From: owner-aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com (aml-list-digest) To: aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com Subject: aml-list-digest V1 #752 Reply-To: aml-list Sender: owner-aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com Errors-To: owner-aml-list-digest@lists.xmission.com Precedence: bulk aml-list-digest Thursday, June 20 2002 Volume 01 : Number 752 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 14:03:34 -0600 From: Christopher Bigelow Subject: RE: [AML] Secret Combinations in Literature I noticed the following came up as a sponsored link on the Google search for you. Is this a business venture started by the anti-Mormons after they lost their lawsuit against you? Pest Starlings a Problem? Complete Bird Control Product Line Call 800-503-5444 for Expert Help! www.birdbarrier.com Chris Bigelow - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 13:32:06 -0700 From: "Susan Malmrose" Subject: Re: [AML] Ghostly Query > have thought a lot about this. Did the spirit have the power to manifest > his presence thought the perception of cigar smoke or was it her > sub-conscious mind at work? I don't see why not. My husband's grandmother had a vision of an ancestor while working on genealogy, the vision was of a woman holding some forget-me-not flowers. If it's possible to manifest a vision, why not a scent? I myself have encountered dead spirits, when I was in intensive care (almost died). I only caught a glimpse of them, what they looked like, when my eyes were closed. However I felt them next to me several times. The interesting thing is that when I did have the vision of them, I only saw their waist lines. I found out a couple years later that my husband's grandma's vision of her ancestor was also of only a waistline. Susan - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 14:54:11 -0600 From: Russ Asplund Subject: RE: [AML] Secret Combinations in Literature Every theory? I quote from your first post: Right - Bans books about sex, violence and satanism. Left - Bans books like the Bible, the Giving Tree and anything by a dead white male. So you have heard people condoning the banning of the bible in Sunday School? Man, those must be some interesting wards you attend. Either that, or you might be tending to exagerate a little. candesa Russell Asplund director of research and development 801.426.5450 russa@candesa.com - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 14:58:51 -0600 From: Barbara Hume Subject: [AML] Personal Beliefs/Fallacies (was: Secret Combinations in Literature) At 09:15 AM 6/19/02, you wrote: >I've spent >years trying to undo the ill effects of my public education--so many >falsehoods and lies taught as facts and just lurking around my head without >me even being aware of them. I don't want to fill somebody's head with lies >that they don't recognize as such. Fallacies that unconsciously control one's decisions are a genuine problem for all of us, no matter where we picked them up. For example, the client whose book I'm helping her write allowed her personal situation to deteriorate because she had picked up such notions as "Hold the family together no matter what. Keep working hard and be a good wife, and everything will turn out fine. Never let people find out you're in pain or in trouble -- just keep smiling. Don't rock the boat." Because she had those beliefs, her husband bullied and intimidated her and her children for years before she stood up to him. I can't point a finger, because I stayed married to a bully for far longer than I should have, because I believed that a woman could not make it in this world without a man. I didn't know why I felt unable to break out of that situation, because that belief was buried deep. Hard to comprehend now, thirty-some years later. If you know me now, you know what a difference there is in my philosophy! I think that one important element of creating a fictional character is to understand what that character's basic, unconscious beliefs and assumptions are: "I am better than other people. Love is an illusion. No one will accept me because I'm [black, female, handicapped, a genius]. Deep down inside, everyone's good. Life's a bitch and then you die. You can do anything you want if you work at it hard enough. My father died at fifty, so I will, too." Whatever. Barbara R. Hume Provo, Utah - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 15:05:11 -0600 From: Barbara Hume Subject: Re: [AML] Secret Combinations in Literature At 03:25 PM 6/18/02, you wrote: >It resulted my being sued by anti-Mormons twice, once for $3million and onc= >e= > for $25 million. On what basis? that you had no right to show them up or reveal the flaws in their arguments? Barbara R. Hume Provo, Utah - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 08:21:26 -0700 From: The Laird Jim Subject: Re: [AML] Attacking the Family on 6/18/02 11:48 AM, James Picht at pichtj@nsula.edu wrote: > Divorce is bad, and you know someone who's better off divorced. There's no > conflict there, so long