MrShorty

I don't know what a man like me would know about suitable baby shower gifts, but I have always noticed that the Church's recordings for the Children's Songbook are almost all fairly quiet, subdued recordings (it seems that the Church showed a strong preference for a small string ensemble for the music). Again, I don't know how well it would go over as a shower present, but I might suggest that the Church's Children's Songbook CD's would fit the description you asked for. In addition to the full CD's, you can go to LDS.org to the music library and download MP3's for most of the songs and burn to a CD.

You may be right, that it is simply a case where addiction would not be noticed until there was a motivation to abstain -- especially with something like pornography where religiosity calls for complete abstinence without room for "in moderation". In the same way, I may be addicted to donuts, ice cream, and other forms of junk food, but I will never know it because I have not motivation to abstain 100%. I don't view these foods as sinful, I don't consume them to excess, I feel that I am in good health and not overweight. Is it ok to call something an "addiction" that is causing no harm other than the perception of "sinfulness"? How does the idea that "you won't see it as an addiction until you decide to try and stop" inform or change the way we deal with porn users?

Being a religious internet community, I thought you might be interested in this article: Strong Religious Beliefs May Drive Self-Perception of Being Addicted to Online Pornography : News : Parent Herald Main article abstract: Transgression as Addiction: Religiosity and Moral Disapproval as Predictors of Perceived Addiction to Pornography - Online First - Springer I found it interesting that the authors claim a correlation between "religiosity" and perceived porn addiction. Not sure that I know what it means, but it was interesting.

If I followed the history of the closed threads that lead up to this thread, let me add this to the original question: What do you think it means to sustain the general authorities when you don't really agree with them? We often talk about the need to "get your own testimony" of principles that GA's teach. What does "sustain" mean when you have studied the principle in question, taken it to the Lord in prayer, and feel reasonably confident that the Lord has told you that the principle being taught (or, at least, the one you perceived them to be teaching) is wrong or being taught out of context or some such? MoE suggesed that, if he could, he would raise his concerns with Pres. Monson. But, with 15M members of record, the church is just too large to allow each of us to raise our concerns directly with Pres. Monson, or whichever GA is in question.

But doesn't this principle also apply to speakers and magazine publishers editors? When a sizeable portion of the Ensign's audience is receiving a message other than intended, shouldn't the speakers/editors/publishers at least consider how to present the message differently to correct the wrong impressions some are getting?

I think the one statement Elder Callister makes that has really fueled the accusations of feeding "rape culture" is this one: "In the end, most women get the type of man they dress for." In an interesting contrast, on page 20 of this same issue, is an article about a young woman recently divorced from an abusive husband. Would any of us really say that this young woman deserved an abusive and controlling husband because of the way she dressed when she was single? Of course not. It seems that this is the kind of thing that those who are sensitive to "victim blaming" are taking issue with. I expect he made this statement thinking along the lines of "birds of a feather will flock together," -- we tend to hang out with people with similar dress styles and attitudes. How we dress might be a part (a large or a small part???) of our way of identifying those with similar ideas about sex in marriage. But nobody deserves abusive or otherwise unhealthy or inappropriate relationships based solely on how they dress or dressed.

Been thinking about your post, Overcomer, and decided I would like to give my opinion. As I have listened to Christians/Evangelicals on the radio, I have found some of the things they say quite interesting. One of the things I find interesting is the choice of words used where I have highlighted "must". Many will use words like "should" or "ought" or even "usually will". I find it interesting that many of them will specifically avoid any word, like "must", that suggests that good works are absolutely necessary. I expect this is how each one interprets the idea of "by faith alone". As LDS, we aren't bound by any loyalty to the idea of "by faith alone". It seems to me that the LDS view is one where salvation is obtained by faith, repentance, and obedience. IMO, the stronger your choice of word in that slot where you have "must", the closer you are to LDS thought. The weaker your choice of word ("should" or "may"), the farther you are from LDS thought. Another interesting observation I have made. It often seems that we conflate the concepts of "by faith alone" and "by grace alone". As a non-Protestant looking from the outside in, I find it interesting that the reformers kept these two ideas as separate "solae." If I separate those "by grace alone" from "by faith alone", I think there is plenty of support in LDS theology for salvation by grace alone. One of my favorite phrases from the Book of Mormon occurs in verses where the people "did all these things, relying wholly upon the merits of Christ" for their salvation. Whirlieking's post I believe also shows that the idea of "by grace alone" is alive and well in LDS thought. So, to summarize the current state of my thinking. I believe fairly strongly in "salvation by grace alone through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, repentance, and obedience" where repentance and obedience are necessary outgrowths of that faith.

