Publius

Innumerable Blessings From the Gospel

2012-01-25T13:59:00.001-07:00

My daughter Emily attended school at George Wythe University in Cedar City, Utah and while there met a young man from Minnesota. His intuition led him to Utah to seek "good principles". Soon after arriving, he formed solid friendships with Emily and her friends, Nichole Ball and Chris Bowler and many others. He knew nothing of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints, but felt, right from the start as he inquired and later heard the message from the missionaries, that he was coming home to his Heavenly Home. The truths resonated with him and he found profound peace and happiness. He later prepared to serve a mission and was called to Los Angeles, California. Emily just heard from him today (He is in his fifth month of a two-year mission) and it has touched my heart. Within the realm of his words I can feel of the power of the Atonement of the Savior of Mankind and the pure love of Christ that reaches to all those who will accept Him and His Father and His message to the world. Below he writes:

Monday, 1-16-12

Emily,

Hello there! I’m so glad that you emailed me. I just wasreflecting on the past two years of my life. As I thought about the last two – can you believe it’s beentwo years since I started the missionary lessons?! I keep the pamphlets that they gave me during the lessonsand also the Book of Mormon you gave me – I keep them in the apartment – butit’s just really crazy to think about how much my life has been blessed from afew college students who weren’t afraid to share what they knew to be true. Iremember driving up to General Conference together and how I got to meet yourGrandparents and I remember when your Grandma said to me, “Don’t forget to plana mission in there”, after I told her what I wanted to do, and I laughed ather! Ha, well we’re both laughing now. I wish I could remember her name. Before I left your Grandma’s, the lady you called your “Auntso and so” but she wasn’t related to you, came out to the car and bore hertestimony to me really briefly about prophets and how she knows how I feel, andI never really knew why, but that always stuck with me. And then on top of that – your lovingparents and their guidance and friendship. You’ve just really blessed my life and I am amazed at howwell you followed the mission protocol as you helped me progress – I mean youreally followed it almost exactly and probably better than the missionariesdid. I bet you didn’t even knowhow much you did. Ha! I can’t believe it’s happening!! I can’t believe I am a missionary rightnow. Without you and Nichole andChris, and everyone else, there is no way I could be here right now. You have been instrumental in myrelationship with God. When I wentto Utah from MN, I was going to figure out what principles were. I never thought that I would findGod. I never thought in my wholelife before, or even after, I got baptized that I would be as happy as I amnow. To go through the temple andmake those Heavenly Promises and know in my heart that it is just thebeginning. Elder Case (*Emily’sinsert: Elder Case was the primary Elder who taughtJustin the discussions.) has just gone home, which is weird to know that for afew weeks I got to serve at the same time as the rookie who taught me how tohave faith – what will the next two years bring? So much to do – so many to teach – so many blessings thatHeavenly Father is longing to give them. I am so humbled that someone like me who rebelled so aggressivelyagainst Heavenly Father, could be allowed to take part in this Work and Glory –the thing that He holds so precious in His giant heart. I remember how bad you wanted to servea mission and how much you love the gospel. As far as I am concerned, you’re a better missionary than alot of us. You served faithfullyand you have helped me in ways I can never explain. I will be forever grateful, and when I say forever,you know what I mean J. The blessings of the gospel in thislife have been innumerable. I canonly imagine what is coming for you and your dear family. I can never repay you for what I havereceived, but I can try to pay it forward to the other lost lambs. At the last day, when we all meettogether with Him our Dear Savior, I hope it will be made crystal clear to you,the lives you have blessed by your faithful example. Please continue to do what you do and be who you are as aloving wife and mother. I hope allis well with you and I’ll see you in a few years. :) You rock!

Your Friend,

Elder Behnke

Chris Bowler's Mother continually updates a blog for Elder Behnke: Go read about him at: elderjustinbehnke.blogspot.com

Great Literature: A Daily Dose of Religious and Human Perspective

2011-12-09T08:25:00.001-07:00

While visiting with a young man many years ago about the task of raising children, he explained that when the time came for him to marry and have children, he would raise them without the restrictions and compulsion of religious laws and principles and let his children choose for themselves once they were grown and ready to live in the world on their own. He touted that it is not fair to expose a child to a worldview when they are not able to defend themselves from beliefs they may disregard later in life. Often I have pondered upon his lenient goal and wondered of the result. Common sense tells me that his children floundered in confusion precisely as a foundationless home eventually collapses. Inasmuch as a builder employs a blueprint, a wise parent employs a formula for guiding children to happiness. God instituted that formula.

We come to know the formula through statutes and laws. God told Moses, “And thou shalt teach [the laws and statutes] diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up”.[1] Later, God enlightens Joshua of the blessings for obeying the laws and statutes contained in the Holy Writ, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.”[2] Continual teaching and learning of the laws and statutes of God bring abundance and happiness. Additionally, the ideals God describes in His laws and statutes can effectively be supplied by literature.

Great literature acquaints the reader to stories and characters that shape such ideals and the more stories the more the understanding of the ideal. Furthermore, stories exhibit an array of human qualities and deficiencies from the best to the worst and the acceptable to the unacceptable. The ideal endows us with a tool to measure correctly in our quest to become happy individuals. Consider, reader, three literary works that define God’s laws and offer a superb foundation for a happy life.

Little Sister narrates her post-Civil War story, in the book, Laddie, about growing up with Mother and Father on their Indiana farm with the last of twelve children still at home. Hard work, faith in God, and a rich education shaped the semi-ideal Stanton family into a happy, charitable, and exemplary collection of characters. Father and Mother devoted every moment to the teaching and rearing of good values. When sorrow came, not infrequently, they faithfully knelt at the side of their bed and then hand in hand prayed for divine help and guidance. “Sometimes the clouds loom up pretty black,” Father declared, “and mother and I scarcely know how to go on, save for the help of the Lord.”[3] Father taught them that God would take care of each and everyone.[4] Daily morning devotionals played a tremendous role in the holistic education. Little Sister recalled, “Father always read a [chapter] before breakfast—no wonder I knew the Bible quite well—then we sang a song [and prayed].”[5] Hard physical work determined character. Getting the house and yard ready for Sally’s wedding was reminiscent to regular work throughout the year. Little Sister remembers the occasion, “There wasn’t a single spot about the place inside or out that wasn’t gone over; and to lots of it you never would have known anything had been done if you hadn’t seen, because the place was always in proper shape anyway”. If not the most profound theme in Laddie, then one of the most profound is Laddie’s far-reaching counsel to Little Sister, “The way to be happy is to be good.”[6]

In an artist’s painting, the shadows define the light, giving depth and perception. Similarly, stories that portray darkness, devoid of law and principle, bestow deeper understanding and a greater desire for goodness. Tolstoy portrays the darkness artfully in his book, Anna Karenina. Major themes depicted include adultery, lasciviousness, broken families and deceit. The book’s namesake seeks love outside her marriage and abandons all truth. In her pretense, Anna justifies living her life based on love, albeit deceitful love. She claims her main dilemma is that she wants Vronsky, her lover and Seryozha, her son by marriage, but she cannot have both together. She must choose one, only to give up the other.[7] Sister-in-law Dolly feels revulsion and disgust by the unnaturalness of Anna’s pretentious life with Vronsky, “all alone without children, playing at a child’s game”.[8] Eventually, Anna’s chosen path leads her to utter despair and then destruction. “That’s what reason is given man for, to escape from what worries him,”[9] Anna hears the words of a woman speaking to her husband in the carriage. Anna, repeating the words in her mind, considers them the answer she has been seeking and throws herself at an oncoming train to “escape what worries” her.

Tolstoy’s famous first line prepares his reader to solve the mystery of what creates an unhappy family. He writes, “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”.[10] He seems to conclude that avoiding certain rules of measure bring varying levels of unhappiness to families. Moreover, he assumes that the reader knows the rules of measure for happiness. Levin may have said it best when after his lengthy search for truth and light he declares, “The one unmistakable, incontestable manifestation of the Divinity is the law of right and wrong, which has come into the world by revelation”.[11]God is our true ruler to measure our actions and rectify our wrongs.

Struggling to do what is right in a world of wrongs is Jane Eyre’s greatest achievement. Jane characterizes John Bunyan’s[12] struggling Pilgrim as she progresses from the possible “City of Destruction” to the “Celestial City”. Her laws and principles move her forward beautifully in the most trying scene where she shuns adultery and chooses freedom and peace of heart. Jane promises, “I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad – as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation; they are for such moments as this when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?”[13] Jane’s unshakable knowledge of God fuels her persistence in keeping His laws and principles throughout the novel. Again she refuses another’s offer of marriage because, “I felt how—if I were his wife, this good man, pure as the deep sunless source, could soon kill me: without drawing from my veins a single drop of blood, or receiving on his own chrystal conscience the faintest stain of crime.”[14] The marriage promised no love, only a life of missionary service in far lands under the heat of sun and toil. Jane clearly and wholly understood not only the evils of adultery, but also the sanctity of marriage; a union between man and wife founded on love and not just for position and convenience.

Jane remained steadfast and strong in her trials, Little Sister learned to be good, and Anna shrunk from truth and light. Anna was devoted to self, Little Sister was devoted to good and Jane was devoted to God. These stories provide the ideals and the ideas to help us see the possibilities for self-improvement and growth. They teach the statutes and the laws of God to effectively convey the tool for which to measure our actions and build a solid foundation. God’s word is the formula for happiness.

If I could go back in time and face that young man with the knowledge I now possess, I would tell him that parents who avoid teaching ideals for the sake of freedom are enslaving their children. Exposure to religious laws and principles contained in great literature increase the healthy decision quotient. For long after reading the story, we ponder in solitude as we solidify thoughts and resolutions, likewise a child plays “make believe” within the walls of the playroom acting out the stories and the characters as she solidifies her thoughts and resolutions. There is no restriction, no religious compulsion; only stories of foundational truths and portraits of human nature, of which the reader can choose for himself the path he will tread, whether it be happiness or unhappiness.

[1] Deuteronomy 6:7, Bible KJV

[2] Joshua 1:8, Bible KJV

[3] Gene Stratton-Porter, Laddie, (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1988), 356

[4] Ibid, 6

[5] Ibid, 106

[6] Ibid, 374

[7] Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina (Simon & Brown, 2011), 778

[8] Ibid, 771

[9] Ibid, 924

[10] Ibid, 14

[11] Ibid, 984

[12] The reference here is to Paul Bunyan’s Christian allegory, Pilgrim’s Progress and tells the story of Christian’s progress through mortal life escaping the Evil One’s destruction and progressing to God’s Celestial City.

[13] Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre (New York: Doubleday Book & Music Clubs, Inc), 325

[14] Ibid, 423

Evolutions of Thought

2011-11-16T11:23:00.001-07:00

Shortly before his passing, Steve Jobs shared his thoughts regarding religion and death, “I like to believe there’s an afterlife. I like to believe the accumulated wisdom doesn't just disappear when you die, but somehow it endures.”[1] Aristotle hoped as much while he sought and taught truth and wisdom. He and his team were more distinctly philosophers than scientists. However, his Physics left an enduring foundation for modern science. Galileo and his contemporaries emerged from the dark ages and for the first time in history separated mathematical quantification from philosophy, creating separate and distinct studies of thought. The necessary separation of religion and science during the Renaissance allowed for a greater breadth and depth study of the sciences, independent of the coercive powers of the church. Today, as the 500-year battle between science and religion gradually subdues, we may find that empirical science is merging with philosophy and religion once again, but this time they may compliment and give evidence one to the other.

The very essence of science is the study of cause and effect in nature and since science builds from what is known before, it is vital that we study from the Ancient Greeks in order to fully understand modern science.[2] Heidegger boldly stated, “Without Aristotle’s Physics, there would have been no Galileo.”[3] Aristotle based his science upon the natural world around him. He studied things as they are and appear. His study of nature was a search for “causes” and assumed that everything is exactly the way we observe it. His writings are philosophical and easily integrated into religious theory. The early Christians felt his approach to the study of nature fit very well with Christianity. “The idea that every organism is beautifully crafted for a particular function…in the grand scheme of nature certainly leads to the thought that all this has been designed by somebody.”[4] As a result, Aristotle’s physics stood as the irrefutable authority for nearly two thousand years.

Although Aristotle’s contemporaries may have ventured upon the path to Modern Science, Aristotle remained true to a holistic philosophy and believed that everything in nature followed a natural continuity, meaning that finite indivisible bodies did not exist. He believed “a line cannot be made of points, if the line is continuous and the point indivisible”.[5] Aristotle refuted Zeno’s paradox of the flying arrow that states for an object to be in motion, it must change place and therefore a flying arrow stands still in the instants, but moves from place to place. Zenos says that if everything is always at rest when it is at a place equal to it, while what is changing place is always doing so in the now, the flying arrow is motionless. Aristotle denied that a line could be composed of many finite points or that time is composed of many infinite “nows”. His holistic approach allowed him only to see things as they are, such as an arrow floating through the air in a continuous motion or time passing in a continuous flow. Unlike Zenos and later, Galileo, he could not separate motion or time into parts.

Aristotelian philosophy did not take into consideration serious empirical experimentation. Though it boasted of a broad sense of nature, it was without substantial quantitative determinations. In order for a real breakthrough in science, it would be necessary for science to separate from philosophy. Two thousand years after Aristotle, the renaissance brought new thought and with it a new dimension of mathematical science. Where Aristotelians embraced his philosophical and holistic view of nature, brave new minds separated the mechanics of physics from the philosophy, at the perils of facing The Inquisition. Galileo, who consequently passed his last nine years in house arrest, was the most influential and known as the Father of Modern Science.[6]

Knowledge builds upon knowledge and Galileo depended upon Aristotle’s foundations for a starting point, of which he could build. He refuted Aristotle’s statement that a line cannot be composed of an infinite quantity of finite points. He explains that a single point can be understood to be equal to a line. In the diagram below Galileo shows two equal surfaces and two bodies and how they will “go continually and equally diminishing during the same time…until finally the surfaces and the solids terminate their preceding perpetual equality by one solid and one surface becoming a very long line and [the other] solid and the other surface [becoming] a single point.”[7]

In the proof below, find the semi-circle AFB, the rectangular ADEB and the triangle CDE. Now imagine that they are spinning on their axis CF. The semi-circle becomes a soup bowl, the rectangle becomes a cylinder and the triangle becomes a cone. Now, in your mind, remove the cylinder, leaving the bowl and the cone in place.

Galileo next proves that the volume of the bowl is equal to the cone by first drawing a plane parallel to the top of the bowl and placing it at DE. As it is moved up through line GN, it cuts the bowl at points G. I. O. and N. and the cone at points H. and L. Galileo explains,

“This leaves the part of the cone CHL always equal to the part of the [bowl] whose cross section is represented by the ‘triangles’ GAI and BON…[as a result,] the plane at any level, provided that it is parallel to the base, or circle of diameter DE, always makes the two solids equal; that is, the part of the cone CHL and the upper part of the [bowl]. Likewise it makes equal the two surfaces that are the bases of those solids; that is, the washer and the circle HL.”[8]

As the plane moves up and gradually diminishes the area of the solids equally, it leaves a point at both the top of the cone at C and the circumference of the bowl, thereby making each of them now equal to a single point. As it turns out, Zenos was not far from the path of modern science since its path diverged from holistic philosophy to the separation of things into distinct separate parts.

Galileo’s empirical studies led the world through an explosion of discovery. One of the most important achievements was his application of mathematics to the natural phenomena. He greatly influenced Newton and later, Einstein.

Whether we are still in the era of modern science or in the post-modern era, even now, we know that knowledge builds upon knowledge. It appears that philosophy and science are merging once again as in Aristotle’s day. Darwinism may be abroad in the land, nevertheless, many scientists are leaning toward philosophical ideas, such as Intelligent Design. Sir Arthur Eddington implies philosophical inquiry when he states, “We used to think that if we knew one, we knew two, because one and one are two. We are finding that we must learn a great deal more about 'and'.”[9] Galileo expounded upon the numeric values, but it is Aristotle that teaches us to expound upon the “and”. John Lewis, a renowned scientist and advisor to the European and NASA space programs, brings science and theological philosophy together, “The Universe is God’s Handiwork; therefore, if the scriptures are God’s handiwork and the universe is God’s handiwork then science and religion represent two independent witnesses of the creation.”[10]

Today, with an array of epistemological avenues such as Aristotle’s philosophical reasoning, Galileo’s proofs, and God’s revelation, our world is heading for another grand explosion of discovery. The diversity of thought in the scientific and philosophical views provides distinct evidence, but when examined together they compliment each other and furnish a holistic panorama of truth. Precisely, as wisdom from Aristotle and Galileo is secure within the foundation of Western Thought, the wisdom of Steve Jobs is far from disappearing. Perhaps this realization led Jobs to ponder the melding of science and metaphysics when he commented on the existence of an after-life. “Maybe that's why,” says Steve, “I didn't like putting on/off switches on Apple devices.”[11]

[1] Walter Isaacson, Jobs' Biography: Thoughts On Life, Death And Apple, http://www.npr.org/2011/10/25/141653658/steve-jobs-a-computer-icon-on-life-death-and-apple, October 2011

[2] Aristotle’s Physics, translated by Joe Sachs, (New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2011), 1, punctuation is updated.

[3] Martin Heidegger, The Principle of Reason, trans. Reginald Lilly, (Indiana University Press, 1991), 62-63

[4] Michael Fowler, Aristotle, http://galileo.phys.virginia.edu/classes/109N/lectures/aristot2.html, September 2008

[5] Aristotle’s Physics, translated by Joe Sachs, (New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2011), 147

[6] Einstein writes, "Propositions arrived at by purely logical means are completely empty as regards reality. Because Galileo realized this, and particularly because he drummed it into the scientific world, he is the father of modern physics—indeed, of modern science altogether,” Einstein, Albert, Ideas and Opinions, translated by Sonja Bargmann. (London: Crown Publishers, 1954), 271

[7] Galileo Galilei, Two New Sciences, translated by Stillman Drake, (Toronto: Wall & Emerson, Inc., 1989), 35-37

[8] Galileo Galilei, Two New Sciences, translated by Stillman Drake, (Toronto: Wall & Emerson, Inc., 1989), 35-37

[9] A. L. Mackay, A Dictionary of Scientific Quotations, (Bristol and Philadelphia: Institute of Physics Publishing, 1991), 79

[10] LDS Church, Our Divine Creator: John S. Lewis, https://lds.org/pages/we-lived-with-god?lang=eng, 2011

[11] Walter Isaacson, Jobs' Biography: Thoughts On Life, Death And Apple, http://www.npr.org/2011/10/25/141653658/steve-jobs-a-computer-icon-on-life-death-and-apple, October 2011

Education Reform and Ancient Chinese Secrets

2011-11-10T14:09:00.003-07:00

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States across the nation are scrambling to solve the prevalent problem of the achievement gap in schools. Utah business leaders cry out to the “village” for help. “If we want Utah to stay competitive, business leaders believe raising the education level for all kids is key.”[1] The Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now recognizes that the gaps are steadily growing. Director Jennifer Alexander states, “We’ve got to do something to fix these numbers,” adding that it will take “bold reforms and bold leadership.”[2] From ever-increasing performance awards to ever-increasing numbers of teacher’s aids, school districts implement dozens of programs designed to increase achievement. Experience shows that student achievement has declined over the past several decades and yet society continues to implement new programs and technology to solve these issues. Solutions lie not in complicated plans and reforms, but in the ideas we glean from an array of great literature and histories. These teachings are available to any at a small price compared to the current plan of costly programs. As we look to the past, we remedy the present. I propose we delve into some ancient Chinese secrets and ask Lao Tzu and Confucius to consider the remedy of today’s educational ills.

