Ironhold

When the KJV was translated, they relied heavily on a work known as the Textus Receptus. Long story short, the Textus Receptus was dodgier than day-old sushi. Since then, a number of older documents have been recovered that represent older presentations of the books of the Bible, documents older than the ones used to create the Textus Receptus. Many of these older documents lack various verses and passages, such as the very much controversial "Johannine Comma" from 1 John: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannine_Comma . The NIV and a number of more recent translations are based on these older documents, and as a result they have struggled to reconcile the lack of these verses and passages. The most common way is to retain the chapter and verse numbering used by the KJV but leave gaps in the main text, instead referring the reader to the footnotes or another supplementary passage. For obvious reasons, the KJV-Only crowd has had absolute fits over the matter and are claiming that it is "proof" the new translations are trying to steal gospel from people.

In real life a number of companies are working with sonic weaponry as a possible "less than lethal" weapon for use in crowd control. All it'd take is a few SWAT officers and a couple of armored cars with these devices and they could have stopped the invasion before lunch.

Yeah... the same film where we're told that the planet was attacked by aliens who hunted via listening to their prey through newspaper clippings warning us of this. The printing presses themselves are loud and need multiple people to effectively run, plus the vehicles delivering these newspapers will make a lot of noise no matter how careful the drivers themselves are. That headline was less than 10 minutes into the film, and took me right out of the entire thing.

Heretic. A24 has a reputation for making pretentious little numbers that are often so divorced from reality they make Hollywood lawyers jealous. In particular, they favor movies that have a "message" of some kind, and will prioritize that over everything else... including the actual plot. They also don't seem to care about who they offend so long as the people they offend are the kids of people that "progressive" audiences don't much care for... like us. Really, if A24 went out of business tomorrow, nothing of value would be lost as the meme has it.

Just looked it up. It's A24. They have a history of making utterly pretentious and nonsensical "message" movies, like the recent "Civil War" flop that was supposed to be about a modern US civil war but only showed that the production team had no idea how US politics actually worked. I doubt it'll see wide distribution, but be prepared to answer questions from people regardless.

"Well, there's your problem!" I keep seeing people who claim to be former or current Home Depot employees saying that the company doesn't always respect its lower-tier workers and so those workers, in turn, are often finding it difficult to be motivated to provide the proper level of customer service.

Trying to find a credible website that doesn't block those who use ad blockers, but the gist of it is that one Democrat has already gone public with his call for Biden to resign so that a new candidate can be appointed.

Over in Japan asparagus is commonly paired with *pork* instead of beef, to the point that you'll see people doing bacon-wrapped asparagus as a light menu item.

The "bun" in that picture is actually an entire loaf of King's Hawaiian bread.

I think I took down 75% of one of the burgers during one event. Nobody finished, so that was enough for me to win.

H-E-B pursues a *very* aggressive "low-cost leader" strategy in which they use a mix of store brands and in-store coupons to bring prices as low as possible, making their money off of bulk sales. The central part of this is their weekly "meal deal" event where if you buy the main course you get 2 - 3 sides and often a beverage for free; if it's a holiday, it's often rather big. For example, one week the deal was "buy two bags of national-brand chicken nuggets, get a box of store-brand deluxe macaroni & cheese, a bag of broccoli, and a bag of kid-friendly snack crackers for free". H-E-B Plus stores often have hot & ready take-away meals available from the deli section, such as generous plates of sausage, beans, and rice for $6 apiece; these plates come with barbecue sauce, but you must provide your own utensils. Pair one of these plates with a glass of milk & some fruit, and you have a nutritionally complete meal. These meals are generally healthier than fast food, and often priced competitively, giving customers healthier options for their meals. I did the math at one point using the H-E-B website, and found that a person could hypothetically get a rotisserie chicken, a bag of tossed salad, a bottle of ranch dressing, a small bottle of hot sauce, a bag of a certain type of bread rolls, some kiwi fruit, and a gallon of milk for about $25. That's enough for a family of four at least.

The year I finally lost (I'd just had a lot of dental work and was still having trouble getting used to chewing certain foods, like onion) was the year that the local H-E-B Plus stopped doing their annual events. But the grand prize was generally about $50 - $100 in groceries, including charcoal and meat, so there were quite a few of us willing to risk it.

