JohnsonJones

It's a little more complicated than that, but in short....yes. Ultimately it's up to those in California handling it. I think they could prosecute, especially if it was on a Mission President rather than a Bishop, but it could get complicated. They might even get a conviction...at first. In all chances it would be appealed successfully due to the laws and how they are written. With the Laws as they are the eventual outcome is more likely known (barring any extremely unusual things occurring). It would even be an open and shut case I think. California could not win this one in the long run. Even if the laws were changed, it would be overturned most likely. This is why the laws are written in such a way (as @Just_A_Guy a guy pointed out above), because in such instances, with the US Bill of Rights, without some extreme incident the Higher Courts will normally rule in favor of the Church in such things as this. There are ways that they are written to get around such things, but ultimately, the Bill of Rights still exists and the Constitution is still the Supreme Law of the Land. If the Church didn't have as deep of pockets to fight a legal battle the outcome may be a little different, but with an entity that has as deep pockets as the church and the likelihood to fight it to the end...probably not the best choice. I agree, California probably would lose this one in the long run (or short, depending on how the lower courts ruled). It could still have people beyond that one individual prosecuted though...that will be up to those handling these matters.

Batman is Chinese now? Hmm, how things change.

If the confession happened in California, I think they could try him for failure to report. I think they may even be able to convict. The problem is if they really want to open that can of worms. If they decided to prosecute it is very likely that there would be a series of appeals over the years. It would eventually get to the Supreme Court and the question of Church and State would occur. The big question is looking down the road what a Supreme Court may decide. It may be a decision California would not want to hear. The church currently has some deep pockets. It would be a drawn out fight. I can see it going ALL the way up to the Supreme Court with the issue at stake being the Religious Freedom and the Bill of Rights. That's a can of worm I'm not sure anyone really wants to open. We'll see what happens though.

I'd imagine some people are almost bathing in the stuff. The way things are going it could be a depression we are headed to. It could be a very bad depression. I think this is one of the concerns that many of the Republicans have noted and the thing that they've struggled with. People and companies missing payments at the beginning of the month is not a good thing, especially en masse. People not spending at all is a bad thing for a capitalist nation. One month of a LOT less spending and money circulating the economy...it could rebound...but that month has already occurred to a great degree with February. Two months and we are probably looking at a guaranteed recession. Three months and really bad things start looming. We could be headed to depression that will be equal to those of earlier centuries. I think this is why Trump set the Easter date initially. That's what some may say is the drop dead date. We either start spending at the latest for Easter...or we hit a depression. The question is how bad is it going to get? When people have no housing and food it can be deadly if the do not know how to take care of themselves otherwise. People today are not as well equipped as people of the 20th century (in my opinion). I think there is a great deal of fear of how to face with another possible Great Depression. On the otherhand, do we trade the immediate future (deaths from this virus) and seem inhumane in light of what could possibly be down the road. I think at first many Conservativess were willing to try to risk the immediate future and many deaths in trade for a more secure economic future no matter how inhumane it seemed. I think that tune is changing and many wish to deal with the immediate circumstances, but in the process are trading away the time to try to solidify a foundation for the further future and as such, a depression is becoming much more likely. As some would put it...how many lives will the cure (quarantines, stay at home, etc) eventually cost in lives if/when a depression hits and a LOT of people who have no idea how to deal with such things are suddenly on the street hungry and homeless. Will our infrastructure even be able to deal with it? Personally, I'd like to deal with the immediate concerns now and try to save as many lives as possible. I think that's the humane thing to do. I will acknowledge that by doing so we may be putting the further future at risk.