It would be efficacious to understand the underlying premise of their teachings. Living in an immoral and degenerate society, both Lao Tzu and Confucius[3] recognized the urgency for reform, not from the top-down, but from deep within the individual. In a sagacious manner, they counseled their people to return to the Way (Tao) of the ancients. Lao Tzu gracefully describes this return to Tao:

Hold on to the Tao of old in order to master the
Things of the present.
From this, one may know
the primeval beginning(of the universe).
This is called the bond of Tao.[4]

In the literal translation, bond refers to “a thread” and indicates discipline or principle, thus, the actual study and lifestyle of Tao is its fundamental concept. The authors of Tao devoted their lives to promote the Way as a panacea for societal corruption. Lao Tzu describes that the action of the Tao is to perpetually return to it, suggesting that human nature inherently and eventually pulls us away if we are not careful to check ourselves:

Reversion is the action of Tao.
Weakness is the function of Tao.
All things in the world come from being.
And being comes from non-being.[5]

Lao Tzu’s two basic concepts underlying the Tao are the non-being and the being. Both are not without the other and come from each other. For example, imagine a clay pot. The usefulness of the pot is not found in the clay, but in the emptiness. The non-being is to the emptiness of the pot as the being is to the clay. Non-being suggests a state of calmness, an absolute peacefulness and purity of mind. It may be that being implies a soul empty of worldly cares and primed for the Tao. If so, then the non-being could be those virtues that fill the soul.

Invariably existing before heaven and earth, the eternal Tao is without beginning or end and operates in a manner corresponding to irrefutable laws and principles. One of Tao’s earliest commentators, Han Fei Tzu states that, “Tao is that by which all things become what they are.”[6] Here, the key word is become and hints of transformation. Tao provides a coarse of action by which we both prime and fill our waiting and ready soul with virtue (te).

Supposing that our Chinese sages were correct and that Tao is foundational to all learning, then I propose that our educational reform take the direction of the Way. According to Confucius, learning pertains to one’s actual conduct first before the acquisition of academic knowledge. He believes that learning is a mixture of scholarly studies, which he calls cultural refinement built upon native substance, which is the moral character that is learned in early childhood. In other words, a student must bring with him a foundation of virtue before he can add to it academic scholarship. Confucius maintains that a man becomes a gentleman, a possessor of Goodness, “Only when culture and native substance are perfectly mixed and balanced.”[7] What virtues do our children learn outside the home and away from the family?

Commentator Wang Shu[8] compared the education of his day with that of the ancients, “The primary focus of students in ancient times was to cultivate themselves by being meticulous in speech and careful in action, rather than merely memorizing, reciting, and composing texts…Students nowadays, on the other hand, devote themselves exclusively to memorizing, reciting and composing texts with the sole purpose of passing the civil service exams and obtaining official positions. Very few of them never get around to paying careful attention to their actual behavior or speech. Perhaps this is why they pale in comparison to the ancients.” I find it very interesting that Wang Shu wrote this in the fifteenth century and it is still extraordinarily applicable to our day, over 500 years later.

The universal call for academic achievement seems to be to get the students to achieve scholastically. This process of enticing students to learn often requires incentives, rewards and external motivation. The dictionary enlightens us to the true meaning of educate, which means “to draw forth”.[9] A teacher cannot educate, but can only help a student educate himself or “draw forth” what is already there. As our Chinese sages see it, the only way is to teach those who have the desire to learn. That desire is nurtured more abundantly as children are taught the Way at the feet of a loving and firm parent. Only then do they go on to seek higher learning with great desire and accountability. Confucius spoke of the great responsibility of the student to learn. He suggests that the teacher require great inner desire on the part of the student, “I will not open the door for a mind that is not already striving to understand, nor will I provide words to a tongue that is not already struggling to speak. If I hold up one corner of a problem, and the student cannot come back to me with the other three, I will not attempt to instruct him again.”[10]

Ultimately parents are the real solution to education reform as they carry the weighty obligation to teach virtue to their children. Confucius teaches the best order for learning the Tao, “Those who are born understanding [the Way] are the best; those who come to understand it through learning are second. Those who find it difficult to understand and yet persist in their studies come next. People who find it difficult to understand but do not even try to learn are the worst of all.”[11]

The inertia of our current path of education with its reforms and programs will be a difficult one to break. States will do well to learn from the ancient Chinese sages. Instead of pushing and even coercing students to achieve through extrinsic rewards, they ought to allow parents to assume the duty of teaching virtue to their children before sending them to the schools. Parents hold the very key to change as they begin to understand the power of Tao in rearing their growing children. No educational program can compete with the simple and ideal foundation of learning virtue first at home and in all aspects of life.

[1] Richard Platt, Leaders say 'village' mentality is key to educational success, http://www.ksl.com/index.php?nid=690&sid=15808814&title=leaders-say-village-mentality-is-key-to-educational-success, June 2011

[2] Abbe Smith, Connecticut students show little progress on Nation's Report Card, http://www.registercitizen.com/articles/2011/11/02/news/doc4eb1ec0c42687228221092.txt, November 2011

[3] Both sages lived in the sixth century BC.

[4] The Way of Lao Tzu: Tao-te Ching, translated by Wing-Tsit Chan, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1963), chapter 14, pg. 124 (The comma added on the third line was added for reading comprehension.)

[5] Ibid, chapter 40, pg 173

[6] The Way of Lao Tzu: Tao-te Ching, translated by Wing-Tsit Chan, (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1963), 7

[7] Confucius, Analects, translated by Edward Slingerland, (Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 2003), 6.18, pg. 59

[8] A virtuous and effective minister of the Ming Dynasty who believed in the “essential unity of knowledge and action, with action being the natural unfolding of any sort of true knowledge, as well as in his assertion that the purpose of learning is realized in words and actions, rather than empty speculation.” (Edward Slingerland)

[9] The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), 833

[10] Confucius, Analects, translated by Edward Slingerland, (Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 2003), 7.8, pg. 66

[11] Ibid, 16.9, pg. 196

In Force For Everyone, or Not?

2011-09-29T10:53:00.000-06:00

There is a law in the universe that brings happiness or misery depending upon the adherence to that law. The law is that all things in our lives must be in order or at least reaching out to order—all things spiritually, mentally, emotionally, etc. When it is so, we find happiness and when it is not we are on the path to misery.

In my scripture reading today I came upon a scripture that makes me think of the Humanist Manifesto (the humanists do not believe in the universal laws of right and wrong, among other things). Many, including the humanists, do not want to acknowledge laws because they believe everything is relative to individual beings and situations. What do you think? Do you think that laws can change for every individual according to their own situation or are these laws straight forward for any and all?

The scripture I was aluding to above is 2 Nephi 2:13 and it says, "And if ye shall say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished away."

While talking with our family this morning, I shared this scripture, of which is talking particularly about the law of the Atonement for salvation, but includes all the other laws of truth (laws of the universe). We talked of our family problem at hand, of going to bed late and waking up late and how this scripture related to it. It was a fascinating discussion of the old Franklin adage, "Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise." and the scripture in D&C of retiring early to our beds and waking early that our minds will be invigorated. We decided that if the law is practiced, we will indeed be strengthened in our desire to wake on time.

My opinion is that all laws are in force for everyone, no matter their situation in life and that when the laws are obeyed to a certain degree, there is happiness to a certain degree, always in proportionate amounts. What is your opinion? What are your experiences with universal law/s?

Educating Oneself is the best way for us

2011-09-15T21:29:00.002-06:00

Today eleven-year-old Edie pushed herself to write a required paper for her shakespeare class in the commonwealth school. It was a refreshing scene to watch as she quickly and obediently went through her jobs so she could have time to write. She used examples from our home life and from the current book we are reading together, Little Women, in order to articulate the principle that being a good example is key to being a good leader. She wrote all twenty lines in beautiful cursive and was very attentive to spelling correctly.

Just one year ago, we were bombarded with caustic remarks filled with fear and anger as our loved ones were in complete disagreement with how we were educating our children. At one point, one family member tried to help by encouraging Edie to read often with her to make sure she was getting her schooling in. I was aware of this family member's intense fear that our children might not learn to read and write or have the necessary social skills to function in society. Thus, I humored her and let the activity go on. At first it seemed okay, however as time passed I noticed some changes in Edie and her younger sister, Hannah. Instead of educating themselves throughout the morning and afternoon like before, they seemed to wait around until it was reading-practice time in the afternoon. They sat by the window almost frozen for long periods of time as if by doing so, they would speed up the time. Their normal activities of work and play became boring and cumbersome. After praying and seeking guidance, I felt it was necessary to quit the reading sessions and return to our normal routine of hard work in the home and freedom to educate on their own. It took a long while to return to our old and good ways. Again, I am convinced that formal academic structure is not right for our young children until they have reached the age Edie is now. Today at the age of eleven, she became the propelling factor in her education as she poured out her best effort to express what she knows about being a leader.

Civil Rights Bill of 1875: Antidote to Slavery or Freedom?

2011-04-22T19:45:00.001-06:00

James T. Rapier’s speech to Congress in support of the Civil Rights Bill of 1875 suggested that the supposedly republican nation ought to practice what it preaches. Written into the Constitution’s Fourteenth amendment is the provision that all people born or naturalized in the United States are citizens of the country and the state. Rapier expected that all African Americans be treated as ordinary citizens, but instead they were treated as the lowest of the low such as in a Caste System. Some of his arguments were that freedom cannot be divided between being free and being a slave and that inferiority is maintained by suppression of quality education and that the dark color of skin constitutes a crime in the minds of the white men.
First, the Alabaman Senator argued that man cannot be half free and half slave. He questioned why, in America, can he enjoy political rights while being denied civil ones. He was protected while in Congress, but not on the road to get to Congress. He could “legislate for a free people, while his own chains of slavery [hung] about him.” Ratification of the Civil Rights bill would allow him and his race to be completely free from discrimination and the “half-time” slavery, or so it seems.
The distance between the educated white and the suppression of quality education perpetuated inferiority of race for the African Americans. Rapier noted that the colored man was “cut off from every avenue that [lead] to the higher grounds of intelligence and usefulness and then [was] challenged…to a contest upon the highway of life to decide the question of superiority of race.” In Rapier’s experience he “always found more prejudice existing in the breast of men who [had] feeble minds and [were] conscious of it, than in the breast of those who [had] towering intellects and [were] aware of it.” His cry was for equal opportunity in seeking and obtaining higher education.
Rapier contests that the African American was accused with the crime of color. He questioned Congress if they had ever reflected that this was “the only Christian country where a poor, finite man must be held responsible for the crimes of the infinite God whom they profess to worship,” the crime of color. According to the majority of the white men, the color of the skin was the determining factor that kept men inferior intellectually and morally.
To sum up, Rapier was an advocate of the Civil Rights Bill that resulted in the endeavor to regulate the conduct of individuals and to compel private businesses to accept all people without discrimination. The bill was in force for eight years before it became unconstitutional.
What do you think? Was Rapier right?

Altruism: Help or Hinder?

2011-04-14T09:53:00.001-06:00

“[The] old people felt rich because they were free”, and “we are poor in spirit because we are not free”, was the cry of Clyde Warrior of the Ponca tribe in 1967. He draws a distinction between those Native Americans before the addition of government assistance and those of today who are the casualties in the thrall of government social programs. As a result, his people have lost the ability to be industrious and responsible and furthermore have turned to crime, alcohol and self-destructive acts. Warrior proposes a solution in three parts; that the Native Americans demonstrate their competence, exercise free choice and learn through their own mistakes.

First Warrior suggests that his people demonstrate their competence through exertion and effort. They must have the responsibility in the ultimate sense of the word or they fall to the incompetent pit of hopelessness. Warrior declares, “Our children are learning that their people are not worthy and thus that they individually are not worthy.” Those who feel unworthy turn to self-destructive acts. Work and industry set the stage for realizing achievement. As the individual performs and completes worthy tasks he gains a strong sense of personal adequacy and competence.

Secondly, the Native Indians ought to be free men and exercise their right to choose. To choose is to have power. How they will make their living, raise their children, or how they will improve their communities and situations will be up to them. Similar to the first proposal, responsibility coupled with free choice will aid them to be prosperous and industrious to the degree that will help them to be free.

Finally, with competence and the freedom to choose come the inevitable consequences of failure. Warrior advocates a people who can make their own mistakes and learn from them as a process to success and freedom. He says, “Failures must be Indian experiences because only then will Indians understand why a program failed and not blame themselves for some personal inadequacy. A better program built upon the failure of an old program is the path of progress.” Wisdom is gained through mistakes.

Warrior’s solution to the Native American social ills is not found in more government assistant programs. It cannot be resolved by others, but must be determined by the Native Americans themselves. Through their experimenting upon competence, their freedom to choose and profiting by their own mistakes, will they eventually ascertain what is needed to help their own circumstances and their communities. The order of Warrior’s solution begs the question if profiting from mistakes ought not to be the first part of the solution. Can our society allow the Native Americans to make mistakes and profit by them? Are we too altruistic to allow that kind of freedom and growth?

2011-02-13T11:52:00.001-07:00

Church and State: Separation or Protection?

2011-02-08T13:58:00.001-07:00

2011-02-08T13:41:00.000-07:00

Emily and Isaac Arnott are engaged to be married the first week in May 2011!

2011-01-25T09:07:00.001-07:00

Visit Original Fast Foods

Our Christmas Letter 2010

2011-01-07T18:46:00.007-07:00

From David's memoirs:

I was reflecting on life and how quickly it passes by. (I reflect much more since Julie and I celebrated our 20th anniversary in Europe studying the art and architecture of Paris, Rome, and Florence. We see things so differently now and look for meaning in all that we observe.)

I realized that Christmas is a touchstone that allows us to reflect and re-evaluate who we are and where we are going and at times how fast we are arriving. I figure that most of us will enjoy about 50 to 60 Christmases. We will have more but we will enjoy about that many. A few on the front end we did not remember, spent in diapers, and didn’t have any ability to eat and enjoy the food and festivities of the season, such may be the case with a few more on the back end of our life. That leaves a few others in the middle that may not have been enjoyable due to our own bad attitudes or lack of love for others. Julie and I have spent 21 Christmas seasons together plus the Christmas season while we were engaged. Each year has been wonderful and full of treasured memories. This year has been exceptionally tender. This may be our last year with our whole family home.

Emily is moving into the realm of adulthood and is quite self-sufficient in her studies at George Wythe University. It has been a treat to have her here, as she is not able to come and visit us often.

We are not sure where Andrew will be next year at this time as he could be getting ready to leave on a mission since he has a January birthday. It seemed like last year that he was a 5 foot little kid trying to look his age but never looking tall enough or old enough. Now he is 6’2” and singing bass in the choir.

Elissa has informed us that she is moving to France to become an au pair. It seems that her time in Europe this summer did not satisfy a desire but created a passion to travel and to learn. She claims that she is going. I say that it is doubtful. Those who know Elissa will not need to hear an update.

The chance of looking at my home in 365 days from now with half the children causes me to reflect and ponder if I have taught all that they need to know to the essential things of life. Where have I spent my time in my discussions, teachings and activities? Where is my heart and my focus? I hope that next year as well as next week will find me gathering those of my family who are home around me and teaching of the matchless love of our savior, of his infinite goodness, of his perfect plan.

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As for the year to come- I will still have much to do with each child. Emily will still need guidance in life and in college (or at least she will still have the grace to ask my opinion even if she does not need it.

Andrew and I will still fix things together and work on projects. Elissa, Andrew and I will still go on epic mountain bike adventures; we may even be joined by Erica a bit more this year. Erica will still be reading and asking me questions about life. I will still count on Edie to look like a princess but attack me when I least expect it like a ninja. Hannah will still keep me on schedule and continue to rule the world from her point of view.

Through all of this, we will continue to draw closer to the Lord and seek to do his will in all that we do.

Photos: 1) Edie and Hannah playing with the Lionel train under the Christmas Tree. 2) Julie and Dave on Ponte Vecchio in Florence, Italy--June 2010. 3) Our family's visit to see Emily at university. 4) Emily with her very special friend, Isaac Arnott in December 2010. 5) Andrew, David and Elissa up in the Brian Head mountain area--Cedar City. 6) Another family picture during our visit to see Emily at George Wythe University.

2010-12-26T07:44:00.000-07:00

Watch more videos like this at www.quantumshift.tv

How to Raise Boys Who Read

2010-09-30T09:49:00.001-06:00

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Focusing on the reading gap between girls and boys is not the most effective topic in this incredible article. However, I especially was drawn to the eye-opening and deplorable environment that society is dishing out to our young boys in the way of "gross-out" books and highly addicting video games.

Understanding and Partaking in the Atonement of Jesus Christ (Talk given during Easter)

2010-09-15T18:18:00.003-06:00

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This season we celebrate that Christ has overcome the world, He has fulfilled his divine mission to redeem His people from Spiritual and Physical death. That fateful night in the Olive Grove at the Garden of Gethsemane He took upon Himself the sins of the world--He took upon him all our infirmities, our pain and sorrows in the past, the present and the future that he might "know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities." This single act is our key to our salvation. It is only through his atonement that we can overcome our sin and to overcome all things in this life and to become clean to enter into our Father's Kingdom.

I have thought of three things that can help us understand and partake in the Atonement of Jesus Christ.

1. We must first attain knowledge of Him-come to know Him.
2. We must exercise faith in Him.
3. We must become Humble

First, We must come to know Him. Our ability to overcome all things depends greatly on our effort to know the Savior, of His mission, of His teachings, of our relationship with Him, and ultimately of his redeeming Atonement. John tells us of the danger that comes of not knowing Him. He writes, "He was in the world and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own (meaning the Jews) and his own received him not. (Now, here is the truth that will exalt us) But as many as received him (says John) to them gave he the power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name."

Leo Tolstoy said it simply when he penned the words in a conversation between two characters of his book, War and Peace. Omen teaches Pierre the reason for his unhappiness, "[Pierre], you know him not, and that is why you are unhappy."

James E. Faust said, "Our salvation depends on believing in and accepting the Atonement. Such acceptance requires a continual effort to understand it more fully."

Hermano Juarez of the Spanish Branch is a great example of coming to know Christ. One day I needed to pick up something from his home and when I knocked on the door, his wife, Celia, opened the door wide to invite me in. A wondrous scene was before my eyes as I looked at Hermano Juarez sitting there on his couch with both his scriptures open on the coffee table before him. In addition to those where his reading glasses, his sunday school student manual and a few other books, including the Liahona, the church magazine in Spanish, all wide open to his studious mind. I was impressed and touched by his example. His calling was not a teacher of Sunday School, nor was he a leader in an organization, he was simply the president of a Sunday school class who welcomes students and calls someone to say the prayers. I came away from that humble home knowing that Hermano Juarez was anxiously engaged in getting to know the Savior.

