LittleWyvern

I think the larger message we should get out of all of this is that it's important that we all cultivate a personal relationship with the Holy Ghost in order to direct and guide us. All of us have a tendency of being products of the worldly culture and teachings around us, even prophets (yes, I take prophetical non-infallibility seriously). However, we are called to not be "of the world." A relationship with the Holy Ghost helps us to make decisions on a higher level than worldly influences, but sometimes the best way we can learn is by trying what we think is right and seeing the consequences of our actions. Thus, I think approaching this new article as an exercise in determining whether or not past prophets and leaders were "wrong" is the wrong way to go. Instead I like to look at these events as slow but sure steps on our long journey to the state of perfection that a Zion state of affairs would require of us as a Church, both regarding the priesthood ban and our individual reactions and feelings about it. Our Church continues to grow and gain more gospel knowledge as it is revealed to us, and I see this new section on race and the priesthood as a step in a positive direction rather than something to be used for ideological scorekeeping.

I think it was a wonderful choice! I think Pope Francis has done much good in the world and I've been inspired by some of his teachings, so I can't think of any reason to oppose this decision at all. :)

In case anybody hasn't seen this:

Wow. I opened my mission call over skype while I was at BYU with my parents and my mom's parents (my dad's parents hadn't quite figured out skype yet). I guess now I can claim it as the most unremarkable mission call opening in the history of Provo.

I was trying to keep my post short

Just fyi, the Bill of Rights did not apply to the states until the ratification of the 14th Amendment in 1868. Now and ever since then, the Bill of Rights applies as equally to the states as it does to the federal government. See Twining v. New Jersey, Everson v. Board of Education, etc.

But we're not choosing any- No, wait. ...Never mind, I'll regret this post later, so I shouldn't write it to begin with. You keep on arguing against what you misread me to say and about how you know exactly what the founders thought, and I'm going to do other more enjoyable things.

Nice try attempting to make me look stupid. You knew I was talking about the 1st Amendment. I'll let you do the math on that one. This isn't a reaction to an event, this is a matter of policy. Your example has nothing to do with anything here. If you don't know how the matter of choice is different between reactions and policy decisions, then I have nothing else to say about this. Brainwashed? Please. I learned much of what I know about the 1st Amendment from BYU's American Heritage class. Maybe you'll have to take this up with the professors there. Something I don't understand about your argument is why we keep going back to "original intention." I could talk about the Lemon Test all day (another product of my BYU brainwashing), but if the only arguments you'll accept are mind reading adventures, then trying to talk with you is pointless. So what kind of prayers do you want in schools? Mormon prayers? Baptist prayers? Jewish prayers? Muslim prayers? I don't understand exactly what you want that somehow won't be unconstitutional via the Establishment Clause. And why are we so concerned about whether or not religion is "cool?" The battle for faith can be won in the home even if being religious isn't popular.

So I have no idea what I'm talking about because I don't know exactly what the Founders were thinking when the Bill of Rights was ratified. Yeah, I'll forget 200+ subsequent years of law and court cases and instead participate in reading the minds of dead people. ...I have no idea how to respond to that, so I'm not going to. Logical fallacies aside (the absence of X is also X), not having prayer in schools is purposefully not picking a side. Having prayer in schools would be picking a side (in this case, the side of whomever is doing the prayer). Sure, ensuring a NPOV by refusing to make a choice is kinda silly, but that's what the Establishment Clause says. Choosing nothing isn't a choice at all, it's the absence of a choice. Look, you may not believe it but I value the role of religion in private and public life as much as you do. But there are various lines that must not be crossed in order to protect religious liberty, and the Establishment Clause is one of them. Students are free to establish student groups, such as bible study and before/after school prayers. Parents are allowed to teach their children whatever they want about religion. People are free to converse among themselves about religion and what it means to them. Even people in public government positions are free to publicly declare the religious reasons supporting their actions. Your argument that a school without religion will necessarily lead children to be agnostic/atheists ignores all the other wonderful religious freedoms we possess. Schools aren't teaching children "to become atheists," they aren't teaching anything about religion whatsoever (except in a historical pursuit). If you're depending on public school to teach children religion, I think you're doing it wrong. That responsibility falls on the family unit, not schools.