James 1:1 is an interesting verse that has been debated by various scholars. This will be long. One of the views that is a common explanation IGNORES the blatantly obvious in front of their eyes. This argument is that the lost Tribes of Israel and the Jews are one and the same. This is actually NOT TRUE. The term Jew could be seen as the nickname for those who were part of the Tribe of Judah, as is inherent in their name. Other tribes would actually object to being called under this nickname. It would be if one was calling an American an Australian, or an Scot a Canadian. While there may be some Canadians and Americans that take pride in their Scottish or English heritage, most United States Citizens would probably not prefer to be called an Aussie as a reference to where they are from and where they come from. If pursued long enough, it could even be considered an insult. That said, ignoring the insults to the other tribes, one of the common views is that James is actually referring simply to the Jews. The idea is that after the captivity they returned to Jerusalem and simply were called Jews instead of the Hebrews, Tribes of Israel, or by their different tribal names. This is not the ONLY theory though, as there are multiple theories, some of which are contested. Some of this come from different readings and interpretations, for example, while the King James version states to the tribes which are scattered, others talk about dispersed. In this some consider that though the tribes were dispersed, they were generally thought to be outwards around the Caucases and elsewhere. Hence, in a way, James could have been talking to the Jews (and parts of the remnant of Benjamin) as if they were Israel as a whole, OR, if being more in line with the New Testament, he could have also been talking to the tribes that had lost their identity and were thus dispersed among the Gentiles, who considered themselves in a way as Gentiles. Part of this and how you interpret it may be how you get it from your church teachings and your church scholars as it can vary between churches, though many times more especially between Catholic and Protestant. On the popular Biblehub site it discusses it similarly to this... Biblehub James 1:1 commentary In this, then is the a matter of more understanding of what many other Christians may understand about this verse, in that the tribes were NOT combined as one in or necessarily at Jerusalem or thereabouts. This is very similar to what the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches in my understanding of much of it. After Solomon his Kingdom was divided in two. These two Kingdoms were split with a majority of the tribes going to one, and Judah going in another to rule. As these Kingdoms fell, the tribes were captured and taken afar. Most of the rest of the Old Testament covers the stories of the Kings people, or those of the tribe of Judah. After their captivity they started coming back to the Holy Land, most of whom were Judah with some of Benjamin and what we believe were small remnants perhaps of other tribes (for example, Levites for the Priests). However, most of the other ten tribes were not returning to the Holy Land, or to Israel or Jerusalem. During the time of the Lord, it was therefore the Jews, or those from the tribe of Judah that primarily lived in that area. The other tribes were seen as dispersed among the other peoples of the earth. How much is debatable. What is interesting is that rather than specify location or which tribes, he was referring to all of them in a general sense. This is an oddity as we know at the time much of the Tribe of Judah was NOT dispersed...so if we include them and part of Benjamin...who was he talking to? Once again, it could be that he accepted that the dispersion where many did not know of their heritage or identity was a foregone conclusion among the ten tribes...thus their being lost among the Gentiles. However, in this light, he was also addressing the Jews. As this was the case, he would have been addressing the Jews and those who were followers of the Lord at Jerusalem, as well as the Gentiles who were joining them. In the Church we have an even greater enlightenment. We believe that, even if we are gentiles prior to our joining, we can either have revealed to us if we are actually part of a tribe of Israel...OR be adopted into one. If we believe that the same organization existed prior to what we call the apostasy, or loss of many great yet simple things of the gospel, than we would also believe this idea of learning which tribe you were a part of if you were part of a tribe was known to the Saints. Thus, the followers would all have also been part of one of the tribes of Israel, even if they had formerly thought they were (or actually were) a gentile. So, how does this fall into the Saints of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints understanding today. As, with many of the Protestants we believe that the tribes are lost, or at least knowledge of what happened to the tribes. You could call it a dispersion or a scattering, whatever you want to call it, today the only tribe we really know about are the ones who kept their identity. Those would be the children of Judah, or the Jews. All the others have vanished. It is impossible to find those of the Levites to perform the priestly functions even if there was a tabernacle or a temple in Jerusalem. There is no one nation or group that claims to