In recent months, Governor Spencer J. Cox of Utah has been in the news for the passage of two new state laws: one that puts strict limits on access to social media for teens, and another that would prohibit social media companies from using designs that are addictive to teens.
The Gospel Topics essay titled “Mother in Heaven,” on churchofjesuschrist.org states “The doctrine of a Heavenly Mother is a cherished and distinctive belief among Latter-day Saints.”It’s with this in mind that three Latter-day Saint women — McArthur Krishna, Ashli Carnicelli, and Trina Caudle, have curated a new collection of writing, poetry, and art called Cherish: The Joy of Our Mother in Heaven.We were lucky enough to bring McArthur on, along with another one of the book’s contributors, Michal Thomas.
This week we are covering the Enneagram, a fascinating topic and a tool that we’ve found to be very helpful and deeply meaningful over the past few years. For this conversation, we were lucky enough to bring on one of the world’s foremost proponents and teachers of the Enneagram — Ian Morgan Cron.Ian is a bestselling author, psychotherapist, Enneagram teacher, Episcopal priest, and the host of the podcast "Typology," which has over 20 million downloads.
Over the years, much of the work that we’ve done at Faith Matters has tried to take into account much of the wisdom and research that’s been done in the field of faith and adult development. It’s also been important to us to share and discuss some of the existing models, including Brian McLaren’s four-stage framework, and the “creation, fall, atonement” framework that our amazing friend Jared Halverson has spoken about at Restore and on this podcast.
In May of this year, the news program 60 Minutes aired a segment exploring the finances of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. David Nielsen, a former portfolio manager at Ensign Peak, the investment arm of the Church, alleged that the Church had been operating improperly as a tax-exempt organization and called for that tax-exempt status to be revoked. 60 Minutes also interviewed W. Christopher Waddell, first counselor in the Presiding Bishopric, who denied Nielsen’s claims. Near the end of June, the Wall Street Journal published an article of its own, again emphasizing the size of the Church’s assets and the opulence of its temples.
A few weeks ago, we released a conversation with Terryl Givens about the life of Eugene England. England’s work on atonement theology had felt like it necessitated another conversation, but it was too big to fit into the first one. So this week, we brought Terryl back to talk not just about England’s views, but about atonement generally.
For this week’s episode, we were honored to bring on Alice Faulkner Burch, General Editor of Deseret Book’s new collection of essays by Black American Latter-day Saints: My Lord, He Calls Me. The title of the book comes from an early Black American spiritual called “Steal Away to Jesus.” The book shares contemporary experiences of Black Americans in the Church, and stories from every era of the Restoration.The essays found in the book are extremely personal — the type of stories you’d only hear as a trusted friend.
In September of 1857, one of the greatest atrocities in the history of Mormonism was carried out. Now known as the Mountain Meadows Massacre, a group of Latter-day Saints led a siege in Southern Utah against a wagon train of emigrants on their way from Arkansas to California. After the siege had dragged on for several days, and under the guise of a truce, leaders of the Mormon party lured the emigrants out of their protective circle of wagons and marched them a short distance across the valley before turning on them in surprise and slaughtering at least 120 unarmed men, women, and children.
It isn’t easy to be born into a famous family with big expectations. And there’s few families more famous or with bigger expectations than the Kennedys. Tim Shriver’s immediate family includes not only a former US president, a US Attorney General, and a US Senator, but his parents, Eunice Kennedy Shriver and Sargent Shriver, founded global humanitarian organizations like the Special Olympics, The Peace Corp, and more.
In a world full of distraction, how do you find time to recognize the Spirit? Could the Spirit be present without you realizing it? Can you feel the spirit when struggling with mental health or questions about your faith? Join speakers Tim & Aubrey Chaves, & Nathaniel Givens as they share their experiences with finding and recognizing the Spirit in your every day life.