as we remember that the first statement is a > statistical > generality, and the second is a specific case. Social science and public > policy > have to focus on the former; the latter is the material on which to build a > story. A great point. Just because all generalities have exceptions doesn't mean that there must be no rule, only exceptions. The funny part about a lot of people with humanities backgrounds is their submersion of the individual into a statistical sea. I've heard "the masses" and "women" and "African-Americans" etc etc spoken of as if there is only one, and all others are mere copies of the model. It seems to me that the argument is over the location of the pigeon-hole, not whether there should be one. Jim Wilson aka The Laird Jim - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 18 Jun 2002 17:39:06 -0600 From: "Thom Duncan" Subject: Re: [AML] Attacking the Family >That isn't an attack on > non-traditional parents and families, but an observation on the way things are. That may be, but the only time (other than now) that I hear this and similar stats used is to buttress up the notion of the superiority of the nuclear family. So it may, per se, be an attack on non-traditional families, but it is often used as a weapon to attack non-traditional families. > Divorce is bad, and you know someone who's better off divorced. There's no > conflict there, so long as we remember that the first statement is a statistical > generality, and the second is a specific case. I contend that many members of the Church don't have the ability to see the subtleties you suggest. Thom Duncan - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 15:14:44 -0600 From: Christopher Bigelow Subject: [AML] Missionary Fiction (was: Setting Goals) Eric Samuelsen wrote: <<< Missionary work is funny, and I don't know that that's ever been explored. (Maybe I should. Hmmmm. . . .) >>> Yes, it is funny. The two words I would use to describe its humorous aspects are "absurd" and "pathetic," both hard to appreciate when they're actually happening to you but great fodder afterwards. Not that I didn't have several incongruent laughing fits at certain points on my mission because of these very reasons. For me, full-time missionary service was a long, slow, grinding depression punctuated by the occasional release of laughter, either triggered by interactions with funny members or missionaries or just little breaking points in my own mind. As far as exploring this, an author named Holly Welker has just sold a missionary memoir with some absurd/pathetic undertones (including missionary goal-setting) to Signature Book. An excerpt appeared in a recent Sunstone (their Eugene England tribute issue), and another one will appear in the spring Irreantum. I've read the whole manuscript, and it certainly explores the absurd and pathetic aspects of missionary life, though I wouldn't say humor is its primary rhetorical mode (it's more a jeremiad). I'm not 100% comfortable with Welker because she's now openly inactive and pretty much denied the atonement in her Sunstone piece (the Irreantum piece is much more benign). However, she captures much that is true about missionary life and stays pretty balanced and fair in telling her story. It will definitely be a worthwhile book to watch for, I believe under the title _The Rib Cage_. As for me, I have a little piece in the upcoming Sugar Beet about missionary disappointment in response to the recent Supreme Court ruling protecting door-to-door solicitation. A sampling: "Dude, I am so disappointed," said Elder Carl Everson of the Colorado Denver Mission. "Hardly anyone is ever home when we tract, except old people, the unemployed, and housewives who might try to seduce us. I'll tell you what, if missionaries or any kind of salesmen knocked on my door, I wouldn't be happy about it. So I'm just a hypocrite out here. We're lower on the totem pole than telemarketers." (Missionary-related pieces by other people in the Sugar Beet pipeline include "Missionary Cooks Inedible Meal" and "MTC Now Powered by Its Own Methane.") Also, the latest round of my missionary memoir proposal is getting farther than the edited journal manuscript I was sending around last year (I'm still using essentially the same query letter to open doors--all told, about 40 agents have responded positively to it). In fact, just last Friday I had an agent offer to represent me, and a handful of others are still seriously considering it. If anyone is trying to sell Mormon-oriented material on the national market, I will share my list of agents who are showing openness to it. (I hope anyone else working along these lines will also share intelligence.) Here's part of a note the agent who wants to represent me sent about her interest in Mormon-related works, for anyone else looking to make connections: "My first job was at Reading International, the late Cambridge (with a branch in Belmont) bookstore. After that I worked for Lauriat's, a venerable (and now defunct) Boston bookstore chain where my best employee quit (in 1977) to go on his mission - my first interaction with Mormon culture. My repping was with national accounts (then Walden and Dalton) and in the southeast, where I lived in Virginia and Tennessee. I repped for many independent and university presses, and as a result know many of these folks personally. I returned home to Massachusetts four years ago. I next came into contact with Mormon culture when I repped for Gibbs Smith/Peregrine Smith Books in Layton. His sales manager and I became friends, and he showed me all around SLC, including Temple Square and a great visit with Patrick at the Waking Owl. (This was twenty years ago.) Through Gibbs and company I met Terry Tempest Williams; we had a memorable dinner in New York many years ago, and I saw her recently when she spoke here at Mt. Holyoke. So, we are acquaintances, which means that I send her a Christmas card every year, but never get one from her! After I got online, about ten years ago, I discovered that there is a whole group of Roghaar relatives I did not know existed; they are all in Utah, and most are Mormon. (The family came from Holland, and one of the brothers went west and landed in SLC.) This was quite a surprise for our branch of the family, and we're in touch about genealogy information on a regular basis. Also, my friend Jana Reiss from Publishers Weekly is a convert to Mormonism and she is very interested in Mormon spirituality. So, combined with my interest in religion and spiritual autobiography, your book is a natural for me." Chris Bigelow - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 17 Jun 2002 17:50:07 -0700 From: "Richard R. Hopkins" Subject: Re: [AML] Attacking the Family [MOD: Richard and I have had some back-channel discussion of this post, which I recognize does go down the political road which I mentioned in my moderator message on this thread. He's persuaded me that having let Eric's original question through, there's value to letting this perspective/reply through as well, although I'm still extremely leery about the potential for turning this into a political discussion, which is not AML-List's function. So having given this thoroughly mixed signal, I guess it rests to me now to issue some kind of revised guideline. And so... What I'd ask, if your perspective disagrees with Richard's (or someone else's) on this thread, and you want to make a comment, is that you focus not on debating or disproving the other person's point, but simply expressing how it is that you see this issue. Keeping in mind, again, that the primary purpose is not to get into a political discussion, but--at most--to discuss what it is that we as Mormons (or others as Mormons) mean when we/they talk about the family being "under attack." A discussion of our culture--not a debate over politics. Thanks again from the--somewhat inconsistent--moderator...] Eric R. Samuelsen wrote: It's as though the institution of The Family is what's under attack, that the very idea that we should organize ourselves into families is regarded in some circles as a questionable one, that we have to vigilantly defend not just our own circles of kinship, but the very notion of kinship itself. If this is what is meant by attacks on The Family, then I have to say that it's a very questionable notion, that Families are under attack Richard Hopkins responds: Eric is very blessed that he did not attend a liberal arts college in either Southern California or the North East, because attacks on the very idea that we should organize ourselves into families are very mainstream at UCLA (where I went to school), and other universities. The attack is often more subtle than most people perceive, however, and is largely on a legal nature. It is in large measure fueled by pro-abortionists and the homosexual lobby. As a former lawyer, allow me to briefly summarize the issues of jurisprudence involved. Why should government involve itself in domestic relationships at all? Why make the contract of marriage one that is enforced by the government? The justification that has been relied upon by governments since the beginning of recorded history is the interest of the community in the perpetuation of the group being governed. Through the years, it has been observed (both by wise men and in the commandments of God) that a good family produces good new citizens of the community. Statistics show that the most rounded and beneficial childhood experience comes in homes where there is a father and mother. Hence, laws have been passed by various governments over history specifically intended to help and preserve the family as an institution which produces the best possible future citizens. This is the interest of government in domestic relations and the foundation for all of what is called family law. What is happening that affects this situation? First we have the Roe v. Wade decision, which held that government had no interest in the very most fundamental aspect of its future citizens, namely the preservation of their potential future lives, because of a woman's right