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Friendly Atheist reports this week on plans by a member of the Satanic Temple to challenge Missouri's requirement for a 72-hour waiting period for abortions by asserting a religious freedom claim. Missouri has a Religious Freedom Restoration Act (MO Rev. Stat Section 1.302.1). Missouri law (MO Rev. Stat. Section 188.027.1) requires that: "The physician who is to perform or induce the abortion or a qualified professional shall provide the woman with the opportunity to view at least seventy-two hours prior to the abortion an active ultrasound of the unborn child and hear the heartbeat of the unborn child if the...

The Mont Order, a possible revival of several much older and more powerful secret fraternities bearing names like “La Montagne”, “The Inner Order”, “Group Zero”, or simply “The Order”, has proven to have greater influence than anyone expected during 2014. My earlier articles documented some of the first initial reports of this mysterious group’s existence, leading up to this development. Currently, the best existing source compiling all information on the Mont Order society into a single dossier has been put together by author Liam Quaid and is available at a new website called the Mont Order Conspiracy Observatory. An explanatory...

Chapter 38: Eternal Marriage [SNIP] Eternal Marriage Is Essential for Exaltation• What is the Lord’s doctrine of marriage, and how does it differ from the views of the world? Many people in the world consider marriage to be only a social custom, a legal agreement between a man and a woman to live together. But to Latter-day Saints, marriage is much more. Our exaltation depends on marriage...[SNIP] Heavenly Father has given us the law of eternal marriage so we can become like Him. The Lord has said: “In the celestial glory there are three heavens or degrees; “And in order...

Requirements for Exaltation[SNIP] To be exalted, we first must place our faith in Jesus Christ and then endure in that faith to the end of our lives. Our faith in Him must be such that we repent of our sins and obey His commandments. He commands us all to receive certain ordinances: ... 3. Brethren must receive the Melchizedek Priesthood and magnify their callings in the priesthood. 4. We must receive the temple endowment. 5. We must be married for eternity, either in this life or in the next.In addition to receiving the required ordinances, the Lord commands all of...

...let me say just a bit more about...marriage. This may sound a little bit bold to urge marriage for those...past the marriageable age;...we are shocked to know that some men are delaying marriage until their later thirties or into their forties, and they have never talked of marriage. [SNIP] ...I have a letter here from a sister that pinpoints something...these girls are going through...There is a man who has been dating her for years and he comes especially at meal time... Here is another one who says, “I am a 40-year-old single woman.” Another one says, “I am a 30-year-old...

This is the third and final post on B. Carmon Hardy’s Doing the Works of Abraham: Mormon Polygamy: Its Origin, Practice and Demise (Arthur H. Clark Co., 2007). The simple story of the end of LDS polygamy is that it ended in 1890 with the Manifesto. The not-so-simple story involves a Second Manifesto in 1904, which raises the obvious question, “If the First Manifesto ended polygamy, why the need for a Second Manifesto?” The First Manifesto did not end the officially sanctioned LDS practice of polygamy. In fact, it took twenty years to fully execute that momentous institutional change of...

As Mormonism enters its third century, it faces a Goldilocks dilemma: Too much tension with the surrounding culture invites scorn; too little threatens its uniqueness. But finding just the right balance to ensure a thriving — and distinctive — faith won't be easy. {SNIP} So, what are the Baby Bear options in Mormonism's future? Too much conflict with the wider society, say on gay rights or women's roles, premier Mormon sociologist Armand Mauss argues, would bring "not only popular disdain but even repression and persecution." {SNIP} Female elders? • Third, the LDS Church runs into much debate and even clashes...

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...