mordorbund

I had a similar experience. I thought it was a wacky song from that guy that sang American Pie. How silly that he thinks rain on a cake destroys the recipe. What world does he live where the only way to preserve a recipe is to consume the baked result? In this past year I introduced my kids to it through Weird Al’s Jurassic Park. They all had a good laugh while I thought “It’s a metaphor, idiot.” Funny how time and life experience can change perspective.

He loves it….. second only to the Taylor Swift jukebox musical he’s crafting in his head.

This feels like the mirror universe of that time I gizoogled the Church’s website.

From Revelation 11:6 They will replicate the miracles of Elijah (who shut the heavens) and Moses (who turned water to blood). This leads to the speculation that Moses and Elijah themselves will be the two prophets, but as far as I know only the LDS tradition has a translated Moses (Enoch’s translation may be why he’s included as Elijah’s companion, but I’m unfamiliar with that rumor). For Latter-day Saints, we already have the authority of both Moses and Elijah, so we don’t need the ancient prophets there personally to fulfill this prophecy (just like we don’t need Peter, James, and John to come to Jerusalem to set up a ward or branch there).

Satan and his followers were cast off for open rebellion. There’s a huge difference between “I don’t understand why we have to wait, but I’ll wait,” and “We need a new God!” They knew God and their relationship to Him and threw it aside. I would also caution against getting worked up on the thoughts of a random stranger on the Internet. If the musing doesn’t work for you cast it aside. I assure you I will once it stops being useful.

I sometimes wonder if one of the driving forces of our choosing mortality was our own ignorance of why lesser kingdoms disobey. Abraham says the creation council at times watched until they were obeyed. The Spirit knows all things, and we may have been told how difficult it can be, but we never really got it so we signed up for the experience of living by faith — of living in a world where God says to be generous because there is enough and to spare, while being surrounded by an abundance of scarcity; of living in a world where we are told God will provide but everything you’ve labored for can be lost through no fault of your own. It may be only in dealing with these post-Fall worlds celestial beings even need to worry about such things as sacrifice and in all other relationships there is no need at all (but they are celestial because they have learned and are willing to sacrifice). It may even be that such an experience is not perceived as sacrifice because what they give up is perceived as negligible. It may also be that this entire post is nothing but an imaginative thought-cloud on a breezy day.

It would be much better if these laws carved out exceptions for the scenarios you describe. They should include some statement to the effect to give them an out like, “except in a medical emergency or in the case of a severe fetal abnormality”. If I convince Mississippi’s lawmakers to include such a statement in their abortion law*, will you support the overturn of Roe and Casey so such laws won’t continue to be challenged? * Don’t read page 6 of the draft too closely.

My ministering brothers and their Christ-like service.

For those unfamiliar with what @JohnsonJones is referencing, the Casey case (the other landmark abortion case that cemented Roe) was ruled on the basis of the 14th amendment. Since no State can abridge anyone’s liberty, they cannot violate a person’s autonomy. This was the basis for decisions about biracial marriage, prison marriage, use of contraceptives, living with relatives, parental authority over their child’s education, the right to turn down medical procedures (including forced sterilization), consensual sex acts, and same-sex marriage. I don’t know where JJ is getting the idea that Southern Baptists will have license to attack us with the law. Perhaps he could clarify that. I don’t think his concern is valid that the other rights the Court found in the 14th amendment will be threatened by this decision. For starters, all but the last two were established before Casey — they aren’t dependent on that case for their judicial doctrine. Second, this ruling doesn’t erode the interpretation of the 14th amendment that these cases stand on. SCOTUS says what was missing in Roe was evidence that abortion was considered a right at any point before the decision. Roe failed in the historical department but most if not all of these other cases will show that there was some notion of parental rights, marriage rights, sex rights, etc. This is why the 14th amendment wasn’t applied in the assisted suicide case. There is no history in common law or American law for a person to have the right to end their own life. So they kicked it back to the legislatures. Finally, one thing all these other cases have in common (even the suicide one and the two post-Casey ones) is consent among all the parties involved. This is not the case for abortion. What sharply distinguishes the abortion right from the rights recognized in the cases on which Roe and Casey rely is something that both those decisions acknowledged: abortion destroys what those decisions call “potential life” and what the law at issue in this case regards as the life of an “unborn human being”. None of the other decisions cited by Roe and Casey involved the critical moral question posed by abortion. They are therefor inapposite. They do not support the right to obtain an abortion, and by the same token, the conclusion that the Constitution does not confer such a right does not undermine them in any way. EDIT: You know, I think that last paragraph is convincing enough I’ll email my local SCOTUS and see if they’ll add it to their decision. EDIT EDIT: see page 32 of https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000180-874f-dd36-a38c-c74f98520000