Due to the rather significant amounts of dental work I've had over the years (including multiple crowns), I prefer thinner cuts of meat that have been cooked to moderate toughness or that have been cubed / ground to tenderize them. These thinner cuts of meat are also easier to bring to appropriate temperatures, as thicker cuts or slabs can take so long to get to the proper internal temperature that the exterior burns. I ran into this during my brief stint as a competitive eater, as the local H-E-B Plus Grocery tended to have their annual competition be massive burgers which very often had charred exteriors. For reference, this is one of the giant burgers. You can see the bottles of water we were given as a size reference.

Tell me - what is your interpretation then of Matthew 5:48? 48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Also, what of Psalms 82:6? 6 I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High. After all, that was important enough for Jesus to refer back to it in John 10:34 - 34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? No, I'm not trying to challenge you. Rather, I want you to think about what is being said, what it means, and how it relates to our theology. As it is, if you haven't read the Bible cover-to-cover yet, I'd suggest doing so as time permits. Maybe even keep a pencil handy to make notes as you go.

Point of note - The very first edition of "Mormon Doctrine" was actually McConkie's pet project and had no oversight from the church. Because of this, much of what went in there was his personal theology and understanding rather than official church instruction. Suffice to say that the church leadership was displeased when they discovered how often that edition was at odds with the official instruction, which is why so many editions of the book have been issued over the years as McConkie was forced to correct it and why it will never be more than quasi-canonical despite the final editions being so often cited.

Next time you go to your local Wal-Mart, browse the book section. If your store is large enough, you *will* see about 1 - 2 dozen Japanese comic titles, South Korean comic titles, bound collections of comic strips, graphic novels, and so forth. You won't see Marvel or DC unless it's something being published *by* one of the above publishers or bound blind-packed bags of overstock comics that are being liquidated. That's the thing your chart isn't telling you, that more and more people are skipping the comic book shops.

Lies & statistics and all that. Manga (Japanese comics), Manhua (South Korean comics), graphic novels, and those bound comic compilations can be had at just about any Wal-Mart or Target in the United States, and they utterly dominate dedicated book retailers like Barnes & Noble. Meanwhile, indie publishers like Alterna have either moved to direct-to-customer sales or have been working to get their product stocked in more traditional retail outlets like convenience stores. Most mainstream comics are... generally exclusive *to* comic book shops unless you're talking about random bags of overstock being liquidated via Wal-Mart or Ollie's. Once you go macro and look at the total actual numbers, it's pretty apocalyptic. In fact, Dark Horse actually *admitted* a few months back that their manga division is only a single-digit percentage of operations yet represents 66% of their annual sales. Meanwhile, IDW very nearly went bust a few years ago due to a series of poor business decisions combined with an active boycott of their products over the toxic public behavior of one of their writers, and Boom literally just saw a top executive step down in what people fear is the first step of a reorganization. Oh, and comic shops themselves are in danger, as for the last few years more have closed than opened.

They're still around, but you have to look a lot harder to find them because modern society has, once again, decided that such classic ideas of morality and beauty are passe. It's a big part of why, for example, the mainstream US comic book publishers are getting annihilated while indie publishers, foreign publishers, and publishers of non-traditional fare (like bound collections of comic strips) are seeing big bucks. In particular, Japanese comic anthology magazine Weekly Shonen Jump is making bank right now because a great number of their titles are hot sellers despite the content making most of them PG-13 in nature. Many of those titles are premised on the classic hero's journey, showing someone who is down on their luck but who has good moral character getting a chance to prove themselves and in the process discover a hidden talent; they are typically rewarded for their diligence and determination by acquiring some combination of fortune, friends, mentors, and at least one lover. Others take their premise and deliver on it by way of characters that feel truly human in their struggles and desires, allowing people the opportunity to reflect upon themselves and their own decisions. Then of course it's got rather quirky numbers in the mix as well to give it a bit of variety. For example, this week is the debut of a new supernatural comedy series called "Shiba Inu Rooms". When animal welfare authorities discover horrible conditions at a dog mill that specializes in breeding Shiba Inu dogs, they shut it down. The property is purchased by a developer who builds an apartment complex on the site, but now every single apartment in the building is home to a talking ghostly Shiba Inu that just wants pets and cuddles from a kind human and will cross over to the other side once they've come to know pure happiness. Looks like this series will be encouraging people to consider the well-being of their animal pals.