Is "sweetness" a relative term here and depends on context? Grapefruit or orange is (usually) sweeter than lemon, but a donut is sweeter than a grapefruit or orange. Is it possible that, in 2 Ne 2: 15 and 1 Ne: 8, the fruit of the tree of life is clearly sweeter than the forbidden fruit. But, in Genesis, assuming Adam and Eve had never tasted the fruit of the tree of life, found that the forbidden fruit was "sweet" compared to other foods in their (limited??) experience?

You are correct, MOE. It is technically not a rejection of sex/porn as an addiction, but merely a lack of evidence. I understand that previous editions of the DSM included sexual addictions or hypersexuality or something like that, so, in this regard, they are maybe saying that including this in previous versions was premature.I think in some ways, I am intrigued by the difference between the APA's conclusion and some of what I read in the church and other Christian writers/bloggers/etc. For example, I recently read an article written by a bishop in and LDS-oriented magazine where he stated that "Medical science has established that pornography is an addiction more powerful than heroin or cocaine." as if it were fact. I think it boils down to -- I find it interesting that the same research that so easily convinces us that porn is very addictive failed to convince the APA committee.

From what I understand, as the APA debated this issue for the DSM-V, they ended up not making a distinction between "sex addiction" and "porn addiction." Which suggests to me, contrary to your assertion that porn is extremely addictive, that the APA was not convinced that porn was addictive. On the contrary, they were convinced that porn was not truly addictive. Do you think they were mistaken, then?

I don't know if this is too much of a threadjack, but I've been wondering for a while, and this thread seems to be an opportunity to ask. You are apparently someone in favor of designating porn and/or sex as addictive. What is your take on the APA's decision to leave porn/sex addiction out of the most recent diagnostic standards (DSM-V)? Is the science of porn/sex addiction weak enough to justify leaving it out? Did the committee make a mistake to leave it out?

In many ways, Traveler, I think you are right. Though it can be difficult to ignore that many in the LDS Church and broader Christianity want to interpret the Bible's accounts of the Creation and Fall as literally as possible.

I'm sorry that I don't remember very well everything that was discussed. I expect it was proffered by someone as one possible explanation, but I don't recall for certain. As I recall, the point of that section of the class was mostly to describe the history and main points of the debate. Not so much to try to come to any meaningful conclusion or resolution of the debate. I know that personally, I have certainly considered creation then evolution as one possible hypothesis, but it still has problems with it that I'm not sure how best to resolve. In some ways, this is true, especially for the modern debate over evolution. Nowadays, people are less interested in debating whether finches can evolve into other finches, or whether one dinosaur species can evolve into another dinosaur species. It seems that the debate centers around whether life can evolve from non-living, maybe because science does not have much evidence for how that would occur. Historically, interspecies evolution was an important part of the debate.

It can be an interesting question. Vestigiality is rather common in nature. It is quite possible that T-Rex's arms are nothing more than "evolutionary leftovers." T-Rex had arms only because whatever they descended from had arms/forelegs.Of course there is some difficulty in proving vestigiality, (especially in a pre-historic creature). about.com has a brief discussion about T-Rex's arms Why Did T. Rex Have Such Tiny Arms? As I recall from my old Evolution class at BYU, vestigiality has historically been an interesting part of the evolution vs. creation debate. Why would an intelligent creator make something with a vestigial structure?

One additional observation: In limited browsing, I saw several individuals who I know have moved out of state, some several years ago, and their names are included in the list. Not sure if the risk is less because you have moved, but it might be worth suggesting that anyone who has registered in the state of Utah (whether they currently reside in Utah or not) check to see what information is available to see if you are concerned as well.

James123: I too have often remarked how scripture (in particular the BoM) teaches it a little differently: Usually start with Creation->Fall->Probationary State->Atonement->Redemption->Judgement->Salvation/Exaltation (or something along those lines).

I agree with many of the criticisms of the original drawing. Perhaps it is just timing, but I found it interesting that for FHE last night, my 9 YO asked to give the lesson based on something they got in primary Sunday. The kids had been given a sheet with similar circles to outline the plan of salvation: (see manual Primary 6: Old Testament Lesson 1: Heavenly Father’s Plan for Us) While the Primary version corrects some of the inaccuracies in the IRR's version, I was wondering how many of the criticisms we have discussed here would also apply to the official primary version published by the Church? For example, I felt like Christ was underrepresented in the Primary version. I know some would like to see all variations of this way of teaching about the plan of salvation go away. Until the correlation department updates manuals, I wonder if we as LDS are guilty of some of the same omissions as the IRR?

I've seen classical guitar, but it really is not very common.

It seems like, at least for a long time, there were talks and such about 4 "pillars" of a testimony: 1) There is a God. 2) Jesus Christ is the Son of God and our Savior and Redeemer. 3) Joseph Smith was a prophet of God 4) The Book of Mormon (along with the Bible and other standard works) is scripture.