As we more fully come to know Christ we can more readily:

Exercise faith in Him

Nephi reminded his older brothers that the Lord could do all things if they would but have faith. While traveling from Jerusalem into the wilderness, Laman and Lemuel along with two daughters and two sons of Ishmael become rebellious and desired to return to Jerusalem. Nephi was grieved. He asked them, "How is it that ye have forgotten that the Lord is able to do all things according to his will, for the children of men, if it so be that they exercise faith in him? [Then Nephi exhorts his brethren], Wherefore, let us be faithful to him."

I would like tot share an experience with you about faith. This past summer our family went with Grandpa Tibbets to the Uintah Wilderness on a backpacking trip. The trail is located in the southern part of the range in the Garfield Basin. The mountains are breathtakingly beautiful. The name Rocky Mountains surely had to have originated in this part of the series because there is no trail that I can think of between the Sierra Madres in California and the Sawtooths in Idaho to the Wind Rivers in Wyoming that have such huge boulders right on the trail. Sometimes it doesn't even seem like a trail because of the abundance of rocks. Our hike was 10 miles long and we were on our way out. It was a beautiful sunny morning. We felt invigorated after a hearty meal of instant oatmeal and hot chocolate. I stayed back with my father walking his pace to keep him company. It was sweet to hear the stories of his youth and about the first times he backpacked along this trail some forty years before. At lunchtime we found that the others had stopped in a place called Swasey Hole to wait for us. After a delicious lunch of bagels and cheese, we proceeded forward. I again stayed back with my father as the children and David proceeded ahead. We trod along slowly up...up...up...the switchbacks. We rested quite often to catch our breath. It was difficult for me to go that slow with such a heavy pack, but it was important that I stay with my dear father. We noticed the sky becoming a little darker. My father's expert knowledge about weather patterns suggested that there were three storm systems coming together and that it could become very dangerous as we neared the ridge of twelve thousand feet elevation. Lightening loves to strike the tops of mountains and we were coming nearer all the time to the top. This knowledge helped to push us a little faster up the trail in hopes that we could clear the top before the storm hit, but more and more my father felt that we might need to stay this side of the mountain if we were to stay alive.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the ridge, and unbeknownst to us, our children, having been informed by David about the dangers of mountain storms began to exercise faith in our Living God and to pray for us and to sing hymns. David laid down his backpack near the children and took off running back over the ridge and to the other side where he found us still trudging along. He grasped the backpack of my father's, slung it over his shoulder and encouraged us to hustle over the top as fast as we could to safety. We made it! Somewhere in the trees down below us we heard shouts of joy and clapping as our children recognized the power of God to save lives. Faith is the key essential to overcome all things.

We must become humble

We must refine ourselves and become humble, even with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. At the end of Father Lehi's life he dedicated his last moments teaching his children of the foundational doctrine of the Atonement. He instructed Jacob, "Wherefore, redemption cometh in and through the Holy Messiah; for he is full of grace and truth. Behold, he offereth himself a sacrifice for sin, to answer the ends of the law, unto all those who have a broken heart and a contrite spirit; and unto none else can the ends of the law be answered." (2 Ne 2:6-7)

King Benjamin taught us why and how to obtain a broken heart and a contrite spirit. He said in those famous words: "For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, for ever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father."

I know that Jesus Christ atoned for our sins. He is risen and for this great act we celebrate this season. It is my prayer for us that we may without hesitation come to know Christ, exercise faith in Him and become humble. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

My review of Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises

2010-09-07T20:49:00.000-06:00

The Sun also Rises is a disagreeable book about the gloomy human conditions after WWI. I disliked the writing style, but nonetheless could feel its powerful tug on my emotions with its straight-to-the-point account. I don’t know whether Hemingway was satirical or not; whether he was making fun of the “lost generation,” as Gertrude Stein describes the post war expatriates or if he was recounting many of his own experiences as an expatriate in France and Spain. The Characters were definitely a lost generation in morals, in purpose, in relationships, in vision of the future. Nothing I have read has ever presented dialogue so shallow and meaningless.

The reader follows the characters from café to café and bar to bar in Paris all the way to Spain. The dialogue consists of such degrading topics such as adultery to prostitution, financial irresponsibility and bankruptcy to immorality and irreligion. Within the center of the plot the reader is introduced to men fighting men and women being the cause of it and women degrading men—leaving them for lack of a marital commitment.

I think what Hemingway was trying to show the world was a new existence of immorality and the easiness of life without a strict moral code. No commitments, no laws, no morals, no values had to be enforced, only a life of fun and entertainment, including plenty of wine, women and profanity. He may have hoped that by reading his novel, individuals and communities would see the pointless and empty lives fabricated by a false moral code. If that is the case, then I agree with his purpose for writing.
However much I hated this story, I see the advantage of having read about and learned lessons from “the lost generation.” It is an eye-opener to the evils that lurk in the lives of lazy, materialistic and drunken people.

Ghastly Grimy Gossip

2010-08-28T06:55:00.001-06:00

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Mud was everywhere, but I did not see it at first, I only felt it. Arriving late at an important meeting yesterday where we were to discuss the details of Pyramid Project, I sat down with Erica, interrupting, but not intentionally, my friend who was conducting. Seeming as if I was bothering some in the room, I stated my regret in arriving late and that Erica and I had a few questions. There seemed to be some contentious feelings between me and my friend and I wasn’t quite certain where it stemmed from, thus this is the mud I am referring to in the opening sentence. I felt it, but could not see it. As the meeting continued, the feeling remained and grew heavier and yet I endeavored to remain happy and excited in order to defuse the tenseness in the air.

Just before leaving I asked my friend if she was all right and if there was anything that I had done to offend. What came next was like opening the double doors into a room filled with mire. The ooze burst through covering both of us until it was difficult to breath. She had been hurt badly by a false rumor that had been spreading throughout our circles and she was bold enough to tell me what others had said they thought I had said. It was an awful and erroneous speculation with an aim to hurt and maim relationships. Being covered with the “mire” caused me to grapple for air and words that might save our relationship. Trying to tell her it was not true was like trying to dam up the Snake River with human hands. Or as Shana Alexander once said, “Trying to squash a rumor is like trying to unring a bell.” My friend would not believe me and I let that usurp my self-control causing me to cry like a baby and leave. I got in my car and headed for home. I felt awful as an innocent victim feels when they are carted off to prison. Even more awful was the scene I had caused—in front of so many friends and their youth. On the drive home a feeling came over me to return and apologize with all my might and to try and make amends of the situation. Because of the knowledge of the truth that I had never said such a thing, I felt free and clear and this feeling boosted me on. Truth always prevails and so surely she would someday know it in her heart and that was my only assurance.

All were still there, no doubt, trying to make sense of the “mire” and the unbridled behavior of the scene I had enacted just minutes before. Sincerely and anxiously I pleaded forgiveness of all the wrong that I seemed to have caused and she took me into her arms and let me cry there for a few moments. The mud seemed to clear up and our lungs could breath fresh air again. We stood to discuss a few concerns and I left feeling more love than ever from this friend.

Mud is ugly and stifling. The Rabbi Wayne Dosick wrote of this muddy Gossip, "Gossip and slander are not victimless crimes. Words do not just dissipate into midair . . . Words can injure and damage, maim and destroy - forcefully, painfully, lastingly . . . Plans have been disrupted, deals have been lost, companies have fallen, because of idle gossip or malicious slander. Reputations have been sullied, careers have been ruined, lives have been devastated, because of cruel lies or vicious rumors . . . Your words have such power to do good or evil that they must be chosen carefully, wisely, and well."

I came away today with a firm commitment to choose my words carefully when I speak. This situation caused me to pour over all the conversations I had been engaged in previously to search for where I went wrong. The exercise revealed to me a possible root to the rancorous rumor. I had told some people that I was anxious for Erica to take more vigorous classes to get her ready for Williamsburg Academy next year. Incidentally that innocent conversation lead to the demeaning rumor stating that I said my friend’s “son was slow and that Erica would be dumbed-down in the offered Pyramid Project class.” How hurtful is that statement and yet it was not true. I reflected on the adversary’s desire to bring misery on all and how easily it can be done when we engage in scandalous hearsay. “To hearken to evil conversation is the road to wickedness,” said the anonymous one.

Cato the Elder taught, “we cannot control the evil tongues of others; but a good life enables us to disregard them.” Gossip will continue as long as humans live upon this earth. However, we have the choice to engage in it and darken the earth or we can disregard it with all our might; let it roll off our souls and into the gutter where it belongs. I resolve today to carefully choose my words and to make amends where amends must take place. I also resolve to follow Johann K. Lavater’s advice to “Never tell evil of a man, if you do not know it for certainty, and if you know it for a certainty, then ask yourself, 'Why should I tell it?'” It has been said that when there is much good in the worst of us and plenty of bad in the best of us, then it hardly behooves any of us to talk about the rest of us. I choose today to clean up the mud whenever it comes my way, regardless of who put it there.

Whole Education vs. Abstract

2010-07-14T17:52:00.002-06:00

Education should introduce the Greats to us and invite us to debate the most significant questions of all time, to find the meaning of life and to come face to face with the heroes that will inspire individual virtue. Tocqueville suggested that in a democracy we tend to focus on single theories; abstractions of a whole array of the greatest ideas and truths available in a whole education. The old writers are not perfect, nor are they always right, but they do make us aware of our individual imperfections as they portray human nature in a raw state. Intellectual danger lurks in our society when the university succumbs to teaching and promoting only the opinions of today's popular culture and current ideologies.

2010-06-22T09:53:00.001-06:00

What is the Best Society?

2010-05-03T14:05:00.001-06:00

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The best society is found where the people choose to serve God over all else. St. Matthew records the Savior’s words, “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” It is true that one cannot choose both. There is no golden mean in these two extremes; an individual must decide either to serve God or serve mammon. This Heavenly society could best be described in a Greek word, to kalon, which means, the beautiful. Thinking and acting beautifully in his or her service to God, would be the mode of life. Do we suppose that this will be a dull, monotonous and mechanical society? Absolutely not, situations will present themselves just as they do in today’s society, but we will respond to them in the way we were created to do as children of a royal and divine heritage.

Upon what principle should this society be based? Aristotle believed that virtue was the means to our ultimate happiness. Everything we do, he concluded, must depend on moral virtue to make its aim right. Moral virtue gives man the most stable and durable condition in which to confront all of life’s deterrents. David of the Old Testament inquires, “who shall stand in [the Lord’s] holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.” Numerous times the Lord condemns hypocrisy because it pretends to be virtuous. Hypocrisy is not being true to who we are and what we were created to be. This writer agrees that whether it is a pure heart or being true to self, virtue is the principle to base the best society owing to the fact that virtue encompasses all good qualities.

What would be the purpose for this society? Principally speaking, most all human beings wish to be happy no matter their race, culture or class. Even our Founding Fathers included happiness and the pursuit thereof, as one of the most important and attainable goals in the Declaration of Independence; they recognized happiness as one of the inalienable rights.

In addition to happiness, the purpose of this society would also be to prepare the people for the Lord’s second coming. Paul’s epistle to the Philippians teach the ancient saints to have one heart and one mind and to love and serve one another. In preparation of Christ’s second coming, the modern reader remembers Paul’s words, “That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Preparation for His reign on earth and the happiness of His people are the purpose for this society.

What would be the purpose of government in such a society? Cicero said, “there is no human being of any race who, if he finds a guide, cannot attain to virtue.” In most worldly governments that I have studied, there has been not only a guide, but also institutions set up to constrain the people to be virtuous. This coercion has not created a virtuous society, but one of corruption and vice. The government of the best society would not be an oppressive government as is the norm; in fact, there would not be a government, as we know it. The governing power would be within each person as Plato described in his Republic. He explained basically that our head and our heart would rule our gut and that we could achieve full happiness in this life as we applied virtue and justice to our individual character. Cicero writes of the natural propensity for love and service to others, “For these virtues originate in our natural inclination to love our fellow-men, and this is the foundation of Justice.” As a result of each person’s integrity to his or her true being and virtuous character there is no need for a government of man.

We have just discussed that the people govern self, however, in truth there is a higher government; one that is not coercive, but is based on character. It has to do with the intense individual desire to be virtuous. That drive to obey is because of the love each has for God, their loving Heavenly Father and for his laws. Talking of this heavenly city, Augustine writes, “The laws of the most high Creator and Governor are strictly observed, for it is by Him the peace of the universe is administered.” Additionally, the people yearn to obey God’s laws because of promised heavenly blessings. “Blessings are upon the head of the just,” taught wise King Solomon.

What would God’s government look like? Unlike the worldly governments, God’s government would naturally and without coercion provide for the poor and needy. By virtue that each person was created with certain gifts, talents and abilities to act, there would be some who would lift a sad heart, some who would feed the hungry, some who would cloth the poor, etc. until all the needs of each individual were accounted for. God knows our needs and desires and although he uses His children to fulfill the needs and desires, still He grants them. Worldly riches and wealth would not be the goal of this government. The goal, in accordance with Aristotle, would be to do individually what we were created to do and do it beautifully, and in that way provide for all. Christ differentiates between worldly and heavenly matter, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” Christ also teaches that we do not need to take thought for our life i.e. what to eat or what to wear or where we shall live. He knows our needs, presumably because we sincerely pray; and since He knows and that we desire it, He freely gives.

What would be the governmental powers? Isaiah prophesied of this heavenly society with Christ as the King, “And the government shall be upon His shoulder,” wrote Isaiah. The Resurrected Christ will reign in Glory as the King and Judge of the best society. Virtue will be His throne, truth will be His gospel and Love will be His governing power.

A Summary of Montesquieu's, The Spirit of Laws

2010-05-03T14:03:00.001-06:00

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What is the proper role of government? Aristotle would say that the end of politics is happiness and the means to that end would be virtue. He believes the state exists for the sake of the individual. Machiavelli would say that the stability of the State and the Power of the Prince is the ultimate end and that we should preserve the state at every cost; the end justifies the means. Finally Montesquieu would say that the State should be a reflection of the people. In his great work, Spirit of the Laws, he describes his purpose for writing, “I do not pretend to treat of laws, but of their spirit; and as this spirit consists in the various relations which the laws may bear to different objects, it is not so much my business to follow the natural order of laws as that of these relations and objects.”

The constitution of the country, explains Montesquieu, is a reflection of what the people are. If people want to have a democracy then laws will be passed to make all property equal. If the people want government to take care of their needs then a pure democracy or socialism would be established. A perfect government is one where the nature of the people are congruent to the nature of a government and the nature of a government is in congruence with the nature of the people. Is it any wonder why the people of certain countries in Europe are content with their socialist regime where the medical, educational and other sumptuary needs are controlled? They are a people that truly want a socialized government. “The government most comfortable to nature is that which best agrees with the humour and disposition of the people in whose favour it is established.”

The Spirit of Laws is comprehensive of the many and diverse kinds of people and therefore, the many types of government that should exist for the diverse peoples. He describes that the physical laws are constant, patterned, ordered, and predictable. However, opposite are the laws that govern the intelligent. Human beings are unpredictable and subject to error. Mediocrity exists because excellence abounds; evil is present because good exists; ignorance throngs our society because intelligence reigns. Writes Montesquieu, “Particular intelligent beings are of a finite nature, and consequently liable to error…their nature requires them to be free agents. Hence they do not steadily conform to their primitive laws; and even those of their own instituting they frequently infringe.” Thus the intelligent world is not as easily governed as the physical. He proposes that each country study their people and conform the government to balance with the people.

To simplify an otherwise very complicated system, Montesquieu suggests that there be three governments and that all others can be classified into one of the three, which are: Monarchical, Republic and Despotic. Illustrating in detail, he discovers the national principle of a people and their government and explains how the national principle can only work well with the national character of the State. To clarify, Montesquieu says that virtue is only needed in a republic form of government, including a democratic republic or an aristocratic republic. “[Political] virtue, in a republic, is the love of one’s country, that is the love of equality…it is the spring with sets the republican government in motion, as honour is the spring with gives motion to monarchy.”

The early founders were heavily influenced by Montesquieu’s separation of powers. The elements of human nature was vivid in their minds and it was in their best interest to form a very limited government. The Constitutional Convention successfully implemented three separate powers of the executive, the legislative including the senate and the house, and the judicial branches of government. The making of the law would be the sole responsibility of the legislative branch; the application of the law, the judicial; and the enforcement of the law would come from the executive branch. Each, along with the people, would form a check and a balance for the purpose of keeping the government at bay and limiting the natural encroachment of powers.

The laws of education would be different in each species of government, explains Montesquieu, “in monarchies they will have honour for their object; in republics, virtue; in despotic government, fear.” What would it take to educate a noble? You would teach them that they are better than the others and it would play naturally into the vice of the human. In a republic, students must be educated to keep up the love of country, their curriculum would be one of virtue and equality.

Montesquieu warned those of a republican government of the dangers of equality. Equality should be feared if it encroaches on the necessary liberties of the people. He wrote that too little or too much equality squelches liberty. Moreover he writes that, “The misfortune of a republic is when intrigues are at an end; which happens when the people are gained by bribery and corruption; in this case they grow indifferent to public affairs, and avarice becomes their predominant passion.”

What made Montesquieu great? Montesquieu looked to history to find the examples of principles and character and their practical applications. He used logic and historicism. His detail to the elements of society, national character and principles made all the difference for the unparalleled founding of the United States.

A Response to Machiavelli's, The Prince

2010-05-03T14:01:00.001-06:00

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Machiavelli seemed to reject the whole philosophical and theological tradition of generations past. Biblical history showed that obedience to God provided security and Divine protection wherever His children lived. Greek philosophy taught that justice was compliance with natural order. Creating and maintaining individual happiness was the purpose of the Platonic and Aristotelian State and virtue was the means to that end. In contrast to godly obedience, happiness and virtue, Machiavelli pushed aside the old belief in the gods and turned the face of the world in the direction of humanism. He felt that the state's fundamental purpose was power in the state itself.

His letter to the reigning Medici family inclined to favor arbitrary power. With the zeitgeist moving in the general direction toward a new humanistic approach, Machiavelli's The Prince, became an important political step towards the Renaissance. Machiavelli wanted to understand politics in a rational way—what is, is what is. The truth is, wrote Machiavelli, that men want power and they do not get it from the gods, angels and demons. Using speed and strength the Prince had magnificent power to conquer and maintain the State. Power should be an end in and of itself, according to Machiavelli. And yet, time has demonstrated the catastrophic implications of such a leader through modern rulers such as Mao, Mussolini, Hitler and many others. Arbitrary power, when used on a human being creates either resentment or it transforms them into a temporal being who lacks desire for individual growth and progression, thus remaining in their childish state—precisely what a Machiavellian prince desires.