The big issue with AI is the same issue we've had with computers since we first started making them: "Garbage In, Garbage Out". Computers only do what they're told to do. Even the most advanced AIs have limits on what they're able to do, especially when confronted with faulty instructions or bad reference materials. For example, a few months ago people found that Google's AI-driven image creator was forcibly programmed by some of the people at Google to *deliberately* display "diverse" imagery in response to image requests, even if those images were illogical, such as when someone asked for generic images of European kings from the Middle Ages and got a set of images that included a Native American chieftain and the female leader of a generic Middle Eastern city. Well, once word got out it didn't take long for people to start gaming the system by deliberately asking for images that would, in the context of the forcible insertion of diverse images, be racist, sexist, or bigoted. The AI was programmed in a certain way, it carried out that programming, and Google was left publicly humiliated. Having a human periodically stop and check to see if things are kosher will help prevent incidents like this from happening.

Often, it isn't the critic we're reaching, but the third party who is watching the exchange.

Hey, the Institute college-level materials are also on the church website as well: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/books-and-lessons/institute?lang=eng

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/books-and-lessons/seminary?lang=eng These are the most recent manuals for seminary students, that is 14 - 18 year olds in high school. I would recommend potentially using these manuals as guides in addition to the regular Sunday School manuals.

If you budget half an hour a day, you should be able to read 1 - 4 chapters. This might not seem like a whole lot to do at once, but it all adds up over time. The church actually has ideas for how to get you going: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/scripture-study-ideas?lang=eng You also have a collection of videos based on various stories: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/media/collection/scriptures-video-collection?lang=eng . You're running a marathon instead of a sprint, so it's OK to pace yourself as long as you keep moving forward. And don't forget to keep some colored pencils, like the ones seen here - https://www.heb.com/product-detail/h-e-b-pre-sharpened-colored-pencils-12-pk/3845006 - or another such assortment of marking implements, handy so that you can highlight whatever verses speak to you or leave you with questions. This can help you as you study further.

Once upon a time there was an academic paper entitled "Mormon Apologetic Scholarship and Evangelical Neglect: Losing The Battle and Not Knowing It" by Carl Mosser and Paul Owens. The pair were grad school students at an Evangelical seminary in 1997 when they decided to compare the then-current state of pro- and anti- works. To their horror, they discovered that most authors of the day who were critical of the faith had become intellectually lazy; rather than investigate matters for themselves, they were just taking old arguments that were often no longer valid, bundling them together with some unique spin, throwing in a bit of personal invective, and calling it a day. As a result, arguments that were years or even decades out of date were still in active circulation. We're nearly 30 years on, and their conclusion still holds true, as you yourself have just seen. Far too many people who are in mainline Christianity don't do their homework and so take what their minister or another "authority" figure teaches them at face value. They are therefore ignorant of the truth, and often that means they are ignorant of their own belief systems. This includes a failure to read the Bible cover-to-cover. This is actually where I'd recommend you start: read the scriptures cover-to-cover, ponder them, then start going through the Sunday school manuals. In particular, I would suggest reading the former Gospel Principles manual - https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-principles?lang=eng . Build up your own knowledge and understanding first before you even think about seeking out others.

Making this a separate post so that I can address this point separately. A decade-plus back, there was a series of ostensible social media posts on a neighborhood-type message forum for residents of a major East Coast city; I want to say either NYC or DC. The opening poster, a woman apparently in her twenties, was upset because she'd moved to the city in the hopes of meeting a millionaire. Basically, she figured that she was attractive enough for someone to see her as a potential trophy wife, but after six months she hadn't had a single millionaire so much as give her the time of day, let alone put a ring on it. She wanted to know what she was doing wrong and where the best place was to land someone. In response, someone explained to her that physical appearances were an asset that could only lose value, not gain value, and that as a result no one with any sense or sense of dignity would willingly invest in a person just for their looks. Instead, she needed to offer something that could only gain in value if she truly wished to be seen *as* worth investing in. Otherwise, she could expect to be on the shelf forever. It seems that far too many people still aren't getting this message.