Spoiler: The Idaho Falls Temple Today I showed my wife this picture and asked her what came to mind. “It kind of looks like a Mormon temple pagoda,” she said. “I think so, too!” I said. “But why does it look Mormon?” The image is from a book called Temples of the Imagination: AI-generated …
Author: Stephen Carter
Traitor Aversion and Mormonism
A recent Pew Research Center poll reported that Americans tend to view members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints more negatively than they view Catholics, Jews, evangelicals, atheists, and Muslims. It seems odd that a religion born and raised in the United States should be so distrusted by Americans. While I was …
Before the Bombs: A Mark Hofmann Interview
In September 1982, the Sunstone Review published an interview with Mark Hofmann. At the time, Hofmann was known for having found a series of extraordinary historical documents. One was the Anthon transcript, which contained symbols Joseph Smith allegedly copied from the golden plates and sent to New York scholar Charles Anthon. Another contained an alleged …
How “Wife Sacrifice” Tanked the Lectures on Faith
The Lectures on Faith used to be part of the Doctrines and Covenants, but a strange event in Eureka, Utah, may have helped give it the boot. On 17 April 1920, James E. Talmage took a train to Eureka to investigate alleged “separatists” that were trying to re-establish the United Order. The next day, he …
E.T.: Celluloid Savior
Consider the following. E.T. is a Christ figure. He is a botanist, a “shepherd of plants” so to speak. His mission is peaceful—he has come to save some of the earth’s endangered organisms. He arrives out of the heavens, heals the sick (the dying plant, Elliot’s finger), and performs miracles (elevating the bicycles and other …
BYU in Playboy
BYU’s Wilkinson Center bowling alley comes in dead last according to the October Playboy’s ranking of “sex on campus” among 20 American universities. BYU’s sexual temperature was a frigid 4 degrees while the “frontier free-for-all” University of Texas (Austin) boiled at a libidinous 212. In fourteen categories the “haloed pioneer’s” alma mater was described as …
Let’s Reverse “Love, Share, Invite”
I had been suckered into donating platelets, which meant I was going to be stuck in a chair with needles in my arms for two and a half hours. Fortunately, the Red Cross provides Netflix on a little screen for entertainment. But, since you can’t move your arms, whatever you pick, you’re stuck with it. …
What Latter-day Saints Can Learn from Tár
When I saw the list of the Academy Awards’ Best Picture nominees, I thought, “Which of these movies would be most useful to Mormons?” And the answer I came up with was Tár. Which seemed strange. After all, we have Avatar: The Way of Water, a movie about a family—and Mormons love families! We also …
The Children’s Friend on Mushrooms
Recently I saw the August 1925 cover of The Children’s Friend (the official publication of the LDS Church’s Primary organization). What made the cover interesting was the fact that it showed two children sitting with their dog in front of a gigantic mushroom. The mushroom had windows and doors in it. And in one of …
The LDS Proselytizing Mission as Hazing
By S. Richard Bellrock S. Richard Bellrock has been teaching and working in areas related to philosophy and psychology since 2000. Or, click here to download the audio file: The LDS Proselytizing Mission as Hazing Presumably, you have heard the notion that one of the primary purposes (if not the primary purpose) of the …