O how great is the nothingness of the children of men; yea, even they are less than the dust of the earth. – Helaman 12:7

I recently read Ayn Rand’s short novella Anthem. I was struck by how true this book is, and also how false. The story follows the life of a man living in a totalitarian collectivist dystopia where everyone exists for everyone else. To exist for oneself, or to privilege one’s own interests over those of others, or even to have desires for one’s own good are forbidden. Indeed, one should not ever think or work alone, but only with and for everyone else.

I noted as I read the story that Rand weaves some interesting imagery into the collectivist society– much of which evokes the Garden of Eden and the Fall.

Continue reading →

The other day I was standing in the bathroom when I happened to look down at my feet. Suddenly I noticed a band-aid on one of my toes– a band-aid I had not put there. I began to wonder how this band-aid had come to be on my toe, but after some thought, I remained baffled. I could recollect cutting my toe against a fragile deck chair while diving into a pool a few days earlier. Then I remembered the cut bleeding some, and people expressing horror at the ugly sight. But I knew I had not gone to get a band-aid myself. It’s almost antithetical to my personality to undertake a task so fraught with logistical weight and depressing minutia, and I was sure I would remember such an ordeal.

Continue reading →

When I think of the law of consecration, the United Order is what comes to my mind. However, while that was an attempt to put the law of consecration into effect in the community – in the physical world – there really is much more to the law of consecration.

Continue reading →