be Zebulons or Zebulites. We cannot find Issacharites or others in a nation or group as a whole that call themselves that...unless we look at our Church. Though we have no great groups as of yet, we can find members of various tribes that call themselves of that tribe. Thus, we take it a step further than some of the Protestants in that we believe that the gathering of Israel can speak of several things. Many feel it is simply the gathering that is taking place in Israel already, and that at some point those from an unknown location in the North will voyage and join the Jews in Israel or some other way it will be manifest. First, as has already been mentioned in this thread, the gathering of the Jews back to their Homeland in Israel. We see this occurring. The land, or so we believed, was dedicated to this purpose and the Lord has shown his great power and his generous hand in gathering them back to their Homeland. Not all Jews have gone to live in Israel and in fact many millions do NOT live there. However, we believe the gathering has been taking place there and many Jews now live in Israel. We also believe in a spiritual gathering of which we believe the tribes are being gathered to the Gospel. This is not necessarily, at least currently, a physical migration, but one of spiritual fulfillment. Here we believe that many of the tribes are gathered spiritually to join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Not all the members of the tribes will join, and in fact many million if not Billions have not. However, we believe the gathering has been taking place and there are millions who will say they are parts of various tribes within the church today, though a majority are probably from either Ephraim or Manasseh. There are also members of other tribes that I have met such as from Dan and others. We believe in Jerusalem as well as a New Jerusalem, both of which will herald the Saints and the tribes of Israel as their inheritance. There are other thoughts of interpretations as well regarding the gathering and in fact, that perhaps at some date there will be a mass gathering of tribes that come to Israel. Already, many of those who have joined the gospel come from what would be the North countries in relation to Israel. The same could be said of the many Jews from Europe who travelled to Israel. In this, with no more occurring, one could say the prophecy of those coming from the North has already been fulfilled...however, we do not know all things and it could be an even greater fulfillment of that is coming in the future. Thus, we believe that the scattering (or dispersion if you want) actually took place. That of those tribes in Joseph Smith's time, at least ten were lost. We believe that the gathering of Israel is currently taking place in the world. The spiritual gathering that we believe in could NOT have taken place without the gospel restoration which we believe in. The Physical gathering of those to Israel we can also believe started with the dedication of the Holy Land long before the incidents which occurred happened. There is probably another physical gathering to also occur in the future in which the ten tribes will be gathered to their respective inheritances and receive all the promises of the Lord. Thus, in that light I see no confusion or problem with James 1:1 in regards to his statements to a gathering or scattering. Even beyond that, if we go into the massive speculation further abroad from normal philosophies of men, we could guess that James was prophetic and that he was not just talking to the Jews and Gentiles of his time, but to the future tribes that had been scattered. One of those, and Ephraimite (or I think he was of Ephraim) read the words of James and was touched. He was searching for what religion was right and found of verse in James Chapter 1 verse 5 that states if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God. He believed the words of James. He believed the word of God and the Bible. He believed the promise given by James. He asked God which church was true. He was answered that while many had some of the truth, none of them were the right church at the time and for him to join none of them. He saw and talked with God and received an answer or wisdom, just as the promise stated. This Ephraimite was Joseph Smith. He continued to pray for guidance and as such received other angelic visitors which led him to the Book of Mormon as well as revelations on the gospel that we, Latter-day Saints, believe in. He trusted in the words of James and in the Bible. Through this, he was led to the truth just like others can be. It is for this reason we do not (or we did not last I checked) say that men must believe without choice, but that instead they can ALSO know like Joseph Smith knew and how I learned of the truth of the gospel. We can read the Book of Mormon and then we can pray to know for ourselves whether it is true or not. In a similar vein we have a promise at the end of the Book of Mormon from a Prophet called Moroni where he states... In this way, those touched by this promise and who pray can find the truth of the gospel. This is the miraculous way the Lord finds the lost tribes today in the spiritual gathering of those to his gospel. We hear his voice and can know him through prayer and earnestly seeking. If you have not tried it, I'd invite you to give it a shot...who knows...perhaps it could lead to paths and places one never expected.