Machiavellian thought transformed the world from theocratic politics to the new cynical approach to power and towards modern political science. Were his writings intentionally to teach kings or were they to open the eyes of an enlightened people to the workings of all levels of tyranny? Rousseau postulates, “Machiavelli was a proper man and a good citizen; but, being attached to the court of the Medici, he could not help veiling his love of liberty in the midst of his country’s oppression. The choice of his detestable hero, Caesar Borgia, clearly enough shows his hidden aim; and the contradiction between the teaching of The Prince and that of the Discourses on Livy and the History of Florence shows that this profound political thinker has so far been studied only by superficial or corrupt readers. The Court of Rome sternly prohibited his book. I can well believe it; for it is that Court it most clearly portrays.” Whether Machiavelli was a realist or satirist, it is evident that the rulers of today strongly favor his opinion. One current example is the power assumed in the Executive branch of the United States over the Health Care issue. Decisions were made behind closed doors and the power went to the minority.

His ideas influenced Marxism in view of the fact that people could be molded and manipulated to think and do what the powers above desired. No longer were people completely responsible for their lives or choices, but were shaped into what the State needed at the time. “Machiavelli seems to agree with Aristotle by saying that one cannot establish the desirable political order if the matter is corrupt, i.e. if the people is corrupt, but what for Aristotle is an impossibility is for Machiavelli only a very great difficulty: the difficulty can be overcome by an outstanding man who uses extraordinary means in order to transform a corrupt matter into a good matter. Matter (human matter) can be transformed from without.” (Strauss, Three Waves of Modernity). The doors have been closing in on human freedom for many centuries, but it does not have to continue. Wise and interested parties can restore the sovereign back to the people. I believe the answer exists in a classically educated and moral people.

A Study on Virtue

2010-05-03T14:00:00.001-06:00

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What is virtue?
According to Aristotle virtue or arête is doing what we were created to do and doing it beautifully. Virtue is found in a well-balanced person with all parts of the soul in harmony with one another. Virtue can be divided into two sorts: that pertaining to thinking and that pertaining to character. Excellence of thinking and excellence of character constitute virtue.

Aristotle taught that virtue can be destroyed by excess or deficiency, and yet can be preserved by the mean between them. Says he, “I am speaking of what holds a position equally apart from either of the extremes, which is one and the same thing for everyone, but the mean in relation to us is what neither goes too far nor falls short, and this is not one thing nor the same thing for everyone.” Think of the sisters in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. Lydia and Kitty are deficient in virtue; Mary is excessive; Jane seem to be in the mean of their extremes and Lizzy is on her way to join Jane after some lessons in tolerance toward Darcy.

Should it be a means or an end?
Virtue is not an end, but should be a means to an end with the end being happiness. What is happiness? Is it living well and doing well? The reader of Aristotle’s Nicomachian Ethics arrives at the idea that it is more than this. He shall find that the classical writer intended for man to live beautifully well and to do things beautifully well. Said Aristotle, “Happiness is a being-at-work of the soul.” A student in the Lyceum Gardens in Greece learned that moral virtue was an active state or hexes. As each situation arose, he must decide how he would think and act. Deciding constantly whether he would act in a virtuous manner while in the mental, intellectual, spiritual and physical state created character, according to Aristotle. Thus character was composed of an active or a “being-at-work” condition.

Virtue is not a habit or ethos, according to Aristotle. While habits are a prerequisite to practicing virtue, it is more like a process of repeating habits. But ultimately virtue is a state of active thought and action; it is an effort of concentrating and paying attention and being teachable. “Then this must be our notion of the just man,” taught Aristotle, “that even when he is in poverty or sickness, or any other seeming misfortune, all things will in the end work together for good to him in life and death: for the gods have a care of any one whose desire is to become just and to be like God, as far as man can attain the divine likeness, by the pursuit of virtue.”

Socrates final counsel in his Republic may have set the precedent for Aristotle’s belief, “Wherefore my counsel is that we hold fast ever to the heavenly way and follow after justice and virtue always, considering that the soul is immortal and able to endure every sort of good and every sort of evil.”

How does virtue relate to government?
Plato taught that a just being would create a just society. Thus virtue was directly linked to freedom and liberty according to the classical school of thought. From Aristotle we know that “The highest good is the end of politics, while it takes the greatest part of its pains to produce citizens of a certain sort, namely, ones that are good and inclined to perform beautiful actions.” The classical writers knew that to maintain a just and noble government the people would need to be trained in virtue. They believed that moral virtue is learned just as a child learns his native language. It is not imposed upon him, but is taught and lived. In Physics, Aristotle said that virtues no more alter what we are than putting on its roof alters a house. In Politics, he wrote of the importance of education in the maintaining of the constitution, “For, inasmuch as every family is a part of a state, and these relationships are the parts of a family, and the virtue of the part must have regard to the virtue of the whole, women and children must be trained by education with an eye to the constitution, if the virtues of either of them are supposed to make any difference in the virtues of the state. And they must make a difference; for the children grow up to be citizens, and half the free persons in a state are women.”

What are the most important virtues? Why?
According to the Classical writers, virtue encompasses all good qualities that create a good and well-balanced character. Plato felt that the most important virtues were wisdom, justice, fortitude and temperance. Aristotle agreed with Plato and added five others, prudence, courage, liberality, magnificence, and magnanimity, but he and possibly, Plato, felt that wisdom was the most important virtue. On wisdom, Plato taught in Republic that a whole education would teach a man about virtue as well as vice. That he need not feel the obligation to live a life of corruption to know vice—his virtuous education would inform him and give him wisdom. Said he, “A virtuous nature, educated by time, will acquire a knowledge both of virtue and vice: the virtuous, and not the vicious man has wisdom.”

This writer believes that honesty, faith, hope and charity are the most important virtues. Honesty demands the highest trust from anyone and with that trust one can teach all truths to the edifying of the human mind. Faith lends itself to trust in God and man in order to learn all truths. Hope is the optimism in obtaining truth. Finally, charity is the absence of all pride and the application of all the good found in life.

What is the ultimate virtue? Why?
In the Aristotelian society, the full measure of virtue was to think and act like God; it was the greatest aim. If charity is what they are describing then I will agree with them, for this writer believes that charity is the ultimate virtue. It was the virtue that Christ most emulated and is the subject of the two most important commandments in the law; that of loving God and loving our fellow man. Charity is considered the highest form of love and the pure love of Christ.

How has our concept of virtue changed since the days of Plato and Aristotle?
The general notion of virtue has not changed much, but there has been a deeper value lost over the centuries. It is almost as if the great philosophers believed that each individual was created for a specific purpose or mission and that as they developed the virtues within, they would essentially do what they were created to do in a beautiful manner. Today virtue means conforming to moral conduct and moral excellence. However fine that may be, it is missing the classical element of the who we are and the what we can become and how beautifully we can perform our actions.

National Principle Decides Government Form

2010-05-03T13:55:00.001-06:00

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The best society, according to Montesquieu, is a matter of connecting the right form of government to the national principle of the people. “The government most conformable to nature,” says Montesquieu, “is that which best agrees with the humor and disposition of the people in whose favor it is established.” For instance, if the people esteem their leaders with honor, then this particular society’s best form of government would be a monarchy. If with fear, then the correct form would be despotic. On the other hand, if a people loved their country and perpetuated the value of political virtue, according to Montesquieu, then this society’s best form of government would be a republic. The United States was established upon political virtue, which can best be described as both a love of country and for the rule of law; its government was a democratic republic.

As I look at the people surrounding me in our once democratic republic, I see a change in the governing principle from its former political virtue, as well as private virtue, to that of extreme equality and commercialism. Many leaders and experts agree that our founding constitution is not compatible with our nation’s people any longer. I will have to agree with them. It is true that our national principle of equality and commercialism is pulling us along the path of pure democracy or socialism. Once the Constitution was completed, a woman asked Benjamin Franklin what the Founders had given the nation. He replied, “A republic, Madam, if you can keep it.” If Ben Franklin and Montesquieu were here they would certainly suggest that our best government, in relation to our national principle of extreme equality, should be a social democracy; a massive paternal government.

Is this the government that we want, one that will suck every drop of ambition from its people and leave them in a mess of mediocrity? If not, then everything depends on establishing the lost political virtue that America once had. “To inspire it ought to be the principal business of education: but the surest way of instilling it into children is for parents to set them an example,” says Montesquieu. Dinner discussions apropos the Founding Fathers, rule of law and love of country will invite the national principle of political virtue to return to our communities. By fostering a love of God, implementing a classical education and turning toward a true free market economy, we could have the very best of societies once again, that of a republic. It all depends on you.

The Theology of the Family

2010-04-23T20:20:00.002-06:00

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The men and women of the Old Testament understood the theology of the family. Adam and Eve were given the command to multiply and replenish the earth. Throughout all of the biblical teachings we see that family life is safeguarded with divine commandments. The three major pillars of the gospel hinge upon the family; the Creation, the Fall, and Christ’s Atoning Sacrifice were implemented to create, teach and save the families of God.

Julie B. Beck taught gospel educators that; “The Creation of the earth was the creation of an earth where a family could live. It was a creation of a man and a woman who were the two essential halves of a family. It was not about a creation of a man and a woman who happened to have a family. It was intentional all along that Adam and Eve form an eternal family. It was part of the plan that these two be sealed and form an eternal family unit. That was the plan of happiness.” (Seminaries and Institutes of Religion Satellite Broadcast, August 4, 2009, Conference Center Theatre.) The Fall provided a way for Adam and Eve to leave the garden and to form their family. Adam was commanded to work hard and “in the sweat of [his] face [could] he eat bread.” (Genesis 3:19) Eve, his wife, would work alongside him throughout their lengthy lives. They begat children and taught them to work hard, but most importantly, to obey God. The Atonement, not only would accomplish the necessary salvation for individuals, but would provide a means for the family to be sealed together eternally under the Celestial Law.

Throughout the Bible, the prophets acknowledged the doctrine of eternal families. Isaiah wrote that Israel must follow after righteousness and ought to, “look unto the rock whence [they] are hewn, and to the pit whence [they] are digged.” He continues his plea to the families, “Look unto Abraham your father, and unto Sarah that bare you: for I called him alone, and blessed him, and increased him.” (Isaiah 51:1-2)

The children of Israel were forewarned of the dangers of mingling with other faiths and marrying outside of their faith. And yet, Israel, not listening to the warnings, lived and mingled among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, and others. As is the case in any setting where we lurk among physical and spiritual dangers, we put ourselves at risk physically and spiritually. Israel was not immune to that fact. In Judges we read about Israel’s spiritual danger in intermingling with the godless and then we observe the loss of covenanted families. “And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim: And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger…And they took their daughters to be their wives, and gave their daughters to their sons, and served their gods.” (Judges 2:11-12; 3:6) Another time we see Israel’s physical danger from not heeding the Lord’s command to “destroy the accursed” from among them. Joshua records the destruction of many disobedient Israelites, “Therefore the children of Israel could not stand before their enemies, but turned their backs before their enemies, because they were accursed: neither will I be with you any more, except ye destroy the accursed from among you.” (Joshua 7:12) God warns his people because he loves them and knows that the only way to preserve them is for them to live as covenanted families and to know and live His law.

Numerous examples in the Old Testament describe righteous women and mothers who knew His law for families. These ancestral mothers taught their children to love God and eschew evil. They taught their daughters the theology of families and to desire the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant. Julie B. Beck recounts the story of Isaac and Rebekah,

“If Abraham wanted these blessings—to be the ‘father of many nations’—how important was Isaac’s wife? Isaac’s wife was pivotal in Abraham being able to receive his blessings. She was so important that he sent his servant on a mission to find the right girl—a girl who would keep her covenants, a girl who understood what it meant to form an eternal family and have those same blessings…Now, Rebekah gave up everything—she left her family and her homeland to go form an eternal family because she wanted these blessings. And of her two sons, she had one left; and of the daughters of the land, there was not one who could form an eternal marriage with her son. She needed to see that her righteous son got the blessings. Rebekah used her influence to see that the priesthood blessings and keys passed to the righteous son. It’s a perfect example of the man who has the keys and the woman who has the influence working together to ensure their blessings.” (Seminaries and Institutes of Religion Satellite Broadcast, August 4, 2009, Conference Center Theatre.)

Ruth understood the covenant and blessing of Abraham. Having lost her husband, but not wanting to leave her Mother-in-law and the God of Israel to go back to her godless family among the Moabites, she chose to stay and was blessed to marry a kinsman of Naomi and stay within the faith. She understood her role as a wife and mother in the family chain of God’s covenanted children. She bore Obed, the father of Jesse, who became the father of David and the ancestor of Jesus Christ.

Hannah understood the blessing of Abraham and desired a child, however barren. She vowed to the Lord that if she were blessed with a son, she would dedicate him to the service of God’s work. She poured out her soul, “O Lord of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of thine handmaid, and remember me, and not forget thine handmaid, but will give unto thine handmaid a man child, then I will give him unto the Lord all the days of his life. And there shall no razor come upon his head.”

Diligent, obedient wives and mothers of the Old Testament were women who understood their divine role and mission of the families. They knew how to create the seedbed for their children to grow up unto the Lord. They taught the theology of the family so their children would know how to perpetuate the blessings of Abraham. Malachi records the Lord’s last words to His people in the Old Testament; they are a powerful statement to future generations on the unifying of the family, “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.” (Malachi 4:5-6) In the last days of God’s kingdom on earth there will be a mighty change in the hearts of parents and children as they learn and understand the theology of the family.

How does that mighty change come about? Just before Malachi writes of the unified hearts of the family members, the Lord’s words remind us to, “Remember…the law of Moses…which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments.” The change of heart will surely come about as we remember the law of God. In Deuteronomy we learn that we are to fear God and keep His commandments, “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all they soul, and with all thy might.” (Deut. 6:6) However it is not enough to live in this manner, but more important is it to teach our children continually that they might remember the good examples of our ancestral parents in Israel. “And thou shalt teach [the laws] diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.” (Deut. 6:7) Moreover Moses pleads with the parents to instruct their children respecting their heritage and remind them continually of their divine deliverance out of Egyptian bondage.

Do the rising generation know the rich heritage of their ancestors, of their country’s treasured heritage? Do they know that they are the future fathers and mothers of a coming generation of the Lord? Do they fully understand the theology of families that they may have the power to safeguard future families and continue the blessings of Abraham throughout all the nations of the earth? If so we can be assured of Isaiah’s prophecy, “And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children.” (Isaiah 54:13)

Lyceum Lessons on Liberty

2010-04-23T09:06:00.002-06:00

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My wise thrifty husband delights in spending time in second-hand stores. His patience and diligence add up to furnish our home with beautiful and simple treasures. Recently David brought home an old solid oak bookcase from our local Deseret Industries Thrift Store. After a vigorous cleaning and polishing it was pristine as if it were newly handcrafted, but more beautiful still was David’s manner of action. A careful observer will perceive that he takes pleasure in doing things well. With a vision of excellence and the mastery of superb skill, he uncovered the beauty of the oaken cabinet. What constitutes this manner of excellence? Aristotle would say it was arête or virtue.

Virtue in the classical sense is best understood in knowing the aim of a specific tool. Precisely as a tool has its noble and distinct purpose, equally a man is created for a noble and virtuous end. Virtue, for Aristotle, was doing what we were created to do individually and doing it beautifully. The full measure of virtue was to think and act like God; it was the greatest aim for an Aristotelian society.

As Aristotle’s mentor, Plato taught that a just being would create a just society. Thus virtue was directly linked to freedom and liberty according to the classical school of thought. From the Lyceum gardens of Greece came the propitious words of Aristotle, “The highest good is the end of politics, while it takes the greatest part of its pains to produce citizens of a certain sort, namely, ones that are good and inclined to perform beautiful actions.” His students learned that moral virtue was an active state. It is not just a habit, but an effort of concentrating and paying attention and being ready to learn more.

The American Founders were strong believers in the principle. As statesmen in colonial times they understood the souls of men as they constructed possibly the most successful society in the world’s history. Being well versed in first principles, an enlightened constitution was created to promote the long yearned-for freedoms from a despotic Britain. Virtue would be the guiding principle in the new nation. Said Benjamin Franklin, “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become more corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.”

Are we a virtuous people? Are we doing well and beautifully those things we were created to do? Only as individuals can we answer these questions and only as individuals can we endeavor to make virtue our habit as we actively work at it in all situations of life, whether it be polishing an oaken cabinet or creating a free society.

An Old Commercial With New Meaning!

2010-01-12T08:13:00.007-07:00

Can Toys Script the Play for Your Children?

2009-12-28T08:42:00.003-07:00

What ever happened to imaginative play?

Click on the title above to read an eye-opening article about change in child's play over the past six decades and the connection to the social ills of today.

Democracy or Republic?

2009-12-28T07:26:00.001-07:00

What Is More Important For An Economy—Liberty or Equality?

2009-12-22T14:08:00.002-07:00

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The desire for equality comes from within man, not his government. Every parent observes that each child wants to have either a larger portion or an equal piece of brownie. Although Human nature passionately desires liberty, it more diligently seeks and loves the idea of equality. Tocqueville penned the truth that the more equal men are; the more insatiable will be their longing for equality. Even a small degree of liberty will satisfy man, but no amount of equality will ever be enough. At first government will allow equality and later they promote it through special interest regulations under the seemingly harmless guise of socialism.

What do democracy and socialism have in common? “Equality,” says Tocqueville, “but while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.” Gradually, the coveted equality turns against a people as government intervenes at a continually increasing rate to grant equality at the price of liberty. In their book, Free to Choose, Milton and Rose Friedman explore three levels of equality. These are equality before God, equality of opportunity and equality of outcome. The first two kinds of equalities did not limit freedoms, but expanded them to be greater than ever in the history of the world during our Nation’s founding and beyond. Since the early decades of the last century a new kind of equality has emerged that is destroying our freedoms—it is the equality of outcome. Let us explore deeper into the different levels of equality to understand their effect on the human race.

During the United States’ founding period it was the equality before God that was desperately sought to break free from an increasingly oppressive government. Inspired by John Locke and other great thinkers of the past, Thomas Jefferson composed the Declaration of Independence to proclaim that all men are created equal. The indicator to Jefferson’s intent is phrased in the famous preamble,“[that all men are] endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” Man was given the liberty to shape his own life and serve his own purposes, provided he did not interfere with similar rights of others. Invading these God-given rights was to be prohibited; therefore, government was instituted to protect these rights.

Conflict between the Declaration of Independence and slavery took center stage until finally resolved by the Civil War. Jefferson agonized over the tyranny of slavery in his notebooks and correspondences. He pondered over solutions to eliminate it. Similarly many of us today agonize over the enslaving power of the welfare system and of its ineffectiveness and degradation of the human soul, but in like manner to Jefferson, we ponder the ways it could be eliminated and find that it seems virtually impossible. Terminating welfare immediately by legislation may cause a war, but could it be phased out gradually? Will we have another civil war? Not likely, however it is quite possible to have a great many statesmen who will rise up and lead us out of the quagmire.

