This documentary sounds like a fascinating project. I welcome it and think it will help the general lack of understanding of our Church. I’ve always thought – even before I was a member – that the story of our Church is interesting simply as a historical phenomenon. It’s always annoying to introduce yourself as a Mormon and get the polygamy question. I have no illusions about that changing anytime soon, but maybe this documentary will inform a few people?

Guess which prominent General Authority said the following? Extra credit for indicating when he said it.

With numerous others, I am greatly disturbed at the rapid move of our government to socialism and what seems to be an approach toward dictatorship; with a controlled Supreme Court, the administration continues to impose more and more demands upon the people…Taxes are becoming back-breaking, expenditure and waste are alarming. The Church must remain independent and furnish its own funds for all its own adventures and projects. The government seems too anxious to give, give, give to the poor, to the aged, to the schools, to everyone, and blinded people feel they are getting something, whereas they pay it to the government so that the government can after great overhead expense return a part of it to the people. And every time a gift returns to the people–a so-called gift–it comes with fetters binding and tying and enslaving. For every block of funds given to the people, they lose a bigger block of liberty.

I’ll wait a few days before posting the answer and commentary. I’m guessing our intrepid commenters will find the answer soon, however.

[Part 3 in a series about improving gospel teaching. Previous entries in the series: Part 1 | Part 2]

Taking the next step from adequate to good is not as easy as going from poor to adequate. At this level, there aren’t specific things a teacher can mark down on a “To Do” checklist before class to make sure it’s a ‘good’ lesson. Teaching now involves more than just ‘not getting in the way’–good teachers actually add something to the lesson, augmenting the inherent spiritual power of the gospel instead of just being a non-obtrusive bystander. At this stage, good teaching starts to rely much more on the skill and preparation of the teacher.

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[Part 2 in a series about improving gospel teaching. Previous entries in the series: Part 1]

Describing how to be an adequate teacher might also be termed “How NOT to be a poor teacher” (thus no need to give poor teachers their own section).

Oftentimes, the difference between a poor teacher and an adequate teacher can be summarized in a list of “Don’ts”. In many cases, the breaking of some bad teaching habits can be all that is needed to lift a poor teacher into adequacy–perhaps making the difference between someone willingly sitting through a class, and finding excuses to skip it every week.

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Ask a random Latter-Day Saint off the street what the state of teaching is within the Church today and you could get a response anywhere from ‘decent’ to ‘horrible’–likely directly related to the quality of the 3-4 most recent lessons they’ve attended.

Generally speaking, in the Church today, there are:

• A few great teachers
• Some good teachers
• A great many adequate teachers
• Lots of poor teachers.

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