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As finals are quickly approaching, students sometimes joke about living in the library. But when author Matthew Brown says he lives in the library, he’s not joking around. Brown, who recently released the book “Exploring the Connection between Mormons and Masons,” does most of the research for his books in the BYU library. “I live here in the BYU library and I’m not kidding,” Brown said. “I have done research at other universities around the country but for the most part, when it comes to LDS subjects, this is my primary research library.” “Mormons and Masons” is Brown’s 10th book,...

Six area churches in the Wolf River Region have voted in recent weeks to sever ties with the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, Two other churches have votes coming up, said the Rev. John Justman, bishop of the East-Central Synod of the ELCA in Appleton. All eight of the churches are in either Waupaca or Oconto counties. Justman said he thinks several of the churches will eventually leave the ELCA. “It makes me sad — they’re all special, and they’ve been good partners,” he said. “And if they do leave, we will wish them well. There’ll be sad feelings, not...

BREAKING: Diocese of Los Angeles Elects Non-Celibate Lesbian As Suffragan Bishop

Christmas 2009: A Message from ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson "But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us..." (Titus 3:4-5a). Into this shadowed world light shines and joyous voices sing. Glad tidings cheer the heart and liberate hope. "A child has been born for us, a son given to us" (Isaiah 9:6). God our Savior has appeared! God's saving goodness and loving kindness have arrived in Jesus, the Word made flesh. Though hidden in the humility of a manger, and later in the scandal of the cross, God's promise is being made...

Accusing Christians in India of carrying out a campaign of illegal or fraudulent conversions is a tactic being used by Hindu fundamentalist movements for mere political reasons, says an ecumenical forum of over 500 priests and pastors from different Christian denominations in the state of Karnataka who met in recent days in Bangalore. The Forum is chaired by Archbishop Bernard Moras of Bangalore and has denounced the attempt by the governments of some Indian states, to approve "anti-conversion" laws, offensive to the religious freedom of Indian citizens. The allegations of conversions "were exaggerated with the specific intention of creating insecurity...

If Christians do not keep watch over their freedom of religious expression, it could be taken away from them even in a free nation. Then they would be hampered like the Christians are in India.

Lutherans to Observe World AIDS Day Dec. 1 WASHINGTON (ELCA) -- Every nine and a half minutes a person in the United States becomes infected with HIV, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta. Globally, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS estimates the number of people infected with the virus is 33 million. On the weekend before or after World AIDS Day, Dec. 1, members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) are invited to participate in a worship service, event or advocacy activity, and to remember and demonstrate support for people living with and...

Lutherans Concerned / North America (LC/NA) responded with sadness to yesterday's announcement proposing a new church body to be formed by and for former ELCA members and congregations opposing the full inclusion of people of all sexual orientations and gender identities in the life of the church. In August 2009, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, by a 2/3 majority, passed a social statement on sexuality. The statement, "Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust" described as faithful four positions on beliefs within the denomination on the inclusion of people in same-gender relationships. The four positions ranged from the view that same-gender...

Minneapolis, Minn., Nov 20, 2009 / 03:54 am (CNA).- Following the decision of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) to allow sexually active homosexual clergy, an objecting Lutheran group has begun to form a new church body for those Lutherans who want to “remain faithful to the Orthodox Christianity of the last 2,000 years.”Lutheran CORE leaders on Wednesday said their working group would immediately begin drafting a constitution and taking other steps to form the new denomination. They hope to launch the denomination by next August.Rev. Paull Spring, a retired Pennsylvania ELCA bishop and chairman of Lutheran CORE said...

Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand. -- Romans 5:1-2a November 19, 2009 Sisters and brothers in Christ of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, I greet you with the words of the apostle Paul to the Romans: "Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand" (Romans 5:1-2a). Where does the Evangelical Lutheran Church in...

Same-sex relationships go against Scripture and morality, according to a letter mailed Monday by members of Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bessemer City. The congregation recently drafted the letter stating its disdain for a resolution passed by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. “We are writing to express our disappointment with the recent Churchwide Assembly’s approval of the resolution to allow gay and lesbian pastors,” the letter states. “We also disapprove of the resolution to find ways for congregations to recognize same-gender relationships.” The 2009 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted in August to open the...

As the original perpetrators for your initial story about a possible UFO sighting in Penparc, we write in reply to last week’s article. In the light of the revelations by Ben Giles that it was he and his family launching giant Chinese lanterns on both dates in question, it would seem likely that in this case we may have been mistaken. However, that does not diminish the fact on a worldwide basis, since 1947 – the year of the famous Roswell incident in the USA – there have to date been five million (and raising) documented sighting of UFOs –...