of privacy. This reasoning undercut some of the most fundamental reasoning in support of governmental intrusion in the domestic relationship. If that aspect of family life--the life of the unborn child--cannot be regulated because of a right to privacy, what aspect of family life can be regulated? How can any aspect of government intrusion in domestic relations be upheld? Some may like this result, but it means the fall of The Family as a government supported institution. Now homosexuals want to be included in marriage, notwithstanding the fact that, by their very nature, such relationships do not produce offspring, i.e., future citizens. The whole concept of the family as preserved by laws in this country, is, by these means, made into a mockery. Why should government interfere with homosexual relations? Why should homosexuals be dragged through divorce court? Having practiced law in such courts to some extent, I suspect that if gays ever got these rights, which they seem now to want so badly, they will rue the fact that they have become subject to government interference in their personal and property relationships. The next logical step is for them to lobby for the dismantling of all domestic relations laws. And why will this be possible? Because we have lost sight of the purpose of these laws. The laws of domestic relations were intended to strengthen and protect the family. There is no other reason why governments should say who a man can divorce and why his wife should get a certain property settlement or child support. Such laws make divorce more difficult, thus acting as a discouragement to the break up of families (an effort that must also be balanced against abuse of the institution, of course). They also provide support for children and spouses when the first objective doesn't work. The failure to recognize these principals, the argument in favor of making what amounts to a mockery of domestic relations law promoted by the gay lobby, and the fundamental damage done to governmental power over domestic relations by legalized abortion, are but two examples of the attack on "The Family" afoot in this country right now. I would add to that the failure of the justice system to recognize pornography as a drug administered through the eyes rather than as "free speech," and the growing attempt of pedophiles to gain the same distorted status given gays as others. The attack on the family is not new, however. Both Plato and Aristotle thought children should be taken from their parents at an early age and raised by the state. Its hard to get rid of some bad ideas. Hope this helps to clarify what is a very valid concern by the Church at this time. Richard Hopkins - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 16:04:12 -0600 From: Christopher Bigelow Subject: [AML] Deseret News: Audition for _The R.M._ Film drawing big lines - for auditions By Callie Buys Deseret News staff writer OREM - To those standing in line, the wait to audition for "The R.M." seemed almost as long as the last three months of a two-year mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Casting director Michelle Wright, director Kurt Hale watch audition for "The R.M." Stuart W. Johnson, Deseret News Still, open auditions in Orem for a new film aimed at LDS audiences enticed 700 people to spend time over three days waiting to audition for one of some 85 speaking parts in "The R.M," created by the same producers as "The Singles Ward." "It was a madhouse, but it was worth it," said Wendy Pyper. Pyper and her 8-year-old son auditioned for the movie. Both returned for call-back auditions, held Tuesday and Wednesday. Director Kurt Hale attributes the turnout largely to word of mouth. While producers informed acting agencies about the auditions, about 50 percent of those auditioning were not represented by an agency, Hale said. Jolene Sayers attempted to audition for a part in the movie June 10 but decided to turn back after seeing the line. She came back the next day to audition and went to call-back auditions on Tuesday. "I'm so nervous," she said before her call back. "I hate auditions." Casting director Michelle Wright said people came from California, Arizona, Idaho and Colorado to audition for the movie, which will film in Salt Lake and Provo most of July and early August and reach theaters in mid-January 2003. "It's a popular film production that everyone wants to be a part of," she said. While "The Singles Ward" featured a mainly young adult cast and aimed primarily at a similar audience, this film is for cast members and audiences of all ages, Hale said. The film tells the story of a young man named Jared McAllister who has recently returned from an LDS mission. McAllister returns expecting to reunite with his girlfriend, get a high-paying job and go to Brigham Young University. None of these things go right for McAllister, whose parents and 11 siblings moved to a new home without telling him and forgot to pick him up from the airport. McAllister faces numerous other challenges, including a stint in