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I've been thinking all afternoon about the trope of bears living in caves. I've probably missed a few, but here's my taxonomy of bears and caves: Bears who lived in caves: Yogi and Boo Boo The Hair Bear Bunch "The Three Bears" from The Beano comic. These are not to be confused with Goldillocks' three bears, who were essentially the victims of Goldilocks' house-breaking, furniture destruction and porridge thievery. The Three Bears of The Beano were scheming, gluttonous and lazy. Nearly every storyline concerned their attempts to rob the local storekeeper Hank of his wares, and ending up getting their furry backsides blasted with buckshoot. Bears who sort-of lived in caves: Winnie-the-Pooh. His "cave" was more of a hollow under a tree. He lived "under the name of Saunders", meaning that he had the sign "Mr. Saunders" fixed above his door and he lived underneath. This detail was lovingly preserved in the Walt Disney versions, though Disney did take diabolical liberties elsewhere. (Disney's "Rabbit" for example was nothing remotely like Milne's original Rabbit.) Mary Plain in the books by Gwynedd Rae . Very few people nowadays remember Mary Plain. I only know about her because my mother used to read me the stories when I was little, she having kept the books from when she was a little girl. Mary and her fellow bears lived in the "Bear Pits" in Bern, Switzerland, which I suppose must have included some artificial simulation of caves. Although Mary was definitely a bear, she had human intelligence and she could read and (somewhat) write. Her best friend was the "Owl Man". The "Bulgy Bears" in the Narnia books. Their home (or "den") wasn't so much a cave as a tree-stump. Bears who don't live in caves: Paddington. He lived in a house with the Brown family, though maybe his original home in Darkest Peru was a cave. Who knows? Rupert Bear. He lived in a house. There again, he was not so much a bear, as a boy with a bear's head. (Old joke: "Who's white and wears check trousers? Rupert the Fridge.) The Berenstain Bears. They lived in a tree of all places. I suppose pandas climb trees, and the panda is a kind of bear. But the Berenstain bears were decidedly NOT pandas*. *Neither were they koalas. The koala is not a true bear anyway but a marsupial. Yes, I know Sheldon tells Amy how much he loves "koala bears" but shame on the writers for that. No one as OCD as Sheldon Cooper would have made such a mistake as that.

I thought there was a standard that said capitalize pronouns for divinity if there's some ambiguity about whether it's a member of the Godhead speaking. "And the disciple whom Jesus loved lean on His [capital, must be Jesus] breast and he [not capital, must be John] said 'Lord, who is it?'" I might have read that for another organization's publications. Here's something more official: Looks like this style has been in use for 50 years.

"...the only true and living Church..." A rifle that fires true is one that, in the hands of a skilled user, will hit the target it is aimed at. Living water is water that flows, that moves, that does not stagnate, that is constantly being tumbled and refreshed by its river bed. The Church's full name is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. That last part is vital. Not only do we serve in the kingdom of Jesus Christ under the name of Jesus Christ, but we are required, indeed commanded, to be holy. And who is the Holy One of Israel? That would be Jesus Christ. So we are commanded not merely to do some good works, not only to offer ovations and oblations to the Most High God, but in a real sense, to fulfill Jesus' commandment in Matthew 5:48 and become like God (Jesus) by being perfect: Perfectly sanctified by the Holy Spirit. As I'm sure many of you know, the word Saint comes from the Latin sanctus, meaning holy. The words Sacred, Sacrifice, Sacrilege, and many others arise from this same root, and all have to do with holiness or the desecration thereof. We are to be holy—Saints of the Lord Jesus Christ, achieved through our sanctification by His blood. I think the name of the Restored Church of Christ and the description given of that holy kingdom is one of the most sacred truths vouchsafed to us as Saints. Let us be quick to sing the praises of Zion and very slow indeed to find fault with it or its anointed leaders. In this, I remind myself as much as anyone else here.

I have been a capitalization minimalist* since I started writing professionally. Pronouns for Deity were one of the first things I decided could live just fine without being capitalized. So it's actually more than a tiny change for me. But several months ago when I noticed the Church capitalizing divine pronouns, I kind of got conflicted. This battle has been raging inside my mind and spirit for a while now. So while I still have misgivings, I'm relieved of the burden of the emotional and moral struggle. (I'm obviously speaking tongue-in-cheek, but there is more than just a tiny hint of truth-in-jest in my words.) *I was going to write "I had been a big capitalization minimalist...", but there seemed to be too many internal conflicts, so I simplified. Very expository/technical writing-ish of me. By the way, did you know where the term "upper case" comes from, as in upper-case letters? It comes from early typesetting, where type was kept in wooden cases, typically two of them, stacked over the desk where the type was set. The normal miniscule (small) letters were stored in the lower case (and so are sometimes called lowercase letters), and the majuscule (big) letters were stored in—dum, da da DUUUUUUM!—the upper case. So those were the upper-case letters. In programming, people refer to programming languages and such as being "case sensitive", which just means that a programming language will distinguish between the capital form of a letter and the small (minuscule, or lowercase) form of the same letter, seeing them as two different things. (E.g. a variable named vort will be different from a variable named Vort, or from a variable named VORT, or vOrT, or whatever.) So the idea of "case" has come to mean one of two different ways of writing a given letter, the big way (upper-case) or the small way (lowercase). Strange that a word takes on a meaning radically different from its actual root just because it's used in an expression. Strange, but common. Also, it sort of bothers me that the non-hyphenated "lowercase" has become de rigeur, but "upper-case" seems to remain hyphenated (or two separate words). I think the problem lies with "lowercase", a portmandeau that serves no obvious purpose but to put a space out of work, but since that's not likely to change, I need to adapt or die. I'll probably do both within a few years or decades. More than doing it like how I would do it, they should just standardize on a way. (The great "they". You know, the people who decide such things.)