‘Brother’ Antonio Cordova, leader of the group “Alpha and Omega”, which defends the existence of creatures in other planets, said: “Peru is a prophetic land and the place chosen by aliens to communicate with humans.” The this group mixes together ‘Christianism, socialism, a vegetarian diet and beings from another planet”, and has now organized the” Fourth International Congress of UFOlogy’ in the Peruvian capital, gathering contactees and researchers from countries like Chile, Ecuador or Brazil. Antonio Cordova, was named as “Trustee of the Divine Celestial Science” and at an interview with international media, remarked the importance of Peru as the...

ELCA synods will not have the option of upholding traditional Christian teaching on marriage and homosexuality in their standards for pastors and other rostered leaders according to a draft of candidacy rules released Oct. 10 by the ELCA churchwide organization. No synod or bishop may make decisions on ministry standards that differ from the new policies of the ELCA churchwide organization as defined by the 2009 Churchwide Assembly, the policy draft explains. The ELCA now allows pastors and other rostered leaders to be in committed same-sex relationships. “By the governing documents, all candidacy and call decisions are made on an...

(In August the churchwide assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America adopted proposals to make it possible for Lutherans in publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationships to serve as ELCA associates in ministry, clergy, deaconesses and diaconal ministers.) In the wake of the ELCA assembly vote to allow gay and lesbian people to serve in the clergy or other leadership positions, the denomination's Presiding Bishop, the Rev. Mark Hanson, has told his bishops and laity to expect some congregations to leave. Whether ELCA congregations will defect in large numbers to more conservative Lutheran denominations remains to be seen. However,...

I. God is the Eternal, Omnipotent, Immutable WISDOM and Supreme INTELLIGENCE and Exhaustless Love. Thou shalt adore, revere, and love Him ! Thou shalt honour Him by practising the virtues! II. Thy religion shall be, to do good because it is a pleasure to thee, and not merely because it is a duty. That thou mayest become the friend of the wise man, thou shalt obey his precepts ! Thy soul is immortal ! Thou shalt do nothing to degrade it ! III. Thou shalt unceasingly war against vice! Thou shalt not do unto others that which thou wouldst not...

Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry , prepared for the Supreme Council of the Thirty Third Degree for the Southern Jurisdiction of the United States. Charleston, 1871. Albert Pike, born December 29, 1809, was the oldest of six children born to Benjamin and Sarah Andrews Pike. Pike was raised in a Christian home and attended an Episcopal church. Pike passed the entrance examination at Harvard College when he was 15 years old, but could not attend because he had no funds. After traveling as far west as Santa Fe, Pike settled in Arkansas, where...

All Army chaplains wear the same uniform, and...answer to the same calling: to provide comfort and to relieve the suffering of American soldiers. But one chaplain stands out from the crowd. Thomas Dyer is the first and only Buddhist chaplain in the history of the U.S. Army. Dyer will be deployed to the Middle East in December along with the 278th Armored Calvary Regiment. Although his faith is grounded in pacifism, the 43-year-old Dyer says war has become a necessary part of peace. "My teacher has concluded that without the military, without civil protection, the world would enter into a...

It was, for its day, as big a book-selling phenomenon as Harry Potter. For decades it was a No. 1 best-selling phenomenon unlike anything seen before in America. And Joseph Smith loved it. Or did he?

A few years ago I was told that at the ceremony of induction of the vicar of one of the local Anglican churches, the Bible which was handed to him had embossed on its front cover the emblem of the Freemasons, the square and compasses. It subsequently came to light that nearly all the male members of his Parochial Church Council were "on the square", and his predecessor as vicar had been a Mason as well. This is not a "low", or Evangelical, church, but very firmly in the Anglo Catholic tradition, where a number of clergy and lay people...

ROME, Italy (CNN) -- The Vatican said Tuesday it has worked out a way for groups of Anglicans who are dissatisfied with their faith to join the Catholic Church. The process will allow groups of Anglicans, including bishops and married priests, to join the Catholic Church some 450 years after King Henry VIII broke from Rome and created the Church of England. The number of Anglicans wishing to join the Catholic Church has increased in recent years as the Anglican church has welcomed the ordination of women and openly gay clergy and blessed homosexual partnerships, said Cardinal William Joseph Levada,...

