religion

The Pew Report on Mormons

(Not to be confused with the pew pew pew report on Mormons) Came across this report over the weekend that studies the current state of Mormonism today–what Mormons believe, how active they are in practicing their religion, what their political beliefs look like, how much education they have, what their racial characteristics are, etc. A fascinating report–whatever your views on Mormons might be. My religion’s been getting a lot of press lately–much of it bad. I thought it was interesting to see what the statistics looked like as far as what Mormons are reporting on national surveys. For those of […]

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Words of Wisdom

Funny thing happened yesterday, but to get the joke, you need a bit of Mormon background. It’s worth the build up, though–trust me. Explanations will be given as footnotes. So anyway, DKC and I are having Family Home Evening with TRC.* For the lesson, I was talking to TRC about the Word of Wisdom**, going over the various things that we don’t do as Mormons. No alcohol, no drugs, no smoking, no coffee, and no black or green tea***. TRC was agreeing all along–he’s learned this in Primary.**** Right after I get to the no black or green tea part,

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House Cleaning and General Conference

So this past weekend was General Conference. For those “Mormon-Impaired” readers out there, General Conference is a twice a year meeting where church leaders (the prophet, the twelve apostles and the like) address the church as a whole. I can answer more specific questions about it if any of you would like, but I’m trying to keep this blog as preachy-free as possible. (Is preachy-free anything like peachy keen? Or squeaky clean? Because I’d like my blog to be all of the above, if possible. Maybe I should send out clean peaches to readers or something.) Anyway. General Conference consists

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Speaking in Church

I’m giving a talk in church on Sunday. Part of the territory when you don’t have a paid clergy is that the members of the congregation are regularly called upon to speak, teach lessons and the like. In fact, when I was in Slovakia, I talked twice in three weeks (fewer members = more frequent speaking duties). What am I going to talk about? Missionary work. Specifically, why I was surprised so many people in my church thought my new calling (Ward Mission Leader) was a bad one. I think sometimes members of the Mormon church look at the church’s

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Updates

So now I can also mention the other thing that’s gotten me thinking. I was called to be the Ward Mission Leader in my church. Now, for those of you who aren’t Mormon, this no doubt requires a bit of explanation. I’ll try to keep it as brief as possible. But in case this kind of stuff bores you, I’ll put it behind the jump. ‘Cause I’m nice like that. First of all, Mormons don’t have a paid clergy. Members of the local congregation volunteer to fill in all the different roles necessary. (A local congregation in Mormon-ese is called

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