This sort of question feels an awful lot like an effort to excuse the words of the Lord. What comes to mind immediately for me is D&C 1:38: "What I the Lord have spoken, I have spoken, and I excuse not myself;" This is expressed practically immediately after the Lord declares the church to be the only true and living church in D&C 1:30. But inevitably someone comes along and tries to excuse what the Lord said. Let's focus "less" on that. Let's be apologetic about what the Lord declared. I don't find the Lord's declaration in this case as useful. Etc., etc. That doesn't sit well with me. I think instead of trying to excuse what the Lord said I'll focus instead on trying to understand why He said it and why it's important.

I learned this interesting fact during our department meeting this morning. While all the blah blah blah was going on, I found myself wondering where bears live. Do they really live in caves like Yogi and Boo Boo? Well the great thing about having a smartphone is that you can use it to resolve urgent issues like where bears live, while everyone else thinks you're answering important e- mails. The answer is that some bears do and some don't. The place a bear hibernates is called a "den" and while some dens are caves, others can be hollow trees, or even abandoned buildings. Also a bear does not live in his den during the summer - he only sleeps there during the winter months.

I have finally decided (though I retain the right to revist the decision) to follow the Church's practice of capitalizing pronouns that refer to Deity—specifically, to the Father, the Son, and/or the Holy Ghost. I will refer to Them individually as He, and in prayer, I will mentally capitalize Thou and, in the very rare instances that I address more than one at a time, You. I know. It's hard to take in. Sorry there was no way to ease you into this announcement. I felt I just had to blurt it out and let everyone deal with the consequences.

Given how big a stink woke progressive millennial antiracists have made over people failing to capitalize the word black, I'm grateful for this thread.

Hibernation makes so much more sense now! Thank you!

Well of course they are! They have TVs and refrigerators too, and they all disappear into the walls whenever the bears don't want them to be seen!

No wonder I couldn't find it - provident living!? OK, I get it, employment training, but a search for "style guide" yielded nothing on the first page except the fact that at the bottom of nearly every page on the Church's website is this: (and thus, a bunch of utterly useless results)

Why should "free will" mean "unpredictable"? This is not obvious to me.

As I've mentioned before, two of the most hateful, bigoted, and willfully ignorant people I have ever had the misfortune of encountering had doctoral degrees in their chosen fields. One was an avowed atheist with a degree in the social sciences. The other was a minister with a theological degree. Both of them regarded their doctorate as a shield of invulnerability. In their eyes, that they had a doctorate meant that they were all-knowing and all-powerful. In their eyes, anyone who lacked a college degree had no right to speak to them unless it was to kiss their ring or serve them somehow... and even then, no one with anything less than a graduate degree had any right to ask them questions. Their incredible arrogance meant that they actually only had a handful of stock arguments and "evidences" for their various positions on different topics, and they kept going right back to them no matter how many times those arguments and "evidences" were debunked; after all, they reasoned, someone who was "below" them was doing it and so how could that person be correct? When they were backed into a corner and shown how, in ways they could not deny, they were wrong, they inevitably threw a childish temper tantrum, often involving expletives. After all, they had a doctorate, so how could they be wrong? They failed to understand that "evolve or die" is a critical part of academia, and part of that evolution means admitting when one is wrong so that one can fix that flaw.

I remember a BYU class taught by Randy Bott in the late 1990s, where he mentioned that in some of his book manuscripts he had consistently capitalized pronouns for Deity only to have the Deseret Book editors make them all lower case.

To capitalize Father, Son, and other titles, yes; but not He, Him, His, They, Their, Them, Thou, Thee, Thy, Thine, You, Your, or Yours. As I said, I'm not sure how long they've been doing it, but if you look, for example, at the "Teachings of the Presidents..." manuals, you'll see direct quotes where these pronouns (when referring to Deity) are not capitalized. I didn't bother trying to work my way forward to see when it started. But I did go look at some foreign language versions of a manual where I found capitalization of pronouns, and found that both Spanish and Russian have this style applied, but not German (which isn't surprising - German already has some strict rules for what does / does not get capitalized). I suppose I should go look at French - they have some strict rules about their language (in general, not sure about capitalization).