Elizabeth Clare Prophet, longtime spiritual leader of the controversial Church Universal and Triumphant, died Thursday evening at her apartment in Bozeman. She was 70. She suffered from advanced Alzheimer’s disease and died with her daughter, Moira, and granddaughter by her side, her daughter, Erin Prophet, said Friday. As the charismatic leader of the New Age sect that many considered cult-like, Prophet led her followers along a path that over the years included apocalyptic predictions, run-ins with local environmental groups, legal trouble and even a late-in-life “miracle” pregnancy that resulted in the birth of her fifth child when she was 55...

Nobody could prove them wrong. They said that Joseph Smith had a faulty revelation in 1830. They said the revelation proclaimed that the copyright to the Book of Mormon would be sold in Canada. They said the revelation was a failure and that Joseph was a fallen prophet. And, best of all, there was no copy of the revelation for anybody to check against their story. This all changed on Sept. 22 with the publication of the latest volume of the Joseph Smith Papers: "Revelations and Translations: Manuscript Revelation Books." For more than 160 years, there was only one side...

ORLANDO, Fla. -- First there was Elian Gonzalez, the Cuban boy torn between two nations. Then there was Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged woman torn between two families. Now comes Rifqa Bary, the teenage runaway torn between two faiths. If you're involved in a high-stakes custody fight, Florida, it seems, is the place to be. Could Rifqa's father in Ohio really kill her for leaving Islam to embrace Christianity? Has the 17-year-old read too many fundamentalist Christian Web sites? Or is it all just teen dramatics? Those are all questions swirling around the 17-year-old Ohio girl who became a Christian several...

Dear Diocesan Family, A panel of the Virginia Supreme Court will hear our petition for appeal on October 21 and, while it is unfortunate that these legal proceedings were necessary, I trust that this hearing will bring us one step closer to resolution. I am proud that the Diocese of Virginia and the Episcopal Church have chosen the path consistently to defend loyal Episcopalians, and to safeguard and to protect the Church's legacy and the Church from unwarranted governmental and legislative interference. It is with the same determination to stand by the people, traditions and legacy of our diocese that...

MEXICO CITY (AP) - Apolinario Chile Pixtun is tired of being bombarded with frantic questions about the Mayan calendar supposedly "running out" on Dec. 21, 2012. After all, it's not the end of the world. Or is it? Definitely not, the Mayan Indian elder insists. "I came back from England last year and, man, they had me fed up with this stuff." It can only get worse for him. Next month Hollywood's "2012" opens in cinemas, featuring earthquakes, meteor showers and a tsunami dumping an aircraft carrier on the White House. At Cornell University, Ann Martin, who runs the "Curious?...

ELCA Bishops Told of Possible Changes in Domestic, Global Relationships 09-223-JB CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Since the Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), the church's global mission personnel have been reaching out to partner Lutheran churches worldwide. While some churches have expressed disagreement with a significant decision of the assembly, only one church to date has said it will change its relationship with the 4.6-million member ELCA. In August the churchwide assembly adopted proposals to change ELCA ministry policies to make it possible for Lutherans in publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationships to serve as ELCA associates...

Technology futurists love to talk about the Singularity as the point in time when technology starts to progress so rapidly that machine intelligence melds with and surpasses human intelligence. It is to futurists what the Rapture is to fundamentalist Christians. Those who welcome or fear this eventuality are gathering this weekend in New York City for the fourth annual Singularity Summit. Speaking at the summit are some of the better-known tech soothsayers, including author and programmer Ray Kurzweil; Steve Wolfram, the founder of the novel search engine Alpha; and Aubrey de Grey, an expert on anti-aging science. Also giving talks...

Or any other “-ism” for that matter Folks, after the recent interactions with Gnosticism triggered by the posts The Teachings of Jesus according to the Catholics and to the Gnostics Compared and Greetings, Gnostics from the Palm Tree, I was engaged in dialogue by a scholar who has studied Gnosticism in an advanced academic setting who offered several valuable nuances and clarifications which I welcomed. I now feel I have to offer a clarification of my own and to accomplish it I want to share with you five ways or modes in which to approach Gnosticism. These five ways are...

MIDWAY, Utah -- LDS filmmaker Kieth Merrill says he picked the background for "The Testaments" by default, and if he had it to do over, he would have sought locations in North America rather than Central and South America. Speaking Friday at the Book of Mormon Prophecies Conference at the Zermatt resort, Merrill said he believes evidence supports a North American backdrop in the "promised land" for the Book of Mormon stories, wars and visits from Jesus Christ. "I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I can't say I know where it all took place," Merrill said as...

