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Perhaps you will find no issue reflecting a greater divide among Utahns that whether LDS Church leaders have too much influence in the Utah Legislature. A new UtahPolicy poll by Dan Jones & Associates finds that three-fourths of the faithful members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints say their church has “about the right amount of influence” on state lawmakers’ political decisions. But when you ask the same influence question of non-Mormons, you find super-majorities – 79 percent of Catholics, 84 percent of Protestants – say the Mormon Church has too much influence on Capitol Hill. Now,...

As many of you that visit this channel know, the Jehovah's Witness religion does not allow people to have freedom of thought and belief. If a person changes their viewpoint and questions the JW hierarchy and leadership then they will be sanctioned. If a member adopts an "unacceptable" opinion or conviction and dares to speak of it, then the local religious leaders (called Elders) will come after them, using an iron fist in a velvet glove to bring them back in line. If that fails, then they will cut the person off and ostracize them before everyone, announcing them from...

“Blessed Be, Aho, and Amen,” aren’t the words members of the Iowa House of Representatives are accustomed to hear at the closing of the invocation marking the House’s opening ceremonies, but that’s just what happened yesterday when a Wiccan priestess delivered the prayer. "We call this morning to God, Goddess, Universe, that which is greater than ourselves to be here with us today,” said Deborah Maynard, who delivered the first prayer by a Wiccan in the assembly. “By the Earth that is in our bones and centers us, may all here remember our roots and those whom we are here...

In the wake of the explosive HBO documentary “Going Clear,” John Travolta has come to Scientology’s defense. The 61-year-old made it clear he has no plans to see the doc, which alleges the church has physically abused and blackmailed some of its members, among other questionable acts. “No I haven’t and I don’t really care to,” Travolta told the Tampa Bay Times when asked if he’ll see the film. He’s been a member of the church for more than 40 years and claims his experiences have been nothing but amazing. “I haven’t experienced anything that the hearsay has (claimed), so...

Biblical Conspiracies 3 of 4 Secrets of the Crucifixion

President Obama met privately with Mormon leaders last night in Utah. One topic on the agenda for the meeting? Immigration. "President Obama is meeting with leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City, including President Henry Eyring, President Dieter Uchtdorf, Elder Tom Perry and Elder Todd Christofferson," White House deputy press secretary Eric Schultz told the press. "The President is pleased to meet with top LDS leaders as so many presidents before him have done. Among other issues, they will discuss the church's long record of service, including its work on disaster relief and...

PROVO — The Christian world is preparing for its biggest celebratory week of the year: Holy Week. To honor and testify of Jesus Christ and His life, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on Saturday will launch an Easter initiative, “Because He Lives,” through social media and other tools. The initiative is expected to reach millions through social media, month-long displays in select LDS Church visitors’ centers, member and missionary tools, and online paid promotion on hundreds of Internet sites. The LDS Church has often been criticized for its less-than-visual participation in Holy Week activities. Throughout Christianity the...

Is the Book of Mormon too violent for children? Graphic Murder and TortureMoroni 9:8 8 And the husbands and fathers of those women and children they have slain; and they feed the women upon the flesh of their husbands, and the children upon the flesh of their fathers; and no water, save a little, do they give unto them. Bodily Mutilation and Killing by Jesus's Hero, AmmonAlma 17: 38 Now six of them had fallen by the sling, but he slew none save it were their leader with his sword; and he smote off as many of their arms as...

A devout Mormon and an evangelical street preacher exchange words near Temple Square. Next thing you know, they're dining together on roadkill In 2007, Bryan Hall was almost finished filming his documentary, Us and Them: Religious Rivalry in America. He still didn't know how to end the film. A devout member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the now-42-year-old from Orem, thought about the protesters on Temple Square. He finally said, "Let's go talk to those crazy street preachers." There he met the outspoken leader of the street preachers, Ruben Israel, a 53-year-old Whittier, Calif., native who...

Don and Carol Richardson and their seven-month-old son Steven left their home in Canada and moved to the jungles on Papua New Guinea to live among the Sawi tribe in 1962. The Sawi, cannibals, considered killing and treachery to be virtues. It was the Richardsons' earnest desire to share the love of God with these people, but it seemed an impossible task. They asked the Lord to make a way for them to help the people grasp it. When another tribe attacked the Sawi, the killing went on for weeks. Finally Don told the people that they would leave if...

