The first newsworthy quotes coming from April General Conference emanate from his moral excellency, Boyd Packer:

Just because the nation may change its laws to “tolerate legalized acts of immorality” does not make those acts any less spiritually damaging, senior apostle Boyd K. Packer said Saturday morning at the LDS Church’s 183rd Annual General Conference.

“The permissiveness afforded by the weakening of the laws of the land to tolerate legalized acts of immorality,” Packer said, “does not reduce the serious spiritual consequences that result from the violation of God’s law of chastity.”

This surprises no one, least of all me, but I had hoped for a more tolerant church response to the push for marriage equality in this country.

His sitting tirade of inclusion, diversity and unconditional love included this as well:

“Tolerance is a virtue, but, like all virtues, when exaggerated it transforms itself into a vice,” said the 88-year-old Packer, speaking from his seat rather than from the pulpit. “We need to be careful of the ‘tolerance trap’ so that we are not swallowed up in it.”

The Salt Lake Tribune article also mentions the “separate but equal” status of women in the church with this bon mot:

Several church leaders also spoke Saturday morning about the important but separate roles of women within the Mormon faith. For the first time in the church’s history, a woman, Jean A. Stevens, offered a public prayer at General Conference.

And then continues on to drive the point home.

“Men and women have different but equally valued roles,” apostle M. Russell Ballard said Saturday. “Just as a woman cannot conceive a child without a man, so a man cannot fully exercise the power of the priesthood to establish an eternal family without a woman. In other words, in the eternal perspective, both the procreative power and the priesthood power are shared by a husband and wife.”

Ballard went on to discuss a new church-produced video called “Strengthening the Family and the Church through the Priesthood” that “shows us all — men, women, children, married, widowed or single, no matter what our circumstances — how we can be partakers of the blessings of the priesthood.”

The church can make all of the videos, create all of the websites, play all of the new social media games it wants, but it does not obfuscate the fact that it has to change to survive — and yet, demonstrates again this conference its unwillingness to do so.

ADDENDUM: One reader ["MenaceToSociety"] of the Salt Lake Tribune article quoted above had this to say:

Say we could classify our treatment of our neighbors roughly as Love, Like, Accept, Tolerate, Dislike, and Hate. Packer isn’t talking about Love Thy Gay Neighbor. Or Like. Or Accept. Packer is resisting Tolerating Thy Gay Neighbor, when tolerate is really quite a low standard. Strange level of feeling towards his neighbors for a church leader.

In Utah, it is currently legal–

• To evict a tenant for being gay
• To fire an employee for being gay

The Salt Lake Tribune reports this morning that a gay anti-bias bill that would prohibit this type of discrimination will be attempted in this session of the Utah State legislature — even though the LDS church has reportedly chosen to not get behind it, as had seemed to be the case earlier this year.

This apparent refusal to provide its blessing (something that is literally required for most LDS legislators to get on board) may be tied to attempts to remove the clause allowing exemptions for people with “sincere religious beliefs against homosexuality”.

Maybe it’s me, but isn’t this exactly the group this bill is targeting? Keeping this clause in makes it essentially non-enforceable and non-effective.

ADDENDUM: It didn’t pass. Another year in Utah with no legal protections. I also read that the church fears this because they would not be able to fire church employees who are in a gay relationship as they currently do with impunity. Nice.

This week the LDS church launched a new website that is an attempt at rapprochement to the gay community, and perhaps their own little attempt at penance for the Prop 8 PR fiasco in California.

According to an interviewed official on KSL-TV, “…the site has been under development for more than two years”. [Personal aside: I could have put it together in a day; it must have been getting buy-in from Boyd K. Packer that took the other 729 days.]

Here are a few quotes from the site that stood out for me (all emphasis is mine):

This official website does not offer a comprehensive explanation of everything related to same-sex attraction, but it does reflect the feelings of Church leaders as to how we should treat each other as part of the human family. The site offers a place where the people whose lives are impacted by attraction to the same sex can find inspiration to work through difficult challenges while remaining faithful to Church teachings.

The Church’s approach to this issue stands apart from society in many ways. And that’s alright. Reasonable people can and do differ. From a public relations perspective it would be easier for the Church to simply accept homosexual behavior. That we cannot do, for God’s law is not ours to change. There is no change in the Church’s position of what is morally right. But what is changing — and what needs to change — is to help Church members respond sensitively and thoughtfully when they encounter same-sex attraction in their own families, among other Church members, or elsewhere.