Of course it does. Before I explain why, let's remember that the bill of rights uses the word "establish:" This can mean both a state-sanctioned religion and establishing one religion above another, i.e. showing preference to one religion at the expense of another. Because the act of prayer differs widely between the many religions in this country, any prayer must necessarily preference one group of religions above another. Who will do these prayers? Who will we all pray to? What will we pray for? The only way school prayer would not be an establishment of religion is if all people in the school were of the same religion, but that's not true anymore, even in Utah. Thus, school sponsored prayer must necessarily be disallowed in order to fulfill the requirements of the Establishment Clause in the 1st Amendment. Besides, a "belief that God is not necessary in our public endeavors" isn't a religious belief, it's the absence of one (you try telling agnostic people that they're religious!). The only people who think science is a religion are those who try to use it to prove things in the realm of metaphysics (which is ridiculous) and those who make it an "-ism" (which is also ridiculous).

And thus you've illustrated beautifully why I think separation of Church and State is a main protection of religious liberty in the United States. Any religion that is state sponsored becomes corrupted and deviates from its principles and teachings, and I believe what is happening to Islam in Saudi Arabia will also happen to Christianity in the USA if it becomes a state sponsored religion. State-sponsored religions also drive out all other religions in that state, and those who would establish Christianity as the official religion of the United States would not establish a kind of Christianity that would be at all friendly to Mormonism.

If anything, their agenda of educating people about non-theist beliefs is probably "Hey! We're not some sort of evil scum of the earth! We also don't worship Satan!"

Will it spiritually strengthen you? Will it edify you? If so, I'd say go for it. :)

Firstly, the bill says nothing about creating a new protected class of speech: it's strictly about discrimination in employment. Sexual harassment is a different issue covered by a completely different set of laws. Second, yes, ENDA would protect someone from getting fired solely because they are straight. In some places, it's legal to fire someone for the sole reason of their sexual orientation or gender identity (the gray counties in the map). That means it's just as legal to fire someone for being gay as it is to fire someone for being straight: they're opposite things, but they're both allowed for the same reason: that kind of discrimination isn't illegal. ENDA would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, making it illegal to fire someone for being gay and illegal to fire someone for being straight. You can also read this bill over here. It's pretty short as far as bills go.

It can be confusing, because existing laws regarding employment discrimination can vary from state to state and even (in the case of Utah) from county to county. This map shows what states have which laws: Purple means that it's illegal to discriminate based on sexual orientation or gender identity for general employment, and dark blue means that it's illegal to discriminate based on sexual orientation only. The lighter colors means that it's illegal to discriminate for those categories for public employment only, not private employment (magenta for discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, cyan for discrimination based on sexual orientation only). Gray means that it is legal to discriminate based on sexual orientation and gender identity for general employment. Using this color scheme, ENDA corresponds to purple. "If men were angels, no government would be necessary."

Nope. Unless your state forbids it, it's perfectly legal to fire someone for being homosexual or to hire only straight people (it's also legal to fire someone for being straight for the same reason).

Oh great, in noting something I found confusing and mildly amusing I've made Vort gleefully pounce on an argument I'm clearly and obviously not trying to make and now this thread is full of Hitler. Let's look at the quoted sections in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, just for fun. I guess we could test the effectiveness of this exemption by seeing how it's worked in the past. Was the church ever sued/kept from making employment decisions/fined/etc. in the period between the passing of this act and the lifting of the Priesthood ban in 1978? I'm asking this as a serious question, because I wasn't alive then. :)

This bill is strictly about non-discrimination in employment, and says nothing about freedom of association or customer service. From start of thread to Hitler took only 11 posts.

That's correct. More specifically, this bill has the exact same religious exemptions that are stated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In fact, the bill pretty much says "just use those exemptions over there:" You can read the text of the bill over here. It's really short, but mostly because it uses the "whatever the Civil Rights Act of 1964 said" strategy in many more places than just this one.

The Disney World Resort, which encompasses nearly all of the Reedy Creek Improvement District, covers about 30,000 acres. About 1/3 of it is used currently for parks and hotels.

Oh joy, now I get to hear another week of "Excommunicate Ried!" comments from my fellow BYU students and facebook friends.

One thing I've run into is increasingly complicated rules about the sabbath. Some of my roommates at BYU in my freshman year were... well, really conservative. For example, they set their watch alarm at midnight on Saturday so they knew exactly what time they had to stop having fun with their other roommates. (insert Cinderella joke here) Just you and me, baby. Dancing .039in apart from each other.

I always thought it was kinda funny that people are calling Card a homophobe, especially when there's real homophobes out there like Bryan Fisher. Card looks like Ghandi compared to Fisher.