Returning to a topic previously discussed in the thread, came upon an interesting item related to it. Previously I stated... I found there is even MORE to this, but that more sparks some interesting thoughts which I have not gotten all the way through. So, originally, the lower priesthood was to be held by the Levites. Only they could perform the ordinances thereof. In this light, they were ALSO the only ones that could perform these ordinances in the temple. At that time, we may also include the Baptisms for the Dead as it is somewhat referred to (or at least we believe this is what Paul is talking about when he talks about the Dead being baptized) in the Bible which would by, default, need to be done in the Temple when they had one. However, as we do not have Levites generally today, we could not practice these ordinances...or could we? We have the priesthood, but in general, most of the priesthood holders do not have the keys...or do they? If one is a Levite, and especially a Son of Aaron, supposedly in some texts they automatically have the keys as their birthright and heritage. They naturally, or their given rights as those of this genealogy have this power and ability. We, or those of us who are not of this lineage do NOT have this right. We may have the priesthood given to us, but it is not our natural heritage. HOWEVER, ALL the rights and autorities of the Lower Priesthood are held and able to be performed by those who hold the Higher Priesthood as we see from Doctrine and Covenants 107:5-12 Thus, why we can perform the ordinances only allowed by those of those who have the keys by heritage, is that these keys are also appendages to that of the greater priesthood, or that of the Melchizedek Priesthood. Thus, this is also why it requires a Bishop to be the Key Holder of the Priesthood in a ward, as the keys are appendages of that priesthood. One who is of the lower priesthood cannot rob the Levite of their blessing, nor can they rob Aaron, but as they are appendages of the Higher Priesthood, the Higher Priesthood already has those keys to be granted to them to utilize. IN that same light, we come to Baptism for the Dead. On this instance though who are the keys being granted to be exercised under. Is it the Temple President, or is it the Bishop? In that same right, as all other Priesthoods are appendages of the Melchizedek Priesthood, in theory, does that mean an Elder or High Priest could in essence already have those keys to the Aaronic and be able to perform ordinances such as sacrament and Baptism without the oversight of a Bishop? Even if the answer to that question was yes, the answer is also no for one very valid reason. The House of the Lord is one of order, and therefore, to keep order it must be done in a fashion where records (both in heaven and the earth) can be kept in order. If one goes about Baptizing without the Bishop's oversight, who is there to know whether that baptism is valid and should be on the records of the church. The same goes for an ordinance, and thus the Bishop is given the keys and authority to control these aspects of the church. This seems especially pertinent in our day and time when many are contained within their households for the duration of the illnesses spreading throughout the world. In this light, perhaps the Melchizedek Priesthood holder in theory may have the keys, but at the same time it must be balanced out with the Common Judge in Israel who holds the keys as delegated by the President of the Church (from the President to lower authorities till the Stake President, and then to the Bishop). Ultimately though, it is the holder of all the Keys, the Prophet and President of the Church to delegate how these keys will be delegated and operated. However, in their absence, it could be argued, at least for the lesser keys, that the Melchizedek holder MAY have them, or might. In this way, we could understand that Alma the Elder actually had the keys for Baptism and could perform the ordinance on his own, even though he obviously did NOT have the approval of his superiors in the situation where he organized a church while in the society ruled by King Noah. It brings to mind another interesting though I had and something I 've been pondering about. What follows is more my line of thought rather than any doctrine or teaching. It is me postulating upon what may be or may not be. It is assumed the Jesus was given authority by those who held authority in his day, but upon thinking upon it I think I differ. He was NOT a levite and had no association to the Priest class of the day. He was a carpenter and as such, would not have been granted that authority. Thus, where did that authority come from. He did not have the power to baptize perhaps, as if he had he could have done as Alma the Elder and baptized himself. However, we learn later he and his apostles DID have the power to baptize. Where did this come from? With the hostility of those in charge of the religion of the Jews in his time, I do not think it came from them. It could have been given by John the Baptist, the rightful holder of the Priesthood at that time (and why the Lord went to him for Baptism). I think though that his power came more directly, from his true Father. His power and authority came directly from the source, as the only begotten son, I think he received the Highest powers and keys of the Priesthood from his Father (his real father, that in heaven). Many of these could have come earlier, but I think many of these (for example, perhaps the keys of Sealing and any he may not have already received) I think he got on the Mount of Transfiguration. Thus, he had MORE authority than any other figure on earth, even the keys to life, death, salvation, and more. He had these not from a mortal figure or individual, but from the immortal Ruler who this power stems from, his immortal father of both his body and his spirit, or God the Father. Thus, he had the power by Heritage, by Genealogy, and also by the hand of it being bestowed directly from the Grand Being who rules Heaven and the Earth giving it to him in person and anointing him personally both in the spirit before this life, and mortally while he was on the Earth. Just some thoughts on the entire Priesthood and Keys while we've been at home and doing home sacrament meetings among our families or however else we have been granted the privilege of worshipping in these days of turmoil upon the earth.

