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Take a look at this! The Story Behind the Prophets Global Prayer of Gratitude: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/inspiration/the-story-behind-my-global-prayer-of-gratitude?lang=eng

I am grateful for the walks I have with my daughter. She won't be with me much longer. Three more weeks or so and she'll be heading out to Fresno for her mission.

I am grateful for the Teachers and Leaders that I and my family have had. People who have taken the time to instruct, correct and guide me as I needed

I'm grateful for the scriptures... From the Book of Mormon, to the Bible and all the Modern Revelations, that help me better know and understand God and Christ as well as what they would have me do.

I'm sorry, I can't find the source. It was the first site I read about this. Now, I can't find it again. But I'm still going to vote for "art" rather than "joke". If it was meant to be a joke, that was one pretty expensive joke that was WAYYYY out in the middle of nowhere and may have never been discovered. One point of the joke is that one gets to enjoy others laughing at it. Art, on the other hand, does not require anyone to appreciate it other than the artist.

You know, it is all about balance. I agree that the primary benefit if for us to find a testimony of Christ through the Book of Mormon. And while it may come through reading it and praying about it. I can't quite verbalize the balance point between "forgetting about the meaning of any of the words" vs. parse every single word to the uttermost senine until we finally get it right. Yes, we can take exegesis too far. If we rely on scholarly evidence too much to point to a spiritual truth, then where is there room for Spiritual impressions? OTOH, if we make interpretations that don't even remotely relate to the text, then why bother having the book at all? It is a balanced walk that many end up falling on one side or the other. And sometimes it is difficult to determine where that balance is. The answer, though obvious, is difficult to apply sometimes by us fallible mortals: Rely on the Spirit to guide you.

I read Moroni 7 last night with my wife, and in verse 17 we read "...whatsoever thing persuadeth men to...believe not in Christ, and...serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil" I'm not saying this woman is of the devil per se, but a message that gives no room for the Lord or even spirituality in general most definitely is. Elder Uchtdorf has said "...we can live with an understanding of our divine inheritance as children of God and with an awareness of our potential as eternal beings." I too like the "head in the sand" phrase. The day will come when we need to give an accounting of our life, and burying our heads (or our talents) in the ground will not prevent the Lord from seeing us and one day asking us what we did with our time here.

I'll grant it's semantics. But...we are, at our cores, spiritual beings. If, as the article implies of "spiritual bypassing", we want to speak of burying our heads in the sand, I think an approach that pretends there is a separation between the spiritual and who we are is king of said head-in-sand burying. The eternal perspective is the only legitimate perspective because it is the only one that recognized truth as it really is.

I'd place this under the category of: The overarching theory is perfectly valid. I've seen it happen in my life and the lives of others. But the overall tone of the article is that there is no "Genuine Spiritual Remedy" to difficulties. It is all one sided. Does it ever say that? Not specifically. But it makes no allowances for it either. The most it offers is that "sometimes it may be a good thing." No, it's never a good thing. But a Genuine Spiritual Remedy to emotional and psychological issues IS a good thing. It is the complete dismissal of this alternative that makes it a twisted truth.

The article is not written from and LDS perspective. And I do think that there is legitimacy to some of the ideas when it comes to the hippy-voodoo "spirituality" that may be common to a lot of people's ideas of "spirituality". Where I have the problem is when you take the world's ideas and try and apply them to the God's religion, and true spirituality. If someone was sharing this article to explain how their Buddhism and yoga were false fronts that were being used to hide from actually facing their problems...sure...I'm on board. When you start trying to apply the same to an actual relationship with the actual God and the actual true processes He has prescribed for us to use, etc., etc... it starts smacking of relying on the arm of flesh pretty quickly. In essence, a lot of the article (if applied by a Latter-day Saint to the Church of Jesus Christ), seems to argue that the Savior's teachings were wrong, the prophets spout useless and harmful platitudes, and we should not take scriptural council as valid or legitimate because... you know...psychology.

