Quelle surprise! It’s Friday, and a new article has appeared in Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship. This one is by Jim Bennett:
“’Somebody Wrote It:’ The Book of Mormon’s Missionary Message to a 21st-Century World”
Abstract: Nathan Oman’s “Welding Another Link in Wonder’s Chain: The Task of Latter-day Saint Intellectuals in the Church’s Third Century” wisely called for “new language in which to celebrate the Restoration.” That new language can be found in understanding the power of the Book of Mormon, which is the tangible miracle at the heart of the Restoration that defies the critics. My father, Senator Robert F. Bennett, devoted his final years to arguing that the Book of Mormon’s existence is a stumbling block to those who try to dismiss it as an obvious fraud. Those who scoff at the Book of Mormon have yet to come up with a plausible secular account of its existence, and this allows the Book of Mormon to endure as the centerpiece of our missionary efforts. But rather than simply use the Book of Mormon to attempt to answer questions people are no longer asking, we need to create a missionary message that uses this sacred scripture to connect people, directly and personally, to Jesus Christ.
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Here, for whatever it’s worth, is a blog entry that I wrote in the wake of Bob Bennett’s passing:
“Honoring the late Senator Bennett”
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Also available on the Interpreter Foundation’s website, from Hales Swift:
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Likewise available on the Interpreter Foundation’s website, this time from Dennis Horne:
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Here’s some news that will interest temple-going Latter-day Saints out there:
“First Presidency Announces Adjustment to Temple Ceremonial Clothing”
Accordingly, some modifications have been made to a Church video on the subject:
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Finally, I continue to try to help those who are eagerly gathering materials for their Christopher Hitchens Memorial “How Religion Poisons Everything” File. So here’s something:
“Giving Machines total nearly $6.3 million in donations for charities”