It is hard for me to pin down. A few elements of romance that come to my mind: 1) A sense of commitment -- Romance to me carries a sense of "I will love in spite of (fill in the blank)." 2) A sense of exclusivity -- An act or thing you would share indiscriminately with just anyone is not very romantic I'm sure there's more, but that is about all I've got so far.

Wasn't sure whether to put this in Christian Beliefs or in LDS Gospel, so, if the moderators feel like moving it, feel free. I was listening to Pastor Erwin Lutzer's Running to Win radio program this morning. He's doing a series about the armor of God, which has been interesting. In this morning's program, he said something that I found particularly interesting as a Latter-day Saint. I can only paraphrase, as I wasn't in a position to write anything down. He said that, if you ask a mature Christian who has had a long and upright walk with God if he know that Christianity is the correct way back to God, he will say yes, and he will know it because of the workings of the Holy Spirit within him. What I find interesting is that, if you change Christian to LDS/Mormon, you will get the same statement. I don't know if there is really much to discuss out of this, but I guess it makes me think of a few questions: 1) Can both be "right" in this regard? Does the Holy Spirit give confirmation/assurance to both LDS and non-LDS regarding their faith? Is it possible that, as another thread discussed, our faiths have enough essential elements in common that the Holy Spirit can confirm the validity of both points of view? 2) Perhaps it is in opposition to question 1, but it seems that a common accusation is that one is receiving his/her assurance from a different spirit. Or one is deceiving himself/herself. If this is the case, how does one avoid being deceived? Anyway, just throwing that out there.

I would convert that 10 1/2 cups of water to a weight, then use a scale/balance to add the water to the pitcher. 10.5 cups * 240 mL/cup * 1 g/mL = 2.52 kg H2O. Now I don't need to worry about the density difference between ice and liquid water. I think there's a time element that has not been given. The main question I see is -- how long will this be in the fridge? I want all of the ice to be melted at the time I remove the lemonade from the fridge. If solid ice is still present at serving, the lemonade will be more concentrated than the recipe calls for. So, the real question will be, how quickly will the ice melt in the fridge? I think we can model this question using Newton's law of cooling. The fridge air will be about 40 F, the temperature of the lemonade + ice will be 25-30 F, depending on how much sugar and other solutes are present. If we had a good estimate for the rate of heat transfer, we could use that to estimate how quickly heat will flow into the lemonade to melt the ice. From there, we could compute how much ice we want (balance will be liquid water at 50 F or whatever our tap water temperature is) so that the last of the ice is just melting as we get ready to pull it out of the fridge.

I'm not sure who is in charge of purchasing copiers -- whether it is on the ward/building level stake level or just how high up it goes. I think what happens is that in many cases, whoever was/is responsible for this decision chooses an "undersized" copier. I recall one ward I was in where the bishop or stake president worked out an arrangement with a local copy shop so that people could bill copies to the ward or stake. The reason that was given was that they were having difficulties with the copier(s) because they were undersized. I don't recall the exact numbers, but the library copier in our building was designed for something small (let's say 1000 copies/month), but the copy meter in the copier was saying that it was trying to do more like 10,000 copies/month (or some other many multiple times its designed rating). The copier in our current building seems to work pretty well and keeps up with demand. I expect the Kidd's observation is rooted in a tendency to buy undersized/underdesigned copiers for the real demand that a ward library really sees.

Even though this question is new to you, it is one that theologians, and philosophers have wrestled with for hundreds or thousands of years. I expect that everyone who believes in an all-powerful, sovereign, and benevolent God needs to wrestle with this question to some extent. I wish I had a concrete answer to it, but I don't. Sure I can intellectually see how "agency" causes suffering (both suffering brought on ourselves from our choices and suffering that my choices cause in others) -- but, if God is sovereign, He could override my agency (or protect others from its effects). I can conceptually understand the concept of "testing," but it sometimes seems like the tests given to some people are similar to me giving my middle school daughter a test in advanced calculus -- there's no way she can succeed. Ultimately, for me, the only answer that has really "satisfied" me comes out of faith. God said that His work and glory is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man (including me). So, for some reason that I may not fully understand, suffering and trials must somehow be a part of His purpose. These "tests" must somehow be a part of exalting me. Agency, in spite of the negative fallout, must somehow help myself and others become like Him. And, in the end, any alleged inequities or other "problems" that may need resolution are atoned for by the Savior.

Traveler: That is one solution I thought of as well -- some kind of mercy rule. However, that is a solution that has to be implemented at the league/rule making body level. If the parents truly feel like their children are being "bullied" when the other team wins by such a large margin, then perhaps this energy should be put to lobbying the rule making body for their league for a mercy rule of some kind.