“The deal that Buffett made with [son] Howie concerning the rent for Howie’s farm was … linked with weight; the amount rose and fell with Howie’s poundage. Warren thought his son should weigh 182.5 pounds. When Howie was over the limit, he had to pay twenty-six percent of the farm’s gross receipts to his father. When he was under, he paid twenty-two percent. … Buffett couldn’t lose on this deal either. He got either more money or a thinner son.” Sharecrop your way to health and wealth.
Category: Life in the Church
Mormon Life – Family – Personal Reflections
Family Home Evening Ideas
After almost three years, we’ve just about made it all the way through the Bible in felt. These have been great FHEs for us. Now I need something new.
The Great Unity
Last weekend I went to the penultimate game in Yankee Stadium, and the next night watched the last game on television, complete with its post-game wake. Over nearly 20 years I’ve attended meetings there, letting a place and a culture become an almost religious part of my life. Its a Temple of baseball.
When Being Right is Wrong
If you’re a teacher of any sort, you know how disruptive a couple of talkative or rude students can be, especially when you’re trying to get a discussion going. In an effort to regain control, you flash a forced smile in the direction of the goof-offs. You pause and wait until they’re finished before you continue. You have a chat with them after class and ask them to be a little more attentive next time. And then after another day or two of rudeness, and despairing that your more subtle techniques have failed, you lose patience and let them have it, right in the middle of class.
BYU in the Memory of the AAUP
Among the other academic spam that I get are regular emails from the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), which is always eager to remind me of their fights for academic freedom, higher salaries for professors, and various trendy and hip progressive causes. Today, the AAUP sent out an email commemorating the ten year anniversary of its censure of BYU. I thought that readers might enjoy a trip down memory lane to the bad-old-days of Mormon intellectual life in the 1990s and a view of events through outside eyes:
Stewardship and Politics
With elections coming up and my time as a guest blogger running out, I like to take up the topic of Mormonism and voting. First, what should we make of the many Mormons who seem completely disengaged in politics?
The Epitome of Not Forgetting
I linked to an article earlier that I have since decided is to good to leave just to the newsfeed. It’s from a Chicago Tribune religion reporter who is Jewish with Mormon relatives. In it, the reporter describes a rift that formed in her family after her great-uncle Al married a Mormon and then later converted to Mormonism himself. To a deeply Jewish family, this was difficult news to absorb, and, as a result, each side of the family ended up imputing bad motives and intents on the part other, leaving bitter feelings that took decades to reconcile. In the wake of all of this, the reporter writes about learning recently that her late (and staunchly Jewish) grandfather had been baptized in proxy by her Mormon relatives and her struggle to come to terms with this revelation: “I imagined my grandfather downright mad at the arrogance of presuming he would abandon what he had devoted his life to preserving. But when I told my mother about the baptism and braced myself for a flood of emotions, she surprised me. “Mom and Dad felt that any blessings bestowed upon them . . . long distance couldn’t hurt a thing,” she said…. My cousin said the baptism was done out of love, as a way to honor my grandparents. “It is the epitome of not forgetting somebody,” he said. It does come down to choice. We have the freedom to choose whether…
First Things Articles
First Things has published two articles about the Church; one by Bruce D. Porter and the other by Gerald R. McDermott.
Are we not funny?
I freely admit that I’m not the funniest person in the world, but I do think I have a sense of humor. I like a good laugh as much as anyone. Or perhaps I should say, “I like a good laugh as much as anyone who is LDS.â€
Missions and the Art of Togetherness
One unique aspect of the missionary experience is the opportunity to focus everything you do, day and night, directly on the goal of serving God. It can be kind of scary to set that as your project, because it is a tall order. Serving God for one day is hard enough; you run out of ideas. Serving God for two years takes a lot of creativity and thought.
Missions, art, and surveillance
One unique aspect of the missionary experience, quite distinct from life before and after, is the feeling that someone is always watching you. It’s probably the one aspect of my mission that I could have done without, although I wouldn’t say that it was entirely unproductive.
Kindness and Technology
“I seriously doubt whether there will be anyone in the celestial kingdom who is not kind.†“An important measure of our efforts for the celestial kingdom is how we treat others.†(Elder Jensen, Regional Conference meeting, September 7, 2008).
Doctrines of Localization
In April, 1998, President Hinckley visited New York City to speak at a special fireside held in Madison Square Garden, and our stake provided a 100+ voice choir for the event. I remember thinking at the time that with all of the talented Church members in New York City, the choir should be permanent.
New Mormon Studies Clearinghouse: MormonConferences.org
Have you been wondering where to go to find out what all is going on in Mormon Studies? Now you know: MormonConferences.org, just launched today, keeps track of all the major public events in Mormon Studies and lists them all on one calendar
Only a Clerk
Soon after I was made a ward clerk 20 years ago this month, I walked into the clerk’s office to find a xerox copy of an article posted there. The article was the text of a letter, sent by one of my predecessors, to the Church’s membership department, and had somehow found its way to Sunstone. It was titled “A Religion of Clerks.” The author, Randal Quarles, has since served as Undersecretary of the Treasury.
Special Feelings (more on Mormon Language)
This morning I heard a member of Utah’s delegation to the Republican National Convention tell a radio talk show host that “there is a really special feeling among the Republican delegation.†Could you run that by me again?