court, as he returns home. Kirby Heyborne, who played a young man preparing for an LDS mission in "The Singles Ward," has already been cast as Jared McAllister. The movie will also feature cameos by "recognized faces," Hale said. Merrill Dodge planned to audition for a role as a judge, but casting directors at the first audition asked him to read the part of Jared McAllister's father, Brigham McAllister. Dodge was called back Tuesday for the part. Dodge, who has been involved in theater and movies for over a decade, still feels nervous before an audition. In fact, he gets more nervous for an audition than for a performance. "Somebody who says they're not nervous, I don't believe it," he said. For this audition, the actor stands on an X taped to the floor of a small room. A camera in the corner quietly documents the audition, including a scene in which Dodge spit out a mouthful of LDS acronyms. Directors look for some things while an actor may be focusing on something different. "The uncertainty of the whole thing makes it kind of exciting," he said. Not getting a part may not reflect on one's ability as an actor, he adds. Rejection is part of the game. While directors whittled the 700 hopefuls to a more reasonable number for call backs - around 60 came back Tuesday, and at least that many were scheduled for Wednesday - most of those called back will inevitably not get the part they want. While the film serves a specific audience, there is no preaching and no agenda, Hale said. "Comedy is universal," he said. "It's not sappy, preachy or heavy handed." - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 16:23:50 -0600 From: "Jana Pawlowski" Subject: [AML] Re: Understanding Others Subject: Re: [AML] Understanding Others Maybe God will figure out what to do with me someday and then He'll tell the bishop. I think maybe if he tells the bishopp not to shake my hand or look at me maybe he know other things that would help. Paris Anderson Hang in, Paris. I admire you. Thanks for your candor in explaining your situation. There are two churches, the official church that the obedient attend and the underground church where the mavericks and backsliders and puzzled souls worship. They are both God's church. Levi Peterson > althlevip@msn.com I tend to agree with Levi: However, I think that position is *sometimes* oversimplified. (not to imply that Levi was doing that, because, believe me, I worship the art of brevity which sometimes precludes one from going into all the altho's, except, also's, and what-if's ......and I'm not acquainted with his writings so I'm not critiqueing anything in a personal way either). Back to the oversimplification aspect I mentioned which I am now going to oversimplify as well. I love the idea of mavericks. I'm related to Wyatt Earp (altho' I'm sure someone here will correct me and say he would now be considered socially conservative???? hmmmm.........) and Merele Haggard and who knows who else on my mother's heathen side..... that blood runs deep, its very instinctual. But I do think it's possible to be obedient to the gospel, unpuzzled, very clear in your thinking, and still be a whopping maverick. Courage that doesn't even get noticed. In fact, if you know the scriptures and doctrine well enough, you could be forever correcting people in meetings, on the street, in your dealings with the clergy etc...perfect strangers on the internet..........and never gain friends, notoriety, or a coterie for it. I rather think the artistic community in the church splits down the standard, traditonal lines of politics mentioned recently in various post, without taking any great surprising leaps into the Unkown. I prefer the big risks that bring about the Fear and Trembling of Abraham (or perhaps it's just that my heroes have always been ancient prophets/cowboys) There's not much to being a maverick when you're surrounded by your own, in either political or socio-economic camps (which brings up a whole other comment on the posts wherein certain people who escape my middle-aged memory, mentioned they'd never had an outrageous experience in a Salt Lake ward......socio-economic conditions always factor in, so we're talking apples and oranges unless all of that is put on the table and factored in......which of course reminds me of another post on the subject of portraying evil......I highly recommend viewing some Discovery Channel documentaries on sociopathic serial killers. I bet Dean Koontz, Frank Peretti, etc research all that stuff), but I digress and wander in a futile attempt to avoid Lesson 4 of Descriptive Astronomy. Jana Pawlowski. - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 18:09:51 -0600 From: "J. Scott Bronson" Subject: Re: [AML] Mormons and Topaz On Wed, 19 Jun 2002 10:34:40 -0600 "ROY SCHMIDT" writes: > Just a couple of comments. Although German Americans were not rounded > up into camps, they were watched very carefully. An example would be > my father-in-law who migrated to the United States after the first > part of the Great War (the one to make the world