The LDS Church often patrols or limits the proliferation of meaning by using paratexts, “verbal frames,” or “symbolic packages.” in “The loss of the Creature,” Walker Percy discusses the way this “general surrender of the horizon to those experts within whose competence a particular segment of the horizon is thought to lie” amounts to a …
Speaker: Barry Laga
SL10112: Out of Context: Using and Abusing Quotations
Nearly all LDS writers and speakers quote scripture as well as passages from other writers. Whether it is Neal A. Maxwell citing C. S. Lewis, Boyd K. Packer quoting a poem from Best-Loved Poems of the LDS People, or President Monson invoking Abraham Lincoln, the time-honored practice helps clarify thoughts, extend arguments, and provide authority …
SL09215 Church Historical Sites and the Construction of Testimony
I embarked on my own Mormon pilgrimage in an effort to understand religious declarations of faith as expressed in Church historical sites, particularly in Vermont, New York, and Missouri. First, I will examine how, in their attempt to restore Mormon historical sites, the LDS Church creates simulacra, sites where the representations have only a tangential …
Ecclesia Mortis: Why Are Church Meetings So Boring?
Ecclesia Mortis: Why Are Church Meetings So Boring? Just as parents bring toys and Cheerios to entertain their children at church, I bring the adult equivalent: essays, books, note pads. But why are church meetings so boring? Why don’t they engage? Is it my fault, or is there something more systemic about the dull monotony? …