This is not to complain, just asking for help from the M* audience.  How do I avoid “Mormon” without being super clunky?

For example, in the past, I have published two article on the TV Show Battlestar Galactica.  One was titled “Why Your Mormon Neighbor Knows More About This Show Than You Do” and the other was “Epistemology and Ontology in BSG and Mormonism.”

Now, “Why Your Neighbor who belongs to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Knows More about this show than you do” is waaaaaaaaaaaaay to clunky of a a name.  Even saying “Latter-day Saint Neighbor” is a bit too much, and it doesn’t include the name of the savior.

“Latter-day Saint theology” would also avoid the name of the savior, but “Epistemology and Ontology in BSG and the theology of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” is also far too long and clunky.  It makes for a terrible title, especially on an academic conference program (one reason I’m not sure about Pres. Nelson’s optimism that the media will come along – “Mormon” is just too short and concise when it comes to headlines – sort of like how “Catholic” would probably stay the default even if the Pope started insisting on  “One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church” as the default).

Anyway, I’m at a loss, but if anyone has suggestions, I would like to hear them.

As many of us embark on a re-reading of the Book of Mormon, I wished to mention a few things to ponder.

The Book of Mormon came forth in a Miraculous Manner

1) Joseph Smith wrote the extant text of the Book of Mormon in 85 days, from 7 June to 30 June, 1829. That is the same number of days we have to read the Book of Mormon between today and 31 December, 2018.[ref]John Welch, “How Long did it take Joseph Smith to Translate the Book of Mormon?“, Ensign, January, 1988.[/ref]

2) We have much of the manuscript of the Book of Mormon. This manuscript lacks the erasures and corrections that are present in Joseph Smith’s own writings following June 1829. This is consistent with the account of contemporaries that Joseph would dictate text he reportedly saw written on the seerstone inside his (beaver) hat. These contemporaries insisted that Joseph would resume the dictation each day without any reference to what the scribe had previously written.[ref]For discussion of the importance of the use of a skin hat, see my post, The Beaver Skin Hat: How Joseph Interpreted the Plates (2015), and the 2018 podcast where Don Bradley confirmed that Joseph did use a beaver skin hat (Finding the Lost 116 Pages).[/ref] Continue reading →

Prior to today, there were 189 temples announced, under construction or dedicated. With these 12 today, we now are at 201 temples in the works!

This list, as of today, does not include the 12 announced.

https://www.lds.org/temples/list?lang=eng

In the past, General Conference was broadcast, but you had to wait for days before you could get the video and transcripts.

I’m pretty sure this past conference the content was being made available while I was attempting to live blog. At any rate, when we asked each other about live blogging this time, we collectively didn’t feel the effort met a need, given how rapidly the content is now available at lds.org.

Even though we’re not live blogging this weekend, feel free to comment as you react to the sessions this weekend.