St. Paul, Minn. — Members of St. Paul's Evangelical Lutheran Church in Minneapolis decided to leave the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America after a 96 percent vote by members on Sunday. The decision to leave came after the ELCA Church-wide Assembly vote on Aug. 21 in Minneapolis, that allowed gays and lesbians in committed relationships to serve as clergy. Before the ECLA's decision, gay clergy were allowed to be ministers only if they were celibate. Some church members object to the new policy, saying it goes against Scripture. The St. Paul's congregation's council set a policy in October 1990 that...

You might think that the Mormon people celebrate Christmas like a good Christian denomination would. But a doctrinal issue broods over the Mormon people, a historic issue that prevents many Mormons from appreciating the Christian meaning of Christmas. Indeed, it is an issue that prevents Mormons from having a saving relationship with the real Jesus Christ. Just who is that Jesus in the manger? How was he conceived? And what kind of salvation does he freely offer to those who want eternal life and the forgiveness of sins?One of the fundamental tenets of Christianity is that Christ was born of...

History: Orderville's utopia was nearly perfect -- for about a decade

Lutheran Core Leaders, Members Map Organization's Future 09-212-JB FISHERS, Ind. (ELCA) -- Leaders and members of the Lutheran Coalition for Renewal (CORE) began planning for the organization's future by adopting a constitution, including plans for a "free-standing synod" not directly related to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). They also suggested ways for constituents to communicate concerns. With the adoption of its constitution, CORE's name was formally changed from "Coalition for Reform" to "Coalition for Renewal." Biblical teaching, the creeds and the Lutheran Confessions are key values of CORE, according to its constitution. Some 1,200 Lutherans from more than...

As members of the church we recognize that the Book of Mormon was written for us and for our day and age. No earthly Nephite, other than Mormon, and perhaps Moroni, ever read the Book of Mormon in its entirety. It was edited by the Prophet Mormon under the direction of the Savior with the intention of articulating doctrine, events and experiences that relate to our times and circumstances. We live in a time of endemic warfare, and as Joseph Smith prophesied on Christmas Day 1832, from that time forth, "war shall be poured out upon all nations" until the...

Dear Seeker of Truth, I am a former Mormon missionary and apologist (defender of the faith). I wrote a book defending the Church against anti-Mormon attacks ("The Gainsayers" 1989). I spent many years of my life in research, hoping to find evidence for The Book of Mormon, and to counter anti-Mormon claims. I studied Book of Mormon archaeology and also Mormon history far more intensively than 99% of other Mormons. I did this because I wanted to defend the Church. Ultimately, I discovered the truth. I resigned from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1996. Below is...

Dear Seeker of Truth, I am a former Mormon missionary and apologist (defender of the faith). I wrote a book defending the Church against anti-Mormon attacks ("The Gainsayers" 1989). I spent many years of my life in research, hoping to find evidence for The Book of Mormon, and to counter anti-Mormon claims. I studied Book of Mormon archaeology and also Mormon history far more intensively than 99% of other Mormons. I did this because I wanted to defend the Church. Ultimately, I discovered the truth. I resigned from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1996. For those...

A WORD FROM THE LORD OF WHAT IS KEEPING THE BODY OF CHRIST FROM HIS FULLNESS On the 22nd of September 2009 I received this word of revelation concerning the body of Christ . . . Why am I shedding tears ? These are tears of remission ,They have come close as babyl yet not entered into a oneness with me ,You see " I AM The Good Shepherd " and there can be no other for I AM the Way , The Truth and The Life ... And no man comes unto the father but by Me ! ALL...

Folks, after receiving a rather vituperative comment on the brief summary comparison on the previous post, The Teachings of Jesus according to the Catholics and to the Gnostics Compared, I decided to research the matter a bit. The results are equivalent to say "I've discovered America." Duh. The Gnostics are not hiding. They operate in the open daylight. Their beliefs are public and open for inspection. They have a church (The Ecclessia Gnostica), a catechism, a lectionary, and a liturgy "which resembles the Mass of the Roman Catholic communion," which they declare to be "the supreme transformational rite of Christian...

The Book of Mormon has undergone thousands of changes through the years as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has corrected typos, grammatical errors and mistaken words. Brigham Young University professor Royal Skousen highlights some of the most significant changes in his latest book, The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text. Several examples are listed below: 1 Nephi 13:24"It contained the fullness of the gospel of the Land." (original manuscript)"It contained the fullness of the gospel of the Lord." (printer's version, 1981 edition)"It contained the fullness of the gospel of the Lamb." (BYU Critical Text Project)1 Nephi 17:48"Whoso...