Shortly after the Civil War greater opportunity for all men provided a new equality never before enjoyed by men of all races—it was the equality of opportunity. It would not be an equal opportunity of “identity” in the sense of an individual’s geographical location; whether there existed a careful or neglectful upbringing; or whether there were limitations of or lack of birth defects. Equal opportunities would mean that “no one should be prevented by arbitrary obstacles from using his capacities to pursue his own objectives… and from achieving those positions for which their talents fit them and which their values lead them to seek. Not birth, nationality, color, religion, sex, nor any other irrelevant characteristic should determine the opportunities that are open to a person—only his abilities” (Friedman). The “melting pot” of all races, religions and culture shows evidence of the vast equal opportunity available in the United States. After the Civil War an explosion of free market ideas promoted extraordinary expansion of free enterprise, competition and laissez-faire. Writes Friedman, “Everyone was to be free to go into any business, follow any occupation, buy any property, subject only to the agreement of the other parties to the transaction. Each was to have the opportunity to reap the benefits if he succeeded, to suffer the costs if he failed. There were to be no arbitrary obstacles. Performance, not birth, religion, or nationality, was the touchstone.” Wealth increased exponentially and charitable activity abounded with non-profit hospitals, charitable foundations and privately endowed colleges and universities.

Equality before God and equality of opportunity provided favorable conditions for freedom and liberty to prosper. We find that when liberty and freedom existed people were allowed to live according to the dictates of their conscience. The society would become a mixture of abundance and poverty, charity and unkindness, master and laborer, honest and dishonest. Not aware they were trading freedom for their security, the people went grappling to the government for security against the “appalling activities of the corrupted”. The security they desired was in the name of socialism. It would be a system that would promote the good of and for all people. Tocqueville feared that a democracy carried too far might undermine civic virtue and replace it with social servitude, "There is a manly and lawful passion for equality which incites men to wish all to be powerful and honored. This passion tends to elevate the humble to the rank of the great; but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level, and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom.” No longer satisfied with the freedom and liberty of the first two levels of equality, the people desired a third equality that would threaten and destroy liberty, but that would ensure security. Just as the child desires an equal piece of brownie, the masses desired the security of having an equal outcome of everything. Tocqueville observed that the chief passion, which stirs men, is the love of equality of conditions.

In the last 60 years our nation has increasingly gravitated toward the security of equal outcome. “Everyone should have the same level of living or of income, [and] should finish the race at the same time.” write the Friedman’s. “As the Dodo said in Alice and Wonderland, ‘everybody has won, and all must have prizes.’” The goal today is the vague notion of fairness. There is a belief among many that some companies have an unfair hold on the market, that some children are unfairly abused, that some youth do not have the “fair” opportunity to go to college, or that some special interest group is not recognized fairly as it should be. Under this false notion of fairness the government must grow stronger and more comprehensive to make things more and more “fair” as the rapacious special interest groups grovel for more. “It becomes regularly necessary to qualify legal provisions increasingly by reference to what is ‘fair’ or ‘reasonable,’” says F. A. Hayek of increased government intervention. The Friedman’s continue, “’Fair shares for all’ is the modern slogan that has replaced Karl Marx’s, ‘To each according to his needs, from each according to his ability.’” Who decides what is fair? Who is to give the prizes? The people, having given up the liberty to choose for the want of security, have now delegated this power to the state. The state can now divide up our land, income and possessions and give it as “prizes” to others who “deserve” it. Surrendering our freedoms over to the increasingly paternal government, we gain what seems to be an increasing equality of outcome, but in reality, the disparity between the rich and the poor becomes greater and will eventually destroy the middle class. Reality is more like George Orwell’s Animal Farm where, “all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

Fearing anarchy, the masses tend toward socialism feeling that the socialist pathway is a recipe for “the good of all.” Yet, in the end the talented have lost the incentive to achieve and the mediocre have been rewarded—all are in a decadent decline towards destruction. Tocqueville warns that “anarchy is not the greatest of the ills to be feared in democratic nation, but the greatest of ills will be the careful downward path to servitude. As equality increases and is never quenched, slowly the freedom will be.”

Many are beginning to look at security, or equality of outcome, with increased apprehension. Have they sensed the reality that this level of equality is squelching our delicate freedoms? Has it been leading us down the path of socialism? Is the collectivist creed destroying our democracy? If so, where did we go wrong? What turned us down the path of servitude? Perhaps we find our answer at the beginning of this article. I commenced by stating that no amount of equality will be enough for man. Later in our study of the three levels of equality we saw that our passion for equality will increase infinitely until we have destroyed our freedoms. The solution is as simple as instilling knowledge to the child who wants an equal piece of brownie. Virtues and ethics are learned; character is built; patience, kindness and charity are impressed upon the young heart. People without the knowledge of what Thomas Jefferson truly meant about equality have interpreted it to mean equality of outcome. Lack of knowledge is perhaps the main cause for our economic catastrophe today. Tocqueville suggests that we seek our education from the classics, “All who have ambitions to literary excellence in democratic nations should ever refresh themselves at classical springs; that is the most wholesome medicine for the mind. Not that I hold the classics beyond criticism, but I think that they have special merits well calculated to counterbalance our peculiar defects. They provide a prop just where we are most likely to fall.” It may be easier to be trained for a career at the local university, but it is essential for our freedoms that we be immersed in a lifelong education in the liberal arts.

Above, I mentioned the possibility of Statesmen leading us out of the quagmire of the welfare state. Statesmen build their character upon the high moral virtues found in the ancient and modern classics. Some are formally educated in the universities and some are self-educated from the mentor/authors of the classics, but both learn to understand human nature and the history of cause and effect. They are empowered with the knowledge that restores and maintains freedoms. It is essential that we relearn our true history and understand human nature or continue on the path of servitude and ignorance. Whether we have the statesmen to lead us out of our predicament or not depends upon the reader. What is more important to you—Liberty or equality?

Unconditional Love has Converting Power

2009-12-12T22:42:00.002-07:00

A talk given recently:

Some time ago I was in the Missionary Training Center preparing to serve God’s children in Argentina. I was thrilled for the opportunity to serve in the same country as my father had done before me. He had loved his mission and the people and the faith building experiences. I grew to love Argentina because of my father. But in the MTC I was surprised that we were being taught to pray with all the energy of our souls to love the people. “Why?” I asked, “wouldn’t that just come naturally?” Don’t I already love them because my father loved them? The next words from my MTC teacher would be repeated in my mind frequently for the next 21 years. He told us that we would need the Lord’s kind of love for these people. They would be of a different culture with different traditions and values than what I had been raised with. I would be teaching them truths that were hard to bare for many of them, but they would listen because they could feel God’s love emanating from me building trust in Him, the Savior, and many of them would want to make the commitments of membership. That day I learned a powerful truth that people will come unto Him more readily if we truly love them with this pure love of Christ, this unconditional love.

Jesus told his disciples opposite of what the world believed was love. He said in Matthew 5:43-44, “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
“But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Christ’s love is not the same as the world’s love. It may seem much easier to love those who are nice, those who behave well, who are respected, and powerful, and influential. And we should love them, but that is only part of the equation—the easy part. The better part is to love those who do not seem to deserve it. King Benjamin knew that we would be tempted to not practice true unconditional love towards others and he warned us that “The natural man is an enemy to God,” he explained, “and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father. . (Mosiah 3:19)
I found in my mission as well as when I became a wife and a mother that unconditional love was a powerful tool in healing hearts and bringing others to Christ.

A marriage that is built on a foundation of unconditional love in the covenant and oath of the Priesthood has the power to overcome the difficulties of this temporal world. Parents who teach and discipline with unconditional love see through the difficulties of childhood and young adulthood and recognize in their children all the gifts and talents the Lord has given them. Parenting becomes more joyful and more meaningful. Individuals who see their neighbors through the glasses of unconditional love will not be offended or angry and will be given the opportunity to lift another rather than condemn.

The disciples of the New Testament together with those of this continent in the Book of Mormon knew the converting power of unconditional love, thus they preached that it was the most desirable gift to possess and encouraged all to pray for it. Paul told us we are nothing if we do not have it. Nephi conversed with the angel who taught him about the tree of life and learned that unconditional love was “the most desirable above all things.” (1 Ne. 11:22) One of the last messages in the Book of Mormon is a discourse from Moroni who pleads with those in the latter days, “But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God.” (Moro. 7:47–48)

Over two decades have passed since I learned the converting power of unconditional love. It has not been a lesson that has changed me overnight, nor will it, but it has been a journey of learning, stretching and growing. It has been a journey of joy.
I would like to share an experience with you about growth through finding unconditional love for an enemy. Some years ago my mother brought into her home a person who had lost her way. She had joined the church as a young adult, had gone on a mission and had become engaged to a nice active member. When things did not work out as intended, she became sad and lost her way. She turned to the vices that she had known before joining the church and was in this state when my mother took her in. Over the years, I have listened more to the adversary than to the Spirit and began letting judgments on her character build inside me. At times I would repent, but not fully. Had I practiced unconditional love I would have seen who she really was as a child of God. It wasn’t until last summer when President Sagers asked us to clear up any poor relationships in order to be prepared to go to the Twin Falls Temple. Through fasting and prayer I prayed diligently and with all the energy of my heart to have that pure love of Christ. Gradually it came and it seemed that my whole being was transforming, that each cell was rebuilding on this new realm of love. I felt a charity for her that I had never felt before and it continues today and she has responded to me more kindly. I testify that this love converts individuals to Christ; both the giver and the receiver.

This Christmas season will be more meaningful to you and to me as we plead to Heavenly Father for this love; the pure love of Christ. As you do He will bless you with gradual amounts of love and you will feel the power come over you to love even your most troublesome enemy and you will feel your capacity to love grow boundless.

Jesus Christ is the author of love. He lives and loves each of us with unconditional love. It was that love that gave him the omnipotent power to atone for our sins. This is His Church. We are his children. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen

The Importance of a Liberal Arts Education

2009-12-12T16:46:00.001-07:00

A response to Hayek's, The Road to Serfdom:

The pilgrims, wishing to worship how they pleased, commenced the beginning of a free society in the newly discovered North America. Over the span of almost two centuries a very large body of people came to believe in a set of principles for politics, economics and education. A corpus of fundamental principles was written in an unprecedented constitution. Over the decades since the founding, our nation became the world’s power center in science, medicine and technology; it lead in politics and education; the free market produced advances in trade and industry. Why was America such a great success? Among many things, the people believed in a certain order of values that guided them in their families and communities, in their vocation, and in their politics. They were educated in the liberal arts that gave them a broad base of knowledge in human nature, politics and literature. F. A. Hayek explains in his book, The Road to Serfdom, how a great nation could unknowingly make choices that would lead them in the opposite direction of the liberty and great bounty we have enjoyed.

Socialism comes in many forms, he writes, but the end is always the same: totalitarianism. Good people lead and thinking that they are doing good things, they plan for ways to help the poor and the suffering by providing programs. What are the outcomes? Never what was expected, in fact, the good leaders would be opposed if they knew the end product beforehand. Virtues lost in a socialist environment include independence, self-reliance, initiative, and responsibility. Fascism, and Communism become the ultimate ends of any socialist state. I wish to influence the reader in understanding that it has been a lack of education that has prompted us down the road to socialism.

The more education received and the more intelligent the individual, the more varied are his interests. He will be less likely to follow the crowd or to agree on a single order of uniform values dictated by a government. If we want to find “a high degree of uniformity and similarity of outlook, we have to descend to the regions of lower moral and intellectual standards where the more primitive and ‘common’ instincts and tastes prevail.” This set of values, the lower and baser, is what will lead a nation. Hayek doesn’t mean “that the majority of people have low moral standards; [he] merely means that the largest group of people whose values are very similar are the people with low standards. It is, as it were,” he concludes, “the lowest common denominator, which unites the largest number of people.”

In the above situation, who leads? It is the potential dictator who can project these low moral standards and recruit more of the masses to support them. Hayek suggests that “it will be those who form the ‘mass’ in the derogatory sense of the term, the least original and independent, who will be able to put the weight of their numbers behind [the dictator’s] particular ideals.” Hayek describes how this dictator will surround himself with people and groups of people who can devise propaganda and programs to push their value system. The followers in this situation are “the docile and gullible,” writes Hayek, “who have no strong convictions of their own but are prepared to accept a ready-made system of values if it is only drummed into their ears sufficiently loudly and frequently. It will be those whose vague and imperfectly formed ideas are easily swayed and whose passions and emotions are readily aroused who will thus swell the ranks of the totalitarian party.”

How can you, dear reader, and I help to combat the low, base, primitive ideals that would eventually destroy freedom? It will have to begin with our own education. There will be others who will be frontrunners in reforming education to include broad liberal arts in addition to social education. What is the difference between the two, you ask? An education in the liberal arts is expanding breadth and depth of general knowledge as a foundation to build upon. It includes reading, writing, discussing and debating the Great Conversation as is found in the classics, ancient and modern. A social education is a technical or professional training for a preferred vocation. Both are necessary, but only one can maintain freedom—an education in the liberal arts. When I say liberal I do not mean the modern sense of liberal as in the progressive movement, but in the root meaning of the word liber, which means, “free.”

Many scholars including Hayek advocate a broad education as essential for resisting propaganda and remaining free. “Even the most intelligent and independent people,” says Hayek, “cannot entirely escape that influence [of political propaganda] if they are long isolated from all other sources of information.” The choice to change our educational system from one of liberal arts to a social education and training has been one of those choices that has isolated us from the liberating principles of freedom and may surely lead us down the road to serfdom. There is still time and there are still classics sitting on the shelves of our libraries waiting for us to pick up and read, allowing us to join the Great Conversation. It is a choice that will lead us to freedom one individual at a time.

History Teaches...

2009-12-09T10:34:00.000-07:00

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."
--C.S. Lewis

What is Truth?

2009-12-08T22:21:00.001-07:00

Good things come to those who discuss:

While arguing Rothbard’s ideas with Dave we chose to be offended for our own reasons. He and I were not agreeing about the Free Market bringing abundance to all participants as stated by Rothbard and Bastiat. He believed that the impoverished soul who chooses not to work is more abundantly taken care of in a welfare state and I believed that in any level of a free market economy that all participants are blessed with more abundance each at their level of wealth, continually progressing further towards more abundance. It is okay to disagree, but we were angry about it and one of us wanted to stop the discussion—Period, the end!

I explained to him that I am not arguing for the sake of being right and “showing off”, but was truly wanting to practice verbalizing in the Socratic method. Learning comes better for me if I can discuss, explain, question and listen. I was frustrated that the dialog would come to an end for that very reason. I began doing what women do best—analyze. Why do we angrily argue about ideas? What is it that offends us? How can we get to the bottom of this if we cannot discuss? What is the “bottom of this” I asked myself? The bottom of this is truth. Whose truth? God’s truth. If it is God’s truth, why are we arguing? Isn’t His truth always constant and unchanging and unquestionably the way it is? Aha, an epiphany arose in my mind that might be the cause of the arduous argument. Are we arguing because we wish to have ownership in the truth we are seeking? Do we want to be the possessor of the truth that ensures that we are “right”? “Was that the cause?”, we discussed together. A sudden relief swept over me as I realized that yes we were “hoarding” the truth for the sake of being the “right” one. There is power in that you know. But, obviously not a power of happiness or peace.

The thought came to me that this idea is huge. Is there anything more huge? Absolutely not. Everything that comes from God is truth. All humankind are in search of it in their own way, but when we hoard it by arguing over it we are in essence taking possession of what is already His. He gives truth to us. All that we seek for is ours, not to hoard, but to share. The essence of why we must learn, discuss and ponder is to search for His truth.

Center for Social Leadership Youth

2009-12-06T07:15:00.003-07:00

My son, Andrew, and his friends at Williamsburg Academy have put together an inspiring and educational site for youth. On the front page they say, "At CSLYouth we are preparing ourselves so that we can provide the solutions to the coming style of life and leadership. Our mission is to become better connected with youth across the Nation and World, and preparing them for tomorrow by using the technology of today."

Who are the authors of the site and what do they believe?

We are students, youth, and leaders. We come from different backgrounds, races, religions, ethnicities, and places.

We part ways with the stereotypical teenager, who is commonly viewed as lazy, overly dramatic, ignorant, incompetent and egotistical.
At CSL Youth, we are young men and women who are educating ourselves for leadership, who value virtue, wisdom, diplomacy, and courage. It is clear to us that humanity is experiencing dramatic changes. The type of leadership in our parents’ world is broken. Instead of letting big business and big government have all the power, our generation is breaking that power up so each individual can make their own unique contributions. As we unite, we are making a new power system which is more service-oriented, where we can choose to serve instead of being forced by government. And can we just say, technology rocks! Our mission is to prepare ourselves to be the leaders who make sure this new power system--which is coming--values faith, family and freedom. At CSL Youth, we dedicate ourselves to improving our own lives and society regardless of our social standing, wealth, privilege and especially age. We are young, but we can create beauty, lift our vision of mankind, educate ourselves and each other, and deepen our life experience. We can prepare for leadership. We will lead in all parts of society, including business, government, education, media, religion, family and community to protect our freedom and the freedom of our children. Our parents’ generation has left us with a huge national debt, landfills full of Coke bottles we didn't drink from, and a broken educational system that pretty much stinks. Society is suffering. Institutions are crumbling. We have lost our faith in government and corporations. Yesterday’s leadership is lacking, even broken. And it is up to us to step up and act. We are preparing ourselves so that we can provide the solutions. Have you asked yourself, What is the highest and best use of my talents and passions? What can I do that will have the most positive impact on society? How will the world be better because of my life and contribution? What was I born to do ? At CSL Youth, we believe that we can make a difference. WE can inspire each other. WE can help each other. WE can teach each other. WE can do it. Who are we? We are… Students. Youth. Leaders. Will you join us?

Free To Choose, Milton and Rose Friedman

2009-12-06T06:48:00.001-07:00

My Summary and Response to the Book:

In their book, Free To Choose, Milton and Rose Friedman write to the common person why a moderate free market system is the best mode of government. They tout that a free market with limited government regulation far surpasses the rate of financial progress for all classes, verses a stagnant socialist system that destroys incentive and growth. Societies that do not permit the free market have huge gaps between the rich and the poor. The socialists believe that the fault lies in the man and not in the system so they continually make the system bigger and more comprehensive to fix the “faulty man”. A free market grows wealth by allowing the individual to do what he does best in his own way within the law. The difference is that with socialism, massive amounts of energy and spending is focused on coercive measures of conformity whereas in the free market most of the energy is focused on innovation and production.

They recommend that the government be limited and that power should never be used to provide benefits. They harmonize with the words of John Stuart Mill, “The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.” Welfare programs are coercive. “New Deal” programs have proven to be very inefficient. Resolving to teach solutions to the ordinary person, the Friedman’s give solutions for reducing and eventually phasing out Social Security and other “cradle to grave” programs. They advise putting education back into the parents’ hands where it belongs.

Three equalities are explored—equality before God, equality of opportunity and equality of outcome. During the United States’ Founding period it was the equality before God that was sought. Shortly after the Civil War greater opportunity for all men provided a new equality never before enjoyed by all men of all races—it was the equality of opportunity. Both equalities did not limit freedoms, but expanded them. Since the early decades of the last century a new kind of equality has emerged that is destroying our freedoms—it is the equality of outcome. “Everyone should have the same level of living or of income,” write the authors, “[and] should finish the race at the same time. As the Dodo said in Alice and Wonderland, ‘everybody has won, and all must have prizes.’” The goal is fairness, a very vague notion. In the end the talented lose the incentive to achieve and the mediocre are rewarded—all are in a decadent decline towards destruction. Under this false notion of fairness the government must grow stronger and more comprehensive to make things more and more “fair” as the rapacious special interest groups grovel for more.

