Category Archives: Religion

Wednesday’s Book Review: “Nineteenth-Century Mormon Architecture and City Planning”


Nineteenth-Century Mormon Architecture and City Planning. By C. Mark Hamilton. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995). X-vii + 203 pp. $65. This is a very poor work. C. Mark Hamilton, a professor of architectural history at Brigham Young University at … Continue reading

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Wednesday’s Book Review: “Religious Seekers and the Advent of Mormonism”


Religious Seekers and the Advent of Mormonism. By Dan Vogel. Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1988. Pp. xiii, 237. I recently reread Dan Vogel’s 1988 book, Religious Seekers and the Advent of Mormonism. I am more convinced than ever that … Continue reading

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2012 in review


The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog. Here’s an excerpt: About 55,000 tourists visit Liechtenstein every year. This blog was viewed about 170,000 times in 2012. If it were Liechtenstein, it would take about … Continue reading

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44 Years Ago Today: Apollo 8′s Historic Broadcast from the Moon on Christmas Eve in 1968


Hard to believe, it was 44 years ago today that the crew of Apollo 8 made their historic broadcast from the Moon on Christmas Eve in 1968. Launched on December 21, 1968, astronauts Frank Borman, James A. Lovell, Jr., and … Continue reading

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Wednesday’s Book Review: “Immortality: The Quest to Live Forever and How It Drives Civilization”


Immortality: The Quest to Live Forever and How It Drives Civilization. By Stephen Cave. New York: Crown, 2012. How might we live forever? Become a vampire? Download your memory into a supercomputer and become a silicon-based life form? Enter the … Continue reading

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Wednesday’s Book Review: “The Nauvoo City and High Council Minutes”


The Nauvoo City and High Council Minutes. Edited by John S. Dinger. Foreword by Morris A. Thurston. Signature Books, Salt Lake City, Utah, 2011. Preface, introduction, city and stake councilmen, appendices, index. Hardcover with dustjacket. ISBN: 978-1-56085-214-8. $49.95. Nauvoo, Illinois, in … Continue reading

Posted in Community of Christ, History, Mormonism, Personal, Politics, Religion, Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

An Iowa Sheriff Comments on the Mormons in Nauvoo, Illinois


In 1995 I published with John E. Hallwas a documentary history about the Mormon experience in Illinois in the 1840s. The book, Cultures in Conflict: A Documentary History of the Mormon War in Illinois (Utah State University Press). In this book … Continue reading

Posted in Community of Christ, History, Mormonism, Personal, Politics, Religion, Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Wednesday’s Book Review: “More Wives Than One: Transformation of the Mormon Marriage System, 1840-1910″


More Wives Than One: Transformation of the Mormon Marriage System, 1840-1910. By Kathryn M. Daynes. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2001). 305 pp. $34.95. Plural marriage was by far Joseph Smith’s most controversial doctrine. The Mormon founder began the practice … Continue reading

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The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints/Community of Christ and African American Members


The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (renamed the Community of Christ in 2000), one of the inheritors of the legacy of early Mormonism who developed a moderate theological position and coalesced as a recognizable group beginning … Continue reading

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African Americans and Mormonism, Mitt Romney, and the 2012 Presidential Election,


In the 2012 presidential contest between the Democratic incumbent Barak Obama and the Republican challenger Mitt Romney, religion has risen to the foreground in many areas of the campaign. Mitt Romney’s lifetime commitment to the Church of Jesus Christ of … Continue reading

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