To me it is a bunch of hogwash, poppycock, balderdash, malarkey...take your pick. I could say the exact same things in this article apply to philosophy, which is nothing more than man's way of avoiding the real trials and questions in life. The only "proof" or reason to believe in the author's view is her word only. She has no foundation...no ground to stand on, and her argument is, truly, very weak. At it's most basic and simple level, believing in God makes much more sense than mankind's way of trying to explain everything. Unfortunately, spirituality will continue to be mocked and attacked in greater amounts in the future. That isn't to say that God has a hand in all things...because I don't believe He does. I do believe in real coincidences, and sometimes things just happen to us for better or worse. That's part of life on this earth...and we all accepted those potential risks before we came here. Being a fanatic and thinking that every single thing that happens everywhere is all the will of God is actually contrary to His plan, and can ultimately lead people away from Him. Now, the author can say faith is just a shield if they wish, and perhaps there are some who use it that way; who say that faith "helps them" while deep down they are truly struggling with their belief in God. For myself, I know what I have felt in my life, and I am not confusing true spiritual promptings for mere emotionalism. The Holy Ghost has spoken to me, and I know it was not my own thoughts. I have also had many experiences in my life that prove to me that there is a God - far too many little details all fell into place (some years in advance) for said experiences to just be a coincidence. I love Alma 30:40-41. The more I think about this the more I believe it to be true. Too many things on earth denote that there is a God...it cannot all be explained by chance or the opinion of one who has an axe to grind against religion.

Yeah, I agree, it's baloney. The idea of "spiritual bypassing" as described in the opening sentences is probably correct. As human beings, we wrongly use all sorts of explanations and thinking, including the idea of spirituality, to explain away or hide from harsh realities. But the specifics of this idea as developed in the article are pure nonsense. Someone took a simple truth and grafted onto it all their doubts and insecurities, and the result is this "spiritual bypassing".

11/20 - I am grateful for a good wife who continually serves our family. She has always been patient with me, and been willing to look past my faults. When our twins were born we had 4 children under the age of 4, and I was shortly thereafter given more responsibilities at work and also called as a counselor in the Bishopric. She has never complained about the stress she is under, and the difficulty of handling 4 young children by herself much of the time. Her sacrifices mean the world to me. 11/21 – I am grateful for the organization of the church and the progression of the Lord’s gospel. The church has so many resources in place that are able to help us and our loved ones stay on the covenant path and to progress. So many programs such as the perpetual immigration and education funds, humanitarian aid, Bishop’s storehouses, and disaster relief have lifted millions of people out of poverty and terrible circumstances. The fact that the scriptures, general conference messages, temple ordinances, and other church materials are available in hundreds of languages is a miracle – the Book of Mormon has approximately 112 languages, and the Bible over 700, with other portions having over 1,500 languages and dialects. So many things are evidences of the Lord’s love for us. 11/22 - I am grateful for the additional service opportunities that the Lord’s church offers us. I currently serve in the Bishopric, and have been anxious as of late to be released and receive a new calling. (our Stake President has let us know that their search for a new Bishop has begun as our Bishop will have been serving for 5 years in January) As I was conducting our Sacrament meeting on Sunday, I realized that this coming Sunday may be my last time doing so, and I felt a sense of gratitude for the opportunity I have had to serve those around me, and for the trust the Lord has in each of us to do His work. I have always appreciated my callings more when I was told I would be released from them, and I don’t realize the growth I experienced until I look back and see where I was before. 11/23 – I am thankful for the good people in this world who continually strive to help others. Politicians and civic leaders continually spout that they are the ones who truly care about people and know what is best…yet they never actually do anything beneficial for anyone but themselves. So many commonplace people are the ones lifting those with feeble knees and whose heads hang down. Much of this work is done in secret on an individual basis, and is truly the backbone of our society. So many church leaders (especially those leading youth) are kept up at night from worry as they totally devote themselves to serving others. Their efforts over the years have blessed me and my family greatly. 11/24 – I am thankful for a Father in Heaven who has the ability to truly love us. His ability to foresee what individuals and nations need in advance, and to put events in motion years before is amazing to me. His power and capacity dwarfs anything that mankind can comprehend, and yet His goal and focus is our welfare. It was not easy for Him to lose a part of his children before the foundation of the world. It was not easy for Him to know that Christ would be His only begotten Son; perfect without spot…and yet have to suffer more than any of His other children. It has not been easy for Him to witness the hate that His children have showed to both Him and each other for thousands of years…and yet His love is still extended to us.