My Response to Approaching Zion, Hugh Nibley

2009-12-06T06:35:00.007-07:00

What is the use of studying economics through the scholars of Adam Smith, Frederic Bastiat and F. A. Hayek when the Lord says the opposite? I just spent several weeks pouring over Wealth of Nations, Economic Harmonies and The Road to Serfdom mingled with selected works of Karl Marx and theories of John Maynard Keynes. What did it teach me? I learned that the free market works and that regulated economies lead to totalitarianism; that faith in the “invisible hand” leads to individual wealth as well as national wealth and that following one’s self-interest leads to a more abundant and wealthy people. Before reading Hugh Nibley’s Approaching Zion, I was convinced that the free-market is the ultimate way and that anything else means destruction to liberty. Confused am I now as I contemplate the Lord’s economy taught in Nibley’s book, which dictates that we must be completely equal with no poor among us. As much as I hated Marx’s philosophy I was tormented to think that the Lord wants us to live similar to Marx’s utopia. It could not be so. Relieved, I realized that Marx’s utopia is obtained by force in an immoral world called communism. Zion, the other utopia, is achieved by individual choice in a pure and moral world. The difference is morality and virtue as opposed to immoral behavior and vice.

Excuses and justifications for immoral actions are the desire of today. Darwinism and Marxism fulfill those desires and become the justification for much of our societal living. It is the lack of spiritual teachings that promote the moral decay leading to an environment where communism can be possible. With such a dark prospect, it is no wonder why many still fight for a free market economy—an economy that allows free choice and prosperity. But on a higher level, God wishes us to not be concerned with money and becoming wealthy—He commands that we be completely obedient and full of compassion to the point that there is “no poor among us.” He teaches us His economy and the proper way to work in His kingdom, which is to study the scriptures, preach the Gospel, and work the land. There is no “self-interest” in the way that Adam Smith teaches, but only the interest in God’s kingdom and the focused preparation that must take place for Zion to prosper.

So my question in the beginning was why study Smith, Bastiat and Hayek when God’s economy is so different? I can only guess that before we can begin living, as God desires we must take strides apart from the slavery-loving Marxists and the compulsory planned economies of Keynes. The free-market is only a step in the right direction. The next step must be a liberal education. And in our education will we studying the subject of how to earn a living and get rich or will we study those revered subjects that will make us better men? All the while a spiritual education must be pursued according to ancient scripture and modern revelation in order to understand and prepare us for God’s economy.

My Summary of Approaching Zion by Hugh Nibley

2009-12-06T06:31:00.002-07:00

Hugh Nibley sums up the ultimate utopia in his book, Approaching Zion, as explained by ancient Israel, ancient American Book of Mormon prophets and early prophets of the Latter-Day dispensation. If one has read any of the writings of Karl Marx he may find that the two works seem to be similar. They both tout equality with no rich and no poor among them. The difference, however, is significant and immensely opposite. Marx’s utopia is obtained by force in an immoral world called communism. Zion, the other utopia, is achieved by individual choice in a pure and moral world. Shedding light on Zion, the prophet Brigham Young elucidates that it will never be achieved until “this inequality shall cease on the earth.” How is equality attained? Nibley describes the process in a series of lectures that comprise Approaching Zion. The people must prepare to receive Zion by obedience to and by becoming pure unto God. The mental attitude should be the belief that everything comes from God; that we do not earn anything from God and that because all comes from Him, everyone has a right to what he needs to sustain him, even that of the stranger who harvests a needed apple off another’s tree to maintain his life as he walks on his merry way.

Nibley writes of the zealous, but uneducated individuals who strive in vain to prepare for Zion. “Zeal,” he writes, “makes us loyal and unflinching, but God wants more than that.” He wants us to obtain knowledge and learn to do our own thinking in addition to having zeal. With many essential truths having been removed from its classrooms, the modern education of today is an education without spirituality and does not educate the whole man. Being humble and teachable is the key to receive the required knowledge that creates the whole man who is prepared to receive Zion. Writes Nibley, “True knowledge never shuts the door on more knowledge, but zeal often does.” He cautions us to become liberally educated equal to our zeal.

There is no middle ground when it comes to preparing for Zion. The masses want to have both the blessings from heaven and the excitement of the world. Zion can only be built on true religion, which is obedience to every principle and doctrine. It is a separation of worldly dogma. Nibley reiterates the truth in Matthew 6:19-20, “You cannot lay up treasures both on earth and in heaven—you cannot divide your heart between them; for to one master or the other you must give your whole and undivided devotion.” Devotion to God reduces corruption. Educating our families away from the middle ground to the saving principles of Zion is paramount to begin the preparation for the Lord to bring Zion to earth. Nibley exclaims that we must preach it, live it, study it and discuss Zion in our families so that they will know how to bring it to the earth!

F. A. Hayek's Road To Serfdom—A Summary

2009-12-06T06:20:00.002-07:00

In his book, The Road to Serfdom, Friedrich A. Hayek, touts classical liberalism and free market economics as the best way to build a happy wealthy nation. He recounts the history leading up to Nazi Germany through the rise of socialism. He demonstrates that democratic planning requires propaganda and coercion and is best implemented in an ignorant society. Hayek sought to find the true commonalities in the many sides of socialism. Fascism and communism are similar in that the end of either become totalitarian systems, but they differ when they exist in a capitalist system—one being a conservative party and the other a modern liberal party. Either way they both share the path of constant expansion of a centralized government. Hayek warns us in his book that unless we change our present course of collectivism we will be headed down the road to serfdom.

My Response to Economic Harmonies by Frederic Bastiat

2009-10-10T06:55:00.000-06:00

Ramblings...

Bastiat’s Economic Harmonies has been a breath of fresh air for one who just finished reading the works of Karl Marx. The harsh society of socialism abolishes private property, family relations, classical education and religion. The socialists argue that capital causes a division of labor, which creates social classes, which creates hostility between the classes. They say that such a social order includes exploitation, evil choices and human suffering. To that I agree; and yet, I say, that is part of the natural path of free trade. With all good things there is opposition because men have agency. Agency is a natural order that brings choice and accountability. “Society is composed of men,” writes Bastiat, “and every man is a free agent. Since man is free, he can choose; since he can choose, he can err; since he can err, he can suffer.” There is growth through suffering and when institutions attempt to remove that error and suffering, they must remove agency and ultimately freedom. “If man-made institutions intervene in these matters to nullify divine law, evil nonetheless follows upon error, but it falls upon the wrong person. It strikes him whom it should not strike; it no longer serves as a warning or a lesson; it is no longer self-limiting; it is no longer destroyed by its own action; it persists, it grows worse.” So I echo Bastiat and proclaim, “bring on free trade and liberty!” Let the people choose for themselves.

The Socialist’s negative view of capitalism and competition is contested that evil choices made by men eventually correct themselves in time. Bastiat wrote, “Man’s principal social tendencies are harmonious in that, as every error leads to disillusionment and every vice to punishment, the discords tend constantly to disappear.” Bastiat did not try to cover up the fact that in a free society there would be errors. Competition does not remove hardship and suffering. The importance of struggle and effort, pain and suffering was essential for man’s progress. “On every rung of the ladder of progress,” says Bastiat, “a certain degree of suffering is and always will be man’s lot. But it teaches us also that suffering has a mission, since it would be impossible to comprehend the role of desire as a goad to our faculties if it lagged behind them, instead of rushing along ahead, as it does.” Although susceptible to evil and injustice, the best way to freedom, according to Bastiat, is undeniably free trade, which includes capitalism and competition.

Seemingly unbeknownst to the socialists, competition exists in both the natural and artificial order. Bastiat warned that competition could not be destroyed. In a free society it would be manifested in a struggle to become the best and most preferred producer, however in a socialist society it would be manifest in the direct opposite. Says Bastiat, “Men would still compete, but they would compete to excel in idleness, stupidity and improvidence.”

Whether we choose the natural social order or the artificial order there will always be competition, free exchange, evil, pain, and suffering. Bastiat enlightens the reader that there is a natural harmony that exists between the interests of man and mankind and that free trade and natural competition will be the mainspring to extend all the gifts of nature worldwide to bless humanity. In the spirit of the book of Revelations, Bastiat proclaims that “evil ends in good and hastens its coming, whereas the good can never end in evil, and therefore must eventually triumph.” Hooray for the good news projected in Economic Harmonies. I am convinced that no artificial social order can bring the happiness achieved in a free state.

Bastiat's Economic Harmonies

2009-10-10T06:53:00.000-06:00

A summary...

The French politician and economist, Frédéric Bastiat was concerned with France’s unfortunate direction towards an artificial social order called Socialism and set out to convince his countryman to adopt the notion of liberty, the natural social order. His passion for freedom gave him an interest for free trade, which subject he examined in his book, Economic Harmonies. In argument with the socialist’s scarcity mentality, he established the belief that the interests of mankind are essentially harmonious and that the more an individual produced the more he blessed those around him. The same is true for a nation: the more a nation produced the more it blessed the world.

Among many of the socialists’ views were the beliefs that as the rich became richer, the poor became more impoverished; as population increased, food would become scarce; and as private property is theft, it should be abolished with all property becoming communal. He sums up their ideas that mankind is unable to make the right choices and that liberty must be the culprit. Underestimating the good and denying the progress made by humanity, the socialist persisted in, “seeking out evils and exaggerating them beyond measure.” Reducing liberty and free choice then became the first motive as they created, “systematic obstructionism, parliamentary bickering, street insurrections, revolutions, crises, factions, wild notions, demands advanced by all men to govern under all possible forms, new systems, as dangerous as they are absurd, which teach the people to look to the government for everything.” In simple terms, people could not do anything for themselves so the government must step in to provide.

The socialists were particularly caught up with the seemingly evil notion of self-interest. They believed that it was the root of evil in a society. The capitalist’s self-interest exploits the proletarian; self-interested greed leads to monopoly; over-population leads to scarce resources were some of their complaints. Frequently misunderstood by humanity are the two social sciences, moral and political economy. The moral realm directs our moral character and includes religious sentiment, parental affection, filial devotion, love, friendship, patriotism, charity, and all godly virtues. The remaining social science runs the economy and includes the single and cold domain of self-interest. It is because of self-interest, observes Bastiat, that the man produces and acquires, but it inevitably blesses society.

Bastiat contended that exploitation, monopoly and scarce resources are problems that arise when there is a disbelief in Providence. If men are ruled by virtuous principles then their self-interest will be in harmony with nature. He urged his people to have faith in God who knows our wants and will provide. “Let us, therefore stop worrying about the fate of mankind,” wrote Bastiat, “Thousands of centuries lie ahead of it; and in any case, without asking political economists to settle problems that are out of their field, let us confidently leave the fate of future generations in the hands of Him who will call them into existence.” With the help of God, whatever his children cannot do, He makes up for it. Bastiat historically showed that, “As capital increases, the capitalists’ absolute share in the total production increases and their relative share decreases. On the other hand, the workers’ share increases both relatively and absolutely.” History has shown that in a free society, Bastiat is right.

My Response to the Works of Karl Marx

2009-09-26T07:08:00.000-06:00

Beware Marx:

Why should one study the works of Karl Marx? The reader either loves him or hates him. Dark and abstract are his ideas of dialectic materialism and the abolishment of family, classical education, religion and private property. The reasons to pursue a careful study include the following. Reading Marx reveals the antithesis of religion, which when studied gives greater understanding of one’s own belief just as the carpenter compares two boards to find the one that is straight. His ideas cause readers to ask questions, to argue, to reach deep inside themselves to understand their own beliefs and the effects of their choices. However dark and odious are his conceptions, he has greatly influenced most of the world’s modern politics and economics.

I wish to compare Marx’s ideas with some of the fundamental principles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day-Saints. The first is the divine directive to “put off the natural man.” The spiritual man must dominate the natural man through believing in and partaking of the Atonement. It is a journey of self-mastery in line with God’s moral code as a means of Eternal Life. In direct opposition, Marx professes world happiness when the natural man dominates the spiritual man, even to the point of destroying him. “The more man puts into God,” scorns Marx, “the less he retains in himself.” It is his goal to elevate man higher than God “The criticism of religion,” Marx writes, “ends in the teaching that man is the highest being for man, it ends, that is, with the categorical imperative to overthrow all conditions in which man is a debased, forsaken, contemptible being forced into servitude.” His view depended upon the working class, the proletariats, rising up to dominate the upper classes; to be prepared to revolt against the French aristocracy.

Another comparison is the task to remove human error and suffering. Marxism endeavors to take the place of the Savior’s divine role as Redeemer by fixing all the societal problems associated with affliction and sin. First it must remove all religion. If there are no moral codes there can be no sin. “Communists preach no morality at all,” profess Marx, “They do not put to people the moral demand: Love one another, be not egoists, etc.; on the contrary, they know very well that egoism, like sacrifice, is under specific conditions a necessary form of the individual’s struggle for survival.” If there is no capitalism or division of labor there is no exploitation. If there is no family, there can be no division of labor.

Finally, the Saints of the Latter Days are admonished to study the scriptures and their heritage in order to remember the many good things the Lord has done to bless his children. Marx attacks the study of history, as it is not relevant to a communist society. He seems to think that if there is no classical education there will be no remembrance of the rich history that reminds the masses of the right paths to take or how to think and act in every condition. Today our education spends much of the time teaching multi-culturalism instead of a balance of the rich history and heritage. It’s goal leans toward teaching the embarrassing and the degrading class struggles just as Marx dictated. We need a balance of all history. Remember William Wilberforce who, because he understood the degradation of the slaves, stood up as a hero for humankind. Remember Christopher Columbus who was "wrought upon by the spirit" to discover this land for the preparation of the Restoration of the gospel? Because of his voyage, we know from the annals of history and the Book of Mormon that the descendants of Nephi were to be scattered and afflicted, but that if they would return to his fold, they would be blessed beyond measure. I fear that if we forget the stories, the heroes and the Lord’s hand in all the annals of history, we will lose the greatest heritage, that of the great founding of our country. Preparing to usher in the Restoration of the Gospel, many great and common people were led to find and found this land with good government. We can keep this if we study and learn from all facets of history, not just the facet of class struggle.

Karl Marx

2009-09-26T07:07:00.000-06:00

A Summary of his works:

Using Hegelian philosophy, English economics and French politics, Marx sets out to create the ultimate communist society. His dialectic materialism takes the contradictions of thought, namely a thesis and antithesis and forms a “higher truth” called a synthesis, which becomes the new thesis. It is now combined with an antithesis, which again produces a synthesis, which again becomes a new thesis. The process continues until the ultimate “truth” is found. In this way, according to Marx, we will eventually attain the perfect state, free of class struggle. “It is the return of man himself as a social [being],” writes Marx.

The enemy to communism is capitalism with its division of labor and its division of the classes into property owners and property-less workers. Marx describes how the laborer is separated from the products he creates, his labor-power and from nature. He is alienated from his potential to become a universal being and master the universe. Abolishing capitalism will require that private property, religion, family and classical education are abolished and replaced by “free, conscious, creative social activity, in which man is not dominated by need, envy, or the desire to possess.” (Eugene Kamenka)

Marx predicts that the proletariat will rise up against the bourgeoisie and overthrow the state, as was the attempt during the French Revolution, but that it would not fail as in the French Revolution. He feels that no leader could liberate the proletariat, but the proletariat itself; nor could any ideology replace the theological understanding or the empirical insight of the perfect society, communism.

Karl Marx to Change the Way We Learn From History

2009-09-25T11:44:00.003-06:00

I am reading Karl Marx works form my university class and am amazed at the parallels between his ideas and what is happening in our nation and world:

Although much of the world believes Marxism, do we realize that his ideas attempt to take over the Savior’s Divine Role. “The criticism of religion,” says Marx in 1844, “ends in the teaching that man is the highest being for man, it ends, that is, with the categorical imperative to overthrow all conditions in which man is a debased, forsaken, contemptible being forced into servitude.” In these words, Marx is planning on reducing all afflictions of mankind by eventually setting up communism. The Atonement of Christ redeems mankind from their sin and afflictions and it is only through him on the condition that we believe and keep his commandments and covenants. Our nation’s public education spends much of the time teaching multi-culturalism instead of the rich history and heritage. It’s goal is going towards teaching the embarrassing and the degrading class struggles just as Marx dictated. I fear that if we forget the stories, the heroes and the Lord’s hand in all the annals of history, we will lose the greatest heritage, that of the great founding of our country. Preparing to usher in the Restoration of the Gospel, many great and common people were led to find and found this land with good government. We can keep this if we study and learn from all facets of history, not just the facet of class struggle.

Book Review: Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

2009-09-21T03:22:00.003-06:00

A Brief Summary:

The natural processes of a successful economy are found in Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. Although two hundred plus years old, Smith focuses on significantly profound and pertinent principles for any age. Stressing that regulations tend to limit prosperity and production, his extensive research of history and economics proves that a free market is an effective system in producing a wealthy nation. “The object of political economy of every country is to increase the riches and power of the country,” writes Smith. He proposes that wealth is built on labor, savings and investment. His labor theory of value regards “labor [as the] the real measure of the exchangeable value of all commodities [and that] the real price of everything is the toil and trouble of acquiring it.” Unlike our nation’s current course of consuming, Smith declares that saving is the sure path to wealth. He observes that, “Parsimony, and not industry is the immediate cause of the increase of capital.” Importantly, he measures the wealthiest nations as those who have a surplus to invest or to increase production. His main theme throughout is that great fortunes are made through a long life of industry, frugality, and careful saving.

My Response to Smith's Wealth of Nations:

Lamentably our country is in financial trouble. The future looks bleak as we contemplate the consequences of consumer and national debt, deflation of currency and an increase of government intervention and regulations. A close look at society will reveal that individuals as a majority are heavily in debt. What is the solution to this downward financial spiral? Do our societal choices mimic individual choices?

God, as a standard of what is right and wrong sets moral principles for promoting human happiness and progress. When those principles are followed, happiness and progress abounds. But the opposite is true that misery and decline follow when wrong choices are made. For example, a prodigal, who does not live within his means, destroys his capital and that of others. His idleness and prodigality encroaches upon the industry and capital of his progenitors. If a great number in a society follow his immoral example then society is in a state of debt and moral decline. Adam Smith states in his book, Wealth of Nations, that if prodigality is not compensated by frugality the path will lead to an impoverished country. Individuals must change if the society is to change. Change must come from the bottom up.

Supposing that Adam Smith is correct, I propose that the solution to our economic woes begin with individuals who are hard working and frugal, who save for a rainy day and who invest surplus income. Individually achieving these four principles will have a great affect in improving our nation’s economy. Smith affirms, “As capital of an individual can be increased only by what he saves from his annual revenue or his annual gains, so the capital for a society, which is the same with that of all the individuals who compose it, can be increased only in the same manner.” Sorry John Maynard Keynes, your philosophy of spending, debt and deflation of money has historically proven to send a nation to its ruin.