Hm. I've been assuming this was the preferred style for quite a long time. I remember in the late '90's arguing with trinitarians about our doctrine of exhaltation and inheriting all the Father hath and such topics. I made sure to ensure all speculation about the deification of humans to include the lower-case g (and the lower-case s when looking at D&C 103 9-10). I haven't gone so far as to hyphenate God as is Jewish custom (and the custom of some non Jewish folks too), but I understand why they do it and I've got no issues. Always happy to talk about Hashem with folks, and avoid use of the "actual" name out of respect for their desires to keep holy things as holy as possible.

It only matters as to our own salvation. To suggest otherwise is to take away others' salvation against their choice and to claim God is entirely unfair. I am fully confident that if I have terrible bedside manner and drive others away from the church because of my terrible bedside manner, that they'll have the same chance at exaltation as if they'd never met me. I'm also confident that if I'm doing my best but still have terrible bedside manner because I'm the moron that I am, that God will forgive me as I do my best to repent and change, despite failure upon failure. And I am fully confident that no matter how others treat me, in or out of the church, that my choice of salvation or damnation is completely and fully my own. And I'm also fully confident that if I purposefully go out and preach against the Gospel and Christ, or set a terrible example, or otherwise do Satan's work, that they only soul I'll ultimately be damning by those actions is my own.

Nor their good works. OK. We are all foolish and ignorant in various ways and at various times. We should not mistake the flaws and limitations of the members of the Church for the restored gospel and Church of Jesus Christ. FTR, those other churches aren't "celestial" (how can they be without the ordinances that lead to exaltation?) - they seem to be teaching things that are terrestrial in nature. As far as I can recall, it's only their creeds God has labeled abomination. (Klaw is on the verge of declaring my typing an abomination, which, if not stopped, will reap desolation, or a least a firm biting on the arm.) Don't forget that we have the entire rest of time through the end of the Millennium to gather Israel and provide those "exclusive" celestial ordinances to all who will receive them. Just as the law of Moses was to prepare a people to receive the Lord at his first coming, so too, I expect, the laws, ordinances, and covenants of Christ's Church are to prepare a people to receive him at his Second Coming. I would expect us to be blessed with more commandments and possibly more covenants during the Millennium. The pointer is always to Christ and through him to exaltation in the kingdom of God in heaven - celestial glory (whatever that means). That others may feel or find their way closer without the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in their mortal lives does not mean they can make it all the way without the ordinances decreed by God - were that the case, we would not be doing proxy work in our temples. It isn't God being exclusive, it's his children using their agency and free will to choose for themselves the eternity they want - the laws they are willing to abide. (See your other thread! ) Jesus Christ will not turn away anyone who comes to him. He will lead them as far as they're willing to go. In my experience, he is the very definition of patient and merciful. Just because someone hasn't received the witness of the Spirit regarding the restored Gospel at this moment, that does not mean we can or should give up on them, nor that God has, nor that they will not eventually find their way into the required covenants and ordinances. (To think otherwise would be to exercise judgement which is God's alone. Check out this GC talk from last October.)

Shift it back, brother. Here's what the Lord himself said: The Lord himself "wrote" this section of the D&C, so let's not suggest that Jesus Christ did not know what he was talking about. Don't know any sane person who suggested otherwise. Even God didn't do that: Clearly the Lord expects us to seek out learning from wherever we can find it (as well as from him). Yes, it is wholly true that: No other church on the earth has the Priesthood of Jesus Christ, nor his ordinances and covenants. I submit that this person didn't follow the instructions (or see my text below the link): Some of us don't want the fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ, some of us aren't ready for it yet or like to do things the hard way (and maybe need to experience evil longer before we can recognize the good), and some of us love Satan more than God. (And whatever other combination of variables I'm not thinking of.) Jesus Christ does not send people (other than Satan and his minions) away, ever. (Explicit verses above, but the scripture are full of little else than Christ inviting people to come unto him. He will let them come as far and via whatever convoluted or tortured path they choose, but they are always invited to come fully unto him, and that path is not complete until one has entered into the House of the Lord, received ordinances, made covenants, and then kept those covenants to the end.)

There's a bear or three within 10 miles of my house. I hear about them once every few years, loping across the street from one garbage can to another. They seem nice enough. Also, Milne's Winnie The Poo fell out of copyright protection the other year, giving rise all sorts of money grab rebrands, including a horror film.

Ftfy.

That reminds me of when I was at Loughborough Univertity, the following notice was posted all over campus: SEXUAL HARASSMENT USING THE OVERHEAD PROJECTOR (Actually two separate workshops)

But did you determine whether all bear dens are furnished with table and chairs?

I just realized that the solution to your troubles with you cat is contained within his name: Walk Klaw.

So, then, not real degrees. 😋

The first 4 lines hits different when you’ve been reading Jacobean English.

HORSE! HORSE!!! (*fixes post*)

My stewardship is over myself, my spouse and our children at home. None of my children have dared to explain to me how the spirit had prompted them to avoid church services. And if that did hypothetically happen, I’m sure that it would not go over well. Adult children can do as they wish though. One of my sons left the church (served as an AP on his mission too). I gave him some counsel but he is grown man and can do as he wishes. D&C 121:37