In Aristotle’s view of epistemology, to know something meant understanding something in preferably four different ways. Aristotle wrote that “we do not have knowledge of a thing until we have grasped its why, that is to say, its cause.” It meant understanding the following causes There are often many times that people want to only focus …
Up until now, my religious academic studies have focused mostly on the Old Testament and the Book of Mormon. I study the New Testament but up until this year have not spent a lot of time on it critically. I have mostly studied the theology. So I have decided that while I am waiting out …
For the past couple of weeks, I have contemplated the idea of restoring the church. As a member of the Church of Jesus of Latter-Day Saints, I believe a restoration of the church was needed. here are the three questions that led me to that conclusion These questions were fundamental for me to understand in …
Recently, on his Facebook page, my friend Ben Spackman posted about the interpretation of scripture(post below). This post was perplexing to me in some ways. In many ways I agree with what he is saying. However, in other ways I do not. In his post he lays out three stages to understanding scripture. Stage one …
Over the years I have seen many people leave my religion(and religion in general) to follow their own path. While this saddens me a great deal I still love those that have chosen to leave. Many people have asked me why I stay. The answer is simple really. My prayers have been answered too many …
Family has been on my mind again. This week we had some of the neighborhood youth over to our house for dinner. We sat down at the dinner table and ate and conversed about different things. A couple days past and my wife conveyed that one of the boys told her how much he had …
Being an open and unapologetic Christian often brings mockery and hostility. I’ve seen a lot of it, especially in my line of work in academia and the sciences. I remember a colleague of mine told me “you’re a very intelligent man, how can you believe in such obvious falsehoods. It’s not reasonable.” I’ve heard all …
Yesterday I had the opportunity to help the mission with transfers. We left at 4:00am to go pickup a sister that was starting her mission and bring down an elder serving in her area. We left the city and were up in the mountains an hour later. I love going in the mountains. It is …
Some thoughts on faith from my scripture study today. Faith = trust in things we cannot quantify immediatly or in other words, things not seen. Faith is a proactive principle( 2 Nephi 2:14, Alma 32:28 ) it is impossible to have faith without being proactive and searching for it. This is why Ether said that …
For those not of my faith, seminary is a four-year program for high school-aged youth. Every weekday during the school year the youth attend a one-hour class about the scriptures. Every year they rotate the topics. They rotate between Old Testament, New Testament, Book of Mormon, and Doctrine and covenants. The latter two being volumes …