Like I said, this has a lot to do with our theory of Book of Mormon translation. The KJV was not what was on the brass plates, but it's indisputably what's in our English Book of Mormon, along with some revisions. No text has inherent meaning. All meaning resides entirely and exclusively in the minds of hearers, readers, and viewers. So why is it the KJV that is mediating the meaning Isaiah intended? "Goddidit" is just methodological punting. And one more question: I'm not suggesting it's phenomenally clear, I'm suggesting that there is imagery that is being used that is easy to overlook, but that I find value in preserving. Educated people translate clear texts incorrectly all the time, though. Like I said above, meaning exists entirely and exclusively in the minds of hearers, readers, and viewers, and it is mediated by our interpretive lenses, which are just as much about dogmatism and identity politics as they are about education. Genesis 1:1 has been knowingly translated wrong for centuries by English speakers because to translate it correctly is to abandon a critical prooftext for creation ex nihilo. Job 19:26 has also been knowingly translated incorrectly for centuries by English speakers because to translate it correctly is to abandon a critical Old Testament prooftext for the resurrection. There is no Bible translation that unilaterally prioritizes what the text says over and against all considerations of theological acceptability or reception. People translate with their readerships in mind, and they frequently massage their translations to meet the expectations, sensitivities, and interests of those readerships. Very few biblical texts are clear. There are always judgment calls to make about what kind of weight to give different considerations. No, I'm saying they didn't give adequate consideration to what I believe to be a salient bit of figurative language. I mentioned that people frequently and knowingly translate things incorrectly to demonstrate that agreement among a bunch of translations is not necessarily evidence the translation is correct. They sometimes think the more literal meaning might be difficult to comprehend. They sometimes think the translation they prefer offers more important hermeneutic help. They sometimes think translating it a different way might be theological problematic or might undermine a specific theological agenda. They might not want to depart from a consensus and draw negative attention to a passage that is ultimately not that critical. There are lots of things that could compel a translator to render a text one way and not another. Yes, I would say it doesn't necessarily indicate accuracy. I recognize that it's a very common assumption and that the overwhelming majority of readers don't have access to the resources to be able to interrogate a given translation choice much beyond comparing different modern language translations, but it's an assumption I try to help folks avoid. There are so many more reasons that translations might miss the mark on a given passage, and the overwhelming majority of them have nothing to do with ignorance or malice.

They just discovered precancerous cells in someone I know. They discovered cancer before it began growing in her uterus. I am grateful they will likely be able to remove the cancer from her and she will likely survive. She is only 45 years old.

I disagree that "is abased" necessarily indicates an outside force. One can abase themselves by the actions they choose. In fact, that's the prototypical use. The Oxford English Dictionary indicates "abase" is "chiefly reflexive." The Hebrew verb here can be used as a stative, meaning it describes a state rather than an action. The semantic focus then is simply on the state rather than on the agent that caused it. It nowhere occurs in the passive, either, so in the absence of a separate subject acting on the object of the verb, a reflexive sense is most likely. I don't know that the Hebrew is that unclear. This verb would have to be piel or hophal or something in order to understand it to clearly mean someone else put them in that state. There are verbal forms that are passive/reflexive (niphal), and others that are purely reflexive (hithpael), but it has a lot to do with the nature of the verbal root, too. Here, it's a stative, as described above. Translators can stick with traditional interpretations for lots of reasons. A widespread. consensus among translations of the Bible doesn't necessarily indicate much, especially when they're all rather conservative translations. These translations all get Genesis 1:1 entirely wrong, too, just like they do It doesn't. The text in Nephi is altering the King James Version of the Bible, so it's not necessarily a reflection of the underlying source text. Frequently it's just trying to make sense of an English text that's problematic, either logically or theologically. When we start using the English text of the Isaiah chapters as commentary on the original text of Isaiah, we enter some incredibly complex territory where our theory of Book of Mormon translation has the potential to be very distorting. The KJV and other translations are assuming verses 11 and 17 out to be used to interpret verse 9. Incidentally, in verses 11 and 17, the KJV interprets in the passive the exact same verbal root as is found in verse 9. It's not about contrasting, it's about repeating. It's synonymous parallelism. It's repeating the same thing over again in slightly different terms. This convention has been described as "A, and what more, B." In other words, there's repetition that frequently also builds on the meaning. This is the single most basic feature of Biblical Hebrew poetry. 1 Sam 17:4, 23 uses the phrase איש־הבנים, which literally means "man of mediation," and refers to the single soldier who fought another single soldier as a proxy for the whole battle. That is precisely the concept of the "champion." Without knowing the Hebrew we can misunderstand the occurrence of איש to be standing on its own, but it's not. In Biblical Hebrew it refers to someone who is vigorous or mighty, so "hero" or "warrior" usually in the Hebrew Bible. In Modern Hebrew, however, it's the generic word for "male." Translating it the same way we translate איש־הבנים is misleading. I'd be careful about using "historical momentum" as an argument. It's always good to see someone trying to dig deeper into the text, and I hope to encourage more of that, but one of the reasons we have the saying that someone knows "just enough Hebrew to be dangerous" is because having a small number of resources can cause more problems than it solves if we don't also know the rules, conventions, and boundaries of the language.