The 2009 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Churchwide Assembly made grievous decisions that will not help the denomination in the years ahead. Those decisions were the adoption of a social statement on sexuality and four resolutions that approve of sexual relationships outside of marriage and direct a change in the ELCA’s ministry standards to allow for practicing homosexuals to serve as ordained pastors and lay ministers. One biblical phrase kept coming to mind in the weeks leading up to the ELCA churchwide assembly and very often during the August assembly—“ears to hear.” The phrase occurs repeatedly in the Old and...

Speaking of Gnosticism (since yesterday we were speaking about C.G. Jung) , I want to share with you yet another table, this one comparing two diametrically opposed “Jesuses” and what they say and think, the biblical Jesus held by Catholics and other Christians as “the Only Son of God, begotten from the Father before all ages,” and the one proposed by the Gnostics, today’s dabblers in the Occult, hermeticism, religious syncretism, and the New Age on the other. The table is inspired by the one printed in the book Stolen Identity: The Conspiracy to Reinvent Jesus, by Dr. Peter Jones,...

Joining the Unchurched James Arne Nestingen In its August assembly in Minneapolis, going by the definition set down in Augustana VII, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America effectively declared that it is no longer a church. Among those unchurched by this decision, a poignant question remains: What in the world do we do now? Consideration of this question requires among other things, some careful examination of definitions. Going back to the sources, some alternatives should emerge. The seventh article of the Augsburg Confession, which has united Lutherans since the l6th century, defines the church as the people of God gathered...

Prophecies Of St Seraphim Of Vyritsa (1866-1949) The Elder said that a time will come (it is already coming!) when the debauchery and moral decline of the young will reach their ultimate point. Virtually no-one will remain uncorrupted. Seeing their impunity, the young will consider that everything is permitted them for the satisfaction of their whims and lusts. They will begin to gather in groups and gangs, stealing and debauching themselves. But a time will come when the voice of God will be heard, when the young will understand that it is not possible to go on living in that...

We Mormons have our own personal religious lore; one that tops the list is the Three Nephites. A healthy percentage of members who make it to church more often than not either have their own personal Three Nephites tale or can relate at least one that has been passed onto them. The Three Nephites are mentioned in The Book of Mormon as disciples of Jesus Christ who ask to remain on earth until Jesus Christ returns and convert souls for him. Christ says yes, which is the same answer he gives to John the Beloved in the New Testament. (I...

By day, Clinton resident Chris Adams teaches art classes to about 200 tweens and teens at Roy Junior High. After hours, the 34-year-old father of three produces abstract paintings about some of the weightier matters of the universe -- in particular, the end of the world. "There's a lot we do that's very unnatural in how we live our lives," said Adams, a self-described Christian and Mormon. "There's a growing tension with people -- perhaps it comes from 9/11 -- and we don't feel safe anymore." "But there's a general belief," Adams added, "that things will get worse and an...

ORANGEVALE, Calif. -- A 15-year-old girl who allegedly worships Satan was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of lighting a fire at her Orangevale church. The blaze occurred at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints at the corner of Hazel and Cherry avenues. Christian Pebbles of Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District said the teen made it clear why she started the blaze, which damaged church pews. "She hates the church and she worships the devil," Pebbles said. "That's the reason why." Pebbles said the teen was taken into custody on suspicion of felony arson. "Well, you know, kids sometimes don't always...

A few days after I watched the Mormons gorging themselves on a giant cheeseburger, Elder Cooper told me that he was being split up from his companion Elder Glover, and being moved to a different area. He was pretty annoyed about it, and told us that he would break protocol by not telling the new missionaries moving in to the area about us, and keeping contact himself. After this, I had no contact with any Mormons for a few weeks before I finally received a call and then a visit from the new missionaries to the area. I had called...

Even if you're not a resident of Utah, you've surely heard of companies like "Clean Flicks" before. Like, for example, in the virtual pages of this very blog. It's a prickly subject among movie fans, and that's probably an understatement. Basically, several companies in Utah have taken it upon themselves to edit all the "objectionable" material out of Hollywood's hottest films, and many in the Mormon community are more than happy to throw those discs into their DVD players, secure in the knowledge that Braveheart will be less bloody, that Forrest Gump never felt a female embrace, and that...

A great explosion of purity is about to come , But "not" as before(as Katrina) ,something straight from my kingdom , The heavenlies are about to applaud , I AM The Lord behold I alone am God ! Yet for my children of my rod and staff , They shall rest in my bossom of Zion and laugh , For the Joy of The Lord is their strength , And these are my children of victiory that have gone the full length , Obedience to me has become their rod , My staff is their com(fort) for I AM their...