The following is not my statement or post, but I found it so wonderful that I wanted to post it to my personal thread (which is in some ways also a thread of my ponderings on culture, tradition and other ideas related to the culture of members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) This is originally from @Vernor's Ginger Ale I think this is a great post and of interest to me that I may want to do further study upon at a later date.

Another thought I had when typing responses up in the forum was a comment I made regarding time and eternity. When Adam fell, I think that perhaps this was a change not just to him, but to the entirety of the world around him and how we perceive it as well. In this, entropy and chaos were entered into the equation, meaning that death was introduced. Because of this, all things die...even the universe around us. Things go on a downward spiral until eventually things devolve to a dead state. However, if eternity is to go on, then something must be able to create or do the exact opposite. The opposite of dying is gaining more life...OR it could be also seen as being at the high point of the energy and never decreasing. Thus, perhaps in eternity, the exact opposite of a dying universe is done and instead the universe does not operate as per our laws of physics, but a higher manifestation thereof. Some say that eternal life is one eternal round. In this, perhaps time does not even exist as we understand it in the eternities, with us able to go to any point at any spot as we desire, while we may measure the passing of our experiences in some way (perhaps as an increase in glory), we have no limitations upon the when or where as we do now. In truth, the power of eternity would be where we are married in this life by temporary power, that marriage will end as it has had a beginning, it must have an end. However, when we are sealed for eternity in the temple, that marriage effectively becomes as if it has always been. It has no beginning and no end, thus being eternal in that there is no beginning nor an end, having always been. The same could apply to us if we become eternal, we have no beginning or end of it, because at our Father's decree and with his power, it becomes eternal, or having no beginning or end. We have ALWAYS been in that and even though we may have an ascension of glory which we can measure, in the eternal reckoning his power makes it so that we have always been and always will be as such. Of course, this is just mild speculation, but then, many things are speculation today. My speculation though probably is more based on faith than science, and as such science will probably be the more relatable in our mortal existence today. To expand somewhat, as many who know me understand I can be quite wordy... I think that in the eternities things are as they are. In other words, they are set more solid than stone. They CANNOT change. Things in eternity are eternal. There is no way for them to change. What is, has always been and always will be. Things are unchanging. Thus, to have change, there must be an environment or place where change an occur. In otherwords, mortality. A way to talk about this could be that eternity is where things are constant and do not change, whereas mortality is where things constantly change. There is nothing that remains unchanged as the very nature of mortality is change. Thus, mortality and eternity could be seen as two opposites of the spectrum. Thus, to actually change in some ways such as our state and our situation we needed to come to mortality. Once that situation and state were changed, we could return to eternity with that new situation and state having been forever formented as having always been and always will be. in the eternities, what is has always been and always will be. There is no beginning and no end. Thus, if a change if accomplished in mortality, in relation to eternity, it becomes as if it had no beginning or end. It is eternal. I believe one can still grow and develop in some ways in eternity, but change is not one of them. Thus, to obtain a body and to obtain certain blessings we HAD to have mortality. There was no other way to obtain these things. A way to view this could be with Adam (man) and Eve (from man). In their initial state they were in an unchanging state. They could not change and change could not come upon or affect them. Thus, they could not obtain certain blessings or status. Only by change could they obtain this. When they partook of the fruit they also had the results of that decision. One of those results was to be cast out of the garden of Eden. They were thus, now, in a mortal state and change could affect them more fully. In this same way we can see it affect our universe in the course towards entropy, chaos, and death. On the alternate side is eternity, energy, law, and life. Hard to explain, and I probably did a very poor example of trying to explain it here. But in essence, I am trying to say that in the eternities, as there is no change, we could not obtain the blessings there that we can by coming into this life of mortality. We could not obtain an eternal body nor the degrees of glory that we seek with that body. Due to the nature of men, we would all fall into sin. This meant, even if we came to mortality to obtain these things we would fail as we would succumb to sin and death. We also needed a Savior to be able to atone for our sins and break the bands of death so we all could be saved from these obstacles of sin and death. He also made it possible for ALL ordinances and blessings that would enable us to advance in glory while in mortality and have these things sealed upon our heads for eternity to become possible. This is why we must also do work for the dead, as these things must be done while in this life, or in mortality, or in this world of change vs that of the eternal nature where things are unchanging from eternity to eternity, forever. Just some thoughts I had regarding the eternity of things vs. the mortality we are in now and temple work.

