Category: Mormon Coffee Blog (2007-2019)
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Jeffrey Holland and the Determination of God
A couple of weeks ago LDS Apostle Jeffrey Holland addressed a Mormon congregation in Tempe, Arizona, telling them “don’t cut and run” when membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints gets tough. Mr. Holland assured his listeners that “every promise will be honored…This is the Church of the happy endings” [3:10; 19:25]…
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Mormon Apostle “Furious” with People Who Leave the LDS Church
On April 26th LDS Apostle Jeffrey Holland addressed a Mormon congregation in Tempe, Arizona. The theme of his talk was “God loves broken things.” Making it clear that everyone and everything is broken, Mr. Holland urged his listeners to hang on, persevere, and stay with the Church, assuring them that eventually, every promise will be…
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Temple Tourism
I was puzzled by an article that recently came across my desk. Published by Pulse Nigeria, journalist Onnaedo Okafor provided readers with a list of “7 ancient temples around the world every culture enthusiast should visit.” The list included four Buddhist temples, one Sikh temple, and one Baha’i temple, most of them familiar as well-known…
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Murky Waters Spin Around the New LDS Push for Transparency
In recent years the LDS Church has been working to change its image of being an organization that tightly controls and artfully spins historical issues to its best advantage. In what has been called a “push for transparency,” the Mormon Church has published several essays online that reveal some of Mormonism’s sordid history, framed in…
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Forever Families?
Check out a two-part Viewpoint on Mormonism series airing August 24-25, 2020. Part 1 Part 2 Last week (3/22/16) Mormon blogger and author Mette Ivie Harrison answered the question, “Do Mormons Still Practice Polygamy?” Her “short answer” was “No.” But she followed up with another 1,000 words explaining that, in some cases, the answer is…
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Mormon Apostle Urges Gaining a Sound and Sure Knowledge of the Atonement
In preparation for Easter, the LDS Church’s March Ensign magazine includes a “Gospel Classic” article titled, “The Three Gardens of God.” Originally titled, “The Purifying Power of Gethsemane,” this was a General Conference address delivered by LDS Apostle Bruce McConkie in April 1985. The March 2016 Ensign article is significantly shorter than Mr. McConkie’s original…
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LDS Leaders Speak More of Jesus
Mormon blogger Jana Riess at Flunking Sainthood interviewed Gordon and Gary Shepherd regarding their research into the themes presented at the LDS Church’s General Conferences. The Shepherd brothers have performed a detailed analysis of all past General Conference talks and published their findings in a newly updated book, A Kingdom Transformed: Early Mormonism and the…
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The Mormon Amazon Challenge
March 1, 2016 The LDS volume of scripture, the Book of Mormon, is available on Amazon.com. As with all things for sale at Amazon, the book is open to reviews. The Book of Mormon had apparently not been faring well enough, receiving too many negative reviews. According to KUTV.com in Salt Lake City, local LDS…
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Joseph Smith is Triggering Faith Crises Among Mormons
The Salt Lake Tribune recently conducted a survey, asking readers (Mormons) “if they have experienced a faith crisis, what triggered it and how they resolved it.” The newspaper received just over 1700 responses. The demographical breakdown was roughly in thirds: no longer members (538), inactive members (637), and still active members (532). The faith-crisis triggers…
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Mormon Rebels and Eternal Punishment
On February 4, 2016 the Huffington Post published an article by Mormon author and blogger Mette Ivie Harrison: “Do Mormons Believe in Hell?” She writes, “The short answer to this is simple: No.” Ms. Harrison goes on to explain that though the Book of Mormon speaks of Hell, it is “largely metaphorical.” She says, “But…
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Ordinary Mormon Families of Utah Territory
Deseret News recently ran a story about Richardson’s Point, a historic spot in Iowa along the Mormon Trail. The graves of the first two casualties of the Mormon westward migration are found at Richardson’s Point. In March of 1849 toddler James Tanner fell off the tongue of a wagon and was killed when the wagon…
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Mormon Apostle Discusses “The Essential Doctrine of Christ”
Last week Deseret News reported on an address Mormon apostle Dallin Oaks delivered to LDS missionaries during a worldwide missionary broadcast. Reaching an audience of 75,000, Mr. Oaks chose to define “Our message for missionaries.” Deseret News explained, “Following a period of dramatic changes in the number of missionaries serving in the world, the Church…
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No Room for Debate: Mormon Church’s Controversial Policy Revealed By God
It seems that perhaps the Mormon Church is tired of all the dissention and discussion regarding the Church’s recently revealed policy affecting same-sex couples and their children. It began in early November (2015) when the Church Handbook of Instructions was changed to include a directive for Church leaders to the effect that same-sex Mormon couples…
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Mormon Scripture and the Bundy Brothers
Ammon Bundy believes in his cause. As a 4th generation Mormon, his church has taught him how to know right from wrong, how to recognize the leading of the Spirit, how to stay on the right side of any line. So Mr. Bundy is confident in his actions. He and his compatriots have taken control…
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The Possibility of Idolatry
Peter Leithart at First Things recently addressed the oft-heard claim that “Christians and Muslims worship the same God but understand God in partly different ways.” He explains, “Muslims and Christians indeed share certain beliefs, and it is, of course, possible to believe different things about the same person… “Yet the common beliefs of Muslims and…
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Do Most Mormons Now Support the Ordination of Women to the LDS Priesthood?
Surveys and polls have been conducted among Mormons in recent years regarding the controversial question of whether or not women should be ordained to the all-male Mormon priesthood. LDS Church leadership has been resistant to the idea, explaining that the issue is a doctrinal one (which implies that a revelation would be required to open…
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Does Romans 8:17 Support Becoming Worshipped?
“… and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.” Romans 8:17 Three reasons why our inheritance in Christ does not imply equality with Jesus or a future of being properly worshipped by others: 1. Since our inheritance in…
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An Existential Crisis?
A guest post by Mike Turnlund. Being a non-Mormon and an outsider to the LDS faith has not kept me from studying the Latter-day Saint system of belief. I am not a seeker, as I already know Jesus Christ – the Jesus Christ of the Bible, not of the Book of Mormon. There is a…
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A Scriptural Twin Study: Nature Versus Nurture
A guest post by Mike Turnlund. One of the enduring issues in the science of psychology is nature versus nurture. Is a person’s behavior, at least in part, motivated by the person’s nature, that is, genetic factors; or by nurture, that is, environmental factors? To answer this question, psychologists have employed twin studies. Here identical…
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This is a Test: Joseph Smith and Deuteronomy 13
It had been a long forty years of wandering in the wilderness. God’s people Israel were finally nearing their Promised Land. Moses’ life was drawing to a close and the people were about to enter a new way of life under the untried leadership of Joshua. They needed to be prepared for what lay ahead.…