Monthly Archives: October 2007

Mormon Heaven Part 4 (of four)

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Some Final Thoughts I must say that, quite surprisingly, at least to me, I never really felt discriminated against when I lived among a Mormon community of True Believers. Religion was so pervasive that it was more or less taken for granted in the little town where I grew up; like air, it was everywhere, and my theory is that people just accepted it as part of their environment, and they never consciously thought about it, because they’d never known … Read on…

Mormon Heaven Part 3 (of four)

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The Mormon Belief System Now let’s examine the basics of the Mormon belief system: First things first: Mormons belief that discorporated individual souls float in the ether somewhere above Earth, and when a woman’s egg is fertilized, one of those souls immediately flies into it and endows it with Heavenly Grace, making it a human being, despite its being too small to see with the naked eye! In our family, when I was a child and a teenager, we used … Read on…

Mormon Heaven Part 2 (of four)

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The History of the LDS Church Let’s begin with a capsule history of the Church. The founder, Joseph Smith, was born on a farm in upstate New York in the early nineteenth century. That area later became known as The Burned-Over District, a nickname alluding to the many fire-and-brimstone preachers who roamed the area delivering jeremiads to the local residents in tent shows and so-called camp meetings, urging them to repent their sinful ways lest they burn eternally in Hell. … Read on…

Mormon Heaven Part 1 (of four)

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Author’s Note: I hope readers will forgive the somewhat ironic tone. I thought skeptical readers might allow some latitude, enabling me to get by with a slight tinge of irony; in any case, it’s the way I both think and write, and there’s little I can do about it. If I have offended, however unintentionally, anyone’s sober sensibilities, I apologize in advance. My Background I don’t claim to be an authority on Mormon theology, but having grown up in a … Read on…

Dear Pathetic Bob

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Dear Pathetic Bob, I am filled with despair. I can make no sense of all the trouble and tragedy going on in the world. Life seems meaningless. To gain some hope and understanding, I am considering joining a religion. Can you suggest a religion that would help me? Sincerely, Desperately Seeking Sense Dear Desperately, You know, I’m supposed to be an advice columnist. So, I don’t mind that much when people write and complain about how their boyfriend or girlfriend … Read on…

Atheism or Humanism?

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Atheists and humanists are united in the conclusion that the supernatural isn’t real. This means that both are without a belief in a god or gods and both hold that people have to take final responsibility for their actions. The buck stops here. In this regard, both also see themselves as at least as capable to lead sane and moral lives as people who believe in confession, absolution, and an afterlife. And by their fruits we know them: the large … Read on…

A Plane Day

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For me, most days are sky days, but some days are plane days. Today was a plane day. There was an overcast with bands of rain scattered around, so I gave my bird a bath by flying through several of them. But mainly, I just communed with her, flying nowhere, listening to the steady drone of her engine, and, well, just being alone in the sky. Like the mountain climber sitting atop a peak, surveying the landscape spread below, I … Read on…

Logic in the Gospels

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A first look at Christendom is like a first peek into a kaleidoscope, a snowflake, or a magic-mirror lantern.  In fact, the World Christian Encyclopedia, 2001 edition, counts 33,830 Christian variants and sects, often divided on even the most basic tenets of belief.  More conservative counts suggest about 9000 groups1.  By contrast, Islam has about 20 sects or denominations, or maybe a few more, depending on how finely you tune your focus; Judaism perhaps 15; and Buddhism is in a … Read on…

After the Everafter

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After the Everafter there’s a loss of soul. A loss of warmth I had somewhere. Now an emptiness not felt before. What I can see is all there is, no more. After the Everafter. So what’s to do, and what’s to be? Can love and awe and truth still be? Is beauty still there for us to see? Now I’m the only judge of these. After the Everafter.

An Interview With August E. Brunsman IV

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August E. Brunsman IV, Executive Director, Secular Student Alliance Brunsman has been the unpaid Executive Director of the SSA since 2001 and has been the paid ED since October 2004. Before that, he worked as a programmer for the Institute for Humanist Studies for three years. In 1997 he founded Students for Freethought at the Ohio State University where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa majoring in psychology and minoring in mathematics and cognitive science in 2001. Brunsman is also the … Read on…