted from Brockwood Hall, Cumbria, England    

“Alien Worlds Might Be Covered in Enormous Mountains”

    Just think of all the glorious things to see out there!   http://www.theatlantic.com/science/ar...   Posted from Brockwood Hall, Cumbria, England  

“How Brexit shattered progressives’ dearest illusions,” and some spontaneous reflections on wider issues

    A very perceptive piece by Damon Linker about the recent referendum in the United Kingdom:   http://theweek.com/articles/632380/ho...   I was struck the other day by the British journalist David Goodhart’s distinction in the debate over Britain’s relationship to the European Union — which I saw cited here — between what he called “somewhere people” and [Read More...]