Smith explains that the principle of saving regularly is a natural expression of bettering oneself and that the greater the fortune, the greater ability to improve individual, familial and societal conditions provided that the individual is a moral person. “Capitals are increased by parsimony, and diminished by prodigality and misconduct,” writes Smith. Wealth is not built upon spending and consuming, but upon sound principles of careful investing, saving, frugality and parsimoniously living. If Smith’s principles are practiced, the nation’s downward spiral can be reversed.

A Vision to Improve Family

2009-08-08T21:22:00.002-06:00

A great family has a vision of purpose or mission—they actively create their life together while other families are created by life, passively waiting to see where their life’s activities take them next. A successful family improves the environment by working hard along side each other in such activities as chores, family meals, routines, family meetings, trainings and spiritual worship. Of course, they are not perfect, but they know a few secrets that help them to be successful.

An attitude of serving each other is a significant link to a successful and happy family. It enlivens the giver and favors the receiver. The Arbinger Institute has discovered a solution to an age-old dilemma of behavioral problems. In their book, The Choice, it infers that responding to others in service is the root of our personal happiness. They observe that on the surface, humans differ extensively, but below that surface and at the level of who we are, there are only two ways that we differ—we either respond to others needs or we resist their needs. By seeing another as a “person” we respond to them in a personal and caring way. By seeing them as an “object” we inadvertently resist their needs.

When we choose to see another as an object we habitually form false ideas in our mind, thus we betray ourselves. An example would be when a mother senses a need to bond with a child, and does not follow through; she is soon filled with guilt. But rather than returning to her responsibility of following through, she begins to put her blame on someone or something. In this case, she begins to fill her mind with degrading thoughts about her husband and his neglect of the child in question. She, therefore, transferred her responsibility (her feeling that she should bond with her child) to someone else. The moment we choose to resist any individual’s need is the moment we go down the dark path of self-betrayal.

If we choose to resist service to others we are betraying our deepest sense of what is right. When we positively respond to another’s need, we portray our deepest sense of what is right.

Leading by example coupled with real intent is an effective tool to silently teach. Individuals learn more perfectly from a leader’s example. A parent acting how he wants his child to act will have a greater impact on what they become than from any other manner of teaching. Expedition leader Ernest Shackleton portrayed an excellent standard of example on Britain’s Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition of 1914. Upon asking his men to do something, he would be the first to comply. All of the men on the voyage survived the difficult expedition because of the morale and good attitude learned from their leader’s example. One of his men wrote that [Shackleton] was “the greatest leader ever came on God’s earth, bar none.” Similarly, a parent’s example and pure motive will empower their children to become well behaved.

Michael E. Gerber, of The E-Myth Revisited, enlightens the reader on the attitude that drives example, “The work we do is a reflection of who we are. If we’re sloppy at it, it’s because we’re sloppy inside. If we’re late at it, it’s because we’re late inside. If we’re bored by it, it’s because we’re bored inside, with ourselves, not with the work. The most menial work can be a piece of art when done by an artist. So the job here is not outside of us, but inside of us. How we do our work becomes a mirror of how we are inside.” Those with whom we live exemplify the vision of who we are.
Success in the family depends a great deal on selfless service and genuine example.

It is not enough to live together, eat together and work together. Positively responding to one another will enhance relationships plus improve morale and behavior. In this setting, family meals, meetings and trainings become more meaningful and chores feel more like charitable service.

—Julie Greenman

Classical Math Evokes Higher Learning

2009-07-29T11:55:00.004-06:00

For some, arithmetic has never been a favorite subject. However, most of us have enough understanding of it to get along in life. While it is true that many current educational systems use the modern methods of teaching and learning math, the focus is mainly on applied math. In the past, the study of math was not always limited to the application of the concepts, but was dedicated to the study of the math philosophy of the great mathematical minds such as Nicomachus, Euclid and others. There are a handful of schools and universities that are becoming successful in returning to the age-old way of learning—with the classics. This method of study seems to evoke an unquenchable desire for more knowledge. The following are considered to be two reasons why classical math may contribute to a greater desire for learning.

Many human beings, with or without realizing it, search for a higher power whether it is God or some other being. When educational studies recognize that higher being, it seems to strike a familiar chord within and creates a significant increase of learning. Classical math philosophy recognizes a supreme creator. Nicomachus of Gerasa (100 A.D.) explains in his two-volume book, An Introduction to Arithmetic, that the patterns in math are conceived “by divine nature, [and] not by [man’s] convention or agreement.” He further expounds that everything existing in nature that has a systematic method “seems both in part and as a whole to have been determined and ordered in accordance with number, by…him that created all things; for the pattern was fixed, like a preliminary sketch, by the domination of number preexistent in the mind of the world-creating God…so that with reference to it, as to an artistic plan, should be created all these things, time, motion, the heavens, the stars, all sorts of revolutions.” In essence he is reminding us that numbers have existed infinitely and eternally and are an integral part the knowledge of God, which is an inspiring prospect

Another aspect is man’s desire for truth. Truth is something that does not change over time, but stays the same uniformly and as Nicomachus says, “never departs even briefly from its existence.” Those that search for the truth and apply it are known to be full of wisdom. Pythagoras (580-490 BC) defined wisdom as the knowledge of the truth as it applies to the knowledge and comprehension of reality—and this he said is the only wisdom.

Plato describes the way to become wise in the mathematical realm when he says, “Every diagram, system of numbers, every scheme of harmony, and every law of the movement of the stars, ought to appear [as] one to him who studies rightly.” He then recommends his reader to study all things regarding them as one principle all bonded together in one great whole. Then he gives this warning to those seeking for an easier way of study, “if only one attempts philosophy in any other way he must call on Fortune to assist him. For there is never a path without these; this is the way, these the studies, be they hard or easy; by this course must one go, and not neglect it. The one who has attained all these things…I for my part call wisest, and this I maintain through thick and thin” As math is a difficult subject to comprehend for some and is often avoided, it is definitely enhanced with the classics. Classical math philosophy is a powerful supplement to applied math as it assists man in his search for truth.

It is not at a desk with a math workbook where one usually feels inspired. However, coupled with the text of one or two of the great mathematicians, one is certain to find insights into the magnificent mathematical world and have a clearer vision of how everything works as a whole. Education is meant to be inspiring and should serve as an avenue to acquire knowledge of God and man. The classic works combined with math concepts will achieve that goal.
—Julie Greenman

Nicomachus of Gerasa, Introduction to Arithmetic, Great Books of the Western World, Ed. R.M. Hutchins, (Chicago: ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA, INC., 1952)

A Lesson for Mothers from Moses and the Children of Israel

2009-07-26T14:06:00.002-06:00

Moses led the children of Israel from Egyptian bondage. His goal was to take them to the Promised Land. The length of trip undoubtedly exceeded his expectations since they wandered for 40 years. What took them so long? They would have arrived dozens of years before had it not been for their rebellion and disobedience to God. It was during this time that the Lord had to instigate a lesser law suitable for them to understand. The lesser law consisted of a set of laws for almost every action with a consequence for disobedience. It seemed that the Children of Israel could not be counted upon to make their own decisions and had to rely on the strong Mosaic Law to force them to comply.
Paul teaches in Galatians that the lesser law was instituted to help the Israelites proceed closer to the higher law—that of acceptance and faith in Christ. Parenting is similar to the way God dealt with the children of Israel: Just as the children of Israel lived under the lesser law, our children also live a lesser law. Our children live under many rules and consequences given by parents. Little by little they are taught and can understand the higher law and their own knowledge guides them—as this transformation takes place, they no longer need the lesser law or their parent’s constant guidance, they will begin to live the higher law and guide themselves.
Faith is eventually developed and becomes the guiding force for the individual to live the higher law. Paul teaches, “But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the [Mosaic] law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.” (Galatians 3:23-25) Our motherly task, therefore, should be to instill the powerful principle of faith into the hearts of our children.
In another part of the world we contemplate youth that are guided by faith. It was Helaman’s two thousand stripling warriors who “had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, God would deliver them.” Their faith was so great that they were freed from death in the great battles against the Lamanite people.
The vision that is created by studying the story of Moses and the Children of Israel is one of hope to modern mothers. The metaphor descriptively chronicles the different stages of youth and gives a perspective of what to work towards. By understanding Moses’ patience, long-suffering and constant guidance towards his people, a mother can learn to develop essential qualities needed to guide her children.
Rebels or not, all children need guidance from faithful mothers who are not concerned about the repetitive teaching and reminding. At times young mothers or mothers of teenagers lose hope and vision because their children fail to live up to their seemingly high expectations. They are expecting their children to live the higher law prematurely. Repetition and reminders are principles employed constantly in the story of Ancient Israel and eventually will lead a child to find the faith required to live the higher law. Meanwhile a mother should develop the essential qualities to live the higher law as an effective example in guiding her children.
The process of guiding a child to the higher law may seldom be a forty-year plan, but many agree that it is longer than expected. With a given set of rules and consequences coupled with a patient mother who knows the importance of quality teaching and gentle reminding, the youth of today will arrive at the promised destination of a faith-filled life.

—Julie Greenman

Books I have read…

2009-06-16T21:45:00.001-06:00

Books I have read…

2009-06-16T21:39:00.000-06:00

A Real Education

2009-06-02T22:04:00.000-06:00

My Response to The Choice

2009-05-29T22:15:00.000-06:00

Recently I went about my day practicing new principles from a book I read. I not only failed miserably, but now I know the source of all my problems-ME. That knowledge is hard to grasp, especially when I am resisting it. But why would I resist something that would bring me more

joy and happiness than I have yet experienced? Chances are that human nature wants me to believe I am faultless, flawless and can do no wrong. Then along comes a book that tells me plainly that I am the cause of all my unhappiness. Would not most resist under that condition? Alas, the act of resistance is the greatest inhibitor of change.

The Arbinger Institute and their team of authors have enlightened the world of psychology in their pocket-sized book, The Choice. Never before have I seen an age-old problem so clearly understood, defined and resolved. Their remedy to relational situations far exceeds the popular material that we read today about human behavior and relationships. Of course, comprehension and change seems easier on paper than is the reality of truly changing oneself. The intention of this paper is to explain the simple process of change as described by the Arbinger Institute.

Two Choices: Respond or Resist

A situation arises and we choose whether we are going to respond or resist. By seeing others as people, we can respond when they have a need and act in service toward them. By seeing others as objects, they become obstacles and problems in our way. We refuse to serve them and spend the rest of the time blaming, justifying and resenting. The pathway is dark and lonesome; it is the course to self-betrayal.

A very recent experience taught me that I am unaware of the choices I make until it is too late and I have made the choice to resist, heading down the path of self-betrayal. I wondered if I had this experience because some hand of Providence wanted me to see clearly how habitual I had become in resisting service. The choice of resistance is an unhealthy habit. When we choose to resist, we slide down the slippery slope of suffering and self-betrayal. As we are presented with situations to serve we can stop and think what will be our choice: to resist or to respond.

Serving Others

If I were to respond instead of resist I could effect a change in me. The only catch is that I need others in which to respond. It isn’t enough to make that change on my own. Clearly, other people are essential to my quest for change. The authors explain that “my responsiveness to others’ needs is my deepest sense of what is right” and by serving them I do right and feel happy. Change only takes place by forgetting myself in response to others. Jesus taught the same principle when He said, ”For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.” Change will come as we serve those around us.

The choice is undoubtedly my responsibility. Unlike in the first paragraph, it is not a question of resisting, but a question of choice. Will I choose to serve by responding to a need or will I choose to resist? My happiness and satisfaction hinge upon my responding to others’ needs. That knowledge is easier to grasp.

Summary of The Choice, by The Arbinger Institute

2009-05-28T21:46:00.003-06:00

The Choice, by the Arbinger Institute is a refreshing new approach to self-betterment. It puts the responsibility back onto the right person, ourselves. The authors attribute our responsiveness to others or our desire to serve others as the deepest sense of what is right. When we feel to assist another and follow through we are showing responsiveness. When we resist the feeling to help others, we betray ourselves and become resistant.

The book is founded upon our view of how we see people. When we are responsive, we see others as people and when we are resistant we see them as objects. Seeing others as people we are seeing them truly and thus we are true to ourselves. Perceiving others as objects we are resistant to their reality and see them falsely, consequently we are false.

Seeing others falsely, we resist them, thus we do wrong, then we seek to be justified, then we begin to see “a world that makes the wrong seem right.” The consequences are numerous when we are resistant. We find fault and place blame on others; self-betrayal magnifies others’ problems; seeing falsely we walk in darkness; and finally we become consumed with self.

The authors touch on some widely accepted behavioral views such as Psychodynamic Tradition, behaviorism, humanism, and cognitive theory teaching that they all have one thing in common: helping people to cope in a resistant, self-betrayal state. Their response to these popular views is that we must change to be responsive and that the only way to change from resistant to responsive is to forget ourselves in the service to others.

Standing Up For What Is Right and True

2009-05-21T10:11:00.008-06:00

I am convinced that only through selfless service will we be able to keep our nation free. We waste our time and energy when we focus on the deficiencies of our government and leaders by complaining, sending emails that degrade and humiliate, and spending numerous hours gossiping with friends. Complaining has never gotten us where we need to be nor will it ever further the cause of liberty in the future. It is an unmistakable misuse of our time.

We need to serve our families, community and nation. Service is the action word for love. I like to think of the compassionate bishop in Les Miserables who transforms the guilty and desperate Jean Valjean with a single service of love. His life is altered in such a way by that solitary act that he is compelled by some unseen power to give his life in service to the forlorn and neglected Cozette and others. Similarly, we can do as the bishop and be forgiving, kind, selfless in our ministrations and charitable. That alone has the power to change our nation.

Our decisions determine our liberty. We the people are not only the cause of our nation's problems, but WE ARE THE SOLUTION. "Will you join in our crusade, who will be strong and stand with me?", say the lyrics in the song from Les Mis called, Do You Hear The People Sing? I invite all of you to stand up for what is right by rolling up your sleeves and serving your spouse, your child, an elderly grandparent, a neighbor, a worthy community program etc. Together we can form a powerful band to spread peace and freedom.

Prince Richard

2009-05-03T23:21:00.005-06:00

The cousins got together in February with a great idea. To show their love and gratitude for her and the legacy she has begun, they set off to create a movie for Cathy Davis' birthday. All their lives they have been entreating Cathy to tell them the famous stories of Prince Richard. The story commenced at Lake Powell when Richard Marsh began splashing little Emily Greenman who then ran for cover in the arms of Cathy. In order to build her up and divert her attention, Cathy set in motion a series of stories that she called the Prince Richard Stories. They were told and retold as each new Tibbets' grandchild was born until the stories are as big as life.

Here is the movie they created:

The Joy Comes

2009-03-12T22:06:00.000-06:00

Sometimes Mothers feel inadequate to the task of homeschooling and I have not been one to escape that feeling. At times I wonder if my children will grow up to be responsible citizens, devoted followers of Jesus Christ and full of charity, intelligence, truth and light. It is in those times that Heavenly Father blesses me through other people who see and admire something in my children.

Today I attended the Parent/Teacher conference of my one daughter who is still in Public School. She is an eighth-grader. While walking down the hall towards her teachers we stopped to talk to the counselor, Mrs. Ramsey. She was full of emotion as she told me how much she loved our Elissa. She said that she had told her returned-missionary-son about Elissa and how wonderful she is (that someday she would make a tremendous wife) and that he should finish his bacchelors degree, go on to get a masters and by then she should be old enough to marry. Of course, that made my heart soar (not that we had made a match for her, but that she is growing to be that young person I was describing in the first paragraph).

During the conferences many of the people told how helpful and good she is, but one in particular, Bonnie Fronk, told me of her love for Elissa. Today I felt Elissa's goodness and knew that she was developing into a beautiful young lady.

Later while visiting with Emily and Andrew's Seminary teachers I was showered with more good comments about their characters. Andrew's said that he is always anxious to participate and Emily's said she is growing to be an outstanding young woman. I walked away from that building with joy in my heart.

In the evening, after the Online Georgics Class that Andrew and I are taking we got an email from one of the other participants (a mother) who wrote us this email. (Her name has been changed.)

On Mar 12, 2009, at 7:22 PM, Helen Hansen wrote:

Julie,

My name is Helen Hansen. I am a member of the Georgics class and I have been very impressed with Andrew. I have a 12 year old son and I was wondering if you could give me some pointers on what you as a mother did (I know there was something) that helped or inspired Andrew to become the marvelous young man that he is. I have only homeschooled for a little over a year but I am struggling with how to inspire my son. I also have a 12 year old daughter who has just taken off but because they are the same age it is difficult to watch him remain behind. It is also difficult because my daughter is very much like me in personality and learning styles and so it is easier for me to inspire her because I can relate. Anyway, Andrew has just been very impressive. I would like to ask him what motivated him to become what he is as well.

Thank you so much,
Helen Hansen

Here is my answer to her:

Helen,

You are very kind. We have only been homeschooling for a little over a year also. Andrew and I have just been discussing what inspired him and we came up with this list below. If there is any one of these that you would like me to expound upon, just let me know. We have Skype capabilities and could video conference if you would like.

1. Work, work and work. (whenever there was lazyness, defiance or contention, I had him and any other sibling do work) Inspiration only comes when we are working.

2. I would lay out some good reads and ask him if he had read any of them, if not, I would ask him if he would like me to summarize them and then let him choose one to read. Sometimes I even read the first few chapters to get him hooked (Carry On, Mr. Bowditch and The Lonesome Gods were some of them that I did this with)

3. Schedule, I made sure that we kept a schedule of math time, reading time and writing time (scheduling time, not content)

4. Andrew liked it when I would kidnap him and take him to a restaurant where we would have an interview and discussion of what I could do better and what he could do better.

5. Parent/youth interviews every Sunday

6. More work

7. Lots of prayer and pondering

8. After lots of prayer we kind of fell into a reading/study group with a few peers. They met each week and discussed an assigned book in a colloquium format. This was very motivating for him and a Godsend. After the study group and after the summer, our group became a Commonwealth School that offers the LEMI classes called Key of Liberty and Shakespeare. Also a Godsend. It is a once a week class with reading and writing assignments.

9. More prayer.

10. Helping to mentor David (Andrew's dad and my sweet husband) to see and understand the idea of homeschooling. Dave has just begun to see some good with this… and… as he has progressed in this understanding so has Andrew begun to be self-directed.

11. Also, and I am not sure how much of a difference this one makes, but we are adamant about having family meals together, family scripture study, family home evening, very limited computer and video time, no video games or hand-held devices and no TV ever (we don't have them-except for a TV for occasional videos).

I hope this helps a little. Andrew has come a long way in such a short time, but I would never had believed it could happen last January 2008 when we began. I truly think it has been a combination of the above. I am also known around my house as a perpetual repeater of teachings. We have frequent discussions of the phases in a Thomas Jefferson Education (Core, Love of Learning, Scholar and Depth) and I ask my children where they think they are on any given day. I also discuss things that I am reading (I am a distance student of George Wythe University) and inspire them with the ideas that are running through my mind at the time.