safe for democracy). > This man was denied promotions, and endured slurs, etc. all during > the second half of that same war. In my science fiction short story "And the Moon Became As Blood" (Irreantum, Spring 2000) the main character, Karl Schneider, is stranded on an abandoned moon base by neo-patriots because back on Earth WWIII is just getting started with the Germans as the primary instigators. I meant nothing personal against Germans in that. In fact, on my Mom's side I am a Snyder (Anglicized Schneider) and a White (direct descendant of Pegrin White). It simply demonstrates that there are always some who will over-react and blame an entire race (or culture, etc.) for the actions of some. scott - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 17:42:52 -0700 From: "Kathy Fowkes" Subject: Re: [AML] Ghostly Query > The problem is the implications of this notion of inebriation facilitating > possession. For instance if alcohol and presumably pain killers do such a > good job, shouldn't we expect people to emerge from operating rooms > possessed fairly quickly? Not necessarily. I'm not an expert on this stuff, I just find it fascinating. From my point of view, there is a choice involved, conscious or subconscious, that a person makes when they (or *I*, past tense, having done this myself when I was 15) get so drunk or toked that they can't feel or think straight. It's a choice to deaden oneself from emotional pain and the influence of the Spirit both, which in LDS doctrine means a turning toward, and a choice to invite, evil influence over one's life. Someone who accepts anethesia to undergo an operation is not making that choice at all, so continues under the protection of the Spirit and, given they are in an operating room, ministering angels perhaps. Choice has everything to do with it. It's an eternal law, whether a person believes in that law or not makes no difference -- when you choose to deny God's light, you come under the influence of darkness. There are no twilight areas where we are not enticed by light or darkness. We either follow God, or the enticements of Satan. At least, I haven't found any evidence in the scriptures or the teachings of the prophets to allow for the possibility, and ample evidence to suppose that we are under the influence of one or the other at any given time, such as: "Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other." (2 Nephi 2:16.) Also, a simple search on the infobases or gospellinks CD under the term "evil spirits" yields a tremendous number of teachings by the leaders of the Church regarding the reality and influence of such spirit beings. Marvin J. Ashton's _Measure of Our Hearts_, chapter 5, for starters. > I think that most NDE are sort of interpreting folk beliefs and folk > psychology onto reality. This is a great example. It sounds persuasive > until you start thinking through the implications for a general theory of > biological - spiritual interactions. Given that God has made it very clear in our day that we are not physical beings only, but have been spiritual beings for eons, and only in these few short years have we ever been physical at all, and given that God has also made it very clear that we are continually being enticed by light or darkness, and that Satan does in fact have power over us if we give it to him by our choices, those implications of biological - spiritual interactions are not only possible, but reality. I think this is what Ritchie's NDE account points out all throughout his book. He saw angels striving to teach spirits in prison, who were prisoners of their own sins and lustful desires. He also saw angels with scientists, teaching them the truths they were seeking to discover. In both cases the individuals with physical bodies were unaware of the angels who were striving with them, but that did not make the reality of those angels and their influence any less real. Writers often talk of their muses. I believe in muses. I just call them angels. These things Ritchie saw are not out of harmony with our doctrine. I could easily copy and paste enough scriptures and teachings of prophets and apostles to fill a 1000 page volume, but my guess is that pretty much everyone on AML list knows them as well as I do. I can state from first-hand experience that Satan and his minions are most definitely hard at work, influencing whereever they can find someone to listen to them, because I've seen them in the same manner that Susan Malmrose saw dead spirits around her in the hospital. It is a real way of seeing -- spiritual mind as opposed to natural mind, D&C 67:10. Unfortunately, this was in my own home, and was a problem for several months, until we fasted and prayed and rededicated the house (for the third time. Long story, won't bore you with it.) It is a reality that a person can be attacked by evil spirits, as Heber C. Kimball described with such hair-raising eloquence on his first mission to England, and can also invite evil spirits and unclean spirits to enter and influence them that way. But it is a