Once more, gathering a few things and posts from the past few weeks to repost here that are of interest to me. The First is not a repost, but something interesting I found online that was given by Brigham Young and I believe the 12. It is a historical artifact of sorts which reflect a time after the development of the cooperative ZCMI. When they first arrived in Utah, Brigham Young instituted the Law of Consecration in many communities with the United Order. They lived with all things in common among them. Also, common at this time was the usage of bartering as cash was not a common commodity. As they grew and became more prosperous money began to filter in and people began to trade with it and with those from outside the community of the Saints. Some started to try to get rich and instead of having this disparity between rich and poor, Brigham Young started with some new ideas. The Law of Consecration apparently was not something some of the Saints wished to be included in, and some of these wanted to go into business. Now, personally speaking, it was probably to try to sate this desire to run businesses and interact with those beyond the realm of the Saints that Brigham came upon the idea of a business which was utilized and run by the Saints themselves. This way, they could have the business, interact with those beyond the Saints borders, as well as still remain united in the common goals of worldly upkeep. However, of course, that is my personal ideas of one of the reasons this may have come about. Regardless, the cooperatives were highly successful and this is seems to be a sort of commentary upon the success of at least one of those coops. From - Social problems of To-day; or The Mormon Question in its Economic Aspects. A study of co-operation and arbitration in Mormondom, from the standpoint of a Wage Earner. by a Gentile, Author of Utah and is People." D. David Lum?? DD. Lum & Co., Port Jervis, N.Y. 1886. pp 17-19. Just something interesting I stumbled across in my browsing. I had to copy it and type it up from hand so, any mistakes of typing are my own on this accord. It is an interesting proclamation of sorts, and not what we are normally familiar with these days in regards to is normally proclaimed or typed up.

Adam is an interesting thing in that it means man or human as someone pointed out above. IT CAN ALSO be a proper name and we find that it us utilized in both ways throughout the Bible (and our scriptures). In some ways we could see the term Father Adam and the Father Man or the Father of Men, and the Adam simply as Man. It is a contextualization that we see Brigham Young having utilized in multiple ways and times (for example, he referred to Joseph Smith Sr. and Joseph Smith jr. as, if memory serves right, Father Joseph and the Prophet Joseph, defining the one from the other). Understanding this differentiation of his is also key to understanding some of the sermons he gave which have been the most misunderstood in our modern era to the point that the misunderstandings of his teachings have had to be explicitly stated to be non-doctrine or incorrect doctrine (while his actually teachings, when understood, can be rather enlightening and go hand in hand with our current or modern teachings). I think the individual that gave the best explanations of Young Doctrine would be Joseph Fielding Smith (though his father also seemed to be very hardcore in believing in the teachings of Brigham Young as well as Bruce R. McKonkie) who has utilized various writings throughout his life to explain some of the more difficult ideas in a more layman's terms. Unfortunately, many of what some would term as deeper doctrines have been laid to rest these days as they could be difficult to digest, even in layman's terms, for some and instead of teaching them in Sunday School or other places, we simply leave them to be discovered for those who wish to read more. ON the otherhand, perhaps it is for the best as we tend to focus more on the core doctrine of the simplicity of the Atonement and the Lord's sacrifice that saved us from Death and Sin, even if we don't go into how it may have operated or the various reasons of why it was needed as much as it was. To know that we have a Savior and if we follow him we can have eternal life is by far the most important doctrine, the rest at times being superfluous rather than helpful.

We have terrible neighbors that don't care and don't worry about their pets. They have cats that have had meningitis or can pass it, or so we have figured from events that happened to another one of our neighbors that had tragic things happen to them. One of our neighbors and us were growing gardens and the cats decided that these places were their litter box. Did you know meningitis (I think that's what it was) can actually transfer into plants and such [edit: or that's what it seemed to turn up in some research we and the infected neighbors did. Unfortunately, with an uncooperative bad neighbor we couldn't verify this information or that their cats were the ones transmitting it. I'm not a doctor so this is just what we took a guess at in regards to how the neighbor actually GOT the disease in the first place or the route of transmission.]. The neighbor got it. Has problems for life. Not sure what recourses they could have, but we decided NOT to grow a garden after that due to our bad neighbor's basic uncaring attitude. That also have dogs which they don't tend to take care of and get loose a bit. Those dogs also feel like our yard is their personal potty chair. It is annoying. (they also tend to burn stuff in a firepit which they made themselves to be extremely LARGE...when the wind blows directly our house. When we have one of our grandkids with Asthma visit, that turns really bad. I think this neighbor doesn't care about anyone but themselves to be honest). (IT could also be that they turned against the church a few years ago and dislike the church now. I sometimes wonder if it is more due to that relationship where I have been quite active and they are pretty anti which has flavored these things, or if they are simply like this in general as neighbors). Our best hope is to grow things indoors.