Moderation in all Salt
Like in many Mormon families, my siblings and I helped fix dinner. On Sunday’s I loved to fix the mashed potatoes. It was in making mashed potatoes that I learned early that though a little is good, a lot is not necessarily better. Early on, I served a large bowl (there were 8 of us) of mashed potatoes after thinking that if a little salt was good, . . .
Three Million Strong (and Growing)…
A little more than a year ago, Russell wrote a post commemorating Times and Seasons 2 millionth hit. A feat he said wasn’t bad “for a blog that doesn’t feature kittens or porn.” Looking back, he also noted that while “We’ve weathered storms and squalls, and some people have gone overboard… Still, old Times and Seasons lumbers onward.” Fifteen months, a few new shipmates, and another million readers later, it’s still plowing onward (with the occasional hiccup). Whatever success Times and Seasons has enjoyed along the way is due in large part to all of you who peek in on us once in awhile. So, to echo Russell once more, thanks… “to our [three] millionth reader, and our first, and everyone who has come in between.” Hopefully, we can keep you coming back for more.
Mormon Language
I can’t resist telling this one again. Last May in priesthood meeting the photographers collecting photos for the ward directory suggested that the photos might end up on the “Blogosphere.” After they mentioned the word “Blogosphere” three times, I replied: “In the Church, we call it the “Bloggernacle.” To my surprise, this drew gaffaws from the entire room, as if I had invented the term there and then as a joke of some kind.
What of the BYU?
Several years ago a returned missionary acquaintance was told, on applying to BYU, that he needed ‘academic repenting’ before he could be admitted.
New Nursery Manual
The new nursery manual is available.
What to do about Deseret Book?
For the past decade, I’ve suggested that Deseret Book is one of the significant impediments to the growth of Mormon culture outside those elements involving worship. LDS books, music, film, art and other cultural products, especially innovative ones, are hampered by Deseret Book’s size, focus and control of the market for LDS materials. What can we do about it?
Sunday School Redux
Three excellent quotes from this week’s Sunday School lesson: Men and women who turn their lives over to God will discover that He can make a lot more out of their lives than they can.
What is an Association Worth?
This past week I received a card in the mail from the BYU Alumni Association, asking for my help in “editing” my biographical information in an “Alumni Directory” in preparation. While I’ve certainly given the Alumni Association biographical information in the past, for some reason this time I started asking myself “is this worth my time?” and, in the Mormon context, “is this worth anyone’s time?”
Evil Speaking
In the Old Testament God likens his relationship to the House of Israel as that of a bridegroom to his wife. In the New Testament, the Church is described as the bride of Christ. The choice of the image of marriage, it seems to me, is hardly accidental. It provides, I think, the background for the commandments against speaking evil of the Lord’s anointed and by extension — I believe — the Lord’s Church. Belief and membership — the two ideas that we use most commonly when thinking about our relationship to the Church — are, it strikes me, far too thin to capture what is really at work in it. Belief implies that what is primarily at stake is assent to a set of propositions. Membership is a bit better in that it nods toward the social dimension of the relationship, but membership tells us nothing about the level of reciprocity or commitment involved. I am a member of the Oman family, a member of the Virginia Bar, a member of my HOA. These are very different sorts of membership. Marriage is a much richer concept. To be a member of a marriage is to have a very thick set of obligations, affections, and relationships. It is also to have a fierce commitment to the maintenance of the relationship with its obligations and affections. We go on dates with our spouses, but not our HOA. We entwine our lives…
Mourning with Those Who Mourn
So I’m at the pool last week with someone I really like but don’t know all that well and we’re kvetching about grocery prices, etc., when out of nowhere she says, “So I know you lost a baby daughter last winter. How are you doing with that?”
Garden Fights
Between loving fresh vegetables and an assumption about gardens being “doctrine,†I find myself planting every spring and harvesting what the bugs didn’t nibble in the summer and fall. Except for a few condo-living years when dirt was a scarce commodity, I have planted religiously. But
Hot Mormon Gossip
Has the Church really made an unsolicited offer to buy Facebook (see here which spun off to here)?
What Model for Spreading Mormon Culture?
Ever been in one of the few LDS stores outside the United States? or in countries that don’t speak English? The selection can be quite discouraging.
My Williamsburg Discrimination Story
Adam’s post about the California Supreme Court’s recent decision, and the resulting brawl in the comments got me thinking about the basis of discrimination. In 1998, while I was a senior at BYU I spent a semester in Williamsburg, Virginia doing research in the archives at the College of William and Mary. The week before my job in Williamsburg was to begin, I drove down from DC, where I had been working over the summer, to find a place to stay. I had three options. One turned out to be unfurnished, which took it off the list. The second option was a house filled with a mix of grad students and college seniors. The ownership structure wasn’t entirely clear, but I think that the house actually belonged to the parents of one of the students. After showing me the room, my putative landlord asked me why I was in Williamsburg. I explained that I was a BYU student doing research in the archives. He got a very serious look on his face, and explained that he had grown up in Spokane, Washington with many Latter-day Saints and found them to be very “un-Christian†and would prefer not to rent to a Mormon.