(more…)

Two words: Lyndon Lamborn

Descriptive LINK and his BOOK

Reuters has just published a special report called “Mormonism besieged by the modern age”

Here’s a quote:

A religious studies class late last year at Utah State University in Logan, Utah, was unusual for two reasons. The small group of students, faculty and faithful there to hear Mormon Elder Marlin Jensen were openly troubled about the future of their church, asking hard questions. And Jensen was uncharacteristically frank in acknowledging their concerns.

Did the leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints know that members are “leaving in droves?” a woman asked.

“We are aware,” said Jensen, according to a tape recording of his unscripted remarks. “And I’m speaking of the 15 men that are above me in the hierarchy of the church. They really do know and they really care,” he said.

“My own daughter,” he then added, “has come to me and said, ‘Dad, why didn’t you ever tell me that Joseph Smith was a polygamist?’” For the younger generation, Jensen acknowledged, “Everything’s out there for them to consume if they want to Google it.” The manuals used to teach the young church doctrine, meanwhile, are “severely outdated.”

These are tumultuous times for the faith founded by Joseph Smith in 1830, and the rumbling began even before church member Mitt Romney’s presidential bid put the Latter-Day Saints in the spotlight.

LINK

I feel like I paid some cultural dues and watched Citizen Kane this afternoon. It’s one of those movies that everyone should have seen (or read, like Moby Dick), but that no one really has. In its 70th anniversary year it still makes the top of every film list, so I rented it on iTunes and intended to watch it on the flight to or from Brazil this last week, but never did.

I accidentally clicked the ‘play’ button today on my iMac and in spite of stopping it upon realizing my mistake, was not quick enough to pause the 24-hour countdown clock. With 16 hours left, I found some time this afternoon to watch it.

It was a shorter movie than I had anticipated (it seems that “great” = “long” for many classic films), and while I was already familiar with story, its history (William Randolph Hearst, anyone?) and the denouement, I enjoyed it.

I think it was so unique for its time due to artistic camera angles, lighting, film overlays, fades, cuts and a team of stage actors in their first movie. It was like a film made by a team of people who had never actually seen one, but had access to the equipment, so were not constrained by Hollywood standards for the time.

This was not a subtle piece. Drawbacks for me were the laughable ‘old age’ makeup and a bit much stage drama at times. Both stemmed from the aspect of a stage audience not being able to see the closeups or to hear the script in the back row. I can almost hear director Orson Welles telling them to “tone it down,” as they played key scenes that did not require the thespian touch. I suspect the makeup was state-of-the-art for the time.

It was well-directed and most of the actors seemed more natural than many Hollywood productions of the same era.

I enjoyed seeing Agnes Moorehead as Charles Foster Kane‘s mother and Joseph Cotten in a somewhat homoerotic role as his best friend. I could’t figure out who Kane’s first wife was until the credits rolled, and then recognized the name Ruth Warrick, a soap opera star (All My Children, 1970-2005).

Best film ever? Hardly

Overall, an entertaining film with good actors and a decent story. Worth a watch — even if just to say you have seen it!

The Salt Lake Tribune published a story about a BYU men’s singing group that was to be featured on a televised singing competition. It was illustrated with this picture:

And this quote:

Sixteen a cappella groups will try to win “The Sing-Off,” NBC’s music competition show. One — Vocal Point — will try to represent Brigham Young University and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

“Absolutely,” said McKay Crockett, a Vocal Point tenor. “This may be the first time that many people know what a Mormon young man looks like. We want to be ourselves and portray the church in a very positive way.”

Interacting with the members of the other 15 groups has been “a great opportunity to exchange beliefs between not only religions but with people who just want to know who we are,” Crockett said. “And what Mormons do and how Mormons act. And they realize we’re a lot like they are.”

I watched a very heart-warming and yet chilling documentary last night. Dear Zachary tells the story of Andrew Bagby, a young doctor who was killed by his ex-girlfriend. She turns up pregnant in court and his parents fight to gain custody of their soon-to-be-born grandchild.

This film is a visual letter to that child, Zachary, about his father from the perspective of dozens of his closest friends, family and co-workers. It also covers in great detail the legal battles and the love his grandparents had for him.

Well done, poignant and thought-provoking about the impact that a life — and death — can have on so many.

Interesting addition to my emailbox today. I bet it’s a hoot!