THIS is the primary problem right here. Teachers SHOULD NOT be able to demand all various different programs installed on a computer. The district should boil down to ONE singular program to utilize. Insisting that everyone use various programs (and I've seen some that are out there, some of the professors are going cheap and wanting to use Chinese made apps or other items which who KNOWS who's getting what information from that, while others point out that apps that may cost some money but be more secure are hostile to students...we have NO basic program that everyone should use which is a PROBLEM) that may or may not be compatible with students is a horrible decision from my viewpoint. Everyone should be using the SAME programs to interact. I think if we did that, even in higher education rather than the haphazard way it has been going, would standardize how we do things and how students can set up their computers. If we did that, we could also have IT help guide students through the process of setting things up easier, make it easier for Professors to coordinate between each other (especially if there needs to be coordination between different departments), and even have classes set up at different times to use that apps so that it is as easy as walking from one class to another for a student to visit. Not being standardized I think is one HORRIBLE way many schools are handling this because we are loading students computers down with bloatware.

My retirement is...not well...at this point. It's gone to a bad place. I AM retirement age...so...that's how the wheel spins sometimes. I will double down on the suggestion to donate to fast offerings. I think the way things are going that we are into some deep financial difficulties in the US coming up. If Trump's hopes that we all get back out by Easter, we MIGHT avoid a depression. I think that a depression may be just around the corner though if we are not already entering into one soon. I think there are many that are currently out of work or not working and that the next few months will see a great need for Fast Offerings to be given. I cannot deny my own worries about income and other items (thus far, still have the same income...but I have no idea what's coming up next with all this) so hope I'm not the hypocrite on this and can offer a good sized fast offering myself to help others in the next few months. I personally feel it will be needed or at least useful.

I believe you are older, perhaps even around my age. When we had kids we had no debt from it. We were able to pay it right of out pocket. Today, I have a Son and Daughter-in-law that are still paying off their last child...11 years AFTER that child was born. When my mother was in old age I was able to get her under my insurance which was stellar at the time. I paid a steep price each month (to the tune of around 1K-2K a month, depending on which era of time it was, it got more expensive as time went along) but the insurance covered EVERYTHING and I didn't have a deductible. It was, I believe, a platinum plan at the time. It was done away with by Obama. If I still lived back when I was a younger adult, or even still had my plan that I used to have, I'd have no worries. Today, if I enter the hospital, only 80% of my cost is covered. Luckily, there is only a $30 copay. If I have a major ailment it could cost a million dollars or more. That's still 200K I would owe. No one should owe that type of money simply for getting sick. We've never had that (in my lifetime that I can recall) where that was the only option open to people before 40 years ago (or thereabouts) when prices and insurance costs started skyrocketing. Before that, if you wished to avoid the risk, you had the option to get insurance that would cover it...though at a high price. Affordable healthcare was not really something that came to the forefront prior to that point. For just about all of human history, if there were valid treatments that could help and were commonly available, people were normally able to get them without having to go to debtors prison. People could normally get them without becoming slaves, or losing all that they had. They may not have had the care available that we have today, but a Baby did not force people to lose everything simply because they had a baby. That's ridiculous. People would have a LOT more children decades ago...someone who tried that today either has all their healthcare paid by government (and I had a daughter and son-in-law who was in the military, the government paid for all their children to be born) OR...they would be in debt up to their ears (as at least one of my other kids are). Why do we think people should not be able to afford to have children and to go bankrupt due to common maladies that have common treatments today? Why is this suddenly acceptable today?

He had some very interesting views on both capitalism and communal living, though he was probably at the forefront of creating communistic/communal communities at the time. Some at a later date even saw him as a prophet due to his creation of many of the principles which Marxist communism tried to create (but, ultimately, as it was a poor copy of the true form of the Lord's intent, as it was from the opposite source, was not successful in that light). This is a book that some suggest in relation to his views and ideas as well as the execution of communal and cooperatives within the community of the Saints during the 19th century. What is interesting in relation to the socialistic/proto-communistic ideals Young installed was it implies that at times these were enforced BY force...not necessarily entirely willing members at times. It also has an interesting hypothesis indicates that the real reason the US government came after the Saints was not due to polygamy specifically, but more in relation to economics and politics. An interesting read on the subject. Great Basin Kingdom Not that it has much to do with the current topic overall, but an interesting read. On topic, whatever is done, I hope that something can be done that truly IS useful in bringing down the prices of insurance and healthcare costs as well as making it easier and more available to all. One should not have to fear bankruptcy from a major illness or ailment.