I am grateful for the liberty, comforts, and technology that we have in the world compared to ages past. I am grateful for having the priesthood so readily accessible in the world. I am grateful for having temples that dot the land. #GiveThanks

Yesterday I threw my back out beating the dirt out of carpets. Then I am grateful this happened to me. I was walking in the Walmart parking lot later at night and tripped and fell. After landing on my right side I was not injured except for a minor bruising of my right foot. When I woke up today about two-thirds of the pain I was feeling in my lower back was alleviated. Edit: Five hours later and my back is hurting even less and I am feeling even better. It is strange that a fall could help heal you.

I think we need to be careful. I've been following this thread for a bit, and I've been thinking about things brought up by both sides. But I think we've (speaking generally) strayed from earnest political discussion into vicious attacks that serve no one and foster the spirit of contention. I don't say this from a holier than thou viewpoint, I've made this same mistake before myself, nor am I a mod so take or leave my opinion as you please. But we are all brothers and sisters in Christ and many of us are active members of his church. We should do better than this.

Yes... because she is human... Humans tend to default to our assumptions being true and simply do not process things that do not fit those assumptions. She expected a bigger picture... your telling her there was not one did not get past her barrier to change that expectation. For example have you ever looked for something only to later find it right in front of you? It was right there every time you looked but your brain simply did not register it until later. The same idea with communication. We generally have to open ourselves up to changing our defaults and until we do we can miss what is right in front of us. Thus this exercise shows that you can't just say words and expect understanding.... You have to verify understanding is taking place as well.

I frankly don’t believe that the scriptures were written with the level of deliberation/precision/stylistic consistency/linguistic consistency/narrative “tightness”, that would justify the sort of hyper-literalistic and hyper-legalistic approach that underlies the timelines most folks propose.

Someone's playing a joke perhaps...

While you're at it why don't you give me a nice paper cut and pour lemon juice all over it?

Good catch. I think I had misread the part about being a "a therapist and Buddhist teacher", where she was referring to someone else and not herself. Maybe she is LDS. In which case my thumbs down increases by 20 thumbs.

No, it's not a joke. It was determined that someone decided to create a "work of art" and happened to be an Arthur C. Clarke fan. My big question was: what is it made of? I'm assuming it is a hollow shell. If it isn't, DANG! If it is steel, it would be far too heavy and it will rust. Stainless would still be too heavy. If it is made of aluminum, it will scar, scratch, dent, and wear away far too quickly to justify the expense. Titanium would be reasonable. But REALLY expensive. I know, only an engineer would care...

Saturday and Sunday I got sad news. It is expected I suppose to a degree, but it hits somewhat close to home. Two friends of mine have passed away this week from COVID-19 (or that is what I was told). One was someone I got to know through my daughter as she had a close friend when she was younger and I got to know that friends parents. Both parents came down with Covid but while one made it through, the other did not. The other one was also somewhat unexpected. I am part of a club where we dress up as Cowboys sometimes, and do cowboy things such as riding horses and doing rope tricks and rodeo tricks as well as other such things. These days we didn't do as much (age gets you a little slower at times) but we still did parades and fairs at times. One of them passed away this week as well. You may wonder what this has to do with thanks, but it has brought to me a stark realization of a blessing that I've had thus far. I've been around students and others who have had diseases (not just Covid, students have all sorts of illnesses and ailments. Strep can be a particularly lethal one if untreated, they also have flus, colds, etc.) which probably are not the best things that I am exposed to. I have been blessed with protection in many ways from being as affected by some of these as others. I am VERY grateful for the protection I have been blessed with thus far. I do not know how long it might continue, but I have been blessed tremendously in the past few months. I am grateful for that protection from ailments and sickness as well as with being healthy. There have been times when I may not have the best health, but I am still alive and am still breathing and exercising. I AM sorry for losing friends, but I am grateful for the time i have to spend with my family and those I love on this earth for at least a little bit longer and the protection and health that I have been blessed with.