Here is the summation for the previous threads and the last of this for some time: Jesus Christ alone possessed the intrinsic quality of infallibility, was unlike any man that has ever lived, and was in a class all by Himself. There were some (like the Ebionites) who believed that Jesus was the messiah but also believed that he lacked divinity. Some, like those who ascribed to Arianism or semi-Arianism, who were somewhere in between the Ebionites and those who believed/believe that Jesus was fully God and Fully Man. Each of these nonetheless believed that Jesus was unlike any man...

On Easter Day (April 5th, 2015), faithful Christians will celebrate the resurrection of Jesus bodily from death. Later on this year, faithful Christians will also (on August 15th, 2015) celebrate the resurrection of Mary the mother of Jesus (before her body could see decay) and her Assumption into heaven. With the shows on CNN (Finding Jesus: Faith, Fact and Forgery) and O'Reilly's book, "Killing Jesus" on television (both this Sunday), there seems to be an uptick in the interest on the life of Jesus, the Apostles and early followers of Jesus - as well as Mary's role, too.

Moving back from the Theodosian Code, which stated the scriptures they believed to be heretical, back to the First Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D., which decreed that the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were to be in the fixed New Testament Canon of scripture, and back to earlier dates we find the following: A.) The Clermont List - a codex which embraced the Canon as it existed in Egypt (i.e. Alexandria) c.300 A.D. It lists the New Testament books which are the same as ours except that the Gospels are listed Matthew, Mark, Luke (the apostolic authors...

Should State Senator Apologize for Calling Hinduism a ‘False Faith’? Idaho lawmaker says she's "really opposed to having prayer that wasn't Christian" in legislative body. by March 19, 2015 - 2:07 pm (Pic in URL) A crowd of naysayers that ranged from her cousin in the state of Washington, to Buddhist leaders in Boise, Colo., to a rabbi in Nevada has called on Idaho Sen. Sheryl “Sherry” Nuxoll (R) to apologize for calling Hinduism a “false faith with false gods.” While the self-described mother, housewife and co-manager of a farm/ranch in Cottonwood, Idaho, has admitted she could have turned a...

1.) The King James Bible and/or Protestant Bible contains 39 Old Testament books and 27 New Testament books. Roman Catholics include all of these books within their sacred canon, with the addition of other books not included within the Protestant Canon. The Coptic Bible contains more books than all of the aforementioned (including the 27/39) and books that Roman Catholics believe to be canonical - and some other books. 2.) The First Council of Nicaea in 325 AD issued the Nicene Creed, adhered to by almost all Christians (Roman Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Protestants and Coptics) with the exception of a...

David Conley Nelson has spent years researching the LDS Church during the Third Reich, resulting in the new book Moroni and the Swastika: Mormons in Nazi Germany.Though it’s not officially out until February 26, the book will be launched Sam Weller’s in Trolley Square, Salt Lake City, tomorrow evening.It’s not right to say I “enjoyed” this book, because it was disturbing to discover how deeply some Mormons bought into Nazi ideology. But it’s required reading for anyone interested in Mormon history and the larger question of a religion’s responsibility to procure justice for the oppressed – even when it means...

A mummified monk found in the lotus position in Mongolia is 'not dead' and is instead one stage away from becoming a real-life Buddha, it has been claimed. Forensic examinations are under way on the amazing remains, which are believed to be around 200 years old, having been preserved in animal skin. But one expert has insisted the human relic is actually in 'very deep meditation' and in a rare and very special spiritual state known as 'tukdam'. Over the last 50 years there are said to have been 40 such cases in India involving meditating Tibetan monks. Dr Barry...

Robert Jeffress, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas. joined Father Gerald Murray of New York on Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor" Tuesday night to encourage Americans of all faiths to contact the White House and demand that the Obama administration call out radical Islam and take action to defeat the Islamic State terrorist organization. "This is part of a disturbing pattern," Jeffress said when asked by Bill O'Reilly what he made of Obama's initial refusal to call the ISIS beheading victims Coptic Christians [until he publicly acknowledged that the 21 Egyptian men were Christians and not just "citizens"...

The clip, meant to stress the importance of paying attention in church and meetings, has been criticized for insinuating that not fully focusing during such gatherings can result in dying, even connecting the concept to the story of Noah’s Ark. JW.org has not yet responded to the backlash. A Jehovah's Witness promotional cartoon has been slammed for appearing to threaten children who don't pay attention in church with death. Viewers have dubbed the controversial animated clip, posted to YouTube by JW.org, as "stupid," "dumb" and "mind control." It begins with two youngsters attending a service with their parents. A little...

On this episode, Richard, Sarah, and Jordan discuss different theories of the atonement, comparing mainstream Christian views to the Mormon view.