choice, or they cannot enter at all. Enter they most certainly do, if we are to believe what our prophets both ancient and modern have taught. Either that, or the dozens and dozens of prophets and apostles, ancient and modern, are off their rockers in this department, exercising their priesthood to cast out devils, etc. My faith is with our priesthood leaders--that they know what they are talking about and doing. > I suspect that a lot of this is akin to how most mental illness would have > been called possession in past centuries. Now we know better, given a > greater knowledge of the biology of the mind. Interesting. If this were the case, then why would the gospel writers have bothered to make an account of just how many evil and unclean spirits were cast out of individuals, such as the seven who were cast out of Mary Magdelene by the Savior, or others who, when asked their identity, were so many they called themselves "legion", and were sent into a herd of pigs and ran off a cliff?Then there are the accounts of the ones to whom Jesus spoke, and who answered through the mouth of the one over whom they had taken possession, and who identified him as the Son of God, and whom He commanded to be silent? We know better now? Hmm....I wonder. I do not place as much faith in science, which denies the reality of anything that can't be seen, touched or measured in some physical manner. Yes, science has discovered many of the biological components that influence human behavior, but does this negate the reality or power and influence of spiritual things? Not in the least. The spiritual is created before the physical, according to LDS doctrine. Perhaps the physical discoveries of science are just the surface, and there is a spiritual component at work that influenced the physical pattern that has developed. (Which component can just as easily be one's own spirit influenced by the "scar" left by a traumatic childhood event, creating a "glitch" in the person's ability to act rationally, yet still a spiritual influence). I have yet to find a single talk by a prophet that denies the possibility of possession. Instead I find accounts of confrontations with Satan and accounts of angelic visits to those in need over and over and over. Kathy Fowkes - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 15:23:58 -0700 From: Robert Slaven Subject: Re: [AML] Doctrine Versus Culture From: "D. Michael Martindale" > Barbara Hume wrote: > > Now, that could make an interesting LDS book. The Lord calls a man from, > > say, Portugal to be the prophet, and the Caucasian American contingent of > > the church says, "No! We won't have it! He's not One of Us!" > > Why is everyone assuming we Caucasion American types would balk? I > wouldn't, and I'm about as Caucasian as you can get without being > albino. > I suspect that Barbara wasn't saying 'All Caucasian American Mormons would balk.' However, the statement 'Some C.A.M.s would balk' is undoubtedly true. 'Some' might be 25%, it might be 10%, it might be 1%, it might be 0.01% (at which point you're into only hundreds or dozens of CAM's). But there would undoubtedly be some. And considering who they might be, and how they might react, could very well be the basis of some great stories. (One of which is fermenting in my mind as we speak....) Robert ********************************************************************** Robert & Linn-Marie Slaven www.robertslaven.ca ...with Stuart, Rebecca, Mariann, Kristina, Elizabeth, and Robin too 'Man is that he might have joy--not guilt trips.' (Russell M. Nelson) - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 16:39:55 -0600 From: "Scott Parkin" Subject: Re: [AML] Mormons and Topaz Roy Schmidt wrote: > Just a couple of comments. Although German Americans were not rounded > up into camps, they were watched very carefully. An example would be > my father-in-law who migrated to the United States after the first > part of the Great War (the one to make the world safe for democracy). > This man was denied promotions, and endured slurs, etc. all during the > second half of that same war. Interestingly, this was in Milwaukee, > which, of course, has a huge German population. > > In my home town of Baltimore, also with a large German population, > many German societies disbanded, and those that remained were watched > very closely. Many ethnic communities fractured during the war for exactly this reason. Good Americans of German or Japanese descent wanted to prove their loyalty and so avoided meeting with each other. Again, because those of Japanese descent were more easily visually identified there tended to be a substantially more intense scrutiny on a daily basis. I know that it was very common for individual communities throughout the U.S. to require that residents of German or Japanese heritage register with the sheriff. Remembering that the Japanese internment camps mostly housed Californians, most other Japanese Americans were not required to relocate--the rationale for interning the California populations was that the west coast was a strategic military zone; areas inland were not considered to be as vulnerable to attack. The real fear of attack was part of what raised the levels of concern. Most Americans had no idea where Pearl Harbor was, but it was in the United States, so the idea that modern war could be fought on our territory created a very real terror in the minds of Americans in the west. Added to the ordinary tensions of the war, that made life in the western U.S. particularly difficult for those of both German and Japanese descent. And yet... Because of the extensive missionary program of the Church, many people had their own direct experience with both Japan and Germany and had learned to love the people prior to the war. That created some odd situations in Utah where the population of returned missionaries was so concentrated. The prophet at the time was Heber J. Grant who had served a mission in Japan and was generally beloved by the Japanese people (his translation of the Book of Mormon is still the preferred edition for many Japanese even though a newer more accurate translation is available). In response to reports of prejudice and racial hate by Mormons he is quoted as saying: "Americans who are loyal are good Americans whether their ancestors came from Great Britain or Japan. Let us therefore endeavor to banish these foolish prejudices from our natures and let us attempt to see that all good and loyal Americans are treated as such." The odd bipolarism was probably at its height in Utah County because of Geneva Steel--the largest inland steel plant in the West. Many of the workers were veterans who carried special hatreds for both the Germans and the Japanese, and Geneva was seen as a legitimate target for terrorist attack. Tension at Geneva was quite high. It turns out that there were a number of labor camps in both Provo and Orem where internees from Topaz worked in the orchards. The Orem camp was later converted to a German POW camp and German labor was used in those same orchards. The German POWs apparently felt much more at ease than the Japanese Americans living and working in the area; I can only assume that the visible racial identification made the difference. Ethan Skarstedt wrote: >>>Again, the fact that there's no evidence that a single mole was detained means nothing. Millennia of warfare has never seen a war that did not involve the warring groups spying on each other. History therefore leads me to believe that the Japanese were at least attempting to spy on us during WWII. And pragmatism leads me to believe that those of Japanese descent were extremely likely to have among there number a few who would and did spy for the Japanese, especially considering the social climate of the time. A climate which could understandably have led to nostalgia for the homeland.<<< In an interesting bit of trivia, it turns out that U.S. intelligence had infiltrated the Japanese consulate in San Francisco and recovered documents from the Japanese government on immigrants to the U.S. In a direct response to the question of using Japanese immigrants to gather information or carry out acts of destruction, the Japanese immigrants were deemed unreliable and referred to as cultural traitors for having left Japan in the first place. This attitude by Japan made the later internment of Japanese Americans that much more bewildering for those interned. They knew that the "old country" despised them for having left, and their new country despised them for having arrived. When the loyalty oaths were administered to many in the camps, they very much feared to answer the question of loyalty to America either way. There was a real fear of deportation back to Japan, so renouncing all ties to Japan meant that if deported those people would become essentially disenfranchised from any country. As you point out, it's impossible to know whether the internment camps reduced spying by Japanese Americans. But the troubling question for me remains whether it's right to imprison people on the basis of fear of what they *might* do. It seems to me that the American justice system is based on the presumption that one is innocent until proven guilty (a position upheld in 1944 by a federal court that paved the way for the closing of the internment camps), so the pre-emptive imprisonment of anyone for the crimes that they might commit seems to fly in the face of well-established law. I'll be curious to see how Spielberg handles this idea in his new film, _Minority Report._ As Mormons we seem to oscillate between the idea that to even think of sin with fondness is every bit as bad as committing the sin proper, and the notion that thoughts (or faith) without works (or acts) has no meaning. This conceptual dichotomy is one of the things that I find so interesting in researching Mormon response to both people of both German and Japanese descent during WWII. Scott Parkin - -- AML-List, a mailing list for the discussion of Mormon literature ------------------------------ End of aml-list-digest V1 #752 ******************************