He has impressed me too, come to think of it. I just told him that it has been God who has molded him into what he is now and I have just been here to help facilitate it. Thank you so much for your compliments and have a nice night.

Julie

Thoughts regarding the Stimulus Bill from "The Cause of Liberty"

2009-03-03T15:08:00.003-07:00

Click on the title above to go to an interesting article for those who are seeking encouragement to write to your representatives.

Social Leadership

2009-02-27T22:34:00.003-07:00

Check this new pre-print publication on Social Leadership

Coming soon…

Doom and Gloom is an attitude of the Scarcity Mentality

2009-02-27T20:44:00.009-07:00

The below video shows a heart-stopping housing chart and I believe that some people are taking it as a doom and gloom message. I did not intend to post anything with that kind of message, but to show anyone reading my blog that the natural downward spiral is a normal and expected thing to happen especially after consumer debt has hit an all-time high since 1929 (it is even-steven with our Gross Domestic Product today just as it was the day the market crashed in the late 20's).

Do I think that people should try to pay their mortgage down as fast as they can in order to save their skin? No! Do I think that people should learn wisdom in crisis? Yes! Do I think that people should continue to save money regularly to bring down consumer debt? Yes! It is true that the value of our homes will continue to drop to its necessary place on the chart and yes, it is probable that it will dip well below the average just as it did during the 1930's depression and WWII. But we have good reason to believe that it will eventually come to its average place when we have recovered from our economic disaster. The former statement should not cause us to panic while declaring the fateful attitude of doom and gloom to all our loved ones and friends, but should teach us that runaway consumer spending always will come back to haunt us. Economic and political knowledge coupled with hope and cheerfulness can replace the negative and inspire an abundance mentality.

Folks, let us save a little more money each day; be a little more frugal; be hopeful and full of wisdom as we encourage others to do the same.

Learn how to say the pledge of Allegiance with feeling

2009-02-27T15:41:00.003-07:00

Heart-Stopping Housing Chart

2009-02-27T10:42:00.004-07:00

In this video of Glenn Beck's we can see that knowledge is power. I am amazed that when we understand economics and history we can comprehend what needs to be done in any given situation.

Freedom vs. Dependence?

2009-02-25T21:06:00.008-07:00

Dear Family and Friends, Last semester as I studied the Federalist papers I came across this quote that discusses the vigor of government (a healthy government) vs. zeal for the rights of the people.

It says in Federalist Paper No. 1, "it will be equally forgotten that the vigor [health] of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgment, their interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants."

I don't know why we have come to a point that we desire dependence upon the government to bail us out. I may be wrong, but it seems like the leaders are "paying an obsequious court to the people". I am not quite sure that the stimulus package is such a good idea. For instance, (supposing that I lived twice as long as Methuselah) if I were to spend $1,000,000 (one million dollars) per day since the day Christ was born I would have spent $733,285,000,000 (almost $54 billion dollars less than what the stimulus package is today). I still have not got over the previous stimulus packages of last year. I can't exactly put my finger on it, but they seem so wrong to me.

I was reading Marion G. Romney's article in the March 2009 Ensign today called "The Celestial Nature of Self-Reliance" wherein he teaches the danger of dependence on well-meaning welfare programs. Here is an excerpt that teaches the principle:

Gullible Gulls

I clipped the following article from the Reader’s Digest some time ago. It reads:

“In our friendly neighbor city of St. Augustine great flocks of sea gulls are starving amid plenty. Fishing is still good, but the gulls don’t know how to fish. For generations they have depended on the shrimp fleet to toss them scraps from the nets. Now the fleet has moved. …

“The shrimpers had created a Welfare State for the … sea gulls. The big birds never bothered to learn how to fish for themselves and they never taught their children to fish. Instead they led their little ones to the shrimp nets.

“Now the sea gulls, the fine free birds that almost symbolize liberty itself, are starving to death because they gave in to the ‘something for nothing’ lure! They sacrificed their independence for a handout.

“A lot of people are like that, too. They see nothing wrong in picking delectable scraps from the tax nets of the U.S. Government’s ‘shrimp fleet.’ But what will happen when the Government runs out of goods? What about our children of generations to come?

“Let’s not be gullible gulls. We … must preserve our talents of self-sufficiency, our genius for creating things for ourselves, our sense of thrift and our true love of independence.” Fable of the Gullible Gull, Reader's Digest, Oct. 1950, 32.

The practice of coveting and receiving unearned benefits has now become so fixed in our society that even men of wealth, possessing the means to produce more wealth, are expecting the government to guarantee them a profit. Elections often turn on what the candidates promise to do for voters from government funds. This practice, if universally accepted and implemented in any society, will make slaves of its citizens.

We cannot afford to become wards of the government, even if we have a legal right to do so. It requires too great a sacrifice of self-respect and political, temporal, and spiritual independence.

In some countries it is extremely difficult to separate earned from unearned benefits. However, the principle is the same in all countries: We should strive to become self-reliant and not depend on others for our existence.

Governments are not the only guilty parties. We fear many parents are making “gullible gulls” out of their children with their permissiveness and their doling out of family resources. In fact, the actions of parents in this area can be more devastating than any government program.

Bishops and other priesthood leaders can be guilty of making “gullible gulls” out of their ward members. Some members become financially or emotionally dependent on their bishops. A dole is a dole whatever its source. All of our Church and family actions should be directed toward making our children and members self-reliant. We can’t always control government programs, but we can control our own homes and congregations. If we will teach these principles and live them, we can do much to counter the negative effects which may exist in government programs in any country.

We know there are some who, for reasons beyond their control, cannot become self-reliant. President Henry D. Moyle had these people in mind when he said:

“This great principle does not deny to the needy nor to the poor the assistance they should have. The wholly incapacitated, the aged, the sickly are cared for with all tenderness, but every able-bodied person is enjoined to do his utmost for himself to avoid dependence, if his own efforts can make such a course possible; to look upon adversity as temporary; to combine his faith in his own ability with honest toil. …

“We believe [that] seldom [do circumstances arise in which] men of rigorous faith, genuine courage, and unfaltering determination, with the love of independence burning in their hearts, and pride in their own accomplishments, cannot surmount the obstacles that lie in their paths.”3

What does the Stimulus package mean for us? For the many generations to come? What can we do to help our economy without going into exorbitant and unreasonable debt? What are your suggestions?

There is great wisdom in studying the scriptures that teach us the pride cycle; there is wisdom in hearing the counsel from our prophets and apostles that tell us to stay out of debt; live frugally; serve and help the needy; build up our stores of food, clothing, and money; obey the commandments; fast and pray for our needs and those of our leaders and for our Barack Obama. There just might be some wisdom in studying the histories that grace our libraries. Wouldn't it be wonderful if these histories graced our minds more often…

Maybe the single most important thing we can do is to fix ourselves individually before we can fix our ailing nation. Confucius said it best when he wrote, "The ancients who wished to illustrate illustrious virtue throughout the kingdom, first ordered well their own states. Wishing to order well their states, they first regulated their families. Wishing to regulate their families, they first cultivated their persons. Wishing to cultivate their persons, they first rectified their hearts. Wishing to rectify their hearts, they first sought to be sincere in their thoughts. Wishing to be sincere in their thoughts, they first extended to the utmost their knowledge. Such extension of knowledge lay in the investigation of things. Things being investigated, knowledge became complete.

Their knowledge being complete, their thoughts were sincere. Their thoughts being sincere, their hearts were then rectified. Their hearts being rectified, their persons were cultivated. Their persons being cultivated, their families were regulated. Their families being regulated, their states were rightly governed. Their states being rightly governed, the whole kingdom was made tranquil and happy."

I have hope that each of us can make small and constant improvements in our lives and that as we do it will eventually spread throughout our nation and the world making the whole a pleasant and fairly peaceful place, eventually. Of coarse, that is the ideal…

2009-01-15T12:35:00.000-07:00

Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man

does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence. —Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein also said, "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity."

"Hello, Greenmans, this is Hannah…"

2009-01-15T12:14:00.000-07:00

Here is our little secretary, Hannah Banana. If you give us a call, she will surely answer and take your message.

2008-11-28T21:36:00.000-07:00

September 2008, shortly after Edie's Baptism.

What is Leadership? Ideas from reading Marcus Aurelius' Meditations

2008-11-28T17:22:00.000-07:00

While coming out of a recent backpacking trip in the Uinta Wilderness, my 15 year-old son, Andrew, discovered the art of leadership as he tried to convince his little 4 year old sister, Hannah, to keep walking the rough and rocky ten miles back to the car. He was excited to tell me of his discovery; “A leader is not someone who is just at the front of the line, but someone who can do what it takes to convince people to move along. A leader can even be at the back of the line if need be!”

Leadership is the art of influencing a group of people to reach a common goal. There are many groups that teach the art and skill of becoming a leader, but art and skill are not the only things we should study in order to lead. We should strengthen character and obtain moral courage to bring virtue into society. Leadership involves the very core of our character. Some of society’s greatest leaders have been ordinary men and women who continually sought improvement in their moral character. Among such Men and women were Gandhi, Mother Theresa, Corrie ten Boom, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson. In Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary a leader is “one who goes first.” The definition suggests that leadership is the art of showing the way, improving oneself first before trying to improve another.

In his book, Meditations, Marcus Aurelius reminds us of the good moral values that we must seek to obtain if we are to lead others. This blog-post will discuss three values and their application. They are self-mastery, love and truth.

Self Mastery

Self-mastery may be the hardest of the virtues because it requires us to recognize that we must change. That is a humbling position that demands remembrance of all our defects, imperfections and weaknesses. Human nature teaches us that we blame our shortcomings on our neighbor. Aurelius teaches that when we remove our judgment placed on another, we do not feel the hurt we once did.

When another wrongs me, what is that to me? Really it should not matter. They have their own disposition and their own actions. I also have my own disposition and my own actions. Self-mastery is a virtue that involves improving our moral character. No one can do that for us and we cannot do it for anyone else. An example comes to mind of my relationship with a friend. For the past several years I have looked mostly at her shortcomings. We humans think that criticizing others will somehow result in a change. But, what kind of change, surely it is a change for the worse. Her faults were things that I couldn’t control. If I were to gain self-mastery, I would only be able to control my own actions, not hers. During a recent visit, a tough situation arose and I again found fault. Things went awry, causing me to question if I really wanted to go down that path again. I knew that I should change my attitude and see the genius in her – see that she was a “potential Goddess” as C.S. Lewis would say. The shift was slow, but when I changed, I felt love for her and pity for her faults. The anger was gone. I had made a change in myself and stopped thinking that I could make a change in her.

With self-mastery the focus is on those things over which I have power. Many are the virtues that I have the power to exercise. So why ignore the virtues and desire only to be revered for the talents that I think people should notice? For instance, when I visit my childhood home I am not admired for my intellect, but I am admired for my hard work and organizational skills. Because of this I live up to the expectation and keep the house clean and picked up. Much of the time I allow it to bother me, and wonder why I should pick up after everyone. Begrudgingly, I begin to conquer the jumble, muddle and chaos. As always I receive praise for this and the cycle continues. I would like to be praised for my heart or be praised for my good example or for my knowledge, but why am I not? Perhaps, it is because I am so caught up in the trap of trying to please according to what they think of me, rather than focusing on the virtues that will help me master self.

Marcus Aurelius says the virtues that are, “wholly in [my] power – [are] integrity, dignity, hard work, self-denial, contentment, frugality, kindness, independence, simplicity, discretion, magnanimity.” In focusing on these virtues of which I have the power, I could then be and feel worthy of being useful in the world.

Love

Once we are on the path to mastering ourselves, we will want to develop a deep and influential love for mankind. Aurelius tells us to accept “and love these people among whom destiny has cast [us] – but [our] love must be genuine.” People will always be a part of our lives. Most of our greatest joys and trials come because of our dealings with other people. When dealing with difficult situations you say, ‘I will just ignore that person, or get revenge…that will teach them!’ This will only make matters worse. Aurelius warns us that, “The best revenge is not to be like your enemy”, but that we must genuinely love them even when it is difficult. I had a neighbor that loved to complain. She sought me out on a regular basis just to complain about her lot in life. When I realized her agenda I began to feel abused. Instead of showing love, I let anger and frustration build up and one day I blew up right in front of her. Several years later and much wiser than before, another opportunity arose. This time another friend loved to gossip. I recognized her agenda and made plans to practice genuine love towards her by listening to her heart. In validating her feelings, I wasn’t expressing that I agreed with her, but that I believed what she was feeling was difficult for her. I know that she could feel the genuine love coming from my heart because her response was usually a recognition that she ought to start accepting the persons she was gossiping about. When I showed genuine love, she sought change in herself.

Truth

Aurelius instills in us the motive of life: “Let one thing be your joy and comfort: to move on from social act to social act with your mind on God.” With our mind on God, assuredly we will find truth and the “Truth shall make us free.” (John 8:32) Is it any wonder why many of the great men and women had this thing in common? They were all lovers of Truth. With their mind on God they sought the truth in all things.

In seeking truth we may find ourselves back in our quest to self-mastery. Much of our truth seeking can literally bring us down to the depths of humility as we change what we once saw as truth to the real truth. On the other hand, if we have made a decision that we are going to master ourselves and continually improve, it will be inevitable that we will find truth. Marcus Aurelius gives us the perfect example of the kind of attitude we must employ in truth seeking, “if someone can prove me wrong and show me my mistake in any thought or action, I shall gladly change. I seek the truth, which never harmed anyone: the harm is to persist in one’s own self-deception and ignorance.”

A personal example of truth seeking happened a few weeks ago when after submitting a paper for my college class; it came back with many suggestions on improving it. I realized that I had not taken the time to really seek the truths that would make this paper most convincing. It was devoid of important principles needed to satisfy the subject. Because I desired a paper with substance, I set out to fill it with clear and true principles. It required much more work than I had imagined, but once finished it was transformational to me, full of significance and validity.

By seeking and developing these principles; self-mastery, love and truth we have the tools to be able to govern our impulses and actions. This act of governing our behavior will indeed strengthen character and bestow the moral courage necessary to lead others. Says Aurelius, “It is the gentle [leader] who [has] strength, sinew, and courage.” He also affirms that when it comes to leadership, the closer we are to the control of our emotions, the closer we are to power. Leadership is about first and foremost “becoming great”, and then “showing” the way.

Talk given at Grandpa Rex's Funeral on September 8, 2008

2008-09-15T10:49:00.000-06:00

Like all of you, I have accumulated many memories of Grandpa Rex and when I recall those memories, they make up a very useful and often enjoyable part of my consciousness. At the time of death, we "remember" those things that are dear to us. Today I want to speak of a more profound role of memory that of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Marlin K. Jensen said, "If we pay close attention to the uses of the word remember in the holy scriptures, we will recognize that remembering in the way God intends is a fundamental and saving principle of the gospel. This is so because prophetic admonitions to remember are frequently calls to action: to listen, to see, to do, to obey, and to repent. When we remember in God's way, we overcome our human tendency simply to gird for the battle of life and actually engage in the battle itself, doing all in our power to resist temptation and avoid sinning."

I would like to share one such "remembrance" with you today. One day as I was reading in the Book of Mormon about how Father Lehi gave blessings to his children and grandchildren I longed for such a blessing and called Grandpa Rex to ask him if he would bless me. A couple of months later I sat in his living room and learned as he taught about the Creation, the Fall, and the Atoning sacrifice of our Savior. Later during the blessing, I was taught further, when he blessed me to understand more fully the Creation, the Fall and the Atonement. He testified of their truthfulness and the important role they play in the Plan of Salvation.

Grandpa taught me more deeply about the Creation by testifying that the earth was not created from nothing; it was organized from existing matter and created by Christ under the direction of the Father. The Creation of the Earth was essential to God's plan. It provided a place where we could gain a physical body, be tested and tried, and develop divine attributes.

He expounded upon the science of the earth: the geology of the rock formations, the role of our beautiful plants that cover the earth, and the animals. He instilled in me a desire to use the earth's resources with wisdom, judgement and thanksgiving.

Adam was the first man created on earth. In the book of Genesis we understand that "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." (Gen. 1:27)

In the Garden of Eden, God commanded Adam and Eve not to partake of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil; the consequence of doing so would be spiritual and physical death. Spiritual death is separation from God. Physical death is the separation of the spirit from the mortal body.

Because Adam and Eve transgressed and partook of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they were cast out from the presence of the Lord—they experienced spiritual death. They also became mortal—subject to physical death. As descendants of Adam and Eve, we inherit a fallen condition during mortality, in which we are tested by the difficulties of life and the temptations of the adversary. Unfortunately, we do not always choose the right, and we know from the scriptures that "no unclean thing can enter into His Kingdom" (3 Nephi 27:19 and Ephesians 5:5)

King Benjamin teaches "For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father." Mosiah 3:19)

The Fall is an integral part of Heavenly Father's plan of salvation. It has a twofold direction—downward yet forward. In addition to introducing physical and spiritual death, it gave us the opportunity to be born on the earth and to learn and progress.

Once we understand the doctrine of the Fall, we can understand the Atonement. The prophet, Jacob of the Book of Mormon taught that we can repent of our sins and become saved and that the "way is prepared from the fall of man, and salvation is free."

Why is salvation free? Salvation is a gift after we have expended our best efforts. We are saved by grace, not by our own accomplishments. In his words, Jacob teaches, "Wherefore, redemption cometh in and through the Holy Messiah; for he is full of grace and truth…Wherefore, how great the importance to make these things known unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they may know that there is no flesh that can dwell in the presence of God, save it be through the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah, who layeth down his life according to the flesh, and taketh it again by the power of the Spirit, that he may bring to pass the resurrection of the dead, being the first that should rise." Jacob then exhorts his brethren to believe in Christ because those that "believe in Him shall be saved." (2 Nephi 2:6, 8-9)

In the book of Deuteronomy I counted over 35 times when the Lord promised abundant blessings upon the children of Israel if they would only love and obey the Lord. Moses exhorts, "And now Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him and to serve the Lord they God with all thy heart and with all they soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord, and his statutes." The same is asked of each of us today: that we love and obey him that we may partake of the blessings of the Atonement.

In studying Deuteronomy I have found a fulfillment in the sixth chapter, verse 7 where Moses charges Israel to "teach [the commandments] diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down and when thou risest up."

As I sat in Grandpa's living room, I knew he understood that scripture. How did he understand it? He was causing me to "remember" the precious Plan of Salvation. Coming unto Christ and being perfected in Him is the ultimate purpose of all remembering.

I testify of the truthfulness of the Plan of Salvation, of the Creation, the Fall and the divine Atonement of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I add my testimony to Moroni who invites us to "Come unto Christ, and be perfected in Him, and deny [our]selves of all ungodliness; and if [we] shall deny [our]selves of all ungodliness, and love God with all [our] might, mind and strength, then is His grace sufficient for [us], that by His grace [we] may be perfect in Christ." (Moroni 10:32) In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

2008-08-30T12:53:00.000-06:00

Edie playing over at Cousin Grace's house in the summer…

Temple Dedication

2008-08-25T00:10:00.000-06:00

What a privilege it was to sing in our new Twin Falls Temple dedication. Here is our choir just after singing in the second session.