I recently saw In the Heights. I think it had the ability to be a good film but it has too many failures working against it. Spoilers In the Heights had enough stage popularity to suggest that it could connect with large audiences. It was the popular hip hop musical before Hamilton (others had tried but did not have either the story or the production values to carry it — sorry Bring on da Noise fans, not sorry Bring it on fans). The general theme is about a neighborhood of people seeking out their individual dreams (and I tend to think most of these are facets of the American dream) with one character in particular carrying a sub-theme of gentrification. In my mind, the biggest thing they messed up was jumbling the songs. It was clear to me that the songs were getting played in a different order because the lyrics belonged elsewhere (or else when). A good (bad) example of this is the love song between Benny and Nina. It was framed as a recollection of the love they shared over the past summer, but both the lyrics and the dance would have fit better if they were actually in love in the moment and not reminiscing. Abuela’s song lost a lot of oomph because they wanted to keep the lotto winner a secret. She sings of the sacrifices her mother made to bring her to New York and make ends meet. Abuela carried on her work. And then the key line: What do you do when your dreams come true? She’s finally arrived to a point where she can have some financial breathing room. What do you do? We’ll you die of course (so sad, so tragic)! No!! You share it and help others with their dreams! But that gets lost because she’s just singing about shuffling off this mortal coil and not about winning the lottery (not to mention it makes the reveal at the end a deus ex machina because they’ve already denied ever finding out who won). The second class of grievances I have are things that chip away at the main theme. I already mentioned the failing of Abuela’s song. Nina is thinking about not going back to Stanford — not because of how much it costs her dad (which looks to be the concern from the play) but because of racism directed towards her. This pulls away from the theme because lottery winnings can help in one case but not the other. The cousin is an activist. There’s a few nods towards gentrification and I think there used to be a subplot about some hoodlums but his big draw now is DACA. The specific problem with this is that it takes him too long to get to this issue so it’s resolved almost as quickly as it’s discovered. Additionally, combined with Nina’s changes it firmly locks the film into the Trump presidency instead of something more timeless. Finally there were some stylistic choices that felt out of place. 96000 at the pool worked, as did the street dancing for the title song. They built to it and you could accept it. But the neon air writing at the start of 96000 didn’t work. It came out of nowhere and didn’t go anywhere. The dancing on the side of the building from Nina and Benny’s love song could have worked if they were in the moment (like the La La Land fantasy dance/flying scene) but as a memory it fell flat. The love interest was unlikable so they shouldn’t have pursued the happily ever after ending. And the entire framing was fraudulent. I will say, listening to the Latin beats in the songs had me longing for Santana to write a musical. I think the music and story had promise, but too many reactive story choices and poor design decisions brought it down.

I seem to remember the director of the 1961 version saying he changed the song order for reasons similar to what you’re describing. After the rumble it was supposed to be Officer Krumpke. The director decides it’s too silly. That just escalated their gang war to a precipice you don’t climb down from….. and they’re going to play dress up? So he puts Cool there instead.

Mothers Day. The bishop let everyone know that there was some goodies for all the mothers in the ward but wanted to hand out extra goodies to mothers in superlative demographics. Newest mother, most grandchildren, and so on. Being a helpful* teenager, I tried to assist my mother to stand up when the bishop prompted for “oldest mother”. I think even mom was surprised when the ensuing POP echoed loudly across the chapel. *helpful and obnoxious are synonyms, right?

Paul, who teaches the Law is the schoolmaster that brings us to Christ, doesn’t seem to recognize the fulfillment in Jesus until after his miraculous conversion. I think a reading that comports with Paul’s experience and subsequent counsel and actions is that the Law was the instructor (for the lay understanding of schoolmaster) or guardian (my interpretation) until Christ came along as the new instructor. He introduced the curriculum or covenant they follow now. Jacob 4 informs us of the Nephite perspective that the Law of Moses was given with the intent to point their souls to God and Christ. With due respect to the future Paul, Jacob seems to place it in the personhood of Christ, referencing the name of Jesus directly. However, even he seems to recognize that this is hermetic knowledge because he wants his posterity to know that he and his people knew of Christ before His coming. If this is the plain purpose of the Law, then why does the obvious need to be stated? I rather suspect that this personhood of Christ in Jesus was recognized as a mystery among the larger Jewish population but well-known among the Nephites. For those that like to split hairs, Jacob says the intent is to point souls to “Christ” (or God, depending on how you read a pronoun) so he may be talking a bit more generally that the purpose is to instruct people sufficiently that they may develop faith unto salvation. In this respect, I rather think that anyone who can prepare for 2 back-to-back sabbatical years also recognizes that God blessed him sufficiently (perhaps even abundantly) and exercises the kind of faith that reconciles him to God.

Perhaps I can be clearer on the relationship between the Doctrine and Covenants and the KJV. If an elder is sent out to some branches he may be counseled to “strengthen the churches” where he goes or to even “confirm the members in the church”. If leaders wanted it to sound KJV-ish they might say “thou shalt strengthen the churches”. But if they want to actually use KJV verbiage they will lift the words directly from Acts 15:41 where Paul “went through Syria and Cilicia confirming the churches”. If D&C 24 were received today with the prevalence of the NIV then Joseph Smith might have been told to continue in … strengthening the churches.” Whereas if Young’s Literal Translation carried more cachet he would “continue in … confirming the assemblies.” So my question about foreign